Draft:Orb of Earth

Omega 0.90.4

Orb of Earth&TypeArtifactBase value (Au)2000Item level7Weight50Unidentified appearanceMysterious OrbCursed nameOrb of Earth

The Orb of Earth is an artifact that teaches disintegration, grants negative-energy immunity and immediately disintegrates a chosen target or terrain feature. It is also a material for the Orb of Mastery. A wrong element answer can destroy carried possessions or kill the player.

Generation

Earth Orbs are repeatable random finds, including in eligible monster treasure. Their item level is 7, with the ordinary over-level generation exception. The Elemental Lord of Air carries one on the second Astral level; the Earth Lord carries Air instead. Normal death drops it, while successful theft may take it from a living carrier. Theft still requires its ordinary check, and any preceding possession is taken first.

The carrier can also be a random scroll summon, without player control over its identity or safety. Normal acquirement and automatically generated pawn-shop stock exclude artifacts.

Activation

Identify the Mysterious Orb before use. Activate it through A → a in accessible inventory, then answer e to smash it against the earth. This is a menu choice, not the separate item-bashing command. Identification, blessing and mana are not prerequisites for the correct effect; Escape is not accepted as a cancellation at the element question.

Result of answering e	Effect
Spell knowledge	Learn disintegration; existing spell cost is unchanged
Experience	+10,000
Protection	Add 100 to negative-energy immunity
Immediate use	Choose a disintegration target
Remaining object	A Burnt-out Orb

Against a creature, disintegration deals 100 unstoppable damage; it is not an unconditional instant kill. Against terrain it can turn walls, doors, portcullises or statues into rubble, clear rubble and ordinary traps, or make a pit in a floor. An existing pit can become a trapdoor in the current dungeon. An altar instead retaliates by disintegrating you.

Self-targeting destroys a worn cloak first, then worn body armor if there is no cloak, or inflicts 250 unstoppable damage when neither is worn. The new negative-energy immunity is not protection against this. Its own positive value normally persists rather than counting down for 100 minutes, although the special all-damage invulnerability countdown can also decrement it.

Wrong answer and burnout

Another accepted answer subtracts 10 current Constitution. If the result is below 3, the player dies immediately. Otherwise the branch destroys possessions in both accessible inventory and the pack. This branch also contains a bug after removing those possessions, so a surviving, recoverable end state is not assured; do not treat a high Constitution as making this a safe experiment.

Use a separated single Orb: successful replacement leaves one Burnt-out Orb, rather than preserving unused copies from the same selected stack. The benefits are already awarded by the targeting prompt. Cancelling that target wastes the immediate disintegration but does not preserve Earth; use a valid target deliberately. Enchantment cannot turn the spent object back into an elemental Orb.

Strategy

Earth's terrain use can be more valuable than 100 damage against a durable foe. It can open an obstacle or provide spell knowledge for later disintegration, but changing terrain can have consequences of its own. Select the site you actually want to affect and avoid altars or your own square.

Negative-energy protection is useful against relevant draining attacks, but does not cover normal weapon damage or every form of lost levels. If the immediate need can be met with another disintegration source, preserve this Orb for Mastery; its combined attribute reward consumes Earth without giving Earth's separate spell or immunity.