A term for fire or acid burning

[Not]

In the GURPS tradition, I'd like to use a recondite term for "damage from fire or acid" instead of writing it plainly on my sheet. Does such a word exist? Maybe a term of art from chemistry or bit of military jargon? Help.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Not

In the GURPS tradition, I'd like to use a recondite term for "damage from fire or acid" instead of writing it plainly on my sheet. Does such a word exist? Maybe a term of art from chemistry or bit of military jargon? Help.

Both fire and acidity are oxidation reactions (which is a historical term, it doesn't necessarily mean there is any oxygen involved)

But a substantial part of the damage doesn't actually come from the chemistry. Particularly in the case of fire, where the secondary effects of the heat matter, but also for the acid where anything more complex than a homogeneous material is going to be taking extra damage from bits swelling or falling off when the connective stuff dissolves. For anything very "interesting", like say a living target, these aren't really very comparable kinds of damage. They tend to draw comparisons in games, and against folkloric monsters, because they have the same sort of total destruction feel - stuff damaged by fire or acid doesn't tend to leave big bits behind, it's reduced to dust (ash) or "nothing" (actually stuff dissolved in the liquid that used to be what the acid was dissolved in). GURPS uses "corrosive" for a lot of damage of this sort, which actually is a pretty good term, but note that it applies equally well to something ground or sandblasted away, which you may not want.

[AlexanderHowl]

Acid is corrosion damage, not burning damage, so it has its own term already.

[Anthony]

Frostbite also produces burn-like effect (damage type ?). Radiation does too (damage type toxic). In general the distinction is probably 'does it kill cells directly, or just cause gross physical trauma'. It depends a bit on what you're trying to describe, though.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Frostbite also produces burn-like effect (damage type ?).

GURPS tends to say that cold/frost damage is 'burning' damage that doesn't have an incendiary effect.

[malloyd]

If you were looking for it as a bit of color rather than a rules notation issue, I'd focus on that totally destructive bit. An alchemist might call a process that caused a material to vanish a sublimation, or a translation, or an apophoric or metaphoric process. A more modern observer might go with decomposition or disintegration, or call it compositional or chemical or microstructural damage (as opposed to structural, physical or gross damage cause by pounding on it until it breaks for example).