From the glossary:
Diseases, poisons, spells, and other abilities can all deal damage directly to your ability scores. This damage does not actually reduce an ability, but it does apply a penalty to the skills and statistics that are based on that ability.
For every 2 points of damage you take to a single ability, apply a –1 penalty to skills and statistics listed with the relevant ability. If the amount of ability damage you have taken equals or exceeds your ability score, you immediately fall unconscious until the damage is less than your ability score. The only exception to this is your Constitution score. If the damage to your Constitution is equal to or greater than your Constitution score, you die. Unless otherwise noted, damage to your ability scores is healed at the rate of 1 per day to each ability score that has been damaged. Ability damage can be healed through the use of spells, such as lesser restoration.
Some spells and abilities cause you to take an ability penalty for a limited amount of time. While in effect, these penalties function just like ability damage, but they cannot cause you to fall unconscious or die. In essence, penalties cannot decrease your ability score to less than 1...
... Ability drain actually reduces the relevant ability score. Modify all skills and statistics related to that ability. This might cause you to lose skill points, hit points, and other bonuses. Ability drain can be healed through the use of spells such as restoration.
So, under normal circumstances, penalties cannot reduce your effective score to less than 1, and while damage can reduce it to 0, it doesn't kill you unless it's Constitution damage, which this isn't. If drained to 0 on any ability score, you would still die.
Of course, Shadows do have special clauses:
A shadow's touch deals 1d6 points of Strength damage to a living creature. This is a negative energy effect. A creature dies if this Strength damage equals or exceeds its actual Strength score.
A humanoid creature killed by a shadow's Strength damage becomes a shadow under the control of its killer in 1d4 rounds.
So, it appears the GM is correct, since a Shadow's Strength Damage supersedes the general norm that Strength Damage doesn't kill you, and it would raise you as a spawn under the killer's control.
My suggestion? Get a Restoration spell cast on you ASAP. Lesser Restoration also works in that it stops the damage from killing you (and transforming you into a shadow), but still requires a lot of recuperation on your behalf, since you only regenerate Strength Damage at a rate of 1 per day.
Also, I appear to be behind on my acronyms, what's a DMZ?
Anti-Magic Field cancels all magical effects. Supernatural Abilities are magical, and therefore are suppressed in the Anti-Magic Field.
No, the Shadow's Strength Damage ability is a supernatural effect. This means that if a Shadow attempts to use its Touch attack against you while you're in an Anti-Magic Field, it doesn't work. If the damage is already dealt, then the Anti-Magic Field won't fix it.
If I was hit with a Fireball, and then walked into an Anti-Magic Field after I was affected by the Fireball, I'd be restored the damage it dealt to me.
Except everybody knows it doesn't work that way, and that's basically what you're trying to say would happen.
The Create Spawn ability would likewise be suppressed because that triggers after you're dead due to Strength Damage caused by a Shadow. The GM is 100% correct on his ramifications, as that's what the rules say.
Again, I suggest you find the nearest Cleric to cast (Lesser) Restoration, or a Scroll of (Lesser) Restoration and UMD it, as that's perhaps the only way you're going to survive.
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If you have no way of easily restoring the strength damage like Darksol is suggesting. I suggest you have the person in front cast light or something on a rock so when the light goes out he immediately stops walking so he won't enter the antimagic field.
p.s. "DMZ"s aren't a thing in Pathfinder. What you're talking about is an Antimagic Field. (your GM is more than welcome to pull it in from "other games" or make it up, but what you're describing already exists as the aforementioned Antimagic Field)
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Ohhhhhh so the event has happened. You walked in.
In the end, it's the gm's call. I would suggest that the transformation would be suppressed (as it is Su), and you'd be unconscious. If you got some restorative magic while in the field, you'd be ok. Otherwise, as you were carried out of the field you'd be transformed instantly.
Just my personal call. Your gm is the final word on the matter.
I disagree with the other folks here. Once the damage has been applied, it's not tied to the shadow any longer. If, while you were recovering (1 per day) you got poisoned it wouldn't remember that it was the shadow and this is the same idea.
I see it the same as disintegrate. If during application it exceeds your strength score, you're killed. Unless you're also saying that if I have 12 Strength, take 8 damage from a poison and then get hit for 5 more I'm not killed by the shadow until I take my full score from shadow damage?
A creature dies if this Strength damage equals or exceeds its actual Strength score.
Mmmmm, not in Pathfinder. Constitution is the only ability score that causes death upon reaching zero. The rest cause paralysis or catatonia.
Donny, i mean Anguish, you're out of your element. Please read shadow's monster entry before responding next time
Well. If I weren't familiar with TBL, that would've crossed the "don't be a jerk" line.
I'm familiar with shadows. I'm explicitly referring to your line, which is important.
See... it doesn't apply to your current situation. The shadow has failed to kill you. Removal of your Strength-boosting ability is what will drop you to 0 Strength. Further, that's being done somewhere that suppresses supernatural effects. Okay. So you're paralyzed.
Sit still for a day... you're... not... dead. Because 0 Strength doesn't cause death.
Then you're back at Strength 1. Leave the antimagic field and go on your way.
Donny, i mean Anguish, you're out of your element. Please read shadow's monster entry before responding next timeWell. If I weren't familiar with TBL, that would've crossed the "don't be a jerk" line.
I'm familiar with shadows. I'm explicitly referring to your line, which is important.
See... it doesn't apply to your current situation. The shadow has failed to kill you. Removal of your Strength-boosting ability is what will drop you to 0 Strength. Further, that's being done somewhere that suppresses supernatural effects. Okay. So you're paralyzed.
Sit still for a day... you're... not... dead. Because 0 Strength doesn't cause death.
Then you're back at Strength 1. Leave the antimagic field and go on your way.
