Pathfinder LO Special Edition, PF Special Edition Subscriber
Hey all, I'm wearing an Acid Flask and can cast Spiritual Armament. Can I use Spiritual Armament to deal acid damage? Nothing in the rules would seem to prohibit it, but my table is split on if this is allowed.
A bomb is a weapon. And an acid flask does deal acid damage.
It does seem that the wording - especially that part about the versatile trait - indicates that it is expecting to be used with weapons that deal a physical damage type. But it doesn't actually say that.
I can understand why the table is split on it.
Is there a reason that acid damage would be preferred in this battle? Having the Spiritual Armament bomb do spirit damage instead would be an alternative ruling.
I hate to say it but technically it works. The only thing that twigs my exploit senses is that the weapon returns to your side for repeated uses, as many attacks per turn that you spend sustains on, doing the (sanctified) damage type of your favorite bomb without needing to spend an action to draw another bomb, for as many spell slots you dedicate to it. So you'd never have to buy or craft more than one of any consumable weapon as long as you have that spell ready. And if you're an alchemist mc, or have an alchemist in the party, you can get that one of each per day for free. I don't like that but there is nothing preventing it... yet
Of course, you're not actually throwing a real bomb so as the spell description says you need to hit or critical hit to do ANY damage - you won't get splash damage at all - nor any secondary effects like persistent damage, nor off guard from lightning bombs, etc.
Baarogue wrote: I hate to say it but technically it works. The only thing that twigs my exploit senses is that the weapon returns to your side for repeated uses, as many attacks per turn that you spend sustains on, doing the (sanctified) damage type of your favorite bomb without needing to spend an action to draw another bomb, for as many spell slots you dedicate to it. So you'd never have to buy or craft more than one of any consumable weapon as long as you have that spell ready. And if you're an alchemist mc, or have an alchemist in the party, you can get that one of each per day for free. I don't like that but there is nothing preventing it... yet
Of course, you're not actually throwing a real bomb so as the spell description says you need to hit or critical hit to do ANY damage - you won't get splash damage at all - nor any secondary effects like persistent damage, nor off guard from lightning bombs, etc.
That wouldn't work due to the bomb's traits.
The Spiritual Armament Bomb still has all its traits, including the Consumable Trait which states that:
Quote: An item with this trait can be used only once. Unless stated otherwise, it’s destroyed after activation. And since nothing in Spiritual Armament Spell says that the item is NOT destroyed, the Spirit bomb is destroyed after you use it, so there's nothing to come back.
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shroudb wrote: That wouldn't work due to the bomb's traits.
The Spiritual Armament Bomb still has all its traits, including the Consumable Trait which states that:
Quote: An item with this trait can be used only once. Unless stated otherwise, it’s destroyed after activation. And since nothing in Spiritual Armament Spell says that the item is NOT destroyed, the Spirit bomb is destroyed after you use it, so there's nothing to come back.
But there's no bomb. And no traits apart from spell's. It's "ghostly, magical echo of one weapon", a spell effect with spell stats (spell attack), fixed spell damage and range. The only thing that is inherited is the damage type. And that is intended to be some physical type (yes, from the mention of versatile). "The weapon returns to your side" is a strange wording, but it's just a visual effect anyway.
More formally, the spell doesn't say it creates real copy of the weapon with weapon traits which works like a weapon you can make Strikes with. It says the opposite actually. So it doesn't do that.
So frankly, I'd just say that there's a missed 'non-consumable weapon'. That's normal GM thing. Making this spell all-damage type is clearly too much, there aren't such spells in the game.
RAW, it works. Alchemical Bombs are Weapons (their item description flat out says so in the first sentence). The weapon isn't consumed, as the spell makes a copy of it. No traits are inherited: it just copies the damage type.
It definitely doesn't feel intended as it's a significant buff to the spell if it can do nearly every damage type in the game, but if your table just wants to play RAW then there's nothing there to prohibit it.
I don't feel like its intended to work with consumable weapons and would totally understand a GM restricting that.
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Errenor wrote: Making this spell all-damage type is clearly too much, there aren't such spells in the game. Though there's at least one I guess Shadow Blast. But they clearly are not the same.
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The only thing that's kind of exploitative is you can carry around one of every energy type bomb and use it to deal repeated energy damage without expending the item. And you don't even need a high level item, because the damage is determined by the spell not the item.
It makes the spell super flexible. Other than that high level of flexibility, there's not much here that's a problem.
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Shadow Blast is also below the damage curve (27 average damage when a fireball would do 35 at this level) and scales slowly because of its versatility, which kind of higlights the problem of Spiritual Armament Bombs.
