Has no one considered the possibility of a ring of inner fortitude + disease build?

[Reksew_Trebla]

I did some basic searching, but found nothing on the subject.

Rings of Inner Fortitude reduce ability damage, temporary ability penalties, and ability drain, by a set amount, depending on which type of the ring you have. This means you could intentionally seek out diseased creatures, intentionally fail your save against them, and be immune to the effects if you get the better rings (and if the only effects of the disease are blocked by the ring). But you are still a carrier, meaning if you are a natural weapon build, you can inflict the diseases on your opponents.

Will this get the book thrown at you? Absolutely. Is it legal? Also absolutely.

[VoodistMonk]

Interesting piece of equipment.

May allow other builds to play along side of my Blight Druid and Plague Bringer Alchemist... even without those archetypes specific class features designed to play with disease.

[Belafon]

Definitely falls under GM discretion, and definitely requires analyzing the player’s intention.

Ring of Inner Fortitude wrote:

If the ring prevents any damage, drain, or penalty that are associated with a beneficial effect, it also negates the beneficial effect.

I’d probably say that being a disease carrier is a “beneficial effect” for your purposes.

[VoodistMonk]

Meh, for what it's worth... immunity to diseases is accessible at level 3 for Paladins, level 5 for Monks, 10 for Ratfolk Alchemists, and 13 for Blight Druids... with the Alchemist and Druid specifically being able to carry diseases and spread them, despite being immune. Antipaladins also get the ability to spread it whilst immune at level 3.

By the time you can afford this ring, whatever you give a disease to via natural attacks will probably be dead due to those aforementioned natural attacks long before any disease you may inflict has a chance to kill it.

It's kind of like poisons... by the time they take effect, the Barbarian has already chopped the dude you just poisoned into tiny bits with a Butchering Axe.

I see no reason to not allow it. If the party starts purposefully not killing things, just to engage them, damage them exactly enough to inflict diseases, and release them in hopes of spreading those aforementioned diseases... I can adjust fire and bring down the everburning wrath of god.

For one, other people can have those same rings, too... making their enemies immune to their own tricks using their own tricks. It's hilarious if they purposefully carry around diseases by wearing these rings, and their enemies are immune to these diseases because of the same rings.

Secondly, diseases can be cured relatively easily, so if the party leaves inflicted enemies alive, they will simply be cured, possibly leveled to show their veteran status, and returned to the battlefield seeking revenge.

Diseases and poisons are fun for NPC's to use against the party, because those very NPC's probably will not survive the encounter. And thusly, inflicting a disease or surprising someone with a long offset poison becomes all they ever did... but it's kinda memorable to the party.

[Pizza Lord]

I tend to agree with VoodistMonk on this. Diseases work far slower than poison. Unlike the magical spells that inflict poison and disease, which typically skip an onset time, you're likely waiting at least a day if not more for any effect.

At least with poisons, onset is usually immediate or close to it and the effects occur every round or so. Also, poison would stack far more effectively on the same target, increasing the DC and the duration on affected targets.

It would really require a reason for such a character, either a worshipper of disease or a god of the plague or a crazy cultist of some apocalyptic prophecy (they might have supposedly altruistic reasons). But for a typical game or party of PCs, it's not going to affect combat in most cases and in almost all cases, combat will render the enemies being diseased moot (since most times they'll be dead). Otherwise you're purposefully not killing enemies (not that that's something that needs to be done) or pulling punches. Other players might not be thrilled to have to hold back on their abilities just to let your (likely less effective) tactic look cool and have a noticeable effect...
sometime... maybe...
a few game days down the road...
when you might fight those those same enemies again...
but they're weaker... which doesn't matter... since you could already have beaten them.... they'll just be a lower CR now... and worth less XP...

But, absolutely you could make a cool character, villain, or even a PC with something like that. Absolutely. Just know that effectiveness-wise it would need specific setting up.

[Java Man]

I have considered an antipaladin using disease carrier status to create ghouls at a much lower level than it is possible to do with spells. Just need to find an infection source.

[avr]

As a PC I could see being a disease carrier being a serious problem socially. But yes a ring of inner fortitude or appropriate symptom-treating spells could let you survive many diseases indefinitely.