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Something having hardness does not make it an object.OTOH there's nothing saying creatures can't be creatures and objects at the same time. But despite that, at least one person with a golem next to his name disagrees.
So my point is, if you don't use the object hardness rules for creatures with hardness, then what rules DO you use for creature hardness? It's not defined in the bestiary at all, or anywhere else as a creature defensive ability. The only rules (that I know of) that cover hardness are those rules for damaging objects in the CRB.
The developers cherry pick object hardness rules to apply to creatures with as far as I can tell, no rhyme or reason. So it's impossible to answer spinoff questions that haven't already been explicitly answered.
I will just treat them as creatures with hardness. And apply none of the object-specific rules. Because they are not objects. The spell animate object heavily implies this as well.
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I don't think anybody here is saying to not use object hardness rules for robots. Rather, what we're saying is that the halving energy and ranged attack damage rules do not apply because the robot is not an object, it is a creature.
For clarity, THIS is the hardness rule:
Hardness: Each object has hardness—a number that represents how well it resists damage. When an object is damaged, subtract its hardness from the damage. Only damage in excess of its hardness is deducted from the object's hit points (see Table: Common Armor, Weapon, and Shield Hardness and Hit Points, Table: Substance Hardness and Hit Points, and Table: Object Hardness and Hit Points).This and halving ranged attack damage are OBJECT rules
Energy Attacks: Energy attacks deal half damage to most objects. Divide the damage by 2 before applying the object's hardness. Some energy types might be particularly effective against certain objects, subject to GM discretion. For example, fire might do full damage against parchment, cloth, and other objects that burn easily. Sonic might do full damage against glass and crystal objects.Packaging those rules as "the hardness rules" is incorrect, they are part of the "object rules" and the hardness rule is a subset of the object rules.
A creature with hardness is not an object, in the same way that a rectangle is not a square. A robot doesn't inherit all of the properties of being an object just because it has hardness, so the ranged and energy damage are not halved, and robots can't be sundered or broken.
The hardness rules are subtly different from DR in that hardness also includes energy resistance.
Also, an Animated Object is a good example of something that is a creature and an object at the same time (mostly), but robots do not fall under such a category because there's nothing saying that they, as a type of construct, are objects.
Thank you. I think this is a good clarification, even if your not a Paizo dude.
I concur wholeheartily.
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I don't think anybody here is saying to not use object hardness rules for robots. Rather, what we're saying is that the halving energy and ranged attack damage rules do not apply because the robot is not an object, it is a creature.
For clarity, THIS is the hardness rule:
Hardness: Each object has hardness—a number that represents how well it resists damage. When an object is damaged, subtract its hardness from the damage. Only damage in excess of its hardness is deducted from the object's hit points (see Table: Common Armor, Weapon, and Shield Hardness and Hit Points, Table: Substance Hardness and Hit Points, and Table: Object Hardness and Hit Points).This and halving ranged attack damage are OBJECT rules
Energy Attacks: Energy attacks deal half damage to most objects. Divide the damage by 2 before applying the object's hardness. Some energy types might be particularly effective against certain objects, subject to GM discretion. For example, fire might do full damage against parchment, cloth, and other objects that burn easily. Sonic might do full damage against glass and crystal objects.Packaging those rules as "the hardness rules" is incorrect, they are part of the "object rules" and the hardness rule is a subset of the object rules.
A creature with hardness is not an object, in the same way that a rectangle is not a square. A robot doesn't inherit all of the properties of being an object just because it has hardness, so the ranged and energy damage are not halved, and robots can't be sundered or broken.
The hardness rules are subtly different from DR in that hardness also includes energy resistance.
Also, an Animated Object is a good example of something that is a creature and an object at the same time (mostly), but robots do not fall under such a category because there's nothing saying that they, as a type of construct, are objects.
Thank you. I think this is a good clarification, even if your not a Paizo
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Me too - but since hardness is going to be an issue in this season - I have a query about it -
Hardness 5 is in general similar to if the creature had both DR5/- & energy resist 5:everything.
However - what of - for example - a longsword with flaming. Would the longsword's damage & the flaming damage stack for bypassing the creature's hardness, or would they each have to bypass the hardness seperately?
Edited: re-read resistance rules
Energy resistance works the same way, so your analogy works even better.
A creature with resistance to energy has the ability (usually extraordinary) to ignore some damage of a certain type per attack, but it does not have total immunity.
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Energy resistance works the same way, so your analogy works even better.
A creature with resistance to energy has the ability (usually extraordinary) to ignore some damage of a certain type per attack, but it does not have total immunity.
Yes - but the hardness rules say "When an object is damaged..." not once per attack - would the flaming longsword count as damaging it only once or twice?
