
Ridiculon |

Hi, I have another question about the Water Manipulator Hydrokineticist ability.
Is Holy / Unholy water a valid target for this ability?
There is no listed minimum volume, can i take a flask of Un/Holy water and cause it to fill out the whole volume listed in the spell?
Prerequisite(s) kinetic cover
Saving Throw none; see text; Spell Resistance no
You can manipulate massive quantities of water. As a standard action, you can raise or lower the level of water as if using control water, or move an amount of water equal to 1/1,000th the amount controlled by that spell to a different location in range.
The water remains where you placed it for as long as you remain motionless and take a standard action each round to concentrate on this effect. This wild talent causes a slow effect on creatures made of water, just like control water (Will negates). When you cease concentrating, the water flows normally unless you accept 1 point of burn to extend the duration and hold the water in its current position for 10 minutes per kineticist level you possess.
Area water in a volume of 10 ft./level by 10 ft./level by 2 ft./level (S)
Duration 10 min./level (D)
Saving Throw none; see text; Spell Resistance no
DESCRIPTION
This spell has two different applications, both of which control water in different ways. The first version of this spell causes water in the area to swiftly evaporate or to sink into the ground below, lowering the water’s depth. The second version causes the water to surge and rise, increasing its overall depth and possibly flooding nearby areas.
Lower Water: This causes water or similar liquid to reduce its depth by as much as 2 feet per caster level (to a minimum depth of 1 inch). The water is lowered within a squarish depression whose sides are up to caster level x 10 feet long. In extremely large and deep bodies of water, such as a deep ocean, the spell creates a whirlpool that sweeps ships and similar craft downward, putting them at risk and rendering them unable to leave by normal movement for the duration of the spell. When cast on water elementals and other water-based creatures, this spell acts as a slow spell (Will negates). The spell has no effect on other creatures.
Raise Water: This causes water or similar liquid to rise in height, just as the lower water version causes it to lower. Boats raised in this way slide down the sides of the hump that the spell creates. If the area affected by the spell includes riverbanks, a beach, or other land nearby, the water can spill over onto dry land.
With either version of this spell, you may reduce one horizontal dimension by half and double the other horizontal dimension to change the overall area of effect.

2bz2p |

If I were ruling as GM, I would allow Water Manipulator to move the contents of a flask of holy water (certainly being less than 1/1000 of amount controlled) and use it in a splash like effect. But Control water doesn't change its volume. Raising Holy water in a flask might cause it to spill out (if unstopped) or just rise up in the bottle causing an air pocket to form at the bottom of the flask. Lower water would squeeze the water into the bottom inch of the flask. But you do not get any more or less holy water by use of either spell.
Only the last line of Control water would be in play to increase the area of effect, and then - its still the same amount of water.

Ridiculon |

The spell statesIf I were ruling as GM, I would allow Water Manipulator to move the contents of a flask of holy water (certainly being less than 1/1000 of amount controlled) and use it in a splash like effect. But Control water doesn't change its volume. Raising Holy water in a flask might cause it to spill out (if unstopped) or just rise up in the bottle causing an air pocket to form at the bottom of the flask. Lower water would squeeze the water into the bottom inch of the flask. But you do not get any more or less holy water by use of either spell.
Only the last line of Control water would be in play to increase the area of effect, and then - its still the same amount of water.
The second version causes the water to surge and rise, increasing its overall depth and possibly flooding nearby areas.
It isn't moving the water up, its literally creating more water (or more accurately expanding the extant water) to increase the overall depth.
It's a transmuation spell, works a lot like Enlarge Person as opposed to Levitate.
Knowing how the spell functions, would you allow Un/Holy Water to be affected if it was in the area?

Daw |

Ridiculous,
Manipulator is about manipulating Massive Quantities of water.
The Control spell clearly references large bodies of water, and the Raise Water portion At the beginning uses the word Surge. It presupposes large bodies of water, boats slide of the hump of water down to the surrounding water. Now, yes it did say you created the hump of water, but you are reading too much with that word. You can create a pit by digging a pit with a shovel.
Everything in both spell texts, taken as a whole, clearly describe Moving liquids around. Even the titles are Manipulate and Control.
It is a clever, deliberate misreading, so No, just No.

