What kind of ambient cold damage would near absolute zero do?

[Humabout]

Originally Posted by simply Nathan

Every single water molecule in your body freezes into a crystal state suddenly

You die, no save

Love it. A nice counterpart to "You fall in lava and die."

[mr beer]

Originally Posted by Humabout

Love it. A nice counterpart to "You fall in lava and die."

Player: This had better not be another one of your games where we all fall in lava and die!

GM: ...OK, no problem. Something different.

[(E)]

Originally Posted by simply Nathan

Every single water molecule in your body freezes into a crystal state suddenly

Then you fall in lava, every water molecule boils instantly, you explode then die. Everyone else roll to avoid PC/lava shrapnel.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by (E)

Then you fall in lava, every water molecule boils instantly, you explode then die.

A couple of quibbles. First, you've already frozen to death. So there's that.

Second, it's going to take a WHILE for your H20 to raise up from absolute zero. Lava isn't going to significantly speed up that process to the point of exploding instantly (or at all). Your frozen corpse might be found skittering around on the surface of the lava on a cushion of steam... or if you fall far enough you'll be plunged beneath the surface, and the steam jetting out of your corpse will send dramatic sprays of lava everywhere.

The latter could be mistaken for exploding, but you'll be doing it over and over and over again, which is way cooler than exploding.

[mr beer]

Now I want to dump people into liquid nitrogen, fish them out an hour later and throw them into a lava-filled caldera.

For science.

[Bruno]

Presented For Science:

Throwing a bag of camp garbage into lava, as an experiment to get a rough estimate of what happens when a person falls into lava. Note that this is a room-temperature person (er, garbage), not an absolute zero person.

Throwing a big container of water into lava

Throwing a propane tank into lava

These are professional yahoos, folks :)

It's important to remember that humans are not the same as, say, dry ice. Dry ice is a fairly uniform block of solid CO2; CO2 becomes a gas at some pretty low temperatures, so that's one thing that's very not-like-humans, but the big difference is that it's just CO2.

Humans may be "ugly bags of mostly water", but we're very much more like a closed-cell sponge soaked with water than some sort of water balloon.

Our non-uniform composition is going to delay heat penetration and make it very irregular, and we have to get up to a much higher temperature before there's significant steam generation. You need enough heat to hit a large enough batch of water at roughly the same time for it to boil out into dramatic jets of steam, rather than rather boring little steam bubbles.

[Anthony]

Depending on the shape of the water container and the size of the cooled area, you might not live long enough to freeze -- water expands by 6-7% when it freezes, and that extra volume has to go somewhere, possibly including crushing objects that happen to be embedded in the ice.

[Nereidalbel]

If you're in water that suddenly drops to absolute zero, you'll probably end up being crushed/suffocated before you have to worry about the cold.

If you were in a room, now you're in a vacuum, and the inability to breathe is going to kill you before the cold can do anything.

[Nymdok]

Originally Posted by Ottriman

I ask this because several potential future characters for my game could cool things down to near absolute zero on a moderate to large scale.

I suppose I should ask for several version here.

1. Person is just standing on the ground when it happens
2. Person is in water when it happens

Thanks.

Lets say NEAR absolute zero because I would LOVE to talk about Bose-Einstein condensates, but that would be a lengthier discussion.

So lets say 5K , or about -450 degrees Fahrenheit.

At that temperature (almost) all the kinetic energy is frelling GONE.

If you shift to 5K in 10 seconds from 70 degress F (around 300 K) that means its about 30K per second or about 55 degrees F per SECOND.

If that hits a person directly, The water in their bodies will freeze at about the 1/2 second mark causing damage and death.

IF however, you wanted something a BIT more interesting and dramatic you could say that it affects the hex that they're in.

So we take the human body at a specific Heat of 3500 and we're not gonna talk about the anisotropy of thermal conductivity. We're just gonna say 'roughly water' and take a spherical chickens, cylindrical horses, Frustrumed turtles and be on about our buisness.

We assume that the effect keeps the area from warming and make no supposition about where the energy goes.

We also assume for an ungeared man the air is actively conducting the heat away from the body.

So After the First second the environment theyre in drops to 15F Cold, but Nothing too drastic. The ground freezes and you definately feel it, but it will take time for the heat to be extracted from your body. The air condenses around you and its presumed that the air rushing in maintains the Atmospheric pressure.

Second 2 -40 F : BOY is it cold. The surface of your skin will begin to frost and seeing the dendrites form in as your sweat gets cloudy and crystalizes is gonna be morbidly beautiful. At 2 seconds, there is still enough heat in your body that your not dead yet, but breathing is actively painful and you should prolly check for stunning.

Second 3 -95 : Oh Boy, this is no Joke. Fingertips are now starting to freeze and we're only 3 seconds in. If you werent dressed for arctic temps, now would be a good time to mutter grim last words through vigorously chattering teeth.

Second 4 -150F : Good night Irene. After 4 seconds, the increase in Atmosphereic pressure, the exiting of heat etc, the freezing of extremeties, go ahead and assume that Your frozen to about 1/4 inch depth. If your still concious at this point, you'll regret it. If Youre eyes arent closed (and probably if they are) they begin to frost over.

Second 5 -205F : As it gets colder, and denser, the air becomes thicker which allows it to wick off the heat from anything it touches. Even Arctic Gear begins to fail as the heat is thermodynamically driven out of everything. If your not wearing Goggles, your eyballs are frozen and useless. the unclothed Body is probably frozen to about 1/2 Inch depth at this point.

Second 6 - 260F : Its impossible to see as the air is turning cloudy, but there really is nothing to see anyway. You're a gonner. Unclothed body, Id say is prolly frozen to at least 1 inch depeth.

Second 7 -315F : So lets make it rain! Yep heres where the Atmosphere Liquifies of course. As It contacts you it draws the heat out even faster. Tough to guess how fast heat leaves the body at this point. I think that with the added liquid conductivity we could easily guess at 1.5 Inches frozen depth for cloethed and unclothed alike. In a vaccuum you'd almost be better off because there wouldnt be anything wicking away the heat from your body.

Second 8 -370F The atmosphere around you Crystalizes and encases you in a convenient transparent tomb. Your whole body has frozen through easily at this point (If that isnt good for -8x HP I dont know what is.)

Second 9 -425F More cold. The molecules that make up you and the buble of frozen atmosphere around you are sluggish. your Body would likely shatter inside its tomb.

the 10th second : Welp, here we are. Hope you enjoyed the trip. Mark -10xHP on your sheet and ironically, throw it into the fire.


Nymdok

[(E)]

Ok. Your almost completely frozen body. (Enough parts are left unfrozen to allow life to maintain for a few moments longer) falls into a combination microwave and radar oven that is powered by a volcano. Which causes every water molecule in your body to simultaneously boil. You explode catch fire and die. All other players roll to avoid Implausibility.