Destroying Spellbooks in Huge Explosion...

[maouse]

General question 31 days from D-Day in Cheliax in my campaign:

If a group of adventurer rogues stole most (not all, as that is pretty impossible, but they got a good number of them) of the spellbooks in Cheliax from mages there, and decided that the Fall Bloodsport festival at the Arena was a good place to make a show of destroying all of them (via improved invisibility, a bag of holding, and a bunch of delayed blast fireballs) - what would the damage be from say 340 spellbooks exploding in the arena. Thoughts? Calculations?

I am considering opening up another worldwound, or perhaps a portal straight to a Hell... but don't know if it would be a big enough event for that. Thoughts?

Are there any actual rules on what happens when a magic item (spellbook in particular) is destroyed via violent means? (Fails its save and takes damage? Crumbles? Explodes?)

[Johnico]

The only damage caused by blowing up 340 spellbooks with Delayed Blast Fireballs is whatever damage the Delayed Blast Fireballs themselves would do. A standard spellbook is not magical on its own, so all blowing it up would result in is a destroyed spellbook.

Even if they were, say, all Blessed Books instead of the standard spellbook, still the only result would be that the books are now ash and the Delayed Blast Fireballs do what they do.

[seebs]

For reference, I believe this is a complete list of all the items which blow up when destroyed:

staff of the magi
staff of power
necklace of fireballs that failed its save against fire damage

And the two staves only blow up if you do it on purpose.

[maouse]

Ty guys... I think it is more of a theatrical appearance of a bunch of delayed blast fireballs going off than anything. I think the whole "exploding spellbook" was an old AD&D holdover house rule from the 1990s... The Rogue troupe doing this stunt really don't know they won't explode, and have actually questioned if they want to do it because they don't want to harm innocent people in the stands. One would think they would know it - arcane knowledge roll... So I guess I have to inform them.

After reading a bit, the broken/destroyed all says the magic simply "is gone" or "dissipates." Nowhere does it say it explodes (except, as seebs pointed out, you do a retributive strike with those staves).

in any event: 13th level, x4(rounds) x3(casters) = 156d6 boom. One round of talking before they go off...

I guess part of my question might be if they get their "protections" per the Ultimate Magic if they are attacked in some fashion, or only if opened. Example: Does a "Guardian Grimoire (Level 15 Abjurer)" let out its "Explosive runes (Reflex DC 16) and fire trap (Reflex DC 17)" when attacked? Seems it might be fair to say "yeh, that might happen."

Also, slightly separate question: can you use "Empower Spell" to increase the variable 5 rounds on a Delayed Blast Fireball to 7 rounds? Just curious.

[seebs]

I don't think those would trigger from being attacked. The requirements for activating an explosive runes or fire trap are pretty straightforward, and "destroy the thing the spell is on so it won't activate" is a legitimate disarming tactic.

I would not consider the rounds of a delayed blast fireball to be the "variable" effect. They basically mean "the ones you roll dice for".

[maouse]

seebs wrote:

I would not consider the rounds of a delayed blast fireball to be the "variable" effect. They basically mean "the ones you roll dice for".

It does state variable at first, which would include the 1-5 rounds. But it does state random later on. The question, I guess, is if these are two separate things or supposed to be the same thing with different wording in different parts. Reasonable to presume either, I think. RAI I think you are right.

[seebs]

Range is also "variable", in the broader sense.

[Ascalaphus]

Spellbooks themselves aren't actually magical. However, it's not unheard of for them to contain Explose Runes. Those only explode if someone reads them however.