Adamandite and DR / cold iron etc

[Helaman]

Adamantine

Maybe this is something we all think from 3.something era.
However, Adamantine makes it easier to destroy things, ignoring hardness, not to bypass damage reduction.

It’s counted as having a +1 enchantment bonus (to hit only), which does not count as magic bonus to add an enchantment bonus to your weapon. Meaning if you want to add flaming, you would still need to enchant is to +1, right?

Adamantine can, however bypass magic DR, even without enchant because it is somewhat considered ‘magic metal’.

does it allow you, however to bypass specific DR reduction?

DR/Cold Iron means that only Cold Iron bypasses it.
DR/Silver Means only that Silver Bypasses it.
DR/Good Means only that a Good weapon bypasses it.
DR/Slashing Means only a slashing weapon bypasses it.

I may be wrong about it, and I appreciate any input from you guys.

[Charon's Little Helper]

Adamantine doesn't get an inherent enchantment bonus at all. It gets a masterwork bonus because adamantine weapons are inherently masterwork. I believe you're mixing in 3.0 rules - where adamantine was always +2 min.

The only DR non-magic adamantine bypasses is DR/Adamantine (not magic/silver/cold iron/good etc) though it also bypasses hardness up to 20. (Hardness of 21 gets full value.) And it could potentially bypass DR/slashing etc.

[Nawtyit]

Also remember that some weapon enhancement bonus equivalents also bypass certain types of DR.
A +3 equivalent will bypass cold iron and silver
A +4 equivalent will bypass adamantine (but not hardness)
A +5 equivalent will bypass alignment-based (law, good, ect.)

So if i have a +1 wounding longsword, it would bypass magic (+1), slashing (longsword), and cold iron and silver (+3 total bonus).

[Orfamay Quest]

Nawtyit wrote:

Also remember that some weapon enhancement bonus equivalents also bypass certain types of DR.

A +3 equivalent will bypass cold iron and silver
A +4 equivalent will bypass adamantine (but not hardness)
A +5 equivalent will bypass alignment-based (law, good, ect.)

So if i have a +1 wounding longsword, it would bypass magic (+1), slashing (longsword), and cold iron and silver (+3 total bonus).

My understanding is that it's the enhancement bonus only that determines the DR that gets bypassed.

Quote:

Weapons with an enhancement bonus of +3 or greater can ignore some types of damage reduction, regardless of their actual material or alignment.

So a +1 wounding longsword will not bypass cold iron or silver, but a +3 longsword will. At the extreme, a +1 vorpal dancing longsword will not bypass anything except magic and slashing, despite a bonus equivalent to +10.

[Shar Tahl]

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

Adamantine doesn't get an inherent enchantment bonus at all. It gets a masterwork bonus because adamantine weapons are inherently masterwork. I believe you're mixing in 3.0 rules - where adamantine was always +2 min.

The only DR non-magic adamantine bypasses is DR/Adamantine (not magic/silver/cold iron/good etc) though it also bypasses hardness up to 20. (Hardness of 21 gets full value.) And it could potentially bypass DR/slashing etc.

I don't see anything saying it inherently bypasses DR magic. It ignores hardness under 20.

[Shar Tahl]

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

Adamantine doesn't get an inherent enchantment bonus at all. It gets a masterwork bonus because adamantine weapons are inherently masterwork. I believe you're mixing in 3.0 rules - where adamantine was always +2 min.

The only DR non-magic adamantine bypasses is DR/Adamantine (not magic/silver/cold iron/good etc) though it also bypasses hardness up to 20. (Hardness of 21 gets full value.) And it could potentially bypass DR/slashing etc.

As a note, it ignores hardness less than 20, not up to 20

[Nawtyit]

Orfamay Quest wrote:

My understanding is that it's the enhancement bonus only that determines the DR that gets bypassed.

Then why does it say "Weapon Enhancement Bonus Equivalent"?

[Bob Bob Bob]

Because the table is dumb. The text says

Overcoming DR wrote:

Weapons with an enhancement bonus of +3 or greater can ignore some types of damage reduction, regardless of their actual material or alignment. The following table shows what type of enhancement bonus is needed to overcome some common types of damage reduction.

No mention of equivalent, just enhancement bonus.

[Gauss]

Nawtyit, it says "equivalent" because +3 is "equivalent" to DR/Cold Iron or DR/Silver, +4 is "equivalent" to DR/Adamantine, and +5 is "equivalent" to DR/Alignment.

[kestral287]

You can see that especially well when contrasting DR/epic, which specifically spells out that it's broken by a +6 weapon including enchantments.

OP's thinking of the 3.0 or 3.5 version of Adamantine, I believe.

[Talon Stormwarden]

"Equivalent" was a bad word to use there, because it's also used in another way in the context of weapon bonuses. But what the heading of the table is referring to is the type of DR that a weapon with a particular enhancement bonus is equivalent to. That is, the first line of the table is saying that a +3 enhancement bonus is equivalent to cold iron/silver for purposes of DR.

Edit: Ninjas!!

[Cap. Darling]

Nawtyit wrote:

...

So if i have a +1 wounding longsword, it would bypass magic (+1), slashing (longsword), and cold iron and silver (+3 total bonus).

I was going to say that this part of the post is wrong. A +1 sword is a +1 sword no matter how Many extra properties it gets on. A +1 of speed is not gonna beat them all.

But several folks beat me to it. So i will just agree with them;)