Just being curious if I have been playing this correct:
The armors (excluding shields) I have encountered this far all have these lines:
- Recharge this card to reduce Combat damage dealt to you by #
- Banish this card to reduce all damage dealt to you to 0; if you are proficient with light / heavy armors, bury this card instead.
I have been using the this against all kinds of barriers even when encountering explosive runes (deals 2d4 fire damage if not defeated)
From an RPG view I just can not understand this, although by the text on the card it is correct.
Should this be an errata or is my interpretation not correct?
I think it's been said a couple times on the forum that if it says it stops all damage it can be used for anything, if it says all combat damage it can only be combat damage (with no modifier like fire mental or etc.)
so if it says prevent all kinds, then I guess the only one that doesn't make RPG sense is how whatever armor stopped damage done directly to a brain. otherwise explosive can be stopped by armor, I mean look at what the bomb tech people wear, a crapton of armor. :-p
Well a lot of times mental damage has the qualifier that it may not be reduced, so it doesn't always work against mind tricks. But sometimes it does :P
Thank you Nathaniel, I admit my RPG experience is mostly (A)D&D / Pathfinder. I agree that it is logical that my leather armor should be shredded when I walk into an explosion, I just can not fathom why I won't have a single burn mark to show for it.
I am glad you and silentdante agree with my reasoning and that I was not reducing damage I could not reduce.
Well a lot of times mental damage has the qualifier that it may not be reduced, so it doesn't always work against mind tricks. But sometimes it does :P
If you'll notice, that is always on monster cards. When you suffer damage from failing to defeat a monster, that's "combat damage" which is why sometime the monster will specifically say "it's mental and cannot be prevented."
Take Black Fang for example - before you encounter him, you might take Acid damage. That is not combat damage, it's acid damage. If you roll an 8, and it takes 12 to defeat black fang, you DO take 4 points of combat damage that armor can work against.
It gets complicated when you start looking at things like the Siren. It's got a wisdom check on it, but its a monster card, meaning you the damage you take from her IS combat damage. It just also had the little addendum that any damage you take from her will be Mental damage, and can't be prevented.
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Damage from a failed Combat Check is Combat Damage unless the Bane's card says otherwise. No matter what weapon/spell you used to make the roll. I know spells like Acid Arrow might say it is Acid damage, but I'm pretty sure that is for future expansions where we might run into Banes that are immune/susceptible to certain damage types [i.e. Trolls].
Remember that the combat check is a combination of to hit and damage. You might be using an Acid attack on the Bane to defeat it, but that doesn't mean that same damage is coming back at you from the Bane.
Also, it isn't very well spelled out, but since a Combat check can be either with STR/Melee or DEX/Ranged, Ranged damage is just that, Combat damage.
The really only time you have to worry if armor is going to reduce the damage if the Bane specifically states something like it if Fire/Acid/Mental damage. Beyond that, you can assume it can be reduced by the Armor.
I think an official response from Vic on the "Defeating Siren" thread pertains to this discussion.
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2q4ht?Defeating-Siren
It's only Combat damage if you're making a Combat check, or if the monster specifically tells you that it deals Combat damage. All of the monsters that require checks other than Combat checks specifically tell you what type of damage they deal; in the case of the Siren, it's Mental damage. So things that reduce Combat damage do not help with the Siren—only things that reduce Mental damage (or "all" damage).
The part about reducing damage, I think really applies here. If the card says it can stop "all" damage, that is just what it does. In my brain, I don't see half plate stopping mental damage, but hey, it's how it is designed, maybe there is a reason.
I play that the initial damage can be blocked using armor (unless it says it can't be reduced) then proceed with the check as normal, which may include more damage. I think of it as that initial spit of acid or such weakening my shield or whatever.
I'd recommend anyone read that other thread for more clarification or confusion.
The Siren says that her damage cannot be reduced, so I'm pretty sure you can't use armors against her.
I would say that is correct. I also suspect the card says it cannot be reduced, but I may be wrong.
