Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
The rules on light say the following: A source of light lists the radius in which it sheds bright light, and it sheds dim light to double that radius.
The rules for the sunrod state that it "sheds bright light in a 20-foot radius (and dim light to the next 40 feet)."
Is the radius of total light for the sun rod 40 feet, or 60 feet?
It's not clear to me if the radius for bright light overlaps the radius for dim light, or if the dim light's radius begins where the bright light's radius ends.
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60 feet total light, because that's what "the next" is there for in the description.
Yes, that makes a sunrod not fit that general text you got from wherever you got it.
Edit to add: went looking through the book for light sources to see about consistency... p. 292 has a sunrod listed as 20 foot bright light and dim light for the next 20 feet, so if somewhere else says 40 feet, that's a typo.
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thenobledrake wrote: 60 feet total light, because that's what "the next" is there for in the description.
Yes, that makes a sunrod not fit that general text you got from wherever you got it.
Edit to add: went looking through the book for light sources to see about consistency... p. 292 has a sunrod listed as 20 foot bright light and dim light for the next 20 feet, so if somewhere else says 40 feet, that's a typo.
I just checked both AoN and my own copy of the CRB, and it says on Sunrod's entry on pg. 554:
"This 1-foot-long, gold-tipped rod glows after it’s struck on a hard surface. For the next 6 hours, it sheds bright light in a 20-foot radius (and dim light to the next 40 feet)."
Confirmed your reading as well, so I guess chalk that one up as another needed errata to be addressed.
Ezekieru wrote: thenobledrake wrote: 60 feet total light, because that's what "the next" is there for in the description.
Yes, that makes a sunrod not fit that general text you got from wherever you got it.
Edit to add: went looking through the book for light sources to see about consistency... p. 292 has a sunrod listed as 20 foot bright light and dim light for the next 20 feet, so if somewhere else says 40 feet, that's a typo.
I just checked both AoN and my own copy of the CRB, and it says on Sunrod's entry on pg. 554:
"This 1-foot-long, gold-tipped rod glows after it’s struck on a hard surface. For the next 6 hours, it sheds bright light in a 20-foot radius (and dim light to the next 40 feet)."
Confirmed your reading as well, so I guess chalk that one up as another needed errata to be addressed. For errata purposes, CRB p292 and p554 are inconsistent
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Are there other examples that might lead us to the intended interpretation?
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All other locations that I can find follow the rule of x' bright and then the same x' dim (general rule). Only on p554 does it differ.
Light spell and torch provide 20' bright and 20' dim.
Lantern provides either 60' bright/60' dim (bull's-eye) and 30' bright/30' dim (hooded)
There is no indication whether Sunrod should be 40'/40' or 20'/20'
I would actually go with the 40'/40' to reflect the more powerful alchemical nature over a torch but that is my opinion supported by nothing other than a guess
Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
In 1E, sunrods were 60' total, split 30/30. Given how it's written in 2E, I'd assume they just shrank the radius for the bright light. I'd go with the description on p. 554.
Every time that a source "bright light" is mentioned in the core book matches to the general rule that whatever the radius of bright light is, dim light radius is double that (i.e. 20 feet of bright light and 20 more feet of dim light) - most by redundantly mentioning the specific amount of dim light in parenthesis, but at least one just lists the radius of bright light and that's it.
The only place in which there is a discrepancy is in one of the two mentions of the sunrod.
That means there are two possibilities: 1) sunrod is meant to be the one and only exception to the general rule for light sources so it's description on page 292 is in error, or 2) there are no exceptions (yet) to the general rule for light sources so the sunrod description on page 554 is in error.
I suggest application of Occam's razor.
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