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Page 279 reads, 'Effects based on a weapon’s number of damage dice include only the weapon’s damage die plus any extra dice from a striking rune. They don’t count extra dice from abilities, critical specialization effects, property runes, weapon traits, or the like."
Not counting "extra dice from abilities" seems intended for abilities like Sneak Attack which simply add extra dice for damage (not weapon damage dice).
Power Attack reads "If this Strike hits, you deal an extra die of weapon damage".
The Support ability from a Horse animal companion reads, "Until the start of your next turn, if you moved at least 10 feet on the action before your attack, add a circumstance bonus to damage to that attack equal to twice the number of damage dice."
If Power-Attacking with a +1 Striking Weapon does 3 weapon die of damage, then how much extra damage would be added while benefiting from the Horse support ability of "twice the number of damage dice" (4 or 6)?
4.
The rule you quoted does also apply to things like Power Attack, One Inch Punch, etc.
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You only get the weapon damage die + bonus from striking runes for power attack, nothing else.
So, +1 striking weapon would normally have 2 dice. Power attack adds 1. The horse support adds 1. You have a total of 4. That's it.
If something adds "die of weapon damage" like Power Attack, shouldn't it be included when tallying "the weapon's damage die", as outlined in the first sentence from the excerpt on page 279?
"Effects based on a weapon’s number of damage dice include only the weapon’s damage die plus any extra dice from a striking rune."
I think this sentence is quite straightforward. Power Attack dice are neither the weapon damage die nor extra dice from a striking rune and as such don't count.
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I do agree with the above commenters. Essentially, they wrote "you deal an extra die of weapon damage" instead of "you deal an extra die of damage equal to the damage die and damage type of your weapon" for the sake of both simplicity and readability, and then set a general rule that the amount of weapon damage dice you count for any purpose is only ever 1+striking runes. It's a little confusing, but I can understand the purpose.
Great video by how it's played 9url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heqv78ImKzg]here[/url] if you want to go more into it but its pretty much a settled question at this point.
Thinking on the OP's question, it may be a sort of order of operations issue.
Where they're thinking they potentially apply power attack first, which bumps the damage from 2dX to 3dX and they're asking if then horse support should double the whole thing.
However, I believe order of operations shouldn't be done that way. When I walk through that process in my mind it would be:
2dX (striking weapon) + (2*2dx) for horse support + 1dX for power attack, which would be 7dX ultimately. Not the 4 I said earlier. But I'm sure I'm misunderstanding how the horse support works because that doesn't seem right. It seems like too much damage.
Edit: Rereading the horse support ability, I think it's not adding dice to roll but adding a flat bonus to damage.
So the damage would be 3dX+4.
F!~*, I'm quite confused about this.
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Thinking on the OP's question, it may be a sort of order of operations issue.
Where they're thinking they potentially apply power attack first, which bumps the damage from 2dX to 3dX and they're asking if then horse support should double the whole thing.
However, I believe order of operations shouldn't be done that way. When I walk through that process in my mind it would be:
2dX (striking weapon) + (2*2dx) for horse support + 1dX for power attack, which would be 7dX ultimately. Not the 4 I said earlier. But I'm sure I'm misunderstanding how the horse support works because that doesn't seem right. It seems like too much damage.
So the damage would be 3dX+4.
F$%&, I'm quite confused about this.
I think your issue is that you think horse support gives damage dice, in fact it does not:
Your horse adds momentum to your charge. Until the start of your next turn, if you moved at least 10 feet on the action before your attack, add a circumstance bonus to damage to that attack equal to twice the number of damage dice. If your weapon already has the jousting weapon trait, increase the trait’s damage bonus by 2 per die instead.
EDIT: Just saw your edit, good job catching it. The correct damage would in fact be 3dx+4+Y+Z where x is damage dice of weapon, Y is Strenght modifier, Z is specialisation if applicable. The +4 being based on a +1 striking lance.
Also to note that this is a circumstance bonus to damage and thus does not stack with everything.
Yep, I got there it just took me a minute.
So the original answer of 4 provided by HammerJack was correct, if he was saying how much damage horse support provided.
When I read his post, I had interpreted it as the number of damage dice the OP was going to get.
What is power attack if not an ability that adds damage dice? It sounds exactly like what the description of counting dice was made for when it says you "don’t count extra dice from abilities, critical specialization effects, property runes, weapon traits, or the like."
The whole reason for this line is because there are many abilities in the game that increase the amount of dice you roll and the type of dice rolled are the same as that of the weapon, which is shortened for convenience to "deal an extra die of weapon damage" or something similar, but the designers wanted this to not interact with abilities that count the amount of damage dice so they made sure to add something that says that it doesn't count. That way they can be sure that whenever they say something is based on the number of damage dice it scales fairly linearly with the damage of the weapon itself. I fail to see what the purpose of the section about counting damage dice is and what it would exclude if power attack is not among them.
The horse's Support benefit does say "damage dice" rather than "weapon damage dice," as other effects that determine their bonuses based only on the number of dice from the weapon and its Striking rune normally do.
