We're playing a 12th level 3.5 party, and last session something happened that caused discussion and disagreement among the players.
I am playing a sorcerer/abjurant champion with a 16 con and 95 hit points, and I was hit by a prismatic spray-type trap. I Failed two reflex saves and ended up taking 20 points of acid damage and 40 points of electric damage, bringing me down to 35 hp.
Then I failed the fortitude save against the poison (the saves were extremely hard) which caused me to lose 10 points of constitution.
Here's the problem. One player says that I am dead, because the con damage caused me to lose an additional 60 hp. The other player (who is also the DM but is trying to adhere to the rules as opposed to fudging it) found a passage in the DMG that says that even if you take enough con damage that the hit point loss would kill you, you still are alive with one hit point per hit die left (which in my case would be 12hp).
Obviously if your con was reduced to 0 you would die, but what happens here? Am I still alive but weakened, or is it time to roll up a new character?
We're playing a 12th level 3.5 party, and last session something happened that caused discussion and disagreement among the players.
I am playing a sorcerer/abjurant champion with a 16 con and 95 hit points, and I was hit by a prismatic spray-type trap. I Failed two reflex saves and ended up taking 20 points of acid damage and 40 points of electric damage, bringing me down to 35 hp.
Then I failed the fortitude save against the poison (the saves were extremely hard) which caused me to lose 10 points of constitution.Here's the problem. One player says that I am dead, because the con damage caused me to lose an additional 60 hp. The other player (who is also the DM but is trying to adhere to the rules as opposed to fudging it) found a passage in the DMG that says that even if you take enough con damage that the hit point loss would kill you, you still are alive with one hit point per hit die left (which in my case would be 12hp).
Obviously if your con was reduced to 0 you would die, but what happens here? Am I still alive but weakened, or is it time to roll up a new character?
You took 60 points of damage from the acid and lightning. Your Con damage reduced your permanent hp from 95. At -5 points per die from your 10 Con damage, your permanent hp dropped from 95 to 35. On top of that you took 60 points of damage. So unless you had a Con score after damage of 26 or greater, you're dead. Con damage effectively rewrites your permanent hp, it's not exactly damage per se. The DM is talking about the fact that when rolling hp you always get a minimum of 1 point per die. At 35 hp you're still over that number.
You took 60 points of damage from the acid and lightning. Your Con damage reduced your permanent hp from 95. At -5 points per die from your 10 Con damage, your permanent hp dropped from 95 to 35. On top of that you took 60 points of damage. So unless you had a Con score after damage of 26 or greater, you're dead. Con damage effectively rewrites your permanent hp, it's not exactly damage per se. The DM is talking about the fact that when rolling hp you always get a minimum of 1 point per die. At 35 hp you're still over that number.
+1
That sucks for me, but that's what I originally thought. The passage in the DMG is not worded very well IMO.
Now the party is in dire straights, because the trap that killed me, turned our rogue/cleric into a statue and teleported our hexblade.....somewhere..... was in a red dragon's lair. We were helping a gold dragon kill a red (HE was killing the red, we were killing the red's minions), with a promise from the gold that we could help ourselves to anything from the red's hoard except for any artifacts. The whole reason we were after the red's hoard in the FIRST place was to hopefully get enough diamonds to resurrect our fighter, who was killed by a black dragon (in spectacularly gruesome fashion) a few sessions ago. So now no fighter, no sorcerer, no hexblade....man, our poor ranger and de-stoned rogue/cleric are gonna have a HELL of a time!
That sucks for me, but that's what I originally thought. The passage in the DMG is not worded very well IMO.
Now the party is in dire straights, because the trap that killed me, turned our rogue/cleric into a statue and teleported our hexblade.....somewhere..... was in a red dragon's lair. We were helping a gold dragon kill a red (HE was killing the red, we were killing the red's minions), with a promise from the gold that we could help ourselves to anything from the red's hoard except for any artifacts. The whole reason we were after the red's hoard in the FIRST place was to hopefully get enough diamonds to resurrect our fighter, who was killed by a black dragon (in spectacularly gruesome fashion) a few sessions ago. So now no fighter, no sorcerer, no hexblade....man, our poor ranger and de-stoned rogue/cleric are gonna have a HELL of a time!
That sucks. Methinks someone needs to get better dice out when rolling to find traps after this little prismatic spray incident...if they survive!