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Well, think of it like this though, Spiritual Armament is a single target spell.
At spell level 5 shadow blast does 6d8 to every creature in a 30ft cone.
If you cast Spiritual Armament at level 4 it will do 3d8 (or 4d8 as a 6th level spell) to one creature within 120ft. So it has a big range, but only hits one creature and does even less damage. Now the caveat is that you can make this attack multiple times per round (for each sustain, but also suffering MAP)for up to 10 rounds.
It is a good spell, but unless you're attacking a creature with a specific weakness, it's not a standout in my opinion.
Now let's compare to a longbow with a striking rune, that will deal 2d8 damage (probably 2d8+1 potency+1d6 element rune). But that attacks doesn't cost a spell slot. Someone can literally do this all day (ignoring exhaustion that would probably set in, and needing to pick up arrows).
So is spending a slot to do average 13.5 damage vs 13.5 average damage for a longbow worth it? Only if you can do something like triggering weakness. At least IMO. Otherwise you're basically just keeping up with a bow user.
Pathfinder LO Special Edition, PF Special Edition Subscriber
Appreciate all the feedback, everyone. I guess this is a GM-by-GM ruling unless it's ever addressed in errata. I, as a player who really needs some acid damage, would love to have this. At the same time, I get why it could spiral out of control if abused by, say, carrying a bunch of different bombs.
On a related note (because this also came up,) does Spiritual Armament transfer the properties of metals to the damage? Like, if I have a cold iron dagger, does hitting an enemy with Spiritual Armament trigger cold iron vulnerability?
BomberJacket wrote: On a related note (because this also came up,) does Spiritual Armament transfer the properties of metals to the damage? Like, if I have a cold iron dagger, does hitting an enemy with Spiritual Armament trigger cold iron vulnerability? Does the spell say so?
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Errenor wrote: BomberJacket wrote: On a related note (because this also came up,) does Spiritual Armament transfer the properties of metals to the damage? Like, if I have a cold iron dagger, does hitting an enemy with Spiritual Armament trigger cold iron vulnerability? Does the spell say so? Not that you're wrong, but you could provide a better direct answer.
No you don't benefit from special materials of the items used, as the spell doesn't specify that it does. In general, assume spells only do exactly what they say they do, don't try to extrapolate.
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The only spell I am aware of that does transfer material properties to the spell effect is Needle Darts.
So that can be used as an example of spell effect wording that would allow that.
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Claxon wrote: Errenor wrote: BomberJacket wrote: On a related note (because this also came up,) does Spiritual Armament transfer the properties of metals to the damage? Like, if I have a cold iron dagger, does hitting an enemy with Spiritual Armament trigger cold iron vulnerability? Does the spell say so? Not that you're wrong, but you could provide a better direct answer. I know. I just frequently don't want to. A bit tired of questions which look like people haven't even tried to read the text first. Though I guess a distinction between damage types and material special properties is not that obvious.
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Errenor wrote: Claxon wrote: Errenor wrote: BomberJacket wrote: On a related note (because this also came up,) does Spiritual Armament transfer the properties of metals to the damage? Like, if I have a cold iron dagger, does hitting an enemy with Spiritual Armament trigger cold iron vulnerability? Does the spell say so? Not that you're wrong, but you could provide a better direct answer. I know. I just frequently don't want to. A bit tired of questions which look like people haven't even tried to read the text first. Though I guess a distinction between damage types and material special properties is not that obvious. I guess I prefer to give people the benefit of the doubt.
If I'm going to respond to the question that was posed, I can either be circumspect and basically tell them to (re)read the spell. But that presuppose they haven't.
I prefer to work from the mindset that they have some experience that is creating in a grey area in their parsing of the text, that leads them to think "maybe...."
The answer is almost always no, don't extrapolate, and only do what the text says.
Claxon wrote: I guess I prefer to give people the benefit of the doubt.
If I'm going to respond to the question that was posed, I can either be circumspect and basically tell them to (re)read the spell. But that presuppose they haven't.
I prefer to work from the mindset that they have some experience that is creating in a grey area in their parsing of the text, that leads them to think "maybe...."
That's great. But also I think I didn't just tell to reread the spell. I think leading question I used is a little bit different and could provoke some thinking and maybe get a chance to find out where 'maybe' is coming from. But I guess this could better work in a chat than a forum.
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Yeah, leading question work better in a (near) real-time conversation (at least in my opinion).
Finoan wrote: The only spell I am aware of that does transfer material properties to the spell effect is Needle Darts.
So that can be used as an example of spell effect wording that would allow that.
Field of Razors also enherrets the properties of the metal used to cast the spell, as does Clad in Metal, if more examples are required.
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