I'm going to be running a fight with an ecorche later this week, and I've got a question about its stats that I just can't figure out or find any previous answers for here. I'm hoping someone has some insight to offer.
Special Attacks bleed (1 Con drain), rend (2 claws, 3d6+11 plus bleed and seize skin)---
Seize Skin (Su)
Whenever an ecorche damages a target with its rend ability, the target must succeed at a DC 25 Fortitude save to resist being skinned alive. Those who fail the save become staggered and take 1 point of Constitution drain per round. Both of these effects are permanent but can be removed with a regenerate or heal spell (or 1 round of regeneration). ...
The rend damage says it does damage, bleed, and triggers Seize Skin. Seize Skin also has a Fort save against bleeding. Is it supposed to cause the bleed only on a failed save (i.e. rend itself doesn't trigger any bleed)? Are they supposed to stack on a failed save (despite bleed not normally stacking)? Does it just always cause the one point of bleeding, and just have staggering as an extra effect?
My suspicion is that, given how deadly bleeding Con is, that it requires the thing to actually take your skin (rend and you fail your save) before the bleeding starts, and that the mention in the Special Attacks line is just a reminder. But that's not at all clear.
well if we go by RAW and the 'seize skin' ability was not written, then the rend ability effect would work like :
when a target is hit with two claws. the target would then take the rend damage and start to bleed 1 con drain each round until stopped by how ever normal bleed is stopped.
adding the seize skin ability to that line seem to indicate (again by raw) that beside that bleed damage the target also need to make a fort save and failing that would have it's skin ripped thus getting staggered and getting an additional 1 con drain each round which is not stopped the same way you can stop normal bleed but only with the mentioned 'heal' spell or regeneration spell or ability.
as a cr 16 creature that much might be in order. (it need to hit twice in the same round to pull off both bleed and maybe skin seizing ability).
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RAI i think the line is meant to be more like "rend (2 claws, 3d6+11 plus seize skin, which can lead to bleed if failed)"
heaving two different kinds of continuous con drain proc from the same special attack seem kinda strange it's more logical one was meant to explain the 2nd.
as in 'when it rend it can tear the skin that causes bleeding' instead of how it now stand as 'when it rend it causes bleeding and also might tear skin for more "not-bleeding-but-the-same-effect-as-it" and stagger'.
it's just that cause and effect seem to be more linear in the rules. one cause doesn't usually make two similar effects. if something make you bleed it is usually not make you bleed in two exact same ways at once (one effect might have 'bleed 1 con and 1 dex' or the like, but not 'bleed 1 con and bleed 1 more con'). and if a creature can make two different bleeding effects it would normally have 2 abilities assigned to proc them, one for each.
also 'rend' ability tend to be a somewhat copy of the attack that proc it. so if the rend had a bleed attached to it (not connected to the seize skin ability) i would have expected that ether the normal claw attack would also have the bleed ability or that a new ability ,something named like 'bloody rend', to be added and state that 'this creature's rend ability also cause bleed when it proc'.
They tend to do that when they change an effect to be different then how it work normally.
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to sum:
RAW - they are 2 separate effects, both proc from the rend ability.
RAI - i believe they are meant as one effect which happen when the rend proc. The seize skin is explaining how the bleed effect is changed from normal bleed effects (it has a save and can only be stopped by 'heal' spell or regeneration)
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Offense
Speed 30 ft.
Melee 2 claws +27 (3d6+11/19–20)
Space 10 ft., Reach 10 ft.
Special Attacks bleed (1 Con drain), rend (2 claws, 3d6+11 plus bleed and seize skin)
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Special Abilities
Seize Skin (Su) Whenever an ecorche damages a target with its rend ability, the target must succeed at a DC 25 Fortitude save to resist being skinned alive. Those who fail the save become staggered and take 1 point of Constitution drain per round. Both of these effects are permanent but can be removed with a regenerate or heal spell (or 1 round of regeneration). The ecorche can use its wear skin ability to don a skin stolen in this way as a full-round action. The save DC is Dexterity-based.