But, the issue is not about the type of damage the siren does. It was the debate about what is combat damage and what is not in regards to armor and such. It also mentioned an example "only things that reduce Mental damage (or "all" damage)" that could easily be extrapolated into the talk here about various other types of damage.
Mind you, I could foresee some sort of magic armor or amulet, etc. that could protect you against mental damage.
Chief Technical Officer
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Just being curious if I have been playing this correct:
The armors (excluding shields) I have encountered this far all have these lines:
- Recharge this card to reduce Combat damage dealt to you by #
- Banish this card to reduce all damage dealt to you to 0; if you are proficient with light / heavy armors, bury this card instead.
I have been using the this against all kinds of barriers even when encountering explosive runes (deals 2d4 fire damage if not defeated)
From an RPG view I just can not understand this, although by the text on the card it is correct.
Should this be an errata or is my interpretation not correct?
Just to be sure that your question is answered...
You cannot use the armor's first power to reduce the damage from Explosive Runes, because Explosive Runes deals Fire Damage, and the first power reduces only Combat damage.
You *can* use the armor's second power to reduce the damage from Explosive Runes, because the second power reduces all damage, including Fire damage.
When you take damage, you and other players may play cards and use powers that reduce or otherwise affect the specific type of damage you’re taking. If you’re taking Fire damage, for example, you may play cards that reduce Fire damage, or cards that reduce all damage, but you may not play cards that reduce only Electricity or Poison damage.
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Chief Technical Officer
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As for the RPG flavor issue, armor is a place where we had to deviate a bit farther than usual from the source material.
In the Pathfinder RPG, armor doesn't actually reduce the damage you take from a hit—it really just makes you harder to hit. And there's no actual model for "hard to hit" in ACG combat—that's really only desirable when combat is a multi-round affair, and we want combat that resolves in one die roll.
So our basic armor mechanic is perhaps actually more true to life—your armor will repeatedly protect you from some damage, but huge amounts of damage will destroy it. (Sure, in real life huge amounts of damage will likely hurt *you* too, but "trample damage" really isn't worth modeling here, apart from the fact that you're already losing one card.)
Well a lot of times mental damage has the qualifier that it may not be reduced, so it doesn't always work against mind tricks. But sometimes it does :PIf you'll notice, that is always on monster cards. When you suffer damage from failing to defeat a monster, that's "combat damage" which is why sometime the monster will specifically say "it's mental and cannot be prevented."
Take Black Fang for example - before you encounter him, you might take Acid damage. That is not combat damage, it's acid damage. If you roll an 8, and it takes 12 to defeat black fang, you DO take 4 points of combat damage that armor can work against.
It gets complicated when you start looking at things like the Siren. It's got a wisdom check on it, but its a monster card, meaning you the damage you take from her IS combat damage. It just also had the little addendum that any damage you take from her will be Mental damage, and can't be prevented.
It's not combat damage from the siren since it's not a combat check to defeat (Vic confirmed this)
Other than that, nothing you posted contradicts what I said, so I'm not sure why that was directed to me.
When you suffer damage from failing to defeat a monster, that's "combat damage"Not always—only if you were making a Combat check.
Which is someone's quote inside my quote which I corrected in that above post by citing you...
Thanks - sorry, didn't mean to sound like a jerk about it.
As for the RPG flavor issue, armor is a place where we had to deviate a bit farther than usual from the source material.
In the Pathfinder RPG, armor doesn't actually reduce the damage you take from a hit—it really just makes you harder to hit. And there's no actual model for "hard to hit" in ACG combat—that's really only desirable when combat is a multi-round affair, and we want combat that resolves in one die roll.
So our basic armor mechanic is perhaps actually more true to life—your armor will repeatedly protect you from some damage, but huge amounts of damage will destroy it. (Sure, in real life huge amounts of damage will likely hurt *you* too, but "trample damage" really isn't worth modeling here, apart from the fact that you're already losing one card.)
Thank you, this answers my question.