Talk:Megaton (3.5e Epic Spell)

Ratings

Planterobloon is neutral on this article and rated it 2 of 4.

This spell is very good as a plot device, like Eiji intended. Having only 100 days to stop an empire from launching a nuke is an exciting plotline. However, if you don't read the talk page, it looks like people are actually meant to cast the spell, which makes it look horrible. Also, a longer range to stop all 555 casters from being in ground zero should be a standard feature, not something you have to add on yourself.

To be fair, by the time you can cast this, you and your buddies have got stuff like plane shift and greater teleport to get the f*ck out of dodge with. Still doesn't help the real problem, which is how easily the whole thing can be ruined by intruders. --Luigifan18 (talk) 01:51, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Math

I hate math. Anyway, this should be fairly accurate actually to a 1 MT explosion. Some liberties were had of course (translating radiation damage and sickness to negative levels and disease, playing fast and loose with the weather effect, etc). If you're curious, it was designed with a 24th level caster in mind with epic leadership and a score that allowed all his spellcaster followers and cohort to praticipate. This is more of a DM Plot McGuffian spell, but I will be making a more combat-friendly spell soon. -- Eiji Hyrule 07:40, April 4, 2010 (UTC)

Question

Can't you technically do something like forcecage the 'bomb' before it explodes and be safe? --Sulacu 07:41, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

How clever. By straight RAW, yes, you COULD. I didn't use the Destroy Seed. On the other hand, I did use the transform seed to effectively duplicate disintrgrate's effect in the close range area (you are dusted, as disintergrate), so the forcecage would probably be disintergrated as well.

A prismatic sphere, however.... -- Eiji Hyrule 08:24, May 11, 2010 (UTC)

Questions:

1: Why does this spell need so many casters?

2: How the heck is one supposed to find that high a number of magic adepts that would all agree to participate in a 100-day ritual?

3: How are you supposed to convince them to participate in a ritual that will kill you, them, and everything else in the spell's range with little reward?

4: Is the spell ruined if interrupted?

5: If so, what's to stop local authorities/random adventurers from interrupting this spell? CobaltTheMadMage (talk) 02:46, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

You've hit upon the precise reasons why I believe this spell sucks. Hard. (I love Tactical Nuke, funnily enough.) --Luigifan18 (talk) 03:16, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

This is pretty much the end result of a thought experiment to see if I could duplicate the roughly real-world effects of a 1 MG nuke in D&D. How it's actually applied in game is up to you. Tactical Nuke was made as a functional version of Megaton, since this degree of power is so over-the-top as to be pointless in any game context.

With that said, if I extend the range NI and throw in enough casters to compensate, the most likely purpose is having a nation have a series of casters ready at all times keeping a Megaton prepped, so it could be cast when needed. Behold, Cold War in D&D. Who will press the red button by ordering their casters-on-hand to make the final incantations? -- Eiji-kun (talk) 03:49, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, increasing the range would make this spell have some almost imperceptible fringe use. Since you made it take not one, but two epic-level spellcasters, it still wouldn't be very useful. --Foxwarrior (talk) 04:32, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

why do all nukes across dnd seem to top out at about 20 dice of damage?

I understand that this thread is probably long dead, but as a nuke enthusiast i have to give my two cents and personally i find it weird that every representation of a nuke i've seen in 3.x tops out at about 20 dice of damage, which is barely enought to bring down a half decent castle, let alone level a city. i mean seriously, 20 dice is the quivalent of a 7-8th level spell, not even 9th and certainly not epic. 

I understand that the size of the explosion causes the damage to be a little on the low side, but still, any mid-level character worth his salt will survive the hundred or so damage. that means that unless they happen to have a few save raising tools, about 5 percent of people (because if you're using a nuke against anything other than an army of at least mid level adventurers, you're better off sicking a dragon on them) are going to be alive. hurt, but alive and very angry at the person who nuked them.

and thats assuming your aiming at a humanoid population center and not something like the tarrasque or godzilla or some great wyrm dragon (which is probably what the nukes would be used for anyway)