Warlock w/hideous blow & whip - ?

[joshjurg]

Will my planned warlock be able to apply hideous blow damage to his whip and have the blast deal lethal damage ? What about to targets with high enough armor bonuses to normally negate the weapon damage ? What if the whip also had a crystal of elemental assault on it (MIC + 1d6 elemental damage) Here is the text for whip from the SRD:

Whip

A whip deals nonlethal damage. It deals no damage to any creature with an armor bonus of +1 or higher or a natural armor bonus of +3 or higher. The whip is treated as a melee weapon with 15-foot reach, though you don’t threaten the area into which you can make an attack. In addition, unlike most other weapons with reach, you can use it against foes anywhere within your reach (including adjacent foes).

Using a whip provokes an attack of opportunity, just as if you had used a ranged weapon.

You can make trip attacks with a whip. If you are tripped during your own trip attempt, you can drop the whip to avoid being tripped.

When using a whip, you get a +2 bonus on opposed attack rolls made to disarm an opponent (including the roll to keep from being disarmed if the attack fails).

You can use the Weapon Finesse feat to apply your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to attack rolls with a whip sized for you, even though it isn’t a light weapon for you.



Any help you rules masters can muster up would help greatly

 

[joshjurg]

Well, upon reading the hideous blow description closely, it has the caveat that the melee attack does not need to deal melee damage - but then if only the eldritch blast damage applies , I might as well just not even use the whip and blast away...

But I am still curious about the theoretical fire damage from an augment crystal..

 

[irdeggman]

I'm curious did you somehow think that the hideous blow converted the whip's basic damage from non-lethal to lethal instead of merely adding on the EB damage?

 

[pawsplay]

The blast deals lethal damage because that's what blasts do. Ditto for elemental damage.

 

[joshjurg]

Cool. I was more puzzled by the "no damage to armor class > n" clause, but you guys have illuminated me.

 

[Presto2112]

When I played my warlock, I looked at Hideous Blow and thought to myself "why would I take this?"

As EB stands, I can stand up to 60 feet away and once every 6 seconds, have an excellent chance of spanking an opponent with level/2d6 damage. However, I COULD get up close to the opponent and do the same damage in melee, but then he can pound me on the head when he couldn't before.

 

[pawsplay]

And you have to make a concentration check, and it's against full AC.

But I'm sure it's great for 10th level warlocks with brilliant energy longspears who like melee.

 

[Felix]

When I played my warlock, I looked at Hideous Blow and thought to myself "why would I take this?"

As EB stands, I can stand up to 60 feet away and once every 6 seconds, have an excellent chance of spanking an opponent with level/2d6 damage. However, I COULD get up close to the opponent and do the same damage in melee, but then he can pound me on the head when he couldn't before.

It's good for melee multiclass warlock/somethings. Instead of weapon damage and strength -or- EB damage, it allows for both.

And I'm sure a melee warlock build is possible as well.

 

[joshjurg]

yeah. this build is an eldritch disciple that buffs a lot for melee.

 

[frankthedm]

Cool. I was more puzzled by the "no damage to armor class > n" clause, but you guys have illuminated me.

Oh, you won't do any damage against those foes at all.

IF you hit a legal target for the whip's damage, those extra dice will be lethal. IIRC 3.0 or 3.5 DMG even state energy damage should almost always be lethal.