Blade Barrier and Stoneskin
- Thread starter Dinkeldog
- Start date
The Souljourner
First Post
There was another question about Blade Barrier vs. Damage Reduction, and it became clear that there are two differing opinions.
The first is that since Blade Barrier says it deals slashing damage that it must be affected by Damage Reduction. Most people of this camp agree that damage reduction would reduce the total damage done by the spell per round (thus if it is 10d6 damage, doing 35 damage, and you had DR 10, you'd only take 25).
The second camp (and the camp that I belong in) is of the opinion that damage reduction does not apply to spells unless they specifically create a weapon to be wielded by a person. Since blade barrier is not a weapon wielded by a person, damage reduction doesn't apply.
To expound upon this argument - damage reduction is negated by magical bonuses (+1 to +5), but what "plus" is blade barrier? None? We don't know because it doesn't mention anything. Is it safe to assume that it counts as magical? I don't know, it doesn't say.
If you look at the description of damage reduction, it's pretty vague. It just says that it prevents damage from "attacks". Most DMs conclude that it doesn't affect spells such as Fireball or Magic Missile. But what about force effects? What about the slashing damage from Blade Barrier? If damage reduction works against a blade wielded by a person, why wouldn't it work against a blade spinning in the air?
It's pretty much up to the individual DM. For my sake, I simply find it easier to say that damage reduction never works against damage from spells. That includes slashing damage, force effects and everything else. It's a nice blanket rule that is easy to remember and won't get you into situations where the players expect one thing and you expect something else.
As long as your ruling is clear and well defined for almost all situations, I don't think it really matters.
-The Souljourner
The first is that since Blade Barrier says it deals slashing damage that it must be affected by Damage Reduction. Most people of this camp agree that damage reduction would reduce the total damage done by the spell per round (thus if it is 10d6 damage, doing 35 damage, and you had DR 10, you'd only take 25).
The second camp (and the camp that I belong in) is of the opinion that damage reduction does not apply to spells unless they specifically create a weapon to be wielded by a person. Since blade barrier is not a weapon wielded by a person, damage reduction doesn't apply.
To expound upon this argument - damage reduction is negated by magical bonuses (+1 to +5), but what "plus" is blade barrier? None? We don't know because it doesn't mention anything. Is it safe to assume that it counts as magical? I don't know, it doesn't say.
If you look at the description of damage reduction, it's pretty vague. It just says that it prevents damage from "attacks". Most DMs conclude that it doesn't affect spells such as Fireball or Magic Missile. But what about force effects? What about the slashing damage from Blade Barrier? If damage reduction works against a blade wielded by a person, why wouldn't it work against a blade spinning in the air?
It's pretty much up to the individual DM. For my sake, I simply find it easier to say that damage reduction never works against damage from spells. That includes slashing damage, force effects and everything else. It's a nice blanket rule that is easy to remember and won't get you into situations where the players expect one thing and you expect something else.
As long as your ruling is clear and well defined for almost all situations, I don't think it really matters.
-The Souljourner
Dinkeldog said:
Blade Barrier is not a attack there for DR does not apply.
Blade Barrier is a spell there for DR does not apply.
Blade Barrier is affected by SR and proves it is magical there for DR does not apply.
Blade Barrier is a Evocation spell there for is damage type energy there for DR does not apply.
Need more?
Re: Re: Blade Barrier and Stoneskin
It is an attack, therefore DR might apply.
It doesn't matter whether it's a spell or not, what matters is if the damage is magical or energy.
Spells can create non-magical effects (such as Wall of Stone). In this case the blade barrier spell creates physical blades (they actually provde cover for anyone behind them) that do slashing damage.
Not good enough. You may be able to resiste the magic that creates and animates the blades, but the blades themselves do physical damage, not magical damage.
Not good enough. Evocation does not automatically create energy effects. (Ex: tenser's floating disk, leomund's tiny hut, wind wall, wall of force,various bigby's hand spells, sending, contingency, etc.)
I don't think it's unreasonable to rule that bladebarrier ignores DR, but I don't think it's cut and dried. I believe that DR would apply, as the spell does physical slashing damage without any enhancement bonus.
melkoriii said:
It is an attack, therefore DR might apply.
It doesn't matter whether it's a spell or not, what matters is if the damage is magical or energy.
Spells can create non-magical effects (such as Wall of Stone). In this case the blade barrier spell creates physical blades (they actually provde cover for anyone behind them) that do slashing damage.
Not good enough. You may be able to resiste the magic that creates and animates the blades, but the blades themselves do physical damage, not magical damage.
Not good enough. Evocation does not automatically create energy effects. (Ex: tenser's floating disk, leomund's tiny hut, wind wall, wall of force,various bigby's hand spells, sending, contingency, etc.)
I don't think it's unreasonable to rule that bladebarrier ignores DR