Sanctuary Spell vs Swarms

[2bz2p]

Is there any reason a swarm would not be subject to a Sanctuary spell?

[Jeraa]

Quote:

Any opponent attempting to directly attack the warded creature, even with a targeted spell, must attempt a Will save. If the save succeeds, the opponent can attack normally and is unaffected by that casting of the spell. If the save fails, the opponent can't follow through with the attack, that part of its action is lost, and it can't directly attack the warded creature for the duration of the spell. Those not attempting to attack the subject remain unaffected. This spell does not prevent the warded creature from being attacked or affected by area of effect spells. The subject cannot attack without breaking the spell but may use nonattack spells or otherwise act.

Swarms don't directly attack. They are more like area attacks. While Sanctuary specifically calls out area of effect spells, its not much of a stretch to apply that to all area of effect attacks. In that case, a Sanctuary spell won't do anything against a swarm.

[Claxon]

As swarms do not make attack rolls, I would agree that they are unaffected by Sanctuary.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Claxon wrote:

As swarms do not make attack rolls, I would agree that they are unaffected by Sanctuary.

Irrelevant. No where under the sanctuary spell does it say "attack roll." It simply says they are unable to "attack" the target. A swarm may not make attack rolls but its damage is still from an attack and it falls under the attack line. The word "swarm attack" is repeated numerous times in the swarm intro.

If one thousand goblins attacked a PC protected by sanctuary, the spell would be effective against all of them(with lots of saving throws). The purpose of a swarm is to have a huge number of small creatures function like a single creature. So sanctuary should be fully effective against them.

[Diego Rossi]

Lord Vukodlak is right. The swarm subtype say:

PRD wrote:

Swarm Attack: Creatures with the swarm subtype don't make standard melee attacks. Instead, they deal automatic damage to any creature whose space they occupy at the end of their move, with no attack roll needed. Swarm attacks are not subject to a miss chance for concealment or cover. A swarm's statistics block has “swarm” in the Melee entry, with no attack bonus given. The amount of damage a swarm deals is based on its Hit Dice, as shown below.

and Sanctuary say:

PRD wrote:

Any opponent attempting to directly attack the warded creature, even with a targeted spell, must attempt a Will save.

Sanctuary require a will save, but it is not a mind affecting spell, so that too isn't a problem and it affect an unlimited number of creatures, so it work.

[2bz2p]

Thanks Lord Vukodlak and Diego. When a clever player tried Sanctuary against a swarm I thought initially "no attack roll, no sanctuary", but I reread the spell before adjudicating and found it said nothing about an attack roll, and gave the Player the day. Failed the save too, so it worked. Now I feel I made a correct decision.