Author Topic: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth  (Read 7909 times)

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Cagemarrow

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Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« on: December 28, 2010, 06:28:55 PM »
Does anyone know if it is legal for earth elementals to pull grappled opponents down into the earth using their earth glide ability? According to the grapple rules you can pull an opponent along at 1/2 your movement if you succeed on a grapple check as a standard action. I can't find any rules for or against an Earth Elemental being able to bring creatures with them when they use their earth glide ability.


Empirate

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #1 on: December 29, 2010, 08:11:07 AM »
Quote from: SRD
Earth Glide (Ex)

An earth elemental can glide through stone, dirt, or almost any other sort of earth except metal as easily as a fish swims through water. Its burrowing leaves behind no tunnel or hole, nor does it create any ripple or other signs of its presence. A move earth spell cast on an area containing a burrowing earth elemental flings the elemental back 30 feet, stunning the creature for 1 round unless it succeeds on a DC 15 Fortitude save.

Important parts bolded. As long as the grappled creature is not an Earth Elemental (or anything else with Earthglide), they're not going to be able to pass through earth "as easily as a fish swims through water". Also, the Elemental leaves no tunnel into which to pull its opponent. So no, grapple can't bring another creature into the earth.

veekie

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #2 on: December 29, 2010, 09:01:57 AM »
It doesn't say anything about an earth elemental bringing objects or creatures along though. Its a plausible reading of RAI(depending on how you think it works in fluff) and an uncertain RAW(since it doesn't specify one way or another), if a passenger can be dragged into the earth and then released inside a rock.
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Cagemarrow

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #3 on: December 29, 2010, 09:50:37 AM »
Does that mean they can't wear or carry equipment as well? It seems odd that they wouldn't say that if that were the case since normally creatures can with other movement modes. Does anyone know if the prestige classes that grant earth glide have any expanded text on how it can be used?

I guess it's not too big of a loss if they can't, just means it can't be used against us either. It would be a very nasty way to go. Encased in a skin tight cocoon of solid rock, just hope that it let go while you were breathing out or you wouldn't even have that little bit of room to wiggle. Just enough time to realize how bad your situation is before you suffocated. Thats if the rock you displace doesn't also crush you.

braininthejar

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #4 on: December 29, 2010, 01:30:49 PM »
So it won't work but I imagine it would hurt. I remember some X-men comic with Shadowcat reaching for her enemy from inside the mirror and pulling her face-first into it, without confering her phasing ability...

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #5 on: December 29, 2010, 01:42:39 PM »
Only class I know of with earth glide is Stonespeaker Guardian, and it only says as an earth elemental.
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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #6 on: December 29, 2010, 01:48:13 PM »
Only class I know of with earth glide is Stonespeaker Guardian, and it only says as an earth elemental.
Earth Dreamer has it too, but it is the same basic text.
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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #7 on: December 29, 2010, 02:25:48 PM »
I have a 3.5 knockoff (Warlords of the Accordlands, by AEG) which provides similar rules in their Monsters & Lairs book, specifically, under the entry for Diamond Gargoyle.

Quote
A diamond gargoyle's favored attack is to grapple opponents, and then to partially move through the surrounding stone caverns or earthen beds.  This results in severe injuries and suffocation unless the victim frees himself.
After making a successful check to continue a grapple, a diamond gargoyle may make a partial-move action to merge with nearby earth, increasing its critical threat range by 1 on attacks made on the grappled victim.  It may continue to perform such maneuvers, increasing its critical threat range each time, every round it succeeds in maintaining the grapple.  If the critical threat range increases to 15-20 or greater, the victim begins suffocating (as if drowning).  If a diamond gargoyle takes a partial-move action to move out of the earth, its critical threat range resets to 20.

Diamond gargoyles can also see and move through unworked earth, stone, and crystal as if they were solid fog.  They are also CR 14, though I've found the CRs in this book to be unreliable at times.

Cagemarrow

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #8 on: December 29, 2010, 02:33:40 PM »
Without text stating that they can't carry things into the stone with them though I would assume then that as long as they are touching, intending to bring something with them, they could pull it into the stone. Especially since the Prestige class abilities were intended for PCs, who almost never go about adventuring in the buff.

I've done further searching on the net and can find no other expansions on the Earth Glide rules so am still not sure how this should be ruled either way. That brings up another thing, how do the elementals see where they are going while doing this? They don't get Tremor Sense and it doesn't say that they can see while earth gliding.


weenog

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #9 on: December 29, 2010, 03:12:12 PM »
A person isn't things.  A person doesn't avoid damage from a blast spell if you're immune to the type of damage and you're holding them.  Creatures and objects are handled separately, and being able to take your clothes and gear with you when you travel by an odd method doesn't necessarily confer the ability to do the same with creatures.  If the person can't earth glide, they aren't coming with you.  The real question is, how much damage do they take from bumping into the ground?  I don't know the answer, but this idea of entombing, suffocating and possible automatic killing is idiotic.  Even a dungeon crasher fighter doesn't do that when he forces something to collide with something else, and he's specially trained to do just that, and generally has inertia on his side.
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Psithief

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #10 on: December 29, 2010, 03:17:24 PM »
It says burrowing, that's not the same thing as phasing.

Since Earth Glide is just a trumped up burrowing ability, then whatever they leave in the rock is merely going to be buried, not half-phased into rock.

I'd say that beyond that, i.e. 'fairness' is up to the DM.

