Myrddin111 |
In our game, an enemy cast Grease in a 10x10 area. But two of those squares in that area are stairs that lead down and are therefore below the level of the floor where the Grease was cast. What happens in those two squares? Does the grease hover in mid-air, or fall down onto the stairs, or not happen because there's no "surface" there? Surprisingly I can't find any ruling on this!
Thanks!
Mudfoot |
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Just assume the grease is cast at an angle and covers those steps. The spell says that the grease covers a solid surface, rather than appearing in midair and raining down on things.
The problem might come that you don't have LOS to the lower steps and so can't affect them; it depends on the slope of the steps and how tall and far away you are.
Azothath |
In our game, an enemy cast Grease in a 10x10 area. But two of those squares in that area are stairs that lead down and are therefore below the level of the floor where the Grease was cast. What happens in those two squares? Does the grease hover in mid-air, or fall down onto the stairs, or not happen because there's no "surface" there? Surprisingly I can't find any ruling on this!
Thanks!
you fall into a GM's area
The game model is very much a 2D system.Generally the grease will cover the top of the stairs, exactly like a template laid over a map, especially if it lies within half of 5 ft (which is the defined unit of an area - a 5ft square. Does it have to line up with the floor? How much displacement before the intellectual grid actually moves?). Often you only need LoE/LoS to a corner of said square.
Stair steps are commonly 10-11" high by 24-48" width by 11-12" depth.
Myrddin111 |
Just assume the grease is cast at an angle and covers those steps. The spell says that the grease covers a solid surface, rather than appearing in midair and raining down on things.
The problem might come that you don't have LOS to the lower steps and so can't affect them; it depends on the slope of the steps and how tall and far away you are.
In this case, the caster did not have LOS to the stairs. FYI, the GM ruled that the stairs were not the same surface as the floor, so the stairs were not affected.
Hugo Rune |
Without seeing a map it is impossible to adjudicate but this is probably a technically correct decision by strict RAW that is nevertheless incorrect because of rule 0.
The character could see the stairs and their direction and the players would have had a lot more fun had the spell succeeded. As it is, guessing by the fact this message was posted; the GM's decision created a lot of discord, argument and bad feeling around the table.
TxSam88 |
Myrddin111 wrote:In our game, an enemy cast Grease in a 10x10 area. But two of those squares in that area are stairs that lead down and are therefore below the level of the floor where the Grease was cast. What happens in those two squares? Does the grease hover in mid-air, or fall down onto the stairs, or not happen because there's no "surface" there? Surprisingly I can't find any ruling on this!
Thanks!
you fall into a GM's area
The game model is very much a 2D system.
Generally the grease will cover the top of the stairs, exactly like a template laid over a map, especially if it lies within half of 5 ft (which is the defined unit of an area - a 5ft square. Does it have to line up with the floor? How much displacement before the intellectual grid actually moves?). Often you only need LoE/LoS to a corner of said square.
Stair steps are commonly 10-11" high by 24-48" width by 11-12" depth.
Real world stairs are 4-7" tall. but yeah...
bbangerter |
Mudfoot wrote:In this case, the caster did not have LOS to the stairs. FYI, the GM ruled that the stairs were not the same surface as the floor, so the stairs were not affected.Just assume the grease is cast at an angle and covers those steps. The spell says that the grease covers a solid surface, rather than appearing in midair and raining down on things.
The problem might come that you don't have LOS to the lower steps and so can't affect them; it depends on the slope of the steps and how tall and far away you are.
The gease spell does not require a "single solid surface", only a solid surface (eg, it can't be cast on top of water or lava). If it required a single solid surface, then casting it in a room with a tiled floor would affect only a single tile on the floor. Same if the floor was made of wood planks, or separate pieces of stone, etc.
I'd talk to your GM about not playing dumb mind games with his/her players. The GM already has the power to make "Rocks fall, everyone dies", they should not be shafting players with little gimicks like this. In world the characters should know how their spells work and what the result would be. If the GM doesn't want the spell to work they should tell the player "The spell isn't going to cover the stairs if you cast it there" before they cast the spell, rather than after the fact.
Ryze Kuja |
I would say that you need to have LoS/LoE to all the squares in question. There's no gravity rules in the spell allowing you to cast half of it on the edge and the other half falls to the lower level that you can't see or have LoE to; either you target the squares or you target the object. It's not like a Drench spell where the material produced "falls" on the object or squares.