(dnd 5e) Prove me wrong, RAW
(dnd 5e) Prove me wrong, RAW
Disclaimer: this is purposefully obtuse.
Other effects in the game which explicitly state they kill you:
Shadows, succubi, massive damage, death saving throws, beholder death ray (notably not even their disintegration ray kills you), power word kill, vampires, mind flayers, night hags, drow inquisitors.
Clearly, if they intended for disintegration to kill you, they'd have said so. Since specific overrides general, and there is no general rule that disintegrated creatures are dead, I rest my case. QED.
OP you appear to be committed to (not) dying on this hill and I applaud you
I like it RAW and wriggling!
What's sneezing precious
Ain't nothin' in the RAW that states a sentient pile of dust can't play basketball.
All new straight-to-DVD film, "Air coughing fit"
Dustbud ®
A disintegrated creature and everything it is wearing and carrying, except magic items, are reduced to a pile of fine gray dust. The creature can be restored to life only by means of a true resurrection or a wish spell.
Why would you need to be "restored to life" if you weren't dead?
Because you could later die. So a creature that has been disintegrated, and then later dies, can only be brought back by those means.
If this was the intent of the rules, it would be expressed in explicit, unambiguous language. They don't write contingency rules for possible future events that haven't happened this way, and if you interpret rules documents this way, then everything becomes an argument.
The implication of "the creature can only be restored to life by (x)..." is present tense. It applies to the current state of the game following the events described. The language "unattended objects catch fire" in fireball doesn't mean "unattended objects in the area of a fireball will catch fire if someone sets fire to them." it means they catch fire.
Language in rules doesn't ambiguously cater to a potential future state of the game that may not occur. It is describing the current state of the game, like the rules do in all other situations.
Undeath?
The difficulty of restoring to life someone who is already alive is why such high-level magic is required.
o7
My sister played a campaign as a sentient ham sandwich. She would love this.
Edit:
Lmao 🤣
Haha awesome, glad she enjoyed it!
I've never played DND so I don't know if this is something you could pull off or anything but I'd probably be like
"I snort the fine pile of dust" and then, I don't know, there's some latent personality or intention there, so now we have to alternate playing my character between turns/minutes or something. It'd probably make for some great RP moments, especially if each personality couldn't remember very well what the other was doing previously. Maybe the class and abilities change with each person, which makes arming up appropriately interesting or a pain depending on how we handle it I suppose.
That would definitely fit right in at our table. Half the group is trying to break the game with their build, and the other half is trying to one-up the first half.
I'd say ingesting the powder either kills it (had the players managed to get me to agree it was alive) or sends it on a tour of your digestive tract
I see no flaw in this argument. Instead of dying, the character exists like the guy from “One” by Metallica, desperately waiting for a stiff breeze to end his existence.
The spell specifies you turn into gray dust. Unfortunately gray dust has no listed stat block.
Luckily it is mentioned in "Tales from the Yawning Portal", "The floor of this room is covered with a layer of fine gray dust and ash, three inches deep."
Based on the rest of the description you are restricted to the room in which you turned to dust and the only action you may take is casting " Minor Illusion", with the added restriction of all illusions must be humanoid.
Nothing about the Disintegration spell says that your stats change. Compare to spells that do, such as Polymorph, or True Polymorph which even covers changing a creature into an object.
I'm not changing your stats, you still have a 14 wisdom.
You are however definitely turned into gray dust and I'm applying the rules as written about gray dust. The gray dust is restricted to the current room and can only form the shapes of various humanoids.
That's probably the path I'd take as a DM if I had a player insisting on rules lawyering like OP. OK, you get to "play" as a pile of dust. Have fun sitting there until random wind currents blow you around.
*ahem Subtle Spell has entered the chat. Cast any spell that doesn't require a line of sight target and that doesn't require material components or otherwise rely on an "attack" or similar action. Like say Guardian Of Nature. Or, if you want to get REALLY pedantic: Dimension Door.
if you get cast in cement and become at least 6 inches of stone your DR goes up to fucking 50 or something
Disintegrate also specifies the creature can only be brought back to life with a true resurrection or wish spell. Which most certainly means it is indeed dead, otherwise, why mention bringing it back to life?
You're not dead when you're petrified, either, which can lead to some pretty interesting exploits, rules-as-written.
Petrified creatures count as creatures, not objects, so rules-as-written you can determine if a statue is a petrified creature by trying to target it with a spell that requires a creature for a target.
With the cantrip Poison Spray, you can check for petrified creatures without using spell slots or risking damaging the creature, since it would be immune to poison while petrified.
I hate DMing for players smarter than me 🤬🤗
You can also safely check with Vicious mockery. The spell can target any creature, but only damages the target if it can hear, which "inanimate" things cannot.
On the other hand, Dissonant Whispers causes the target to hear (rather than hearing being a precondition as it is with Vicious Mockery) and with this you can kill petrified creatures, thus ensuring no spell casters return them to flesh-and-blood, without damaging the statue.
If you want to go absolutely strict RAW with the creature/object distinction, resurrection spells don't technically work. They target "a creature that died", which, by an obnoxiously precise reading of the rules, can't exist. After they die, they're an object and not a valid target.
I don't understand why they can't just make "dead" a state a creature can be in.
that's a lich that travels with his phylactery
I like it!
Get the feeling it would be difficult to have a dust based strength character though. Hard to hold weapons/make attacks with them as dust.
Maybe wizard?