0 Strength doesn't cause death. This is true. The rules say this, and I already quoted them.
0 Strength caused from a Shadow does cause death, and in most cases, the creation of another Shadow. This is true. The rules also say this, and I already quoted those as well.
The thing is, the latter outcome is a result from a specific circumstance, which supersedes the general rule that the former poses.
Also, Anti-Magic Fields only stop instantaneous effects if the effect happens within or around an Anti-Magic Field. If I get hit by a Fireball while outside of an Anti-Magic Field, then walk into an Anti-Magic Field, I still have suffered the instantaneous effects of the Fireball, and there's no way to reverse those effects, even by standing in an Anti-Magic Field.
Same case here. OP was already hit with the effects of the Shadow's Touch Attacks. Because it's ability score damage, and not, say, a condition, its effects are already applied the same as hit point damage, and he can't reverse those effects in an Anti-Magic Field. And the nature of the ability score damage is what results in him simply dying.
Of course, if he dies within the Anti-Magic Field, he doesn't turn into a Shadow while the Anti-Magic Field persists, since that's a Supernatural Effect that triggers from his death (which would be suppressed at the time), but once it's over, his Shadow will rise and service the one that slew him (though at this point, it would technically be which one caused the final hit that resulted in his 0 Strength), as Anti-Magic Fields only suppress persistent effects, not dispel them.
Mostly agree with Darksol, but could also see the argument that a Shadow reducing your STR to 0 results in death is also a part of the SU ability that should also be stopped by being in a dead magic zone / AM field (though you would still be paralyzed until your STR goes above 0).
It's a weird one.
"Unless you're also saying that if I have 12 Strength, take 8 damage from a poison and then get hit for 5 more I'm not killed by the shadow until I take my full score from shadow damage?"
Yes thats what I'm saying
Donny, i mean Anguish, you're out of your element. Please read shadow's monster entry before responding next time
Ok. I can see that interpretation. I disagree with it for reasons I hope I have stated in such a way that it's understandable (including that it means I might need to track strength damage in multiple pools, determine which pool gets any healing I recieve, and determine whether two shadows contribute to the same pool and similarly for normal and greater shadows). But the disagreement is fully in the interpretation - like many things I think multiple interpretations are consistent with the written rules.
The STR damage is not an ongoing supernatural effect, it is ability damage that needs to be healed through either rest or magic.
However, as TimD suggested, normally STR damage doesn't kill you, and the special Shadow effect that kills you when STR damage >= ability score IS a SU ability which would not function in a DMZ.
So, if you stumbled into a DMZ, your STR boost would go away, your STR damage would be >= your ability damage, but the SU shadow ability that kills you would not be operative. Instead, you would be affected by the normal ability damage rules:
If the amount of ability damage you have taken equals or exceeds your ability score, you immediately fall unconscious until the damage is less than your ability score.All you would need is rest to heal your STR damage to < your ability score before you leave the DMZ.
Someone else said that in this thread. And got insulted. Twice. Beware.
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I think this works like disintegrate in that the ability is only checking when applied. The strength damage is still just strength damage, and doesn't carry the Shadow's supernatural ability to kill you if it exceeds your score. If it were, it would be supernatural as well, and disappear in an antimagic field, which I don't think it does.
The only time you will be killed by a shadow's strength damage is when it is hitting you with it's supernatural ability. After that, future reductions (from drain or removing strength increasing belts) do not result in your death. Like I said, if it did, then the damage would disappear as well, since it would apparently be supernatural as well.
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It doesn't make sense to me that a shadow's 'death from strength damage' ability would be a permanent supernatural effect. That is, if you took strength damage from a shadow, somehow never healed this damage, and then had a strength score decrease from natural aging decades later, you should not suddenly die and become a shadow.
Rather, it seems most plausible to me that the supernatural effect occurs at the moment of the attack. If the shadow does enough damage then you die and become a shadow. If not then you are 'safe'. Any future strength decrease and/or damage will follow the normal rules and not kill you unless it too is caused by a shadow or other creature with a similar supernatural ability.
Thus, entering an anti-magic field or dead magic zone (e.g. the Mana Wastes) would knock you out, but you should not die upon leaving such an area because there is no persistent 'shadow death touch' effect.
PS: If your GM has ruled otherwise then it doesn't really matter what anyone here thinks. That said, you don't need to worry about mistakenly wandering out of the zone and dying... you are unconscious. You aren't going anywhere until you recover enough to move (in which case you are safe) or someone picks you up and carries you out (in which case you are dead/a shadow if the GM rules such... MAYBE try a last ditch appeal to shift back to hybrid form since it was only the null magic area which took you out of that).
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Most str damage is the same and the source can be ignored, but once you get shadow damage you need to start tracking just the shadow damage. Why would they say 'this' damage rather just just damage?
I would have a Str 20 character with 18 'normal' strength damage who then took two more strength damage from a Shadow die and turn. An immediate effect which is checked at the time the damage is delivered and then done with.
If you are instead using a system where they must have taken 20 points of accumulated strength damage all from Shadows then you are treating it as a persistent effect... the 'shadow origin' of the damage is persisting across multiple attacks... and thus you WOULD die if ever at 'shadow strength damage' >= 'strength score' in an area where supernatural effects function.
You still should not die in a no magic zone because 'killing with strength damage' is a supernatural ability of the shadows.
I could be carried out, and if we are being chansed by something, that would be likely.
So there are other party members around.
Does anyone in the party have Knowledge (Religion)? If so, they might well know that you are in danger of becoming a shadow. In addition to restoration or natural healing, any magic item granting a strength bonus could potentially save you. Alchemical items like Fury Drops or Icecap Ale could also get you on your feet... potentially even within a null magic area.