You have grappled the air elemental, and must now grapple the whirlwind...

[seebs]

Can you grapple an air elemental, either in its normal form or the whirlwind form? So far as I can tell, RAW, you can, because nothing says you can't, and the grapple rules seem to assume they apply to anything that doesn't say otherwise. But I can't figure out how you can grapple something that is made entirely of air.

[Tiny Coffee Golem]

"made of air" is relative. It's not incorporeal and has a strength score. Based on that i'd assume it has a "body" of sorts. Since it's got a body therefore it can be grappled.

[seebs]

Tiny Coffee Golem wrote:

"made of air" is relative. It's not incorporeal and has a strength score. Based on that i'd assume it has a "body" of sorts. Since it's got a body therefore it can be grappled.

Hmm. Gaseous form isn't "incorporeal", but has been confirmed to be immune to grapple. But gaseous form can't manipulate objects, and air elementals perhaps can.

[andreww]

I would let you grapple an air elemental, it has strength and con and clearly has a physical form. If it switched to whirlwind form I would not as it turns into an animate column of wind.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

If you can damage it with a non-magical weapon, you can grapple it.

[seebs]

FrodoOf9Fingers wrote:

If you can damage it with a non-magical weapon, you can grapple it.

Hmm. Gaseous form is DR 10/magic, but definitely not grappleable according to SKR.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

There are a few exceptions, but that is the general rule in my games. If it specifically says otherwise, fair enough.

Air Elementals are proficient with weapons, same with fire elementals. So why not? O.o

[seebs]

Well, the obvious answer would be "it's made entirely of air, what exactly are you holding?" Especially in whirlwind form.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

It's made entirely of air, what exactly are you hitting with your sword? Doesn't HAVE to make sense, and while I try not to use the "it's magic" way out, it kinda does apply to the situations, elementals being entirely magical in nature (as compared to humanoinds, monstrous humanoids, outsiders, animals, magical beasts etc... We actually know why (or have a good guess as to why) hitting them hurts them).

[seebs]

You have a point. I mean, intuitively, you can't grapple a whirlwind, but then, intuition only gets you so far with magic.

I might consider the whirlwind form to be similar enough to something like gaseous form to qualify under SKR's "this is pretty obvious and we shouldn't need to state it" ruling.

[EvilPaladin]

I don't think grappling an air elemental is as weird as some of the other things you can grapple. A Reduce Person'd Gnome can grapple the tarrasque if he is lucky. I'd say grappling an air elemental is sensible enough.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

I used the wrong emphasis on the word "have" in my previous post, hopefully that didn't come across as "very argumentative".

[seebs]

FrodoOf9Fingers wrote:

I used the wrong emphasis on the word "have" in my previous post, hopefully that didn't come across as "very argumentative".

Seemed fine to me. I mean, it's a good point; "make sense" is not a strict requirement for game rules.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

Your completely right when it comes to intuition though :), so I guess to boils down to GM style: only RAW (FAQ, Errata, and books only), RAW with non-official quotes form developers, RAI, or whatever-the-heck-feels-good.

O.o

[FLite]

As far as I can tell, there are two ways (under the rules) that you can interpret the whirlwind power. In either case, you can grapple the air elemental, but you would get different effects depending on what your interpretation is.

Case 1: When it says the air elemental transforms into a whirlwind, this is literally what happens. This is effectively a "polymorph" effect. (and follows all the applicable rules. For example, their armor and gear merge with their form. Irrelevant for wild air elementals, but relevant for dijinni and stormcallers and other creatures that have the whirlwind or vortex power. This also would affect their CMD) Based on the table we have for what size creature the whirlwind can pick up at various heights (from the stormcaller prestige class,) and the assertion that the whirlwind can on;y pick up creatures smaller than it (umr,) we know that most air elementals turn into a whirlwind one size category larger than they are. Since they do not gain the amorphous form, or anything else, they can be grappled. Note that the whirlwind's special ability activates on contact, so you may need to make a save or take damage and a second save or be swept into the air. Grappling or pinning the whirlwind may keep it in the square it is in, but won't end the whirlwind form.

Case 2: The creature creates the whirlwind by spinning in place / flying in tight circles, so fast it turns the wind of its flight into a whirlwind. (There is no transforamtion, so gear is unaffected, and it's size doesn't change.) In this case, you can still grapple the creature, but what happens is you grab the creature creating the whirlwind. This probably ends the whirlwind power (assuming you make your save and are not swept up in the whirlwind yourself.) Pinning the creature creating the whirlwind almost definitely does end the whirlwind.

[seebs]

I had mostly been thinking in terms of elemental body, in which case you're already polymorphed with gear merged.

[Ascalaphus]

I think the air elemental is just a badly written monster. It should be a truly gaseous monster, not this surprisingly solid one.

Yeah, it would be hard to hit at low level, but you could just make the junior ones unable to deal physical damage.

[Majuba]

I'm fine with an air elemental being grappled (I'd say not a whirlwind). I'm sure they're darn slippery, but that's what an incredibly high dexterity score is for.

Grappling a Whirlwind is perhaps something appropriately mythic.

[Te'Shen]

Take a really deep breath. You gain the Breathless (Ex) quality until it's dead.

(I hope you have internal DR.)