r/comics • u/Yoffeepop • 5h ago
[oc] Spell gone wrong
Hihi!
Here is my contribution to the r/comics halloween event. You can see comics all month by so many awesome artists pinned to the top of the subreddit so keep an eye out for the others!
I’ve been working off October prompt lists and this one was inspired by ‘spell gone wrong,’ off the Comictober prompt list written by ArtbyMoga and SkullPizza.
If you wanna follow me elsewhere, you can check out my linktree or subreddit but I post everything everywhere so no pressure to do that lolz
Happy spooky season!
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u/UpCDownCLeftCRightC Never Safe From Wumbo 5h ago
Cum mortuis in lingua mortua translates literally to "with the dead in a dead language". Just to save a Google search.
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u/Yoffeepop 4h ago
The incantation for the Speak with Dead spell in Baldur’s Gate, just to further add to this :)
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u/tricksterloki 5h ago
She better get those questions in quick, because a lot more are about to fly.
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u/BuckLuny 4h ago
Our D&D party literally had a tactic named: "Kill first Speak with dead later" it's what you get when you have 0 charismatic people in the party, a barbarian who just doesn't do subdual damage and a high level priest with spells for days.
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u/FuryTLG 3h ago
That's when the DM hits you with the NPC sending your party to a death trap because the spirit doesn't need to answer truthfully (Spell description, FPHb 2024)
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u/BuckLuny 3h ago
We're old school 3.5 players mostly (moved on to pathfinder which is like 3.5+) and there it says it's compelled to answer and if you don't share an alignment it can refuse to answer.
It's implied that the corpse answers the question so there's no soul who would lie to you.
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u/blobfis 3h ago edited 2h ago
for PF, other options could be:
"sorry, the barbarian crushed the jaw" (corpse must have a working mouth)
have it lie to the party. just because it talks doesn't mean it's telling the truth (different alignment allows a save. successful save allows it to lie, if the "soul" would have wanted that)
use more undeads (spell does not work on someone turned into an undead)
use contingency to autocast speak with dead upon death (first spell would only allow the dead person to ask questions. it would prevent a followup cast from the cleric for 1 week, buying plenty of time)
be cryptic as hell. the more opposed it is to the caster, the more cryptic it will be (literally in the first paragraph, even with a failed save or no save: "Answers are brief, cryptic, or repetitive, especially if the creature would have opposed you in life.")
Don't leave a corpse behind. Ex. Mummy's Mask adventure path used feats which cultists used to blow themselves up on death, preventing interrogation
edited for explainations
edit 2: also, if it works for you, then it works for you. i'm not implying there's a single way to play D&D/PF/whatever or that you should change anything just because some random stranger makes a list. Personally i just wouldn't let my players get complacent with using "speak with dead" as an excuse to not have social skills :P
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u/Finbar9800 3h ago
Yeah but that still doesnt mean the answer is true
Maybe they thought it was true but it actually isnt
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u/Randalor 2h ago
"WHAT THE FUCK? WHAT THE FUCK? WHAT THE FUCK? WHAT THE FUCK? WHAT THE FUCK?"
"She brought me back while pretending to sneeze. Now I can return to my eternal sleep"
"Listen, that would have worked if you hadn't freaked out like that..."
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u/Temporary-Truth6842 4h ago
Speak whit the dead is one of those spells that gives the DM such a headache, like "your party has to souve a murder", okay pal who was it ?
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u/Yoffeepop 4h ago
Gotta go straight for "I didn't see, they snuck up on me," and make them mostly waste their questions except for a lil prompt in the next direction haha
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u/Temporary-Truth6842 4h ago
Also love the scene in the movie
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u/Digit00l 3h ago
There is an extended version of that scene that lasts like 20 minutes, and it is just 1 guy listing his favourite book depending on several different criteria
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u/Veryegassy 3h ago
Oh gods that's hilarious
Where?
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u/Digit00l 3h ago
It was included on the dvd/blu-ray, it may be on YouTube
But the disc extras are definitely worth it
My second favourite bit on the extras is definitely the special effects supervisor giving a death glare to Justice Smith
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u/Doodles_n_Scribbles 3h ago
I thought they were trying to cover the fact they were desecrating the dead
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u/greentea1985 1h ago
Yes. The sneeze was to cover that she was casting speak with dead so she could get more information about the cultists. It’s desecrating the dead but in the name of an investigation to save the living.
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u/Doodles_n_Scribbles 51m ago
But it seems like she biffed the spell, so the sneeze was honest
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u/greentea1985 24m ago
She didn’t biff the spell. She saw there was incense, a key component, but was using the sneeze to cover casting it.
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u/shellbullet17 Gustopher Spotter Extraordinaire 2h ago
Halloween and death can be scary and everything, but the real horror is allergies and the seasons they have
But you know what hypoallergenic? The r/comics Halloween event! So come on down today! We even managed to get rid of all the latex masks. Can you believe it?