Striking Rune Should be Rewritten

[Caleb Garofalo]

The Striking Rune says, "...increasing the weapon damage dice it deals to two instead of one." I imagine it was worded this way because all the weapons in the equipment section only deal 1 damage dice.

I used Dinosaur Shape getting 2d8 damage. Rules as written a striking rune would not add a damage dice because the wording does not say add 1 damage dice, it says to bring it from 1 to 2 and it's already 2.

Any weapon that is added in the future that has a base damage of to 2dx will also not be effected.

I propose that the wording be changed to indicate that it's damage dice will be increased by 1.

[Midnight Anarch]

Things like the Magic Fang spell make it seem as though that may be intentional, rather than an oversight or poor wording.

[Captain Morgan]

Caleb Garofalo wrote:

The Striking Rune says, "...increasing the weapon damage dice it deals to two instead of one." I imagine it was worded this way because all the weapons in the equipment section only deal 1 damage dice.

I used Dinosaur Shape getting 2d8 damage. Rules as written a striking rune would not add a damage dice because the wording does not say add 1 damage dice, it says to bring it from 1 to 2 and it's already 2.

Any weapon that is added in the future that has a base damage of to 2dx will also not be effected.

I propose that the wording be changed to indicate that it's damage dice will be increased by 1.

That might be working as intended.

[Zwordsman]

Hmm. I didn't see an issue prior. Still kind of don't. but I do see how some folks might.

It uses "dice" which is the plural of "die" Sure most people rarely use "die" and just use "dice" even when talkinga bout one. But it is the plural.

so it is referring to any and all dice of the weapon as "one unit" and then tells you to deal two of said unit.

So it works fine to how I read it. If it said "increasing the weapon damage die it deals to two instead of one" it would be an issue.

but Dice is an innate plural and the sentence structure makes the innate damage dice to be a unit noun in the context.

[Caleb Garofalo]

If it is indeed intended, I think it is a poor decision for both helping Druids do more damage when wild shaped, and for any future weapon that's base damage will have two die.

[Edge93]

I'm pretty sure this is quite intended. Shifting spells aren't balanced around their attacks being increased by runes that way, and Paizo very deliberately made any 2dx weapons from PF1 into 1dx weapons in PF2 (See Greatsword/Maul 2d6 to 1d12 and Falchion/Scythe 2d4 to 1d10), so I wouldn't exactly be expecting 2dx base weapons. (Partly because of all the idiotic debates that spring up over how effects that added weapon dice or did something based off of weapon dice worked with 2dx weapons in PF1, I'm sure. Heck, in the PT someone started one such debate over the ONE case where a weapon-type ability technucally did 2dx base, so they're probably feeling extra-jistified in that.)

[rayous brightblade]

polymorph effects can't benefit from striking so its not like it matters. "If you take on a battle form with a polymorph spell, the special statistics can be adjusted only by circumstance bonuses, status bonuses, and penalties."

[Caleb Garofalo]

What do you make of, "Your gear is absorbed into you; the constant abilities of your gear still function, but you can't activate any items."

The bonus you get from the runes are constant are they not?

[Arachnofiend]

Animal Form's natural attacks kinda suck if they aren't supposed to benefit from striking runes - if you interpret the 2d8 on a Canine's bite as a d8 with a striking rune then it's the worst d8 weapon in the game since it doesn't have any traits. Even simple d8 weapons get a trait (longspear has reach).

[rayous brightblade]

They are constant, but the weapon dice of your natural attacks are special statistics and can't be adjusted. Property runes should work, so you could add flaming/shocking/etc. And if you use your attack bonus instead of the set one you can get the potency rune.

[lordcirth]

Arachnofiend wrote:

Animal Form's natural attacks kinda suck if they aren't supposed to benefit from striking runes - if you interpret the 2d8 on a Canine's bite as a d8 with a striking rune then it's the worst d8 weapon in the game since it doesn't have any traits. Even simple d8 weapons get a trait (longspear has reach).

If striking runes set the number of dice, rather than +1, does that imply that a greater striking rune would give you 3d8 on animal form?

Also, animal form is available at 3rd level, where you are lucky to have a +1 weapon. You will probably not have a striking weapon until 5th.

Between 5th and 8th, animal form is still decent for the 10 THP, climb speed, swim speed, damage types, etc. At 8th you have dino form for a bit more damage, reach, etc. At 10th, you can use elemental form and pick between 2d10+9 B, 1d8+9 fire + 1d4 persistent fire, or a fly speed of 80ft, etc.

tl;dr I think Wild druids are fine.

[Edge93]

Arachnofiend wrote:

Animal Form's natural attacks kinda suck if they aren't supposed to benefit from striking runes - if you interpret the 2d8 on a Canine's bite as a d8 with a striking rune then it's the worst d8 weapon in the game since it doesn't have any traits. Even simple d8 weapons get a trait (longspear has reach).

Not entirely accuracy here. First, that's a two-handed simple weapon that gets d8 with 1 trait.

And, well, kinda quibbly but any attacks from these forms have the unarmed trait, which I think counts as a trait (it's the same as free-hand), so these would be d8 with 1 trait, the standard for one handed martial weapons.

Also I don't have the spell in front of me but doesn't Animal Form have a higher flat damage modifier than you can get otherwise at that level as a Druid? That should be factored in.

[Edge93]

Caleb Garofalo wrote:

What do you make of, "Your gear is absorbed into you; the constant abilities of your gear still function, but you can't activate any items."

The bonus you get from the runes are constant are they not?

Sure, the bonus is constant, so that ability functions, but it doesn't apply to your shifted form's attacks because the rules say that form can't benefit from those bonuses. You don't benefit from bonuses that don't apply to what you're doing, whether those bonuses are active or not. The bonus being active doesn't change what it does and does not apply to.

[Dragorine]

One note is you do gain reach in your forms as early as 7th level and 2d8 is higher than any weapon damage before that unbuffed by magic weapon. I don't think striking works but flaming may.

[Blave]

If we go with the interpretation that the handwraps set your damage dice to the striking rune's number, you'd always have roughly the same damage dice number as a weapon using character.

Let's take dragon form at level 12. Everyone is using greater striking runes, setting their damage to 3 dice. The martial character deals 3d12 with his greatsword.

The caster in dragon form can choose between forms that deal 2d12 or 3d8 damage. The greater striking handwraps set this to 3d12 or 3d8. So at best just as much as the martial does.

The dragon form spell comes with +6 damage. The martial will easily match or even surpass it with strength and weapon specialization.

Now, the dragon form comes with quite a few additional benefits like flight, elemental damage on the jaws attack and the breath weapon. All very powerful. But Dragon form is also a limited resource. And due to it's short duration will most likely not work as a pre-buff, so you spend your first turn doing not much more than transforming. And it disables all your spellcasting, cutting you off from a rather huge part of your character.

Bottom line: I see no harm in setting the damage dice of a battle forms attacks with striking handwraps. It will barely affect higher level polymorph spells (which come with multiple dice anyway) but can make lower level spells last a few levels longer. They'll still fall behind eventually due to their lower AC and other bonuses but it might give them a bit more staying power.