Hmmmm... not sure. I'd probably just say once, but most of the justification would be it makes the math easier.
And tossing this in here, because I thought I'd found a way to actually contribute to the battle, but was told otherwise:
Light Ray (Ex) A lantern archon can fire beams of light to damage foes. These light rays have a maximum range of 30 feet. This attack overcomes damage reduction of any type.
Yeah, awesome to sit there and get told the attack that overcomes DR of any type did nothing. (At least the robot had a junk Will save and the aura of menace did something.)
Along with it? Being told the damage from *falling* was halved by hardness. Being told that if you dropped a robot *on* another robot, the damage would be adjusted by hardness.
Personal opinion: Hardness should be left to objects. Creatures should have DR.
-Ben.
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Along with it? Being told the damage from *falling* was halved by hardness.
Yeah, when I played 6-02, I dropped two robots into a Create Pit spell, and did no damage. But DR would have done the same thing in that case. I was just happy to divide the enemies so we could fight less of them at once, which worked out great for us.
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Apparently what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Had a fight with a remorhaz last night dealing 8d6 damage a hit to the party's weapons. The gnome barbarian had an adamantine hooked hammer, and hardness 20 with Fort for half and then halfed again anyway mean all that happened was it got a little warm.
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Apparently what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Had a fight with a remorhaz last night dealing 8d6 damage a hit to the party's weapons. The gnome barbarian had an adamantine hooked hammer, and hardness 20 with Fort for half and then halfed again anyway mean all that happened was it got a little warm.
A successful Fort save avoids all of the damage.
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Along with it? Being told the damage from *falling* was halved by hardness.Yeah, when I played 6-02, I dropped two robots into a Create Pit spell, and did no damage. But DR would have done the same thing in that case. I was just happy to divide the enemies so we could fight less of them at once, which worked out great for us.
Falling damage isn't considered weapon damage, is it?
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Here's something that may or may not come up:
Damage Reduction only reduces damage from weapons. Energy Resistance only reduces damage from specific energy types.
Hardness reduces damage from all sources. That includes falling, cavern collapses, spell damage as from spiritual weapon, lantern archon attacks, etc
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Falling damage isn't considered weapon damage, is it?Along with it? Being told the damage from *falling* was halved by hardness.Yeah, when I played 6-02, I dropped two robots into a Create Pit spell, and did no damage. But DR would have done the same thing in that case. I was just happy to divide the enemies so we could fight less of them at once, which worked out great for us.
I'd say the ground is a pretty big, blunt weapon.
DR protects against everything except energy damage, or a specific damage type that overcomes it. Falling isn't an energy type, and I've never seen "DR 10/Falling", though I'm not entirely kidding when I say the ground is a blunt object. I'd actually have falling damage overcome DR XX/Bludgeoning.
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I'd say the ground is a pretty big, blunt weapon.I'm going to build a barbarian that wields the earth against his enemies now.
He'll be fine until he runs into a sundering shoanti with an earthbreaker. Then we'll all be screwed.
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I'd say the ground is a pretty big, blunt weapon.I'm going to build a barbarian that wields the earth against his enemies now.
Good luck getting your strength high enough to lift it. Maybe while raging...
Of course, now I'm having flashbacks to some comic books with REALLY strong superheroes, usually back in the Silver Age time period (60s and 70s). I remember one issue of the 90's Supergirl comic where the no-longer-existent pre-Crisis version of Supergirl shows up and tries to "push" the Earth, but discovers she's not as powerful in the post-Crisis DC Universe as she used to be. Heh - found it in a quick Google search.
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DR protects against everything except energy damage, or a specific damage type that overcomes it.I guess you consider the bolded sentence in the entry as flavor text?
Damage Reduction (Ex or Su) A creature with this special quality ignores damage from most weapons and natural attacks. Wounds heal immediately, or the weapon bounces off harmlessly (in either case, the opponent knows the attack was ineffective). The creature takes normal damage from energy attacks (even nonmagical ones), spells, spell-like abilities, and supernatural abilities. A certain kind of weapon can sometimes damage the creature normally, as noted below.
Why does the bolded sentence get ignored in favour of the italicized sentence when they don't contradict each other?
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DR protects against everything except energy damage, or a specific damage type that overcomes it.I guess you consider the bolded sentence in the entry as flavor text?Damage Reduction (Ex or Su) A creature with this special quality ignores damage from most weapons and natural attacks. Wounds heal immediately, or the weapon bounces off harmlessly (in either case, the opponent knows the attack was ineffective). The creature takes normal damage from energy attacks (even nonmagical ones), spells, spell-like abilities, and supernatural abilities. A certain kind of weapon can sometimes damage the creature normally, as noted below.Why does the bolded sentence get ignored in favour of the italicized sentence when they don't contradict each other?