Well the kicker is that we have a houserule that each player gets ONE re-roll per night...and he chose not to use it. He was disarming the trap, then rolled a 1 (auto-failure) and then rolled again to confirm a critical failure. 3. The trap went off, turning him to stone.
He was the only other person in the room at the time, so our hexblade went in next followed by my sorcerer. The room was filled with four mirrors, and here was our rogue turned to stone.
My sorcerer, having NO knowledge of traps, figures that perhaps our rogue looked into the mirror and this was what turned him to stone...so he shoots the mirror with a crossbow, hoping to break the mirror and thereby the spell. Not only did it NOT break the mirror, but caused the WHOLE ROOM to be subjected to the prismatic spray-like effect.
Not our best night as a group.
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A roll of a 1 on a skill check isn't an automatic failure. That's attack rolls and saving throws. There are no critical failures in the rules either, that's like crazy bad house rules as your example shows.
Give that his DC should have been somewhere around 32 he probably still fails it but I thought I should point that out. 12th level rogue, 3.5 D&D...yeah +31 to Disable Device seems unlikely. Probably not impossible though...
15 from skill points
5 from magical item, like the cheap ones in the Eberron book.
3 from Skill Focus (Disable Device)
2 from Nimble Fingers
2 from masterwork thieves tools
So I got a +27 with that.
Assuming like a what? 20 dexterity for another +5 and no ACP you'd be at +32. Wow, I do make it on a 1. Even without one of those feats you don't fail to the point you set the trap off.
Why roll at all at that point though? Take 10, get a 42 and move on. You'd have to run into a magical trap containing a 18th level spell to even start failing. Not sure what would make a trap DC 47, but that would be pretty sick for 12th level.
I do have one little piece of advice for the party:
When someone is disarming a trap STAND BACK!!!!!
As this simple advice does not seem to have been followed, my sympathy is drastically limited. If he hadn't found the trap it would be one thing. But he did find it so anyone other than himself getting caught it in has only themselves to blame.
Although at 12th level a prismatic spray trap seems more than a little excessive. How did it get made in the first place? It would require someone with the caster level to make it as an item which means either a) there is a high level caster ahead who can drop them on you himself or b) the GM didn't bother to think about that and should get a smack on the back of the head. If it's a then you might want to rethink being there in the first place. If it's b you can tell your GM when you smack him that I told you to do it.
I do have one little piece of advice for the party:
When someone is disarming a trap STAND BACK!!!!!
As this simple advice does not seem to have been followed, my sympathy is drastically limited.
I think you should have read farther down the thread. In fact, they followed "stay back" so precisely that it was the cause of this entire debacle.
That and a failed "don't do anything stupid" check.
regardless of character actions; which are irrelavant; basically; you have hp based on your rolls; so you should record your rolls; if you gm just give max or something like that; then not needed; but your hps are your rolls plus your con bonus or negative if you have low con.
say your rolls equal 50 points for 10 dice; if you dont have your individual rolls; you will see the issue shortly
lets say you have a con bonus of +3; that would mean you have 30 extra hps so 80 hps; but it really mean you have 1d# + con bonus per level. now if you roll a 2; that is 2+3 for 5hps; ok; now here is the kicker; if your con bonus is suddenly -3; so you loose hps; it is not just 50 -30 for your hps; leaving you 20; it is 1d# -con negative with a minimum of 1 point per level. So, in our example; that roll of two does not become a negative number; it has a minimum of 1; thus you cant just apply -30 to your total hits; that cheats you as a player.
so for a d10 hps; your hps per level is 1-7 for a -3 con; and 4-13 for a +3 bonus. You really need to make sure the math isnt killing you by rounding errors and bad math application.
it is not at all fair to just apply a big con minus to hps; like your taking damage; that is not right; the con needs to be applied to the each roll per level; jsut like when you gained them or bad math is what is going to kill you.
your gm should be very careful to not make con damage like real damage; but instead as a loss of bonus per level; apply this correctly, and whatever the result; you may or may not come out below zero; also; con damage cannot take you below zero, so if the damage takes you to -1 hps; the con damage cant take you lower; ie; less heathly than not alive, so you should have to worry about being -8 or whatever true death is by the rules, and a person should be able to stabilize you.
hope this helps.
I'm not sure a lot of people "record their rolls".