|
2 people marked this as FAQ candidate.
|
Does the venom spur count as an untyped weapon?
Does weapon focus and specialization apply?
I can't seem to find anything that says it does. (even though I really want it to.)
Additional Question:
Can a character, at the time the Venom Spur is grown & implanted, specify that the poison is to be non-lethal? (Always non-lethal damage for the poison itself, like a sedative, even though the sting would still do lethal damage).
I looked this up just recently, as part of a thread over in the advice forum for a Vesk Unarmed Mystic. Venom Spurs are almost completely undefined, but I'll do my best:
1) There are no rules supporting having the venom spur's venom deal nonlethal. You can swing the spur itself for nonlethal (i.e. the 1d6 P), as you can do so with all melee weapons.
2) Venom Spurs aren't described as being Basic Melee or Advanced Melee, so there are only two options: they are, or they are not. If they are not, focus and specialization can't apply, because you can't become proficient with venom spurs (and hence will always take the -4 penalty to hit). If they are, Advanced Melee doesn't make sense, but there's a good argument to be had that Venom Spurs are meant to modify your unarmed attack damage, meaning they're Basic Melee, and all the rules you're expecting to apply to Unarmed Attacks aside from what Venom Spurs say apply, meaning Venom Spurs also have the Archaic and Nonlethal keywords base.
From a homebrew perspective, I recommend treating them as Unarmed modifiers - a melee weapon you literally can't become proficient with is so stupid no one would ever buy it, and hence no one would ever sell it.
quindraco wrote: I looked this up just recently, as part of a thread over in the advice forum for a Vesk Unarmed Mystic. Venom Spurs are almost completely undefined, but I'll do my best:
1) There are no rules supporting having the venom spur's venom deal nonlethal. You can swing the spur itself for nonlethal (i.e. the 1d6 P), as you can do so with all melee weapons.
2) Venom Spurs aren't described as being Basic Melee or Advanced Melee, so there are only two options: they are, or they are not. If they are not, focus and specialization can't apply, because you can't become proficient with venom spurs (and hence will always take the -4 penalty to hit). If they are, Advanced Melee doesn't make sense, but there's a good argument to be had that Venom Spurs are meant to modify your unarmed attack damage, meaning they're Basic Melee, and all the rules you're expecting to apply to Unarmed Attacks aside from what Venom Spurs say apply, meaning Venom Spurs also have the Archaic and Nonlethal keywords base.
From a homebrew perspective, I recommend treating them as Unarmed modifiers - a melee weapon you literally can't become proficient with is so stupid no one would ever buy it, and hence no one would ever sell it.
As per page 243, under weapon proficency, "All characters are proficent with any natural weapons they might have, such as a claw or bite."
Unclear if Venom Spur is a natural weapon or if natural weapons are considered a weapon group for weapon specialization, but based on this, I'd argue that proficency is assumed for the venom spur.
My main question regarding the Venom Spur is if you can use it while wearing clothing/armor that covers you. Seems like an environmental suit would have issues with a stinger piercing the glove....
Pax Miles wrote: As per page 243, under weapon proficency, "All characters are proficent with any natural weapons they might have, such as a claw or bite."
Unclear if Venom Spur is a natural weapon or if natural weapons are considered a weapon group for weapon specialization, but based on this, I'd argue that proficency is assumed for the venom spur.
My main question regarding the Venom Spur is if you can use it while wearing clothing/armor that covers you. Seems like an environmental suit would have issues with a stinger piercing the glove....
I mean, I stand by what I said - we don't have a rule telling us what the spur is, so we don't have a rule telling us it's a natural weapon. But again, I super duper agree with you about what the RAI probably is.
As for using it in a suit, it's not even the only weapon of its type in the game - e.g. Dead Sun 3 has similar stuff in it. I think it's pretty clear it's RAI that it should work like climbing suckers, which means you need custom armor/clothing to make it work without damaging your stuff, but it's not clear how to go about getting said custom stuff. If I were the GM, I'd houserule that the Adjusting Armor rules on page 196 can be cross-applied to any armor or clothing in the book when having it "adjusted" for exotic needs like an augment.
Of course, that also assumes the venom spur is immune to things the armor was protecting you from, like hard vacuum.
quindraco wrote: I mean, I stand by what I said - we don't have a rule telling us what the spur is, so we don't have a rule telling us it's a natural weapon. That wasn't really my point. Just pointing out that Natural weapons are covered and there is a proficency for them. And Unarmed Strike is listed as part of Basic Melee Weapons so provificency is there too. To me, seems like more of a stretch to assume a need for proficency than it is to assume non-proficency. So I assume proficency in the respect that I don't think you are expected to take -4 to attack with venom spur, since it doesn't describe or imply this anywhere in the description.
Additionally, the Venom Spur does not describe itself as a weapon. So I doubt weapon proficency applies here. I think this is just an ability that deals a flat d6 piercing per attack (plus poison). I question if strength adds to damage.
|
7 people marked this as FAQ candidate.
|
So, thus far we are wanting some form of official rulings:
1 Clarification on whether the Venom Spur is a weapon (Natural or otherwise, and what kind of weapon is it, if it is indeed a weapon, and what are the attack modifiers if it is not a weapon since the Venom Spur does state that attacks are made with it)
2 Clarification on whether suit customization is needed for use in environments where gloves might be worn (e.g. space, also this might apply to Dragon Glands)
3 Clarification on whether venom spur venom can be made non-lethal at time of installation/creation (which might also be nice in the Electrostatic Field armor upgrades, and just for clarity, the Dragon Gland-although I tend to agree that the acid, cold and fire options would be harder to make non-lethal)
Until the above are properly clarified, we are stuck with the general GM question of:
Do we permit that which is not explicitly prohibited, or [exclusive or] prohibit that which is not explicitly permitted (no matter how clever an idea the players may have come up with)?
WolfhawkAz wrote: Until the above are properly clarified, we are stuck with the general GM question of:
Do we permit that which is not explicitly prohibited, or [exclusive or] prohibit that which is not explicitly permitted (no matter how clever an idea the players may have come up with)?
Not the GM, but if I was:
Easiest to consider it a natural weapon. I would not allow it to function within an environmental suit (same the dragon glands), you'd have to remove a glove/helmet in order to use them (or otherwise be able to expose that part of your body in order to use them).
But that would be a houserule, or rather, how I would resolve it if it came up in-play.
While we're at it, does it count as an operative weapon?
thistledown wrote: While we're at it, does it count as an operative weapon? Almost certainly not - there are no operative natural weapons in the game that I know of (unarmed strike certainly is not). Closest you can get is those necrograft bone spurs, but they're explicitly labeled as operative.
Recent threads in Rules Questions
|
