Iron Armbands of Power and Item Bonus Stacking?

[Bodhiwolff]

Do the various bonus additions from different items stack?

I was under the impression that they did not. You chose the largest single bonus, and that was it.

However, the Iron Armbands of Power have a property which grants a +2 bonus to damage rolls.

However, if item bonuses don't stack, then this item has a fairly useless ability, since a straight-up magic item's bonus to damage is probably sufficient to over-ride it. The only place where the damage bonus from the Armbands would be if the weapon being used was only a +1 magic weapon.

So, do item bonuses stack?

If somebody could point me to a page reference, or a forum thread, or anything, I'd be very pleased.

 

[Mengu]

Armbands give +2 item bonus. A +3 weapon would give +3 enhancement bonus. They are two different keywords, and as such stack.

 

[Istar]

Is that +2 to ALL damage rolls.

Say you have 3[w]

Is that +6 ?

Then say you have Sneak Damage is that +2 to the 3D8 or +2 to each roll.

Worst Case: +2 damage to the entire attack.
Best Case: +6 to ALL rolls ???

Ditto same question to the Weapon Sec feat AND magic tems, cheers

p.s. Question from a Newbie

 

[FireLance]

Is that +2 to ALL damage rolls.

Say you have 3[w]

Is that +6 ?

It's per damage roll, not per damage die. Think of it as rolling all the dice at the same time.

1[W] is one damage roll.
2[W] is two dice, but still one damage roll.
3[W] is three dice, but still one damage roll.
1[W] to one target and 1[W] to the same or a different target are two separate damage rolls.

 

[Starglim]

If an item gives you an item bonus, its description will say so. Magic items can also grant enhancement bonuses (from the enhancement line), power bonuses (from their powers), unnamed bonuses and maybe others. These are different types of bonuses, so they all stack.

 

[Starglim]

Is that +2 to ALL damage rolls.

Say you have 3[w]

Is that +6 ?

No. The damage roll is 3[W] so it would be 3[W]+2. Sneak attack is not the damage roll for the attack, it's extra damage, so it would be 3[W]+sneak attack+2.

 

[underfoot007]

Do the various bonus additions from different items stack?

I was under the impression that they did not. You chose the largest single bonus, and that was it.

However, the
have a property which grants a +2 bonus to damage rolls.

However, if item bonuses don't stack, then this item has a fairly useless ability, since a straight-up magic item's bonus to damage is probably sufficient to over-ride it. The only place where the damage bonus from the Armbands would be if the weapon being used was only a +1 magic weapon.

So, do item bonuses stack?

If somebody could point me to a page reference, or a forum thread, or anything, I'd be very pleased.

4E PHB 192;

Most feats give you small, static bonuses to one of the
numbers on your character sheet. When picking feats,
there’s one important rule to remember about these
bonuses: Bonuses of the same type don’t add together​

(or stack). ...futher down...

A bonus that’s untyped (such as one expressed as
simply a “+2 bonus”) usually applies only in certain
situations. These situational bonuses reward particular
combat tactics. For example, Combat Reflexes gives
you a +1 bonus to attack rolls with opportunity attacks.
Unlike feat bonuses, however, untyped bonuses stack​

with themselves.


and thus "An item bonus from a magic item"

but on 4E PHB 232

A magic weapon adds an enhancement bonus to attack
rolls and damage rolls, so a​

​

​

​

+3 flameburst longbow adds
+3 to all attack rolls and damage rolls made with the
bow. This bonus does not apply to any ongoing damage​

or other damage that might be applied to the attack.


So you can add all the "untyped" and the "Enhancement" and the highest "Item" bonus, and possibly the highest "feat" and "power" bonuses if you had any.


so a sword +3 and Iron Armbands of Power would result in 3 + 2 = 5 damage.

game on,
-jjm

 

[Bumamgar]

The question then is, what makes up the [W] in a power? Clearly a 1[W] power used with a +3 weapon and the armbands would be 'damage dice' + 5, but what about a 2[W] power? Is it 2d + 5 or 2d + 10? Or even weirder, 2d + 6 + 2 ?

 

[-Avalon-]

The question then is, what makes up the [W] in a power? Clearly a 1[W] power used with a +3 weapon and the armbands would be 'damage dice' + 5, but what about a 2[W] power? Is it 2d + 5 or 2d + 10? Or even weirder, 2d + 6 + 2 ?

The way we play it simplifies issues so much on that:

Run it like it is math... 1[W] + X, 2[W] + X, 3[W] + X, etc...
Where W = Base damage of Weapon and X = Total Damage bonuses

W can be 1d4, 1d6, 1d8, etc
X = stat + feat + enhancement + item + misc (whatever other bonuses you may have)

as a math problem it is a simple straightforward 1 * W + X or 3 * W + X... you roll the one amount of weapon damage, multiply it, THEN add the extras... you don't multiply the extras, they are merely extra lil pips of damage, if they did it any other way, the entire reasoning would be thrown off and we would be back to 3.X again lol...

Imagine using a Greatsword + 3, with a 20 str, power Attack, and Iron Armbands... if we did this without multiplying, the damage would be 1d10 + 13... a good chunk of damage coming from the bonuses, but a nice bit coming from the weapon also... and if this is a 4[W] attack, it becomes (4 to 40) + 13, a very small piece is the bonuses... yet if we multiply...

(4-40) + 52? Somehow, the entire idea is off scale now, and we no longer really care what we rolled as long as we hit and got that minimum of 56 damage lol...

and if you had those same bonuses using a longsword... (4-32) + 12... decent difference... all based on what weapon, not everything else.

I think the designers meant weapons to be more substantial in this edition, not just be like a cake: just a means of delivering the icing...

 

[Mengu]

PHB page 276:

Weapon Damage Dice: A [W] in a damage expression stands for your weapon’s damage dice. (The weapon tables on pages 218–219 show damage dice for all weapons.) The number before the [W] indicates the number of times you roll your weapon dice.​

​

I'm not sure what's so confusing about this statement that it gets so many questions, but [W] just represents the dice (you know those little polyhedrons we roll with numbers or pips on them). Nothing else.