2bz2p |

Then it comes down to if you apply this to all liquids or only water. If these spells were used on beer, would the beer become thin and watery, as there is no more yeast, alcohol, hops etc. in the greater amount of beer than there was before, so should the effectiveness of the Holy water be similarly watered down? I've never cared for the notion that raise water actually creates more water.
For a liquid in a container - what happens? Does a water-skin burst from the sudden volume of water, or is the water's expansion limited to the space it can occupy? What about the blood you walk around with in that bag of skin of yours, can I control water and expand your blood until you burst?
The simplest approach is this: If it isn't a body of water (salt or saline free), the spell doesn't work. Holy Water is more like a potion or an alchemical mixture (like beer) and thus unaffected by anything that controls water. So, no - you can't lower the river of blood or increase the volume of holy water.
Personally, it the Holy Water was exposed, I would allow it to be manipulated into the air and moved with Water Manipulator. Control Water would do nothing to the Holy Water in a stopped flask (maybe make an air bubble if lowered - but even that's a stretch), can double the spread of tossed holy water, or could cause an open container of holy water, or a font, to overflow with watered down holy water that quickly becomes way more water than "holy" and is useless as holy water. We have always played that water expands to a maximum of the area it can occupy, but there really isn't MORE water - treat it like the molecules are bigger - but that is more house rule than RAW.
But I could see a quick and simple ruling of "doesn't have an effect on Holy Water" being the most elegant way to resolve the issue.

Ridiculon |

Ridiculous,
Manipulator is about manipulating Massive Quantities of water.
The Control spell clearly references large bodies of water, and the Raise Water portion At the beginning uses the word Surge. It presupposes large bodies of water, boats slide of the hump of water down to the surrounding water. Now, yes it did say you created the hump of water, but you are reading too much with that word. You can create a pit by digging a pit with a shovel.
Everything in both spell texts, taken as a whole, clearly describe Moving liquids around. Even the titles are Manipulate and Control.
It is a clever, deliberate misreading, so No, just No.
How is quoting directly from the description of the spell a misreading?
The second version causes the water to surge and rise, increasing its overall depth and possibly flooding nearby areas.
Please explain to me how you are supposed to "increase the overall depth" of a body of water without adding more water?

Ridiculon |

Then it comes down to if you apply this to all liquids or only water. If these spells were used on beer, would the beer become thin and watery, as there is no more yeast, alcohol, hops etc. in the greater amount of beer than there was before, so should the effectiveness of the Holy water be similarly watered down? I've never cared for the notion that raise water actually creates more water.
For a liquid in a container - what happens? Does a water-skin burst from the sudden volume of water, or is the water's expansion limited to the space it can occupy? What about the blood you walk around with in that bag of skin of yours, can I control water and expand your blood until you burst?
The simplest approach is this: If it isn't a body of water (salt or saline free), the spell doesn't work. Holy Water is more like a potion or an alchemical mixture (like beer) and thus unaffected by anything that controls water. So, no - you can't lower the river of blood or increase the volume of holy water.
Personally, it the Holy Water was exposed, I would allow it to be manipulated into the air and moved with Water Manipulator. Control Water would do nothing to the Holy Water in a stopped flask (maybe make an air bubble if lowered - but even that's a stretch), can double the spread of tossed holy water, or could cause an open container of holy water, or a font, to overflow with watered down holy water that quickly becomes way more water than "holy" and is useless as holy water. We have always played that water expands to a maximum of the area it can occupy, but there really isn't MORE water - treat it like the molecules are bigger - but that is more house rule than RAW.
But I could see a quick and simple ruling of "doesn't have an effect on Holy Water" being the most elegant way to resolve the issue.
This makes sense, i went back and found the way Holy Water is made, it involves adding silver (shavings i assume) which i suppose would get thinned out right along with yeast or whatever from your beer example (which was actually something i had asked about in another thread about including a tavern in the are of effect).