My personal rule 0? Probably something along the lines of turning any spaces occupied by a buried creature into rubble (easier to clear) and using the suffocation/buried in rubble rules (a slow, nonlethal damage death, or a fast I ran out of breath death). Nothing instantaneous.

weenog

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #11 on: December 29, 2010, 03:23:44 PM »
If I had to Rule 0 it on the fly, I'd probably have the collision do 1d6 damage to the dragged creature and 1d6 damage to the space of terrain it hit, like a blocked awesome blow.  Maybe add 1.5x the dragger's Str mod to the damage dealt to both.  And the drag-ee would remain outside the surface (or maybe in a small crater, if the dragger managed to do enough damage to that 5' terrain space to destroy it).
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Cagemarrow

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #12 on: December 29, 2010, 03:54:39 PM »
I wasn't expecting it to do any damage, just leave them trapped within the earth with the possibility of suffocation if they are fully immersed with no way to escape. All I was really trying to do was come up with a different way to take enemies out of the fight.

Since the consensus seems to be that it isn't possible I guess I'll just have to come up with something else creative to try.

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #13 on: December 29, 2010, 06:27:29 PM »
1. this is a favorite tactic of mine.

2. magic / fantasy

3. no rai / raw really exists, do not assume things can / cant be done because the text dosnt say. if rule 0 says no, EE's cant carry things (people are things, just an odd sort of thing) then you cant use them to fetch items from underground, such as 'go to the cave below us and bring back the big treasure chest' or 'take this ring to the volcano and put it in an empty lava chamber'. a fish (read as sentient aquatic thing w/ at least one hand) could do similar things in water. an air creature could do similar.



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veekie

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #14 on: December 30, 2010, 01:21:36 AM »
It says burrowing, that's not the same thing as phasing.

Since Earth Glide is just a trumped up burrowing ability, then whatever they leave in the rock is merely going to be buried, not half-phased into rock.

I'd say that beyond that, i.e. 'fairness' is up to the DM.

My personal rule 0? Probably something along the lines of turning any spaces occupied by a buried creature into rubble (easier to clear) and using the suffocation/buried in rubble rules (a slow, nonlethal damage death, or a fast I ran out of breath death). Nothing instantaneous.
I'm with this as well, I think, since my fluff reading of Earth Glide is more of the earth/rock parts around you and closes behind.
By the levels it can become a common tactic, there would be ways around suffocating(which isn't instant, whatever the 'left stuck in rock' sounds like), and you can get out. Most burrowing creatures can already do this, Earth elementals merely extend it to rock and metal instead of just dirt, which DOES make it a bit tricky. But there are better grapplers out there than them.
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"Just what do you think the moon up in the sky is? Everyone sees that big, round shiny thing and thinks there must be something round up there, right? That's just silly. The truth is much more awesome than that. You can almost never see the real Moon, and its appearance is death to humans. You can only see the Moon when it's reflected in things. And the things it reflects in, like water or glass, can all be broken, right? Since the moon you see in the sky is just being reflected in the heavens, if you tear open the heavens it's easy to break it~"
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altpersona

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #15 on: December 30, 2010, 01:43:12 AM »
exactly, your just stuck, not damaged, other than the regular damage from grappling an EE..

but it could easily spend its move action going down and just release you, you would have very few options, but its not inherently fatal.

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veekie

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #16 on: December 30, 2010, 01:47:25 AM »
Good thing they don't move very fast eh.
And if you're grappled by a big bruiser type monster you got more issues than entombing to start with.
The mind transcends the body.
It's also a little cold because of that.
Please get it a blanket.

I wish I could read your mind,
I can barely read mine.

"Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. At 2:15, it begins rolling up characters."

[spoiler]
"Just what do you think the moon up in the sky is? Everyone sees that big, round shiny thing and thinks there must be something round up there, right? That's just silly. The truth is much more awesome than that. You can almost never see the real Moon, and its appearance is death to humans. You can only see the Moon when it's reflected in things. And the things it reflects in, like water or glass, can all be broken, right? Since the moon you see in the sky is just being reflected in the heavens, if you tear open the heavens it's easy to break it~"
-Ibuki Suika, on overkill

To sumbolaion diakoneto moi, basilisk ouranionon.
Epigenentheto, apoleia keraune hos timeis pteirei.
Hekatonkatis kai khiliakis astrapsato.
Khiliarkhou Astrape!
[/spoiler]

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archangel.arcanis

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #17 on: December 30, 2010, 11:33:38 AM »
After pondering it for a while the rule I think that is closest to this would be concerning outsiders with teleport at will. They aren't allowed passengers and only 50lbs of gear. I think it is mostly to keep port and grab tactics from being used by creatures who can do it all day long.
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wotmaniac

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #18 on: December 30, 2010, 11:53:28 AM »
my take on what seems to be a bit of a debate ... :

when using earth glide, EE uses their burrowing movement speed, right?
and burrowing just another mode of movement, right?

okay, let's see .... when grappled, can :
- a surface-dwelling creature move along the surface with his opponent in tow?  check.
- a creature with flight grapple someone and also fly?  check.
- an aquatic creature grapple someone in the water and then swim away with them?  check.
and, can any of those release their grapple at any point, and subject their opponents to the relevant environmental dangers?  check.

earth glide and subterranean movement via a borrowing speed is merely just another mode of movement -- just like walking, flying, swimming, etc.

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Cagemarrow

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Re: Earth Elementals - using grapple to pull enemies into the earth
« Reply #19 on: December 30, 2010, 12:07:31 PM »
That's pretty much what I was thinking originally. But of course you said it much better. I'll keep these suggestions in mind if I decide to try it during our up coming game. I'll keep this idea in reserve unless we absolutely need it.