D&D 5E Battlerager Barbarian Question

[CapnZapp]

There are several magical staffs that specify that they can be wielded as a magical quarterstaff, while the description of the "staff" category says that unless noted otherwise a staff can be wielded as a quarterstaff. The omission of the word "magical" in the category description seems to be deliberate, as the staffs that get to be magical quarterstaffs are the ones with abilities related to melee combat rather than just spellcasting.

So to me it seems that the intention is that magical items do not work as magical weapons unless it explicitly says that they do.

Correct.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

It's an improvised weapon. It does improvised weapon damage.

If a non-magical whip can kill someone, then it should surely be possible for an old lady to beat you down with her purse.

But a whip is designed to cut you...a burlap sack isn't. Also, an old lady's purse isn't what's going to do any damage to you (if any), it's the items inside. If it's a small purse with 4 coins and a hankerchief...er...no. No DM in his right mind should rule that it does "improvised weapon damage". Just like no DM in his right mind should allow a player to "backstab a book because it has a spine". I think you are taking "improvised weapon" so far off into the pale that there shouldn't even be weapons...because then a player could take a reed of long grass, cast "Light" on it, wrap it around his hand and punch the Stone Golem in the face...and claim "it's a magical improvised weapon...so I do 1d4+STR Bonus worth of damage". Reading "Improvised Weapon" on pg 147-148, it's pretty clear to me that the spirit of the rule is "something that could conceivable be used as a weapon", not "whatever the character picks up"; that's why there is this thing called a "DM" in the game...to make reasonable adjudications.

The problem comes with weapons that don't have a bonus to attack or damage. In every previous edition, the reason why something required a +1 sword to hit was because the +1 represented how it was magically sharper and more damaging than a non-magical weapon. Your weapon must be +X more powerful than a regular weapon in order to hurt this enemy.

In 1e monsters with sufficient HD could hit creatures hit by +X weapons. An Ogre, for example, can hit/damage a creature normally needing a +1 weapon. This *never* equated to characters, and it even states so in the DMG.

In 5E, that's no longer the case. You can have a sword that isn't sharper or more damaging than a regular non-magical sword (like a Flametongue or a Frostbrand), and it will still hurt an iron golem that is otherwise entirely immune to non-magical sources of physical damage. It doesn't matter that its specific enchantment is unrelated to its sharpness or damage capacity; it's just that it has magic on it at all that somehow allows it to hurt an iron golem.

Not that drinking a potion would make you inherently magical, the same way that enchanting a suit of armor would make the armor magical. (Although I could imagine a DM ruling otherwise.)

You are free to rule however you want for what's best for your campaign, but, IMHO, this line of thinking goes against the spirit (if not the rules) of 5e. I think it would be an interesting campaign world that had magic uber-common, where most folks could cast a cantrip or two, and magical effects were easily recognizable by sight/smell/etc. In such a world, your rulings would add to the worlds flavour.. However, the core baseline of D&D5e isn't as such. It's based on a much more "mundane" foundation. IMHO, of course.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[The Crimson Binome]

You can certainly make this ruling.

What you can't do, however, is give off the false impression it's by RAW.

By RAW and RAI, everything is up to DM discretion, and there's nothing to imply that your reading is any more legitimate than my own. The best you can do is to make your case to the DM, and be prepared for it to go either way.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

But a whip is designed to cut you...a burlap sack isn't. Also, an old lady's purse isn't what's going to do any damage to you (if any), it's the items inside. If it's a small purse with 4 coins and a hankerchief...er...no. No DM in his right mind should rule that it does "improvised weapon damage".

A whip is designed to cause pain without severely injuring or killing, so its ability to hurt someone is roughly on par with a heavy book. The Bag of Holding weighs 15 lbs, which should be more than sufficient for this purpose.

In 1e monsters with sufficient HD could hit creatures hit by +X weapons. An Ogre, for example, can hit/damage a creature normally needing a +1 weapon. This *never* equated to characters, and it even states so in the DMG.

All this is saying is that an Ogre is so strong that it can hit harder than a human or elf ever could. In fact, it hits so hard that it is as damaging as a +1 weapon. It is a rather roundabout way of saying it, and there are corner cases that don't make sense due to specific rule interactions, but the underlying principle is consistent - golems require you to hit them way harder than normal in order to hurt them at all.

 

[CapnZapp]

By RAW and RAI, everything is up to DM discretion, and there's nothing to imply that your reading is any more legitimate than my own. The best you can do is to make your case to the DM, and be prepared for it to go either way.

By that reasoning everything and nothing goes, which makes discussion pointless.

For any reasonable interpretation of the rules you need a magic weapon, not merely any magic item, to bypass resistance to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage.