Ok, I'll admit to not having looked at the exact definition of DR in over 2 years, so my off the cuff remark was a guideline from memory, not a definitive rules statement. Now that you've got me thinking about it, I can think of a couple of exceptions that would violate my earlier statement - DR doesn't protect from bleed damage or drowning damage, for instance.
That said, you're wrong about those statements not contradicting each other. One says that DR protects from weapons, while the other says that it doesn't protect against spells. Since the Pathfinder definition of a weapon includes many spells, those statements are contradictory.
But back to the original point, I stand by my statement that DR does lessen falling damage. The whole point of DR is that it protects against being hit by physical objects. Whether it's a manufactured weapon, natural attack, improvised weapon, or the ground rushing up to meet you because you missed a reflex save, those are all different ways that you can have an outside, non-magical, non-energy based, physical object slam into you, and DR treats them all the same.
Btw, that's also my reason for saying that DR does NOT protect against bleed or drowning damage, despite neither of those things being mentioned at all in the rule you quoted.
The ground is not a weapon or natural attack. Unless you want to argue the sudden stop and collision of the creature cells against each other a nature weapon.
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Damage Reduction
Some magic creatures have the supernatural ability to instantly heal damage from weapons or ignore blows altogether as though they were invulnerable.The numerical part of a creature's damage reduction (or DR) is the amount of damage the creature ignores from normal attacks. Usually, a certain type of weapon can overcome this reduction (see Overcoming DR). This information is separated from the damage reduction number by a slash. For example, DR 5/magic means that a creature takes 5 less points of damage from all weapons that are not magic. If a dash follows the slash, then the damage reduction is effective against any attack that does not ignore damage reduction.
Whenever damage reduction completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates most special effects that accompany the attack, such as injury poison, a monk's stunning, and injury-based disease. Damage reduction does not negate touch attacks, energy damage dealt along with an attack, or energy drains. Nor does it affect poisons or diseases delivered by inhalation, ingestion, or contact.
Attacks that deal no damage because of the target's damage reduction do not disrupt spells.
Spells, spell-like abilities, and energy attacks (even nonmagical fire) ignore damage reduction.
Sometimes damage reduction represents instant healing. Sometimes it represents the creature's tough hide or body. In either case, other characters can see that conventional attacks won't work.
If a creature has damage reduction from more than one source, the two forms of damage reduction do not stack. Instead, the creature gets the benefit of the best damage reduction in a given situation.
Overcoming DR: Damage reduction may be overcome by special materials, magic weapons (any weapon with a +1 or higher enhancement bonus, not counting the enhancement from masterwork quality), certain types of weapons (such as slashing or bludgeoning), and weapons imbued with an alignment.
Ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an enhancement bonus of +1 or higher is treated as a magic weapon for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. Similarly, ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an alignment gains the alignment of that projectile weapon (in addition to any alignment it may already have).
Weapons with an enhancement bonus of +3 or greater can ignore some types of damage reduction, regardless of their actual material or alignment. The following table shows what type of enhancement bonus is needed to overcome some common types of damage reduction.
DR Type Weapon Enhancement Bonus Equivalent
cold iron/silver +3
adamantine* +4
alignment-based +5
* Note that this does not give the ability to ignore hardness, like an actual adamantine weapon does
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I'm not sure why hardness is applied before you determine how much damage is dealt, since that would reduce it much more than the other way around. If the intent is to reduce the damage more than the total hardness, then that is how you should do it. If the hardness is how much should be removed, you need to determine the total with vulnerability included before subtracting hardness.
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I hate timeouts.
I had a very neat table of why vulnerability should be applied before hardness, but it vanished.
Anyway, vulnerability before hardness results in (slightly) more damage to the hardness protected object/creature (5 points in general) which is what I personally expect from something that's vulnerable to something.
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Here's the way I look at damage for pathfinder. There's basically 3 damage categories in the game. Physical, metaphysical and stress.
Physical damage includes weapons, falling, and some spells (such as ice store's bludgeoning part). DR applies only again physical damage.
Metaphysical damage includes most spells and mundane elemental damage (such as from a fire). Hardness applies against both physical and metaphysical damage. Energy resistances/immunities apply only to metaphysical damage.
Stress damage is caused by over exertion or malfunctioning. This includes forced marching, starving and suffocation. Nothing reduces stress damage.
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Posts seem to indicate apply hardness, then vulnerability.
The logic is basically if a creature were to augment its resistances to protect against damage it is vulnerable to, then that resistance should be somewhat meaningful. So apply the resistance first, then the vulnerability. The proposed scenario is typically something with fire vulnerability putting up Resist Energy Fire - that they invested a spell into having resistance should mean that they get a measurable benefit.