Bleed (Ex)
Source Bestiary 6 pg. 290, Pathfinder RPG Bestiary pg. 298, Bestiary 2 pg. 294, Bestiary 3 pg. 292, Bestiary 4 pg. 290, Bestiary 5 pg. 290
A creature with this ability causes wounds that continue to bleed, dealing additional damage each round at the start of the affected creature’s turn. This bleeding can be stopped with a successful DC 15 Heal skill check or through the application of any magical healing. The amount of damage each round is specified in the creature’s entry.Format: bleed (2d6)
Location: Special Attacks and individual attacks.
RAW they are 2 different sets of damage.
When the rend ability is activated:
1) the targets start bleeding and take 1 point of con drain each round. There is no save against that, but, if you are immune to bleeding it doesn't do anything. That bleed can be stopped normally.
2) at the same time the target must make a save or have its skin seized, and that causes a different constitution drain. Creatures that don't have a skin will be immune to this ability, but what hasn't a skin is the GM call.
Theoretically, a caster using Elemental body III+ will be immune to both abilities. Probably a creature using Plant form will be immune to being skinned (bark is not skin). But it is the GM call to decide as the rules are lacking.
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Thought experiment:
If the description of seize skin had said
Seize Skin (Su)
Whenever an ecorche damages a target with its rend ability, the target must succeed at a DC 25 Fortitude save to resist being skinned alive. Those who fail the save become staggered and take1 point of Constitution drain per roundbleed damage every round. Both of these effects are permanent but can be removed with a regenerate or heal spell (or 1 round of regeneration). ...
Would it then be double bleed? Or is it only two because the description put an exact number instead of generally stating that it causes bleed? The description is just reiterating what happens, not adding an additional effect.
It's fairly common for special abilities to include text saying something like "...and causes bleed damage..." with no numbers. That doesn't double the bleed. I think what happened here is that they didn't want to use the normal language ("and causes bleed damage") because the ecorche's bleed causes drain not damage.
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For your thought experiment, the discriminating point is that one is a Bleed effect, and can be cured or resisted as such (several creatures are immune to bleed, fast healing stops it, etc.), the other constitution loss is dependent on losing your skin and has a very different set of conditions that would stop or resist it.
As an example, a Skin Stealer is a fey, so it has blood, but it lacks a skin. It would be susceptible to the bleed effect, but not to the Seize Skin ability.
RAI probably was to have the bleed dependant on the successful use of Seize Skin, but RAW is very different.
If you fail the save against seize skin, you become staggered and also receive 1 Con drain per round, which if you're just looking at the ability, is not listed as bleed.
So technically they would stack, since one is bleed and the other is just an ability that drains 1 Con (until you get a heal or regenerate). It doesn't call out the Con drain from seize skin as 'bleed', even though it is mechanically and functionally similar.
Ooh, I hadn't even registered that it was not called a bleed in Seize Skin.
RAW - they are 2 separate effects, both proc from the rend ability.
RAI - i believe they are meant as one effect which happen when the rend proc. The seize skin is explaining how the bleed effect is changed from normal bleed effects (it has a save and can only be stopped by 'heal' spell or regeneration)
RAI probably was to have the bleed dependant on the successful use of Seize Skin, but RAW is very different.
I do think you're right about the RAI here. For whatever it's worth, it looks like both PF 2 and DnD 5 have their equivalent persistent effects only on the Seize Skin and not on the rend itself, so other designers seem to agree.
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All that said, I have a better handle on how it works now. I think I'm going to plan to run it as actually written (two separate sources of ongoing drain) - after all, it's nominally supposed to be the same level of challenge as an Astradaemon (up to four negative levels per round and a save vs instadeath) or Bythos (save vs permanent aging). Odds are good it'll only manage to take one skin before being splatted anyway, given how high level fights tend to go. I'll see how it plays out and adjust on the fly if needed, though.
Thanks!