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Lava damage?
- Thread starter Ninja-to
- Start date
malraux
First Post
(Psi)SeveredHead
Adventurer
I think it's in fantastic terrain in the DMG.
IIRC it does 30 ongoing fire damage and slows you. It probably has a level; low-level PCs should try to stay away from lava!
IIRC it does 30 ongoing fire damage and slows you. It probably has a level; low-level PCs should try to stay away from lava!
Infiniti2000
First Post
This. A thousand times, this. Read it twice if you have to, it's short.
Nikosandros
Golden Procrastinator
Those rules refer to previous editions of the game and are therefore outdated. The current rules for lava are as follows:
Effect: You're dead (save ends).
Aftereffect: You're still dead.
OnlineDM
Adventurer
I'm using a river of magma in a particular scene in my next adventure. The rules I'm using are:
- Any creature being forced into the magma gets a saving throw to stop themselves. If they make the save, they fall prone at the edge of the magma and take no damage.
- For each square of magma a character enters, they take High Damage (see below) and are slowed (save ends)
- High Damage varies by level (see below)
- Since this particular adventure is designed to be run at any of five levels in the heroic tier, I use a table to define what High Damage is at various levels
- Any creature being forced into the magma gets a saving throw to stop themselves. If they make the save, they fall prone at the edge of the magma and take no damage.
- For each square of magma a character enters, they take High Damage (see below) and are slowed (save ends)
- High Damage varies by level (see below)
- Since this particular adventure is designed to be run at any of five levels in the heroic tier, I use a table to define what High Damage is at various levels
malraux
First Post
More seriously, what I'd do is figure out roughly what your party's striker can do as crit damage in an ideal situation (i.e. gets his striker bonus damage, etc) and use that number. Assuming you don't want lava to be deadly, then it should be something that really really hurts.
Neonchameleon
Legend
Then work out average at will damage for a monster of the right level. You take that much fire damage just from being in a square adjacent to lava.
We had this come up in a game recently. We were level 10 at the time. The DM ruled that the lava caused ongoing 5 fire damage, and that you couldn't save until you moved out of the lava.
If that seems soft, it's because he put the lava at the bottom of a 50-foot drop. On a rickety bridge. Crawling with creatures that push.
Of course, when the Fighter got hit, failed his save, and fell to the bottom, hovering just a few points above negative bloodied, we thought he was doomed. That's when he got a natural 20 on his death save, stood up, and hauled himself up out of the lava, thereby winning bragging rights for basically the rest of his life.
If that seems soft, it's because he put the lava at the bottom of a 50-foot drop. On a rickety bridge. Crawling with creatures that push.
Of course, when the Fighter got hit, failed his save, and fell to the bottom, hovering just a few points above negative bloodied, we thought he was doomed. That's when he got a natural 20 on his death save, stood up, and hauled himself up out of the lava, thereby winning bragging rights for basically the rest of his life.
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