Applying Poison


Rules Questions


Crafted poisons can cost hundreds of GP to create. I can see how applying poison to the entire blade of a long sword could use the entire dose of poison.

But shouldn't you be able to coat more then a single arrow head or bolt tip with your dose of poison?

Wouldn't common sense be more like: You craft a dose of poison for hundreds of GP in materials, and you make enough to dip 3 or 4 bolt tips in poison?

Darthslash


Makes sense, and would be pretty cool but by rules nope. in a home game you could try it though


Another one of those 'simplifications for the sake of gameplay' things.

I'd be tempted to do more the route of all the weapon enhancement spells and make it 50 arrows/bolts, for consistency's sake.


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Agreed with Zwordsman. By RAW, it's one dose equals one attack.

I think part of the reason they make poisons so pricey is because they are very potent. I tinkered with a house system that lowered the price extensively but effectively made poisons much weaker for any class without Poison Use; for them, it was still a reduced price but had the original effect.


Xaratherus wrote:

Agreed with Zwordsman. By RAW, it's one dose equals one attack.

I think part of the reason they make poisons so pricey is because they are very potent.

Really? There must be rules about them I'm unfamiliar with, most of them seem rather weak and not worth the expense.


Xaratherus wrote:
I think part of the reason they make poisons so pricey is because they are very potent. I tinkered with a house system that lowered the price extensively but effectively made poisons much weaker for any class without Poison Use; for them, it was still a reduced price but had the original effect.

I like this approach. Poisons in PF require a hefty suspension of disbelief, basically, since they run the gamut from toxins to venoms to alcohol. Abstracting them all out into one mechanical system means they have to stop making real-world sense.


Well, 1d3 CON damage per round for 6 rounds, requiring two consecutive saves to cure? It's not anything to sneeze at. If you can afford to stack them with multiple attacks, you can push the DC up and extend the duration. The problem is that right now they're so pricey that you can't easily afford to stack them, especially at low levels when they're most effective.


Making the save has rarely been an issue.


The only real problem I have with dosing 50 arrows with a single vial of poison without making them weaker in effect is the implication that you should be able to do the same thing with a dagger.

If the poison does X damage no matter how much of it you use, or how diluted it is, why would you ever use the whole dose on a melee weapon?

Unless it would last 50 strikes, it makes poison WAY more powerful for ranged attackers than for melee attackers.


I guess I've just been unlucky at lower levels. Having to make two consecutive DC 20 Fort saves pre-6th for many classes hasn't ever struck me as something to sneeze at. Once you start getting up in levels, sure, they're not as effective.


Could be ... but I've never once managed to succeed with poison, which certainly filters my perceptions.


after initial levels poisons DC are waay tooo low, and way too costy.
There are some really expensive ones that have decent saves but for around the buying price you can get some really useful several use items..
Baring building directly for using poison (alchemist and daggermark guild poisoner PRC) (though i am trying to create a prc for it) poison is seriously hard to use.

It would be nice if one does could be applied to more. Though I can not see that being a general rule, i wish that the alchemist's discovery that allowed you to hit Intel modifier amount of times allow you to apply it to that many arrows.


Oh.
though innate natural poisons tend to do a bit better (like the eldritch bloodline stuff, or race based poisons) since you can activly improve that at least.

The snake line is kind of good if you have enough Charisma for it.

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