The bit about presenting your case to the DM still holds true, however.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

For any reasonable interpretation of the rules you need a magic weapon, not merely any magic item, to bypass resistance to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage.

If you want to be reasonable, then you need to point out some quality - any quality - which is possessed by all magic weapons but not by magic armor or a Bag of Holding.

If magic weapons behave differently when they hit an iron golem than other weapons do, then there must be some inherent property which signifies them as different. And in 5E, for the first time, that property isn't that they are more accurate or deal more damage.

 

[CapnZapp]

Sorry, but that's not how it works.

There is no such quality - because none is needed.

There certainly is no rule in the book that tells you magic weapons work differently than amulets, bags or what have you.

Just as there are no rules that detail exactly the interaction between Fireball and the inn you're staying at, and how this interacts with Cone of Cold.

Instead, unless you're specifically making a ruling to the contrary, I will simply assume a Headband of Wisdom deals absolutely no damage to a magic-resistant foe.

You certainly can't wrap the Headband around your club and suddenly do magic damage.

If anything, the DMG hints that a magic sword can't be used to carve through mundane stone.

Sorry Saelorn, but I can't take you seriously if you suggest using a bag as a weapon.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Sorry Saelorn, but I can't take you seriously if you suggest using a bag as a weapon.

Not a very good weapon, mind. It weighs 15 lbs, which is certainly not negligible and should qualify it as an improvised weapon, much like trying to swing a chair.

The point is more general than that, though. Even if you can't seriously see someone wielding a Bag of Holding, it's not unreasonable to thrust with a shield, or to slam into someone with the magic armor you are wearing. There are rules in place for determining how much damage this sort of thing does. The only question is whether this source of damage counts as magical; and given than there is nothing special about magic weapons that allows them to hurt a golem - nothing aside from their inherent magicalness - it's difficult to argue that the golem should be immune to enchanted shield or armor. You need some sort of logic in order to back up your position.

 

[devincutler]

Magic is magic. If you bash someone with your Bag of Holding, then that's magic and it can hurt a stone golem.

Your DM is free to rule otherwise.

First, I am curious if you allowed such inanity in 3.5e? Does a bag of holding wrapped around some rocks overcome DR 15/magic?

Second, I believe with regard to 5e you are hanging your hat on the choice of WOTC to word damage resistance as half damage from nonmagical weapons as opposed to saying full damage from magical weapons. You are saying that since they are resistant to nonmagical weapons, they must not be resistant to EVERYTHING else.

The fact that the damage resistance entry uses the term "nonmagical weapon" as opposed to "nonmagical item" implies greatly that the converse, magical weapons (and only magical weapons...not magic items) do full damage.

Weapons are a fairly specific term in 5e. There is a weapon chart in the PHB that does not list burlap sacks, for example.

Clearly, the RAI and the non rules lawyer RAW intends for a non-improvised weapon that imparts some portion of its magic via an attack roll to overcome damage resistance.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

First, I am curious if you allowed such inanity in 3.5e? Does a bag of holding wrapped around some rocks overcome DR 15/magic?

In every previous edition, monsters required a weapon with sufficient + to hit and damage. In AD&D and 3.0, it was spelled out as +1, +2, etc. In 3.5, /magic DR required a weapon with at least a +1 bonus, and /epic DR required a weapon with at least +6. It would not suffice to hit something with a Bag of Holding or a +3 shield, unless the item was also enchanted as a +1 or better weapon, which was explicitly allowed in 3.x and not addressed at all in earlier editions.

Second, I believe with regard to 5e you are hanging your hat on the choice of WOTC to word damage resistance as half damage from nonmagical weapons as opposed to saying full damage from magical weapons. You are saying that since they are resistant to nonmagical weapons, they must not be resistant to EVERYTHING else.

The fact that the damage resistance entry uses the term "nonmagical weapon" as opposed to "nonmagical item" implies greatly that the converse, magical weapons (and only magical weapons...not magic items) do full damage.

If you check the current version of the DM's Basic Rules, which I believe reflects current errata and which was changed to better convey the intent of the rules, resistance or immunity to certain weapons has been updated to say that it's resistance to damage of those type from nonmagical attacks. You can attack someone with an improvised weapon, just as you can attack with a sword.

The previous terminology was changed because it didn't convey the proper intent. Saying that you needed a magical weapon in order to deal slashing/piercing/bludgeoning damage to a golem was apparently misleading, possibly because some people were stuck on the idea that a "weapon" is some sort of specifically-defined system term rather than the natural language which describes the thing you use to make attacks that deal damage. An improvised weapon is entirely as much of a weapon as anything else, even though it can't be encapsulated in chart form, and there's even a specific rule for improvised weapons that bear no resemblance to a weapon.