The horse's Support benefit is written unusually loosely in general, though, and I'd consider it fairly normal for a GM to rule that it applies to one or more of 1) Strikes only, 2) melee only, and 3) weapon damage dice only, and I suspect errata will eventually apply all three of those conditions to it at once.
Edit: Other features that add bonuses based on weapon damage dice, such as Dread Marshal Stance or the Forceful weapon trait, unambiguously do not stack with features that add weapon damage dice, such as Power Attack, Grievous Blow, or the Fatal weapon trait, to echo what others in here have said already. My comment is more about the horse Support benefit in particular than the general case.
All of these are trumped by the broad rule that states:
Effects based on a weapon’s number of damage dice include only the weapon’s damage die plus any extra dice from a striking rune
There is no ambiguity here. GM's might rule otherwisez but I don't see why they would because it is very clear cut.
Source: https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=226
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The horse's Support benefit does say "damage dice" rather than "weapon damage dice," as other effects that determine their bonuses based only on the number of dice from the weapon and its Striking rune normally do.
The horse's Support benefit is written unusually loosely in general, though, and I'd consider it fairly normal for a GM to rule that it applies to one or more of 1) Strikes only, 2) melee only, and 3) weapon damage dice only, and I suspect errata will eventually apply all three of those conditions to it at once.
Edit: Other features that add bonuses based on weapon damage dice, such as Dread Marshal Stance or the Forceful weapon trait, unambiguously do not stack with features that add weapon damage dice, such as Power Attack, Grievous Blow, or the Fatal weapon trait, to echo what others in here have said already. My comment is more about the horse Support benefit in particular than the general case.
All of these are trumped by the broad rule that states:
Effects based on a weapon’s number of damage dice include only the weapon’s damage die plus any extra dice from a striking rune
There is no ambiguity here. GM's might rule otherwisez but I don't see why they would because it is very clear cut.
Source: https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=226
It isn't trumped actually, because nowhere in the Horse's support ability does it say that the bonus is "based on a weapon's number of damage dice", just damage dice in general.
Here's that wording:
"Your horse adds momentum to your charge. Until the start of your next turn, if you moved at least 10 feet on the action before your attack, add a circumstance bonus to damage to that attack equal to twice the number of damage dice. "
There is a following statement that says "If your weapon already has the jousting weapon trait, increase the trait’s damage bonus by 2 per die instead." which I think strongly implies that it should be referring to weapon damage dice, but strictly RAW it could easily refer to a spell attack's damage dice for example.
That's why it should be cleared up, it ought to say Strike instead of attack and it should say it adds a circumstance bonus to damage equal to twice the number of weapon damage dice.
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Horse Support is so imprecisely written that its hard to even consider the concept of running it strictly RAW as a valid concept, anyway. You'll notice that it also doesn't even require you to be within a hundred feet of the horse (though it's obviously intended to be used while mounted, based on the description).
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Well I hope they do. They have already flagged if for errata as it doesn't clearly require it to be a melee weapon attack. Some people are using it with spell attacks.
Well I hope they do. They have already flagged if for errata as it doesn't clearly require it to be a melee weapon attack. Some people are using it with spell attacks.
Yeah I had made a whole build around it I think, with a beastmaster sorcerer specialising in disintegrate and having his horse give him massive circumstance bonus to damage :D
Actually, since it just mentions "attack" and not a "strike" doesn't that mean if you're doing strict RAW the horse's support action works on spells? Which, btw, can have upwards of 20 damage dice (maybe more, idk). It also just checks that "your weapon" has the jousting trait, not that you're using that weapon for the attack, so it could give you up to 40 bonus damage (80 on a crit). I know no one here is claiming this is how it works, but I think it's worth pointing out if we're talking about "what's RAW?" for the ability rather than how it should work.
Ultimately, at my table it works by assuming it's intended to function like the thing that there is rules for: "counting damage dice". Once we start trying to read intent into the presence or absence of a word or two in the ability it kind of breaks down in my opinion, but by all means keep discussing.
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This made me search around and I found my old Godric Horsefriend build from another thread!
I'll update him to be holding a lance !
GODRIC HORSEFRIEND
Sorcerer build
"A kind soul, Godric always though of himself as a friend of horses, and always felt better when he was around them... This tendency was exacerbated when it turned out that his great grandmother had sallies around with a brass Dragon and his sorcerous powers awakened."
A:halfling
B:animal handler
C: sorcerer (dragon bloodline)
Str:10
Dex:16
Con:12
Int:10
Wis:12
Cha:18
(Boosts to dex con Wis cha every five levels)
Feats:
1: dangerous sorcery
2: beastmaster dedication
4: mature companion
6: bloodline spell
8:incredible beastmaster
10: other bloodline spell feat
12: enlarge companion (if ever you want to polymorph into something large)
14: specialised beastmaster companion (bully)
16: side by side (if someone comes in melee with you you can shocking grasp their ass while it's flat footed)
18:effortless concentration
20: bloodline perfection
Enjoy your 20d10+50 disintegrate agaisnt a flat footed frightened target.
Cavalier works too if you want more sorcerer feats.
A bloodline with divine would give you divine vessel which you can use to get on top of a huge horse thanks to enlarge companion. You don't get disintegrate but you can use chilling darkness/searing light.