Jeraa |

This makes sense, i went back and found the way Holy Water is made, it involves adding silver (shavings i assume) which i suppose would get thinned out right along with yeast or whatever...
Just as a note, material components are completely destroyed during casting. There is no silver in holy water.

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Hi, I have another question about the Water Manipulator Hydrokineticist ability.
Is Holy / Unholy water a valid target for this ability?
There is no listed minimum volume, can i take a flask of Un/Holy water and cause it to fill out the whole volume listed in the spell?
** spoiler omitted **** spoiler omitted **...
Control water is an odd spell because it doesn't specificy why the water is being "raised" or "lowered". It doesn't clarify if the spell is generating/removing the water to make the body of water raise or lower.
Regarding holy water, yes, it is definitely considered water.
Whether it creates more holy water, or just speads and raises the existing holy water is up to the GM, since neither ability says.
Regarding damaging other creatures, it doesn't grant any ability to actually make an attack roll with the water. You might be able to slowly move puddles of holy water around a dungeon, but it's not something fast enough for it be an attack.
I will note that that holy water functions as acid when it contacts the undead. I believe this means it is consumed when they contact.

Daw |

Ridiculon,
First, I apologize for not catching the autocorrect on your name.
On the misreading aspect, when you cherry-pick out one sentence of a description out of the full text, which, when taken out of the full context, appears to support a different interpretation, that would be misreading the text. Given how actually clearly the full text reads, I would say that the interpretation you are going for isn't supported.
Now, back in the Arduin days, there was an unpublished first level version of Fog Call, that created a mist cloud but required a liquid source. We abused it horribly. You would need gallons, not flasks, but something like that would reasonably work for what you are doing. Now, the clever idea to use a barrel of White Lightning to create an intoxicating cloud would have worked, except we failed to take the torches into account.....
To create a temporary flood of holy water, should be doable with a researched spell. It is an awfully effective idea, I just don't see it working with Manipulate Liquids.

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Were I the GM, I'd have the holy water take up a larger volume but become more diluted. As if you were adding normal water to the holy water when you were raising its level.
Holy water is not normal water, in the same way that potions are not normal water. You couldn't use raise water to "crate" extra potions, and you can't use control water to create extra holy water.
@Daw, I'd be up for a specialized spell that massively increased the volume of holy water, but noting the material component would end up being Costly (should still work out at 25gp per "Flask" unless the holy water was only holy for a few short amount of time).

