Elemental Betrayal:
You call upon the elements to undermine your foe. When you Cast this Spell, choose air, earth, fire, or water. Each time the target takes damage from a spell or effect with the chosen trait, it takes an additional 2 damage of one damage type dealt by the spell or effect. If you chose fire or water, the target also takes this additional damage when taking fire or cold damage, respectively, from effects or spells without the chosen trait.
What actually triggers elemental betrayal? Would a strike buffed with elemental assault count as an effect with an elemental trait?
for fire and water it's easy.
you just have to deal fire or cold damage respectively. So, elemental assaults fire damage does trigger it.
for the other two types you need either a spell with the trait or an effect with the trait.
For cold/fire a property rune would work as well, right?
Elemental assault specifically states that your Strikes gain the trait of the chosen element, so yes, they would be buffed by elemental betrayal. That's a pretty cool combo you found.
Basically, you have to look at the traits on spells, items and such (next to things like "evocation"). For instance, a Crystal Shards alchemical bomb has the earth trait, so it should work.
As for other abilities like elemental assault (usually from feats), you would have to check the description. If it mentions gaining the trait of the element you picked and it deals damage, it works.
Then, there's ice and fire damage that will work if you pick the corresponding element even if the effect somehow doesn't have the traits.
I hesitated after reading shroudb's reply, but I went back to check. This is what the Core says about effects : "Anything you do in the game has an effect. Many of these outcomes are easy to adjudicate during the game. If you tell the GM that you draw your sword, no check is needed, and the result is that your character is now holding a sword. Other times, the specific effect requires more detailed rules governing how your choice is resolved. Many spells, magic items, and feats create specific effects, and your character will be subject to effects caused by monsters, hazards, the environment, and other characters." So basically, anything someone does in the game has an effect, and everything that has the trait and deals damage should work.
JackieLane wrote: Elemental assault specifically states that your Strikes gain the trait of the chosen element, so yes, they would be buffed by elemental betrayal. That's a pretty cool combo you found.
Basically, you have to look at the traits on spells, items and such (next to things like "evocation"). For instance, a Crystal Shards alchemical bomb has the earth trait, so it should work.
As for other abilities like elemental assault (usually from feats), you would have to check the description. If it mentions gaining the trait of the element you picked and it deals damage, it works.
Then, there's ice and fire damage that will work if you pick the corresponding element even if the effect somehow doesn't have the traits.
I hesitated after reading shroudb's reply, but I went back to check. This is what the Core says about effects : "Anything you do in the game has an effect. Many of these outcomes are easy to adjudicate during the game. If you tell the GM that you draw your sword, no check is needed, and the result is that your character is now holding a sword. Other times, the specific effect requires more detailed rules governing how your choice is resolved. Many spells, magic items, and feats create specific effects, and your character will be subject to effects caused by monsters, hazards, the environment, and other characters." So basically, anything someone does in the game has an effect, and everything that has the trait and deals damage should work.
correct.
The main issue will be coming from table variation on effects affecting other things rather than the strike directly.
As you pointed out, Elemental assault says the strike gains the trait, so it should no doubt work everywhere.
but imagine an effect with teh "air" trait that gave bonus damage on a weapon (dunno, maybe pushing a weapon faster or something).
in most cases like those i think that the "air effect" is enhaning your weapon/strike. But the effect that actually causes the damage is the weapon swing/strike itself, which (without specific language like in elemental assault) doesn't actually inherits the traits of what modified it in the first place.
As the most basic example, let's say you have a "Shoony Shovel" which is a magical javelin with the earth trait.
A strike with said weapon is actually not an effect with the Earth trait, despite the weapon itself carrying the trait.
and etc.
Air: Cataclysm, Storm of Vengeance, Tempest Surge, Thunderburst, Wild Winds Stance and Storm Arrow.
Earth: Crystal Shards, Stoneraiser Javelin, Terraforming Spell metamagic, Hurtling Stone, Localized Quake, Cataclysm, Control Sand, Earthquake, Pummeling Rubble, Shattering Gem, Shockwave, Spike Stones and Upheaval.
Water: Decanter of Endless Water, Tempest Touch, Unbreaking Wave Advance, Cataclysm, Crashing Wave, Deluge, Holy Cascade, Hydraulic Push, Hydraulic Torrent, Quench and Snowball.
Fire: Alchemist's Fire, Dwarven Daisy, Explosive Ammunition, Flame Tongue, Flaming, Four-Ways Dogslicer, Radiant Lance, Redpitch Bomb, Smoking Sword, Wand of Smoldering Fireballs, Fire Ray, Flaming Fusillade, Hellfire Plume, Incendiary Aura, Moonbeam, Spray of Stars, Sun Blade, Sun's Fury, Whirling Flames, Blazing Aura, Blazing Talon Surge, Explosive Death Drop, Radiant Burst, Rain of Embers Stance, Scorching Disarm, Burning Hands, Cataclysm, Fiery Body, Final Sacrifice, Fire Seeds, Fire Shield, Fireball, Flame Strike, Flaming Sphere, Heat Metal, Linnorm Sting, Meteor Swarm, Produce Flame, Pyrotechnics, Searing Light, Sunburst, Volcanic Eruption, Wall of Fire
Of course there are things like Elemental Toss that gains the trait of the element you pick.
Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
I just wish Air had an exception for lightning/sonic damage like both cold and fire do - as long as it couldn't trigger twice on one attack that did both damage (so maybe just lightning or pick one). Earth would be a bit trickier since it almost entirely physical damage, but I could see Acid applying just so there's one weapon rune for it.
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