It seems logical to me. But I guess natural resistance could be a little bit different?
Applying the vulnerability first makes the resistance a little less significant, because then you're doing
Damage * 1.5 - Resistance
Whereas if you do it the other way,
(Damage - Resistance) * 1.5
The resistance has more weight because you're effectively also multiplying it by 1.5.
Either way, the extra damage from vulnerability is still going to be an effective difference in most cases.
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I prefer the other way around, first vulnerability then resistance/hardness.
You are more susceptible for it, thus you need to work harder than those without vulnerability to resist it.
Yes that means that you have to invest more into resistance than others and that the same level of resistance is less effective for you than for those without the vulnerability.
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realizing that "vulnerability" is not normally a PC feature, the issue of which feature to apply first is only going to be effecting "monsters".
Vulnerability then resistance means weaker monster HP.
Resistance then vulnerability means stronger monster HP.
(IMHO) many posters here are first seeing this thru the PC vs. Judge lens...
I wonder how many of the posters on here would be in reverse camps if vulnerability was a PC trait and the order of resolving them effected the strength of the PCs?
This debate should be on the rules forum.
And if there is really anything unclear, perhaps some kind designers will comment on it.
Untill then i fear it might be table variation.
Unfortunately table variation often includes rules unclarities due to GM/players just not knowing or understanding.
In this case, it could be argued that it might be a good tool though, since a friendly GM could go easier on weaker groups or heavier on cheesier groups. ;)
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Here are several posts saying the same thing.
And yet it would be equally bizarre to roll vulnerability if a creature has immunity to a given energy type, would it not?
Energy Immunity and Vulnerability
A creature with energy immunity never takes damage from that energy type. Vulnerability means the creature takes half again as much (+50%) damage as normal from that energy type, regardless of whether a saving throw is allowed or if the save is a success or failure.
Again does imply that it must have taken the damage in the first place, yes?
EDIT: Incidentally, the "meaningless" interpretation of the rules coincides with the justification provided by the 3.5 FAQ.
If the creature has both resistance and vulnerability to the same kind of damage, apply the resistance (which reduces the damage dealt by the effect) before applying the vulnerability (which increases the damage taken by the creature). For example, imagine our frost giant wore a ring of minor fire resistance (granting resistance to fire 10). If the save failed, the frost giant would take 37 points of fire damage: 35 (fireball) – 10 (resistance to fire 10) = 25, plus one-half of 25 (12.5, rounded down to 12). If the save succeeded, the frost giant would take only 10 points of damage: 17 (half damage from the fireball, rounded down) – 10 (resistance to fire 10) = 7, plus one-half of 7 (3.5, rounded down to 3). As a general guideline, whenever the rules don’t stipulate an order of operations for special effects (such as spells or
special abilities), you should apply them in the order that’s most beneficial to the creature. In the case of damage, this typically means applying any damage-reducing effects first, before applying any effects that would increase damage.
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It is unfortunate if this is the way it works. It does not reward players from choosing the "right" type of energy.
Look at DR. A skeleton has DR 5/bludgeoning. A fighter uses a short sword on the skeleton, rolls a 6, and does 1 point of damage. But if he switches to the "right" weapon, say a mace, and does rolls a 6 then he does all 6 points of damage. The fighter is rewarded for choosing the right weapon.
Now look at a robot with hardness 5 and vulnerability to electricity. A sorcerer uses an elemental ray of fire, rolls a 6, and gets 1 point of damage. So she switches to shocking grasp, rolls a 6 for damage and gets 1 point of damage. There is no reward here for choosing the right energy. Moreover, she decides that she has only a limited number of those each day, so she switches to her crossbow. Again she rolls max damage, an 8, and does 3 points of damage.
As a participant in this interactive story-telling game, I think it would be far better for a character to choose the most thematically appropriate effect. In the case of robots, it is more cinematic for characters to use electricity effects than other forms of energy, yet they are not encouraged to through the mechanics. In practice, when dealing with a creature who has hardness, one should instead use whatever deals the most raw damage; all other considerations are secondary. That's a little sad, it diminishes the thematic coolness of robots, in my opinion.
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Now imagine if the sorcerer used snowball for 5d6 and rolled 17 points of damage. She does 12 points of damage. Then she switches to shocking grasp, also rolling 17 points of damage. After vulnerability, she deals 18 points of damage.
The thematic choice was rewarded when using abilities powerful enough to affect the creature, not not rewarded when the abilities were too weak to affect the creature.
But yes, hitting something with a heavy object over and over will outdo one-shot spells in the damage category.