First of all, I'd like to say I *really* like the Downtime rules - as a player and a GM. Having my character be able to be a part of a community rather than a wandering murderhobo forever or being able to hand out abstract awards to my players ("The construct wasn't carrying any treasure... but from it's shattered remains you manage to scavenge 2 Magic points worth of magic dust") is fantastic.
Anyway...
I'm sorry if this was already asked and answered elsewhere - I searched, and couldn't find anything on it.
My question: How much hp/hardness does a typical room have?
I know the general description says “A room can be as simple as a 10-foot-by-10-foot area surrounded by wooden walls, or as complex as a stone-walled guard tower with a heavy wooden gate.”, but that’s nto very specific. That’s like the difference between a level 1-fighter in scale mail and a level 10 fighter in mithril plate.
We get a little bit of specifics in this section:
“Exterior doors are good wooden doors with simple locks. Interior doors are simple wooden doors with no locks. You may install different locks by paying the normal price for locks.” (Keep in mind some specific rooms already have strong wooden doors or better included in their price.)
There's a section on there mentioning that rooms get the "Broken" condition if they take more than half their hp in damage:
"Broken Rooms: If a room takes damage in excess of half its hit points (or is otherwise rendered sufficiently damaged by a downtime event or at the GM's discretion), it gains the broken condition."
But despite combing the Downtime rules both on the PFSRD and in my Ultimate Campaign book, I've not been able to find any definite statement of how much hp a room is supposed to have, or even what it's made of (wood? masonry? stone?). What if I want to know if my building survived a monster attack or not? Why leave it up to GM fiat?
So without explicit info, I had to rely on the implicit.
1) The "Fortification" Augmentation says:
"This upgrade can be applied to any room, reinforcing walls, improving doors, and treating or replacing flammable materials. Upon buying this upgrade, the room's walls have their hardness increased by +2, the doors are improved to strong wooden doors (hardness 5, hit points 20), and walls and floors gain fire resistance 5."
So that tells us that most rooms are *not* flame-resistant by default. This seems to rule out materials like brick and stone for default room walls.
2) “Defensive Wall
This simple *wooden* wall, fence, or hedge surrounds your structure and provides a modicum of security.”
Wood seems to be the default material for defensive walls, as was common for stockades until castle engineering became more advanced (although wooden forts were still used by those who could not afford castles of stone, or as temporary military encampments). If such stalwart defensive structures are made of wood, it seems doubtful that the default for ordinary bedrooms and barns would be much sturdier.
3) “Shack
This no-frills wooden shelter contains a simple table, pallet bed, and stool. One person can build a shack with simple tools and basic materials. For an additional 1 point of Goods and 2 points of Labor, you can construct a brick or stone hut instead of a wooden shack.”
Again, wood is the default material, stone costs extra. We know wood has a hardness of 5 and 10 hp /in. of thickness.
But how *much* wood are we talking about for a typical wall? The PF Downtime rules don’t say. Looking through my D&D 3E Stronghold Builder's Guidebook, page 36 (hey, PF was designed with backwards compatibility in mind, so I’m counting this as relevant) gives us 6 inches of wood for a typical wooden wall, hardness 5, 60 HP, Break DC 20, Climb DC 21. A wooden freestanding wall (like one going around your fort) is 1’ wide, 5 hardness, 120 HP, Break DC 26, Climb DC 21
So there you have it folks:
Until the good people at Paizo tell me otherwise, I’m assuming that the typical room stats look something like this:
[Conjecture]: 6” Wooden walls; [hardness 5, 60 HP, Break DC 20]/5-foot square
[Official]: “Exterior doors are good wooden doors with simple locks. Interior doors are simple wooden doors with no locks.”
So if I have a 4-square room, it’ll have 240 HP (60x4). If it takes 120+ damage, it’ll be broken.
What do y’all think?
Well your 1-story walls are probably around 10' tall. The exact hp would depend on the size of the room and how many walls you have.
The stats I got for the wall were "per space". In The Stronghold Builder's Guidebook, an average "stronghold space" was assumed to be 20'x20' square and 10' high. In PF Downtime, our rooms can be as small as a 5'x5' shed or outhouse.
Remember, these 60 hp wooden walls are not freestanding. They rely on each other and internal bracing for support. If I destroy 3 out of 4 walls of a 5'x5' shed, that 4th wall isn't gonna stand on its own very well.
So I would interpret it as every 5' wide, 10' tall square of our
6” Wooden walls has hardness 5, 60 HP, and Break DC 20.
Oh, and "on ground level", since it takes the Arboreal upgrade to raise it up above that level.
So a bigger room is going to be able to soak up more damage, but the trade-off is you're hogging up more real estate for one purpose you could be using for other stuff.
And remember, a "room" doesn't have to be "in a building". A 1-square kitchen can be food stand at the market, a "taco wagon", a ship's galley, etc.
Since the official rules don't have anything for building up or down (and the default seems to be mostly ground-level structures, except specific rooms like the Gatehouse), I'd probably say as a "quick-n-dirty" rule for players wanting to build towers or dungeons is that for every level above or below ground floor multiply the cost by the number away from ground floor +1. So 2nd floor (or a basement) costs x2, 3rd floor (or sub-basement) costs x3.
Anyway, "Stronghold Builder's Guidebook" and "Strongholds & Dynasties" go into way more detail about structures made of brick, stone, or fancier stuff like adamantium, as well as building towers and dungeons, so if my players want to push the envelope beyond building "fantasy medieval Moscow" (New Stetven?) where everything is made out of wood, I'll let them adapt stuff out of those supplements.
Yay backwards compatibility!
Update: So now I've found actual, official rules for building hp/hardness. They're hidden away in the end of the Siege Weapons section of Ultimate Combat.