Reduced person using medium weapon

[Brett Gillespie]

Could a human with reduce person cast on it use a regular medium sized light crossbow?

I'm trying to find some way to take advantage of the good benefits of Reduce Person, but not get gimped by my crossbow being one size smaller. I was thinking that if I set the crossbow down, get reduced, then pick it up again, it will remain it's original size while I'm smaller.

Can you think of any complications to this idea? Besides the -2 for using an improperly sized weapon (effectively cancelled out with the +2 dex and +1 attack given by reduce person).

The light crossbow entry says it can be wielded with 1 hand, but at a -2 penalty. However, as a small creature using a medium crossbow, I would definitely be using 2 hands. It'd just be one size larger.

Thoughts?

[Name Violation]

your cross bow reduces with you. however once the bolt leaves the bow the bolt becomes regular size, meaning it does normal damage

[Brett Gillespie]

that wasn't what i was referring to. if i'm reduced, and i pick up a weapon off the ground, does that weapon automatically reduce?

if i pick up a weapon (that wasn't on my person when i reduced), does it stay the original size because it wasn't among my possessions when the spell took effect.

[ZeroCharisma]

I don't know if your GM would go for it, but a clever adaptation my ren-faire gaming group came up with was the use of a sling that one wore over the shoulder to which one's crossbow was attached.

When adventuring with, say, a low level mage, one would keep a crossbow loaded on this sling, fire it and then "drop" it, at which point it would still be "worn" or "carried", meaning it would reduce with you if you later chose to cast reduce person.

The crossbow can be an unwieldy weapon as it is, and this little "trick" helps make it a better option. Of course, now that most casters have abilities which allow them to do crossbow-esque (or better) damage several times per day, the frequency with which crossbows are even used by such classes has reduced considerably.

[Name Violation]

Brett Gillespie wrote:

that wasn't what i was referring to. if i'm reduced, and i pick up a weapon off the ground, does that weapon automatically reduce?

if i pick up a weapon (that wasn't on my person when i reduced), does it stay the original size because it wasn't among my possessions when the spell took effect.

no it stays the same size if you drop it and pick it up.

i was saying there is no advantage to dropping it then picking it up, when it gets the same damage both ways.

but if you really wanna take a -2 to hit feel free

[Brett Gillespie]

thanks for the input. truth be told my character would be a Rogue/Alchemist. i was just looking for a way to overcome the stupid decreased damage die on crossbows by reduce person. hehe.

[Name Violation]

Name Violation wrote:

Brett Gillespie wrote:

that wasn't what i was referring to. if i'm reduced, and i pick up a weapon off the ground, does that weapon automatically reduce?

if i pick up a weapon (that wasn't on my person when i reduced), does it stay the original size because it wasn't among my possessions when the spell took effect.

no it stays the same size if you drop it and pick it up.

i was saying there is no advantage to dropping it then picking it up, when it gets the same damage both ways. since once the bolt leaves the cross bow it reverts to normal size. there is no reason to over complicate things. reduce person doesnt gimp the damage of ranged weapons or ammo since they become full size once they leave your possession and do normal damage.

but if you really wanna take a -2 to hit, and have no benefit feel free, but may i suggest the deadly aim feat so you at least get some benefit if you really wanna take a negative.

[Brett Gillespie]

I'm all for avoiding a penalty, but according to the spell Reduce person, which says in particular,

"Melee and projectile weapons deal less damage. Other magical properties are not affected by this spell. Any reduced item that leaves the reduced creature's possession (including a projectile or thrown weapon) instantly returns to its normal size. This means that thrown weapons deal their normal damage (projectiles deal damage based on the size of the weapon that fired them)."

Note the last part about projectiles dealing damage based on the size of the weapon that fired them, and not on the actual size of the projectile itself.

Based on that, the weapon would be gimped if it were smaller. imo. hence the whole reason for the thread to begin with..checking out a way to get past that. hehe

[Name Violation]

huh. totally missed that part. sorry 'bout that

[Brett Gillespie]

its all good. thats why i'm trying to find some way past that. i figure if he drops his crossbow, drinks the potion of reduce person, then picks it back up, he'll be able to still fight for the same damage, but with better accuracy.

thanks. ;)

[Magicdealer]

My suggestion is to carry around more that one crossbow. Use your light crossbow as per normal.

it is 1d819-20

Keep a heavy crossbow on you for when you drink your reduce potion.

the heavy crossbow is normally 1d10 19-20
When reduced it becomes 1d8 19-20

Same as your original light crossbow.
The reload time increases, which can be offset by the rapid reload feat to knock it down to light crossbow-reloading time. But this way you benefit from an improved attack bonus.

Unfortunately, if you use the improperly sized weapon, you'll be taking -2 to hit from it. You get a +1 size, and a +2 to your dex, which becomes an effective +1 to hit. So you won't be gaining much from reducing yourself beyond the bonus to armor class.

[Abraham spalding]

Crossbows don't have a damage decrease from reduce person. Once the bolt leaves the crossbow it returns to normal size and deals normal damage.

[Magicdealer]

Abraham, check some of the earlier posters, and specifically check the reduce person spell.

The bolt size isn't what deals damage on crossbows. The reduce spell clarifies that projectiles *such as arrows and bolts* deal damage based on the size of the weapon that fired them.

It's third paragraph from the bottom in the reduce person entry on page 330. Easy to overlook :/

[Name Violation]

Abraham spalding wrote:

Crossbows don't have a damage decrease from reduce person. Once the bolt leaves the crossbow it returns to normal size and deals normal damage.

thats what I said, but "(projectiles deal damage based on the size of the weapon that fired them)" kinda shut that down

[Abraham spalding]

Name Violation wrote:

Abraham spalding wrote:

Crossbows don't have a damage decrease from reduce person. Once the bolt leaves the crossbow it returns to normal size and deals normal damage.

thats what I said, but "(projectiles deal damage based on the size of the weapon that fired them)" kinda shut that down

Yeah of course it does -- because you know a crossbow bolt that is medium size is going to deal less damage just because the crossbow it was fired from is smaller, but the dagger that just got bigger deals full damage...

This makes sense why?

By this accounting the damage of a crossbow bolt from a person under an enlarge person spell should increase, (same with the bow actually) since it's the size of the weapon that matters.

[Snapshot]

It would appear there is a conflict between reduce person and enlarge person on whether the damage is based on the size of the projectile or the size of the weapon.

Maybe the developers will address this

[Magicdealer]

I would say that the medium size of arrows and bolts are optimum. Going down in size reduces the damage done. Going up in size doesn't improve it because now it's counter-balancing the effect of gravity.

But, hey, who knows. The devs. That's who :p