Area Spells not defined as Burst, Cone, Emanation or Line

[HeshKadesh]

Just noticed this while trying to make an Elementalist Magus summoning Tornado's with their Expansive Spellstrike.

Now, with Whirlwind being a 3 Action spell it won't work with Spellstrike (sad face), but I spotted that it didn't have any specification as to what kind of area it is, only that is was a 15-food radius, 80-foot tall Cylinder.

Cylinder is not mentioned to my knowledge within the Core Book as an area type on page 456-457 (despite a number of spells, like Flame Strike, Punishing Winds, Reverse Gravity, Volcanic Eruption in the same book having these wordings). The CRB lists these types of areas in a way that makes them appear as the 4 finite ways of describing area, so how are Cylinder's represented, as without being either Burst, Cone, Line or Emanation, it is effectively non-targetable.

For reference, I'd houserule it as a Burst, with the exception of the vertical aspect raising to the height of the cylinder, rather than hemispherically upwards. Am I correct in this, or are there rules I've not got that clarify?

[Aw3som3-117]

I agree, it seems like it's a typo / oversight and it should be:
"Range 500 feet; Area 15-foot radius burst, 80-foot tall cylinder"

The reason why I say this is because it doesn't make sense for it to be an emanation, as it's not emanating from the caster, but rather from a fixed point, and it's most definitely neither a line nor a cone, as it species "radius", which only makes sense for a burst or an emanation.

And then, of course, there's the 80ft tall cylinder part, which I think we can all agree is pretty self explanatory once you have the initial circle set up.

[Malikor]

Several spells have similar X foot radius, x foot high cylinder areas of effect.

Each spell then states exactly how those inside the area are effected. There is no burst, but specific rules within the spell detailing, since the origin of the effects come from different places.

Flame strike, the fire rains from above, so anyone under a roof may be able to get cover.

Volcanic eruption, the eruption comes from below, and goes up.

Whirlwind and a few others that do not state any 'origin' of the cylinder would effect everyone in the area as if that were the origin of the effect basically.

The game doesn't define cylinder as an area of effect, because they are special cases that are dealt with in each particular case.

At least that is how I read it. Whirlwind definitely does not have a burst.