Ridiculon |

Ridiculon,
First, I apologize for not catching the autocorrect on your name.
On the misreading aspect, when you cherry-pick out one sentence of a description out of the full text, which, when taken out of the full context, appears to support a different interpretation, that would be misreading the text. Given how actually clearly the full text reads, I would say that the interpretation you are going for isn't supported.
Now, back in the Arduin days, there was an unpublished first level version of Fog Call, that created a mist cloud but required a liquid source. We abused it horribly. You would need gallons, not flasks, but something like that would reasonably work for what you are doing. Now, the clever idea to use a barrel of White Lightning to create an intoxicating cloud would have worked, except we failed to take the torches into account.....
To create a temporary flood of holy water, should be doable with a researched spell. It is an awfully effective idea, I just don't see it working with Manipulate Liquids.
Well lets look at the spell in detail:
This spell has two different applications, both of which control water in different ways.
So far so good, a nice little intro saying that we will be controling water.
The first version of this spell causes water in the area to swiftly evaporate or to sink into the ground below, lowering the water’s depth.
Ok, right off the bat we see that the method by which the first application of the spell controls water is by manipulating the depth.
The second version causes the water to surge and rise, increasing its overall depth and possibly flooding nearby areas.
And again we see that depth will be the aspect of the water we are manipulating or controlling.
Lower Water: This causes water or similar liquid to reduce its depth by as much as 2 feet per caster level (to a minimum depth of 1 inch).
Alright, here are the mechanics by which we will lower the depth of the water.
The water is lowered within a squarish depression whose sides are up to caster level x 10 feet long.
here is the area in which the depth of the water will be lowered.
In extremely large and deep bodies of water, such as a deep ocean, the spell creates a whirlpool that sweeps ships and similar craft downward, putting them at risk and rendering them unable to leave by normal movement for the duration of the spell. When cast on water elementals and other water-based creatures, this spell acts as a slow spell (Will negates). The spell has no effect on other creatures.
Here are some bonus effects that occur when the spell is used in specific situations, super nice since a lot of seemingly flexible spells don't have this much extra detail.
Now on to the piece in question:
Raise Water: This causes water or similar liquid to rise in height, just as the lower water version causes it to lower.
I can definitely see how you could come to the conclusion that all this use of the spell does is raise the height of the water in the area of effect. It would be really easy to do if you skim over or ignore the second half of the sentence where it specifically says that this half of the spell manipulates or controls water in the same manner as the first half of the spell. Since we know that the first half of the spell lowers the depth of the water in the area we can safely re-word this sentence (for clarity) like this: "You cause water or similar liquid to raise in height by increasing it's depth instead of lowering it". This sounds a little silly since "depth" and "height" are descriptors for the same thing, but it is easier to see when you say it like this.
Now i will admit that my assumption of there being no minimum depth listed for this part of the spell is incorrect, since this is supposed to work "just as the lower water version" of the spell. That would peg the minimum depth of liquid target-able to 1 inch. There is no mention of a minimum area however, so I would still make the argument that as long as you have at least 1 inch of water in a container it is a valid target.
Boats raised in this way slide down the sides of the hump that the spell creates. If the area affected by the spell includes riverbanks, a beach, or other land nearby, the water can spill over onto dry land.
More bonus effects for specific situations, again very helpful and convenient that they had enough space in whichever book this was published in to give us this much detail.
I'm not trying to be rude, just spelling out where i'm getting my interpretation of the effects of this spell.

Ridiculon |

Quote:This makes sense, i went back and found the way Holy Water is made, it involves adding silver (shavings i assume) which i suppose would get thinned out right along with yeast or whatever...Just as a note, material components are completely destroyed during casting. There is no silver in holy water.
Ah interesting, in that case i would argue that the Un/Holy Water would not be diluted at all if you allow it to be a target in the first place.
This is assuming that the Un/Holy Water is literally the only water-like-enough liquid within the entire area of the spell of course. If there were other sources of water that are larger volume than your flask of Un/Holy Water i'd say dilution would be a definite factor.

Daw |

Yes, and thanks for including the full text, so I can paste easier :)
The first version of this spell causes water in the area to swiftly evaporate or to sink into the ground below, lowering the water’s depth.
Ok, right off the bat we see that the method by which the first application of the spell controls water is by manipulating the depth.
Actually, it says that what it does is manipulating the water, causing it to evaporate or sink into the ground, the effect of this is a lowering of the water's depth. It does not in any way suggest water is being destroyed.
You know, this is pointless. You don't care and I have just stopped caring, be well.

Ridiculon |

Yes, and thanks for including the full text, so I can paste easier :)
The first version of this spell causes water in the area to swiftly evaporate or to sink into the ground below, lowering the water’s depth.
Ridiculon wrote:Ok, right off the bat we see that the method by which the first application of the spell controls water is by manipulating the depth.Actually, it says that what it does is manipulating the water, causing it to evaporate or sink into the ground, the effect of this is a lowering of the water's depth. It does not in any way suggest water is being destroyed.
You know, this is pointless. You don't care and I have just stopped caring, be well.
I do care actually, its why i took the time to make a post about this issue and respond to you. Also i never said the water was being destroyed.
If we reverse this to apply it to the raise part of the spell we see that water is still being added, only now instead of expanding it or summoning it you are getting it from the ground or the air. This is another argument for the Un/Holy Water being too diluted to be an issue for any devils or angels in the area of the spell, and its pretty compelling. I kinda wish you'd just made this argument from the beginning instead of just saying "your interpretation is wrong, read the spell".