Can any Strength damage kill you?

[Ravingdork]

A shadow's Strength Damage ability says that "a shadow’s touch deals 1d6 points of Strength damage to a living creature. This is a negative energy effect. A creature dies if this Strength damage equals or exceeds its actual Strength score."

What happens if you also have Strength damage from another source? Say, for example, my 10 Strength wizard gets poisoned and gains 4 Strength damage from that, then he is unfortunate enough to encounter an undead shadow that deals an additional 6 points of Strength damage.

Is he dead? Or does the shadow need to deal 4 more Strength damage?

(I'm well aware that Strength damage doesn't normally kill you.)

[wraithstrike]

Poison doesn't lower you actual score if it does ability damage. . It just provides a penalty so by RAW the shadow's damage should have to add up to your actual strength score. Now if you have had your str drained and then you run into a shadow......

[DarkLightHitomi]

Sounds like a typo somewhere to me. You don't normally die from str dmg, so obviously something different is going on here.

Though the word "this" implies that only this source of damage counts for the death effect.

[wraithstrike]

I personally believe you are intended to die even if you have previous str damage, but RD'd groups play by RAW so....

[Ravingdork]

wraithstrike wrote:

Poison doesn't lower you actual score if it does ability damage. . It just provides a penalty so by RAW the shadow's damage should have to add up to your actual strength score. Now if you have had your str drained and then you run into a shadow......

I don't see what this has to do with my question. I never said anything about your score actually being lowered.

[wraithstrike]

By the rules if the shadow's damage equals or exceeds the actual Strength score your strength score you die. I think we agree on this.

If you receive ability damage from a poison you asked if that was a factor. I am saying, by RAW it does not because poison does not lower your actual strength score. It only gives you a penalty to certain stats based off of strength.

Unlike in 3.5 ability damage does not normally lower your ability score.

The key here is your actual str score.

PS:Of course I am assuming you copied and pasted directly from the shadow's entry.

[wraithstrike]

In short only the shadows damage should matter.

[Sean H]

You only die if the Shadow's strength damage exceeds your actual strength score. That is, if your character has 10 strength, but has 4 strength damage due to poison, the shadow still needs to do 10 total strength damage to kill the player. Note the line "A creature dies if THIS strength damage exceeds his score." However, once the shadow does 6 strength damage, the creature still has an effective strength of 0, which paralyzes the creature and makes it easy to finish off.

[DarkLightHitomi]

@wraithstrike - Normally str dmg stacks however, I think that's what the OP is refering to but you are talking about the score not the damage.

What I feel he asking is whether option A leads to death or just option B.

A - str dmg from other source + str dmg from shadow = str score

Or

B - str dmg from shadow = str score

[wraithstrike]

I understand. I told him that only the shadow's damage applies.

[Driver 325 yards]

Ability Score Damage
Diseases, poisons, spells, and other abilities can all deal damage directly to your ability scores. This damage does not actually reduce an ability, but it does apply a penalty to the skills and statistics that are based on that ability.

Ability Drain
Ability drain actually reduces the relevant ability score. Modify all skills and statistics related to that ability. This might cause you to lose skill points, hit points, and other bonuses. Ability drain can be healed through the use of spells such as restoration.

From the above quotes the answer obviously depends on whether it is ability drain or ability damage that occurs before the shadow strike.