How severe would you rule the damage done?

Issue came up in game last night and at the time I said it'd need a Regenerate spell to fix, but I'm not sure if that's fair (party is only level 6, he may not be able to get such a spell for a while). The exact details don't bother me to discuss, but the squeamish may not want to read on...


The party had been captured previously, and were being tortured for their crimes and religious beliefs, the NPCs trying to force them to convert under duress. Very much like the Inquisition, that was what I was going for.

One particular character had a Pear of Anguish in his mouth.
Medieval torture devices - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
While there aren't rules for this exact scenario, I kind of ruled on the fly: The character decided to make a rather spectacular resistance, and chose to use his Mountain Hammer maneuver (ignore all object hardness) to try and destroy the implement... with his teeth! For the record, the players agreed it should be treated as an unarmed strike for damage (d3) for medium. He has no Imp. Unarmed Strike and thus can only do non-lethal and probably has no way of damaging an object, maneuver or not. I said I'd allow it, and just subtract some damage from the result. I also tried to act as his character's common sense, flatly stating, "I think that's a REALLY bad idea, and whether you succeed to destroy it or not, you'll suffer pretty severe damage."

He said he wanted to regardless. So, I told him he didn't need to roll to hit (I mean, really!) and he rolled fairly low damage. I described the device (made of mostly metal and some wood on the interior) as getting some dents and holes punctured through it, but still functional. My description of the incredible, horrific pain he experienced took about three paragraphs worth of text. Basically, I said he chipped and broke many of his teeth, forced them deep into his gums, broke and dislocated his jaw... the pain being so severe it instantly floored him and gave him a tremendous headache. I told him he wouldn't be speaking for a while (the torture room had a permanent mind link effect on it to hear the victims' mental anguish anyway, so he could still RP) and once he could, he'd basically be sounding like someone whose tongue had gone numb.

He said, out of character, it wasn't a big deal. He'd just get a cure spell later. I corrected him, no, that wasn't something a mere cure spell will fix. I thought that was clear in my warning before he did it, and the fact I never actually rolled hp damage. Guess it wasn't. I told him it seemed like something you'd need Regenerate to fix.
Regenerate :: d20srd.org

For what it's worth, he wasn't angry about it and accepted my ruling. But I do feel kind of bad. Is requiring a level 7 spell too harsh? I can't think of a better spell to model it. Am I interpreting what happened right? I see it as him biting down into the mostly metal object full force with no care for self harm. Perhaps by ignoring object hardness, it should cause the object to buckle like rubber against his teeth? What do you guys think?

No. Cure should do it. Getting punched with a mailed gauntlet could knock teeth out. Cure would handle. Unless, you want to start using specific body damage rules. Not a good idea...

I would agree that it should be something 'better-grade' than a Cure spell.

Cure spells don't replace teeth. That's Regenerate.

However, if you wanted to be kind for the rest of the mouth, you could say that it would take a Cure Severe Wounds, or a Cure spell cast by a cleric of CL 7+ or something.

The player knew the risks. Besides, just having a Cure spell heal this injury is kinda...lame.

I'm glad the player is cool with your ruling, though.

Good luck.

Lopke_Quasath said:

I would agree that it should be something 'better-grade' than a Cure spell.

Cure spells don't replace teeth. That's Regenerate.

However, if you wanted to be kind for the rest of the mouth, you could say that it would take a Cure Severe Wounds, or a Cure spell cast by a cleric of CL 7+ or something.

The player knew the risks. Besides, just having a Cure spell heal this injury is kinda...lame.

I'm glad the player is cool with your ruling, though.

Good luck.

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It be cheaper to just get a Reincarnate though (Regenerate is sonwwhat expensive).

I'd say a restoration spell should do the job. Muscle damage is often done as Str or Dex damage, loss of blood is modelled as Con damage, and some blows to the head cause Int damage. I'd say his mangled mouth is some severe Cha damage and call it a day.
-blarg

Starbuck_II said:

It be cheaper to just get a Reincarnate though (Regenerate is sonwwhat expensive).

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Reincarnate has a 1000 gp cost, a lost level, and randomness. I assume you meant another spell? Really, if you're going to kill yourself and get raised to "cure" something, might as well just do a Revivify.

I would second the ruling that a Restoration spell would fix the damage.

I have presented similar injuries to players and said they needed a full restoration to fix it. Considerably easier to obtain and cheaper than a regeneration spell. I they have access to a regeneration or a Heal spell of course those would work too, but restoration should be all they really need.

Well, basically, there is no clear rule for maiming a character. So it is up to DM, you, whether if it considered to be a loss of body part or a simple injury.

IMHO, what more important is, if you want to let the PC pay extra cost for the player's RP (or your story).

If you don't like to punish the PC (and thus the player) for this, you can either let him cure with usual cure spells, or, give him opportunity to get regeneration for free.

Shin Okada said:

Well, basically, there is no clear rule for maiming a character. So it is up to DM, you, whether if it considered to be a loss of body part or a simple injury.

IMHO, what more important is, if you want to let the PC pay extra cost for the player's RP (or your story).

If you don't like to punish the PC (and thus the player) for this, you can either let him cure with usual cure spells, or, give him opportunity to get regeneration for free.

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I didn't want a 13th level cleric handing out casting (for money) to be an easy thing to get anyway, so I was considering making a small quest out of it if I kept to ruling that it needed regenerate. Some people are saying to use Restoration, I guess that could work, though I don't think it should be the same as ability damage (because if so it'd heal on its own, and likely much faster than it should). Also, if it were con damage, that'd gimp him pretty badly till they break out of prison and get to town, being a front line warrior and all.

I guess I could not deal ability damage and just say healing it would be a different function of the Restoration spell. Doing so makes things interesting, as the party just turned level 6, so the cleric couldn't yet heal him for a few sessions. A scroll would work, but cost as much as just paying the regenerate casting fee. They could do the quest idea, but it seems decidedly more lame for a spell the party could just cast themselves in another 3-4 sessions of unrelated adventuring anyway.

Maybe if he likes the idea of playing with slurred speech and needing mushy food that doesn't require chewing for a few sessions, I'll just tell the player a Restoration will fix it, the cleric can heal you in a few sessions, until then...pretend you're a Monty Python actor and have fun with it. Unfortunately, it's online with text, so it's not like he'd be doing wacky voice work.

I think people here are suggesting you treat it as ability drain , not just damage, charisma drain to be more precise.

Which doesn't heal naturally, and can be cured by a Restoration spell.