SunTzuWarmaster at [unixtime wrote:1176252697[/unixtime]]I'm pretty sure that if you leave the child alive, you are violating the intent. The spell WAS in the book of Vile Deeds. As a necromancy spell. I think a better question is whether a child-zombie-finger counts.
Not at all. While most spells in BoVD just refer to a part, without caring about the current status of that part's owner, the one they're referring to is the one exception. Refer to the following...
Book of Vile Darkness wrote:Boneblast
Necromancy [Evil]
Level: Blk1, Clr2
Components: V, S, M, Undead
Casting Time: 1 Action
Range: Touch
Target: One creature that has a skeleton
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: Fortitude Half or Fortitude Negates (see text)
Spell Resistance: Yes
The caster causes some bone within a touched creature to break or crack. The caster cannot specify which bone. Because the damage is general rather then specific, the target takes 1d3 points of Constitution damage. A Fortitude save reduces the damage by half, or negates it if the full damage would have been 1 point of Constitution damage.
Material Component: The bone of a small child that still lives.
So yeah, the spell isn't that impressive generally, AND you need to be Undead to cast it, AND it requires a weird spell component (note that it's not just a finger, it's ANY bone... but how many can you take without killing the child?). All in all, I'd say avoid this one; there's a lot of other, more cool spells you can use that require you to carve up your foes after battle, if you're into that kind of thing.