Is slashing/bludgeoning/piercing damage even needed?

[Dalamar]

I know what they do. I just doubt that anyone needs to be told that (unless they genuinely have no idea what a falchion is).

I would think that it's equally obvious that Burning Hands deals fire damage, and there are only two creatures that interact with the damage type (troll and gray ooze). The gelatinous cube is immune to cold, but I'm not sure there's any way to deal cold damage in the playtest package.

 

[arscott]

The real problem here is that we're discussing weapon damage type as though it was a separate thing from other damage types. Sure, skeleton is the only place in the playtest where slashing type damage comes up, but other creatures are called out as having immunities or restistances to fire, cold, etc.

There's absolutely no reason why weapon damage needs to be a separate set of categories from energy damage. Which means to remove them from the playtest is removing half of a system.

 

[Walking Dad]

Okay, what do they do in the base game?

-YRUSirius

They avoid that possibly each type of ooze, zombie, skeleton etc has a three lines list of weapons they resist. And if they publish new weapons (like from an Asian background or Dark Sun) the have not to include a line with each of them that they count as which of the core weapons in respect of the resistance of ooze, zombie, skeleton etc

I'm very certain the inclusion of the type with the weapons in the book (I'm not sure it should be included on the sheet) will reduce the needed amount of writing over all and will lessen the confusion how a "new" weapon will work.

Edit: Also AD&D 2nd had an optional rule for different protection of armor, dependent on the weapon/damage type. Options like this are far easier to integrate if the base system already lists damage types for weapons.

 

[YRUSirius]

It still feels so clumsy for the base game, atleast to me.

-YRUSirius

 

[UngeheuerLich]

What Crazy Jerome said, about modular design.

Also, there's no reason why other monsters can't make use of it. Personally, I think the zombie (and indeed most corporeal undead) should be resistant to piercing too. (Actually, I wouldn't mind making skeletons outright immune to it.)

Here's a question. Incorporeal undead are presumably mostly ethereal, and thus take half damage. (Interesting choice, that.) Does that stack with resistance or not? So if you have a ghost that happens to be resistant to piercing damage, does it take 1/4 damage?

EDIT: Another possibility is that two halvings like that 'stack' into full immunity. It would certainly be simpler.

you don´t do half damage, you get disadvantage this time. Seems reasonable.
If you happen to stab a rib, it will be broken, but most times, you hit in between and do not a lot of damage...

 

[imurphy943]

What I said was that I have no problem putting weapon types on monster stat blocks, since they do help brevity, but I think it's a waste of space to also put the on the weapon lists.

 

[Frostmarrow]

They could use this design space for different damage depending on if the last attack hit or not. Each weapon has three damages 1d6/1d6/1d6. The first is damage while recovering if the last attack was a miss. The second die is initial damage for the first (charge) attack, and the third damage is used when sustaining an attack. Example:

Spear 1d4/1d8/1d10
Dagger 1d4/1d4/1d12
Longsword 1d8/1d8/1d8
Battle Axe 1d6/1d10/1d10

Or some such.

 

[GX.Sigma]

I know what they do. I just doubt that anyone needs to be told that (unless they genuinely have no idea what a falchion is).

Apparently the D&D design team have no idea what a falchion is, so there's an argument to be made. (Both 3e and 4e describe it as a large two-handed sword, but in reality it's a heavy, short, one-handed sword/knife.)

 

[Larrin]

I think giving weapon damage a type is smart. In 4e, resisting weapon attacks wasn't simple, usually it became resist all, or specifically ranged/melee or calling out weapon attacks...blah. I like weapons having a type of damage.

I'm less thrilled about weapons having three separate damage types. B/P/S makes sense, and I agree that they are very different if you ever get to experience them first hand, but unless its a benefit to the player to have three different types, I don't like it. If the only thing weapon damage types gets used for is "your bow sucks against skeletons" then its not a good core mechanic. Even if there is the occasional "your bow is good against the pin-cushion-beast" you'll find yourself punished more often than not, and then, BPS is a liability.

With other damage types, there is a viseral reaction to them, A fireball, a lightning bolt, ray of frost. You can get behind them in your immagination, and even if everything resists fire, you still want to play a pyromancer. If your cone of cold can freeze a salamander, but my scorching ray does half damage, I can buy that. But when my sword can't smash a skeleton, but your stupid club can, I don't care about cutting edge or trained technique or what-not, my three feet of steel has enough momentum to bludgeon with the best club out there.

So, unless BPS will get some real support/fun/advantage for players, I would rather just have "physical" damage, and be done with it.

 

[NotAYakk]

By giving weapon damage a type, you avoid saying "untyped damage" or "weapon damage" later on. Ie, a spell that creates blades that slice: it now does "slashing damage".

You can see in 4e where they tried untyped damage from weapons, and it resulted in really stilted text sometimes.

It also means that we can have hooks that attach to weapon damage types just like there are hooks that attach to spell damage types. Burning Hands doesn't need to do fire damage -- a sword doesn't need to do slashing damage. But by having that hook there, we open up possible interactions.

We can have magical plate armor that gives you resistance to slashing damage, oozes that react to being cut by breaking into smaller oozes, paper monsters that are immune to piercing damage, etc.

Adding that after the fact, without there being rules asto what weapons do crushing/piercing/slashing damage, would be awkward. And by making sure that all damage has a descriptive type, they do away with the annoyance of ever having rules talking about "untyped damage".