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The rules specifically mention natural armor bonus of +5 being sufficient to prevent a worm from burrowing, but what about damage reduction, does it matter?
It seems like a creature with damage reduction, especially aginst piercing or slashing attacks should be resilient to worm burrowing, but at what point 5/, 10/, or higher?
Also, I would think that the Stoneskin spell, since it provides the recipient 10/adamantine damage reduction would be an effective worm repellent.
Has anyone else had this discussion?
The rules specifically mention natural armor bonus of +5 being sufficient to prevent a worm from burrowing, but what about damage reduction, does it matter?
It seems like a creature with damage reduction, especially aginst piercing or slashing attacks should be resilient to worm burrowing, but at what point 5/, 10/, or higher?
Also, I would think that the Stoneskin spell, since it provides the recipient 10/adamantine damage reduction would be an effective worm repellent.
Has anyone else had this discussion?
Per the rules, stoneskin wouldn't help since the worms don't deal damage.
Just get potions of barkskin and you should be fine.
actually, on further thought I'm not so sure that my first answer is correct. The worms do 1 point of damage as they burrow, so if the target has DR the worms shouldn't be able to affect it.
If so, barbarians and warlocks would be much more useful in this AP.
any "official" answers on this?
Not official but wormforged worms would get past stoneskin.
Not sure if they could transform a fleshbag.
Probably just would kill the humanoid.
i know that an attack that transmits poison or disease won't have an effect if the attack doesn't cause damage due to DR, so I would think the same would apply to this, except that it's not technically a disease....
I ran into the same issue in my game over the weekend -- worm burrowing and DR.
I'll admit, I think I was working too hard to make it make sense for the worm to burrow, but I latched onto the description of DR that describes some DR as exceptional toughness, and some as instant healing (and the example given of the instant healing sort was demonic DRs, which is the source of Warlock DR).
I will admit that I really, really wanted the worms to be able to burrow. As a DM I was really disappointed with the idea that they would be so easy to shrug off, at least for some characters. So I latched onto the "rapid healing" interpretation and ruled that the worm could still burrow towards the character's brain, but the damage it caused was absorbed by the DR (as the tunnel it was burrowing closed behind it). At this point, I'm not at all sure that was the right decision, but I'm looking for some other references and ideas that will help support that.
You mentioned that a natural armor bonus of +5 is enough to keep out a worm -- where is that reference?
-j
check the entry for the Spawn of Kyuss in EaBK or the MMII.
I generally prefer to think of DR as impenetrable rather than super fast healing. That's what regeneration and fast healing are for in my opinon. Also, poison and disease should be able to work if DR is fast healing.
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Believe me, I'd rather keep the situation reasonably perilous for my players. It just seems counterintuitive that a barkskin spell, which by description makes your skin as tough as bark, would prevent burrowing, but a stoneskin spell, which makes your skin as hard as stone, would not.
How the heck could a worm burrow through stone but be thwarted by bark? And call me crazy, but I've always hated being put in one of those situations with my players where I have to say, "because the rules say so" with no real rationale.
The reason I brought it up was because a player playing a warlock had a worm burrow into his arm. He tried to blast it off with an eldrtich blast, but criticaly fumbled and blasted his own arm off in the process (he was ok with this outcome). I later realized that he had DR 2/cold iron and the worm probably couldn't have burrowed into him.
Yeah I know the temptation is strong as a DM to feel like it's a ripoff to be able to protect yourself against the horrific effects in your toybox--but think about it this way; the characters are trying to adapt to terrible situations in the world they are in, and are trying to be shrewd and clever in avoiding the danger they're in. To swat away their very good ideas because they go against the game mechanics is a good way to get players to switch their brains off and just go chugging disgruntledly down the railroad tracks you've set.
Game mechanics aside if a worm is gonna' tunnel into your flesh to your brain and eat it, a spell that would turn your skin to a stony consistancy would stop it dead--game mechanics or no. On the other hand, the idea that barbarians can take a bit less damage from each attack (in reverse to the way sneak attacks and crits work) strikes me as less a matter of invulnerability as much as inurement to damage. Likewise I like the idea that damage reduction that comes from instant regeneration are no barrier either.
Frankly there's a lot of weaknesses in the mechanics of D20. Nothing that is unfixable, but a lot that I would change if suddenly someone died and willed the WotC company to me. So basically I would say keep as many rules as makes sense for you, but don't completely suffocate the flame of ingenuity and creativity and real worldness that makes the game fun.