Hello there! I have another little question about how something works. I have a brawler character, which like monks, use a different damage die for unarmed damage which goes up as he levels up.
Now, since a normal unarmed strike deals 1d3, but with a cestus it deals 1d4, i was wondering what would happen if a brawler (or monk) of lets say, level 1, used a cestus.
would it deal 1d4 because it's a cestus, 1d6 because brawlers/monks deal 1d6 with unarmed, or would it deal 1d8, because
1d3 -> 1d4 is one step higher and 1d6 -> 1d8 is one step higher.
i've been looking around on google all over the place but i never found exactly the answer i've been looking for. many thanks for your time :3
Soul Reaver wrote: Hello there! I have another little question about how something works. I have a brawler character, which like monks, use a different damage die for unarmed damage which goes up as he levels up.
Now, since a normal unarmed strike deals 1d3, but with a cestus it deals 1d4, i was wondering what would happen if a brawler (or monk) of lets say, level 1, used a cestus.
would it deal 1d4 because it's a cestus, 1d6 because brawlers/monks deal 1d6 with unarmed, or would it deal 1d8, because
1d3 -> 1d4 is one step higher and 1d6 -> 1d8 is one step higher.
i've been looking around on google all over the place but i never found exactly the answer i've been looking for. many thanks for your time :3
A cestus, despite the logic behind it, does only its damage (and crit range). If a character has an unarmed strike damage, like the monk or brawler, then they must declare they are attacking with that instead of the cestus. Treat the censtus as you would a dagger or sword, and not as an extension of the brawler/monk's fists.
This is in place primarily to prevent monks from spending 5 gold and getting keen fists.
Edit: Relevent Links
Link 1
Link 2
And for those unfamiliar, SKR is a Dev, so his word is effectively errata.
A Cestus deals Cestus damage.
Improvements to unarmed strike damage have no effect on Cestus damage.
As the others have said a Cestus doesn't do the damage of your unarmed strikes but as a brawler at lvl 5 you should get the Close Weapon Mastery class feature which allows you to use your Unarmed Strike damage of your lvl-4 in place of the normal damage so now a Cestus would be dealing 1d6 damage.
Alright then! Many thanks to you all for your quick responses and thanks for clearing it up. Better to clean up my fists :P
The purpose for the Cestus isn't to change your damage.
The purpose is for the special abilities you can add to it - in particular, special abilities which require you to have weapon "in hand".
The other question with a Cestus being: is it, like a gauntlet, an 'unarmed strike' for the purposes of things that benefit from or use an unarmed strike, or is the entire benefit section just pointless gibberish?
BadBird wrote: The other question with a Cestus being: is it, like a gauntlet, an 'unarmed strike' for the purposes of things that benefit from or use an unarmed strike, or is the entire benefit section just pointless gibberish? Check out the links in my first post. They clarify your question.
It's certainly clear that the cestus, like a gauntlet or brass knuckles, doesn't use any modified unarmed strike damage. For things like style feats or Domain Strike it isn't nearly as clear.
What's funny - or maybe kind of embarassing - about that SKR post is that in his zeal, he manages to completely steamroll right over the fact that - as far as a gauntlet goes - the text explicitly states that "A strike with a gauntlet is otherwise considered an unarmed attack." It's one of those developer posts that kind of highlights why they're in that 'official-unofficial' no-man's land until something is actually thought through and posted officially. He's got a full head of steam going about what something 'should' say, but then...
It's five years later. And nothing has changed in print or PRD regarding the fact that if a cestus isn't functionally considered an unarmed strike at least in the abstract, then it has a good, hearty paragraph of utter nonsense attached to it. And regardless of what a gauntlet 'should' be, the text remains completely unambiguous about what it is.
Recent threads in Rules Questions
|
