Aquatic combat and alchemical bombs

[Jed Roach]

How do alchemical bombs work underwater?

The rules appear to be silent on the subject.

Aquatic Combat Rules:

You’re flat-footed unless you have a swim Speed.
You gain resistance 5 to acid and fire.
You take a –2 circumstance penalty to melee slashing or bludgeoning attacks that pass through water.
Ranged attacks that deal bludgeoning or slashing damage automatically miss if the attacker or target is underwater, and piercing ranged attacks made by an underwater creature or against an underwater target have their range increments halved.
You can’t cast fire spells or use actions with the fire trait underwater.
At the GM’s discretion, some ground-based actions might not work underwater or while floating.

Here are some possible rulings I might use at my discretion:

1. The water interferes with and/or dilutes the chemicals to the point of being ineffective even if you do hit and the flask breaks. Basically, treat it like a bludgeoning ranged attack. Auto miss and no splash.

2. They can only be used to attack creatures within your reach and they don't splash. (Ever try to throw a baseball under water? Even a bullet is slowed to non lethal speeds in 3-8 feet) It's almost a melee attack, but you release just before impact so your hand doesn't get caught in the effect.

3. They take the halved range increment of piercing ranged weapons, but otherwise work as normal.

4. Water breathing creatures are also sickened 1 because they are breathing the water full of hazardous chemicals.

5. They work as though on land with no penalties or modifications.

6. Due to mentioning "exposure to air" in the description, alchemist's fire, bottled lighting, and frost vials do not work underwater. Tanglefoot bags explicitly do not work underwater.

7. Thunderstones do double damage, do splash damage, and deafen within 30 feet. Water conducts pressure waves (i.e. sonic damage) much better than air. Try googling "hydraulic abdominal concussion", unless you're the squeamish type.

The rules say I have the discretion to say that some things don't work, not that they work different. So, for PFS 2,4, and 7 are probably not defensible.

How would you rule?

[Sister Hannah]

There's a Pathfinder Society scenario with several combats underwater and these were the rules our GM shared:

AQUATIC COMBAT:

• You’re flat-footed unless you have a swim Speed.
• You gain resistance 5 to acid and fire.
• You take a –2 circumstance penalty to melee slashing or bludgeoning attacks that pass through water.
• Ranged attacks that deal bludgeoning or slashing damage automatically miss if the attacker or target is underwater, and piercing ranged attacks made by an underwater creature or against an underwater target have their range increments halved.
• You can’t cast fire spells or use actions with the fire trait underwater.
• At the GM’s discretion, some ground-based actions might not work underwater or while floating.

We had two alchemists in the party, and we decided that they basically just couldn't use Alchemist's Fire.

[Cordell Kintner]

You can not use alchemist fire since they have the fire trait. All bombs would have the range increment halved, meaning they have a 10 foot range. All other bombs would work normally though, as they aren't explicitly affected by underwater combat rules.

[Watery Soup]

I would rule that you shouldn't strictly apply real life physics to a game that allows alchemists to make an elixir in 2 seconds.

It would be more realistic if poison were diluted. Yes, sonic and electricity should be stronger. It would also be unnecessarily more complicated. At some point when we've got rules regarding the osmolality of salt water and the extra electricity damage from high ionic strength, the game is going to lose players.

The existing rules are posted above. Fire, acid, and tangle are affected. Range is affected.

If you want to add stuff on top of that in a home game, I'd suggest diluting frost and poison (blight bombs) akin to acid (resistance 5), weakness 1-5 to sonic and electricity, crystal shards doesn't sound like it should work at all, and all ingested potions/elixirs should get diluted. I'd also exaggerate environmental effects to simulate the higher heat capacity of water vs air.

[CrystalSeas]

Sister Hannah wrote:

There's a Pathfinder Society scenario with several combats underwater

Do you remember which one? I'd like to take a look at those rules.

[Sister Hannah]

I wouldn't recommend it for a rules source. According to our GM, nowhere in the scenario were there DCs for swimming.

But if you're interested:

It's 2-06: The Crashing Wave

I haven't looked at it myself. There's presumably a GM Discussion thread that might discuss more in detail.

[CrystalSeas]

Sister Hannah wrote:

I wouldn't recommend it for a rules source. According to our GM, nowhere in the scenario were there DCs for swimming.

** spoiler omitted **

I haven't looked at it myself. There's presumably a GM Discussion thread that might discuss more in detail.

Thanks, I've got that one. I'll take a look

[KingTreyIII]

Cordell Kintner wrote:

You can not use alchemist fire since they have the fire trait. All bombs would have the range increment halved, meaning they have a 10 foot range. All other bombs would work normally though, as they aren't explicitly affected by underwater combat rules.

Strict RAW, the range increment isn't halved, since most alchemical bombs don't deal slashing, bludgeoning, or piercing damage, meaning that the whole range increment thing doesn't apply.

That said, I would still personally rule that their range increments would be halved underwater because come on!

[Jed Roach]

Watery Soup wrote:

I would rule that you shouldn't strictly apply real life physics to a game that allows alchemists to make an elixir in 2 seconds.

The entire game is a collection of mechanics that have been abstracted and simplified from real world physics plus magic. The limitations on bludgeoning and slashing weapons probably derives from the idea that those weapons and attack motions have high drag ratios and are therefore slowed down by water drag. I think applying a similar level of abstraction to situations in which the rules are silent is appropriate. Whatever rules I come up with wouldn't be kept secret from the players. I think the characters would have enough experience with their standard actions to know how an extreme environmental challenge might affect their results.

As to Quick Alchemy, yes, that is clearly not a thing that is possible in real life. The game says that alchemy is not magic, but magic is the best way of explaining what a person's "alchemical essence" is and how it can be turned into other items in 2 seconds. Though now that I'm thinking about it, I might rule that mixing chemicals underwater is extremely difficult with tools designed for use on land and attempts at Quick Alchemy are disrupted by the water. Be on the lookout for Underwater Alchemist's Tools in a future splat book. Or, I might rule that it's basically magic so it just works if I think the player is really going to struggle without having access to core class features. I will then remind them that alchemists are proficient with crossbows which are still effective at 60 ft(because we don't apply real life physics).