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Adamantite Bypassing DR?
- Thread starter Xarlen
- Start date
Cloudgatherer
First Post
Wolf, reference? I didn't see it in the FAQ.
By my understanding of the rules it does bypass DR as if it were a magic weapon. Just because it says "natural" in front of it, doesn't mean it is not an enhancement bonus.
Seriously though, don't attacks which ignore "armor" also ignore "natural armor"? Take touch attacks for instance. They bypass armor, right? Just as natural armor is still a type of armor.
By my understanding of the rules it does bypass DR as if it were a magic weapon. Just because it says "natural" in front of it, doesn't mean it is not an enhancement bonus.
Seriously though, don't attacks which ignore "armor" also ignore "natural armor"? Take touch attacks for instance. They bypass armor, right? Just as natural armor is still a type of armor.
Wolf72
Explorer
reference ... I want to say sage advice, but I'm not about to go scrounging thru them to find it.
or ... it might have been an SKR rant, but I'm fairly certain that it is correct ...
I think it was a month or two ago that this came back out and then got as close to an official answer as we were going to get.
[edit: looked but I couldn't find it (online) ... bed time now, perhaps tomorrow I'll look, after work, if no one has found it ... or caliban hasn't answered it]
or ... it might have been an SKR rant, but I'm fairly certain that it is correct ...
I think it was a month or two ago that this came back out and then got as close to an official answer as we were going to get.
[edit: looked but I couldn't find it (online) ... bed time now, perhaps tomorrow I'll look, after work, if no one has found it ... or caliban hasn't answered it]
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Cloudgatherer said:
You will get into trouble if you take this line of thinking too far.
Natural armour and armour bonuses are two different things, that just happen to have the same word in them. Eg the brilliant energy weapon enchantment ignores armour, but not natural armour.
Wolf72
Explorer
Dr. Zoom said:
okay now I'm pretty sure it was an SKR clarifacation ... but each is it's own special category ... DR/silver, DR/adamantine, and DR/mithral are all seperate categories. A mithral dagger will not bypass a lycanthrope's DR ... nor will an adamantine one.
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Jeremy
Explorer
After re-reading it twice, I'd be inclined to say that adamantine does serve as a magical weapon for the purposes of bypassing Damage Reduction.
Damage reduction says it is defeated by enhancement bonuses, and adamantine grants an enhancement bonus.
Wolf/Xarlen, if you can quote the source of the professional that says otherwise I'd definately appreciate it.
Damage reduction says it is defeated by enhancement bonuses, and adamantine grants an enhancement bonus.
Wolf/Xarlen, if you can quote the source of the professional that says otherwise I'd definately appreciate it.
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See above.
Adamantite (Like Silver, Mithril) is a Special Material.
DR is a Supernaturel effect that is bypassed by Magic. That's why spells eat through it.
Adamantite is a *natural* substance that gives it's bonus for the density and power of the material, not for any supernatural or magical nature. It just gives it because it's better quality. Think of a regular weapon as a +0 natural enchantment weapon, because of the quality.
Silver bypasses because it's part of the werewolf Legend. Like faeries and cold iron, like Vampires crossing water.
Adamantite (Like Silver, Mithril) is a Special Material.
DR is a Supernaturel effect that is bypassed by Magic. That's why spells eat through it.
Adamantite is a *natural* substance that gives it's bonus for the density and power of the material, not for any supernatural or magical nature. It just gives it because it's better quality. Think of a regular weapon as a +0 natural enchantment weapon, because of the quality.
Silver bypasses because it's part of the werewolf Legend. Like faeries and cold iron, like Vampires crossing water.
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Xarlen, I wish you wouldn't keep using the same reasoning that has already been refuted...
Here's a sum up of my responses to Xarlen's opinions, while we were having this debate in another thread:
"Special material" has nothing to do with adamantine. "Special material" is meant to refer to silver, wood, mithral, and other nonmagical materials which do not grant enhancement bonuses but which can bypass certain types of DR.
Adamantine gives a natural enhancement bonus to the weapon it is made out of. I could not see how this could be more clear, until IanB came along and pointed out the description of the adamantine battleaxe in the DMG. This proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that adamantine bypasses DR...since DR requires an "enhancement bonus" to be bypassed, and adamantine gives something an "enhancement bonus". It doesn't get any simpler than that.
Also, the argument about "magical attacks bypassing DR" is irrelevant, because magical attacks are simply one of the exceptions to DR. There is nothing that says that DR much be bypassed by magical attacks, and indeed it even says in the description of DR that there are many cases in which it gets bypassed by completely mundane attacks (it uses the phrase "mundane fire" as an example of something that bypasses DR). So no, things do not have to be "magical" to bypass DR.
And, once again, the argument that "masterwork weapons not bypassing DR is a contradiction" is also false, because masterwork weapons do not give an enhancement bonus, they give an unnamed bonus that is explicitly stated not to stack with enhancement bonuses. Since masterwork weapons do not give enhancement bonuses, then they do not bypass DR. It's very simple.
And for some replies to comments made in this thread:
DR is always a supernatural ability unless denoted otherwise, and the only cases in which it isn't that I've been able to find are in the cases of werewolves and forsakers (and the aforementioned case of the barbarian...this also applies to other classes that get x/- DR, but the - is irrelevant when we're talking about overcoming DR, so I'm not really going to discuss barbarians or anyone else who gets that type of DR). In the case of a werewolf it's easy to overcome even in an antimagic field, because it's silver and silver doesn't get negated by antimagic fields. With forsakers it can be above +2, but other forsakers can get around that DR and it's really not a massive amount compared to the level at which you get it anyway.
Also, if the "adamantine doesn't bypass DR" side is basing it's argument on a sean k reynolds rant, then I don't really think that adds any credibility at all to that argument...I mean, c'mon, the guy argues that invisibility would cause people to explode.
And now, for the balance aspect of it all:
Adamantine costs more than equivalent magical enchantments, is not as flexible, and is set to a specific amount depending on what type of item that is being used. It also cannot be further enchanted, and the enchantments on it can't be anything other than a simple enhancement bonus. All of this is in exchange for it not going away inside antimagic fields (which almost never is encountered, and even if it did go away it's a very minimal effect since DR goes away inside antimagic fields anyway), not being able to be dispelled (which people don't try to do very often anyway, there's far more effective things to do than try to dispel someone's wimpy +1 or +2 sword), and having slightly higher hardness than steel (which isn't even that huge a difference, since magical swords get bonuses to their hardness and such anyway). Also, adamantine weapons and armor do not get the advantages of being masterwork, so the armor doesn't lose any of it's armor check penalty and the weapon wouldn't retain a +1 to hit if it were dispelled. So the net bonus of having an adamantine weapon is slightly higher hardness, +1 damage (or +1 hit, +2 damage) in an antimagic field, and that it doesn't get dispelled. And these minimal bonuses are in exchange for a higher cost, a LOT less flexibility, and supposedly the lack of an ability to overcome DR? Without being able to overcome DR, adamantine is too weak, and with the ability to overcome DR it is just about right.
Here's a sum up of my responses to Xarlen's opinions, while we were having this debate in another thread:
"Special material" has nothing to do with adamantine. "Special material" is meant to refer to silver, wood, mithral, and other nonmagical materials which do not grant enhancement bonuses but which can bypass certain types of DR.
Adamantine gives a natural enhancement bonus to the weapon it is made out of. I could not see how this could be more clear, until IanB came along and pointed out the description of the adamantine battleaxe in the DMG. This proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that adamantine bypasses DR...since DR requires an "enhancement bonus" to be bypassed, and adamantine gives something an "enhancement bonus". It doesn't get any simpler than that.
Also, the argument about "magical attacks bypassing DR" is irrelevant, because magical attacks are simply one of the exceptions to DR. There is nothing that says that DR much be bypassed by magical attacks, and indeed it even says in the description of DR that there are many cases in which it gets bypassed by completely mundane attacks (it uses the phrase "mundane fire" as an example of something that bypasses DR). So no, things do not have to be "magical" to bypass DR.
And, once again, the argument that "masterwork weapons not bypassing DR is a contradiction" is also false, because masterwork weapons do not give an enhancement bonus, they give an unnamed bonus that is explicitly stated not to stack with enhancement bonuses. Since masterwork weapons do not give enhancement bonuses, then they do not bypass DR. It's very simple.
And for some replies to comments made in this thread:
DR is always a supernatural ability unless denoted otherwise, and the only cases in which it isn't that I've been able to find are in the cases of werewolves and forsakers (and the aforementioned case of the barbarian...this also applies to other classes that get x/- DR, but the - is irrelevant when we're talking about overcoming DR, so I'm not really going to discuss barbarians or anyone else who gets that type of DR). In the case of a werewolf it's easy to overcome even in an antimagic field, because it's silver and silver doesn't get negated by antimagic fields. With forsakers it can be above +2, but other forsakers can get around that DR and it's really not a massive amount compared to the level at which you get it anyway.
Also, if the "adamantine doesn't bypass DR" side is basing it's argument on a sean k reynolds rant, then I don't really think that adds any credibility at all to that argument...I mean, c'mon, the guy argues that invisibility would cause people to explode.
And now, for the balance aspect of it all:
Adamantine costs more than equivalent magical enchantments, is not as flexible, and is set to a specific amount depending on what type of item that is being used. It also cannot be further enchanted, and the enchantments on it can't be anything other than a simple enhancement bonus. All of this is in exchange for it not going away inside antimagic fields (which almost never is encountered, and even if it did go away it's a very minimal effect since DR goes away inside antimagic fields anyway), not being able to be dispelled (which people don't try to do very often anyway, there's far more effective things to do than try to dispel someone's wimpy +1 or +2 sword), and having slightly higher hardness than steel (which isn't even that huge a difference, since magical swords get bonuses to their hardness and such anyway). Also, adamantine weapons and armor do not get the advantages of being masterwork, so the armor doesn't lose any of it's armor check penalty and the weapon wouldn't retain a +1 to hit if it were dispelled. So the net bonus of having an adamantine weapon is slightly higher hardness, +1 damage (or +1 hit, +2 damage) in an antimagic field, and that it doesn't get dispelled. And these minimal bonuses are in exchange for a higher cost, a LOT less flexibility, and supposedly the lack of an ability to overcome DR? Without being able to overcome DR, adamantine is too weak, and with the ability to overcome DR it is just about right.