Two-handed weapons require two hands, and one-handed weapons require a free hand to load. But you could use a one-handed weapon that you don't have to load. Or rather, you don't even need to do that, since no weapons are listed as being one-handed.
Still needs an arcane focus and the spell components could be problematic. Monk maybe? (A dextrous pile of dust gently (yet masterfully!) being blown at enemies)
Just have someone carry you around in their pockets, then throw you in the enemies eyes to temporarily blind them.
Blind possibly but would you get weaker the more dust lost?
I mean, from your characters perspective, death is preferable to being transmuted to dust, especially in a setting with a well established afterlife.
You can be literally obliterated by a sneeze. And you're so dusty, folks would need to make a Con check for allergies.
"I cast Vacuum Cleaner."
*"Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?"
Jesus, get the quote right.
That's not even in the scene.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX-m7UsCp3I
Here's what Walter actually says:
How are you doing?
...mumbling...
How are you doing?
You did the only thing that you could, I hope you understand that.
Any thoughts on what our next move might be?
Our next move. Our next move. Given the fact that at the first opportunity, Gus will kill us.
No, no, we bought ourselves some time, yes, but... The question is how much. He will be looking for another chemist.
Are you sure you're...
What do you mean?
What page is that?
Probably should go join the Thousand
SunsSons. They might set you up with some nice power armor.Thousand Sons*
Also, pretty sure that it comes with a permanent controlling enchantment subjugating them to the next Sorcerer
If the speck of dust is sentient, then it's not really a rubricae. The suits of armor do nothing when not controlled
Well, that's a small problem compared to being a pile of dust without power armor.
AI GM be like: "Yep. Seems legit."
This is the real meaning of the exception that proves the rule.
Why would it matter if it says you die? It's not like there's a rule that dead characters can't take actions. Or that they transform into objects. Or get sent to another plane of existence depending on who they worship and their alignment while leaving an object behind.
Because if it doesn't say I'm dead, I'm not dead. QED.
I would argue that by this logic, your ability scores also fall to 0, killing you
Nothing in the spell says your ability scores change.
Nothing in the spell says they don't. By contrast, Wild Shape
Your game statistics are replaced by the statistics of the beast, but you retain your alignment, personality, and Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores.
Also, a pile of dust doesn't have a stat block because it's an object. It's not even sentient. But if you really really want to play as a lifeless pile of dust, knock yourself out.
I'd like to imagine that this is how non-necromantic sapient undead creatures are created, someone has all their flesh incinerated away but somehow their soul clings to the bones, and bam sapient skeleton.
In this case it could result in a poltergeist, which uses the dust to interact with things.
Well memed, but it's no fun to try to argue with someone who will take everything in bad faith, even as a joke.
I disagree, I think it's funny as long as this is all theory.
If a player was actually serious about wanting to do this as more than a meme, and was arguing this hard for it I'd be mad as hell. In this context, though? It's fine. I think it's amusing how hard people can stretch the rules. It's similar to the peasant railgun. Hilarious concept. I'm still not okay with someone trying to actually use a peasant railgun.
In theory, sure. But not with OP saying "Nah-uh" to everything. There's just no fun to be had.
And I really enjoy arguing about game mechanics, just look back at me talking about that insect swarm/animal shapes nonsense people who know nothing about the game came up with.
I'd say I'd agree but there is no stretching here, you'd have to rule that a creature that is missing every part of its body is alive. You'd also have to rule that a pile of dust has a maximum HP of more than 0, or else you'd also be dead instantly.
You'd never get a death save, your already dead.
RAW, a pile of dust is not a playable character option. Sorry.
RAW, you also cannot play as a dragon fairy princess. That would be homebrew.
You REALLY want to play a pile of dust...? Well, okay, we can homebrew that for you.
Pfft, you could play a dragon fairy princess in 3e. Probably at something like a +10 level adjustment.
The good old days.
I’m just going to swing for the fences with the always objectionable, “fiction trumps rules.”
I go with fun trumps rules
This reminds me of Torchwood
It doesn't kill you, it turns you into an inanimate object.
Edit: And objects aren't creatures.
Spells do what they say they do, and disintegrate doesn't change you into an object. Compare to True Polymorph, a higher level spell, which can creatures into objects.
I agree that "spells do what they say" but a pile of dust is definitely an object, not a creature. That said, I'm willing to concede that it doesn't turn you into a object because it says one of the only ways to be restored to life is through True Resurrection which targets creatures. (And I don't feel like being so obtuse as to argue that the specific rule of Disintegrate saying True Resurrection allows the dust to return to life means it overrides the general rule of True Resurrection targeting creatures lol.)
Fine dust does not have the consistency of chunky salsa, so it checks out.
The rules also don't state that being incapacitated impairs movement in any way, dropping to 0hp is stated to incapacitate you. So you can just move away at 0hp.
Obviously we have DMs who aren't robots and will play to the spirit of the game, not the word of the rules.
The rules state that you either die or fall unconscious when you have 0 hit points. The definition of "unconscious" in Appendix A specifies that you are incapacitated AND can't move or speak AND are unaware of your surroundings.
EDIT: Maybe I shouldn't assume you're talking about 5e. I have no idea about 5.5e or any other edition
Yes but in D&D you only quote the rules that support whatever bullshit you're trying to pull.
No, dropping to 0 hit points makes you unconscious, not incapacitated. That's an important distinction. It's the unconscious part that impairs your movement.
Do they need to define dictionary words? You are incapacitated, you don't have capacity to do that.
The lack of qualification indicates you are completely incapacitated and have no capacity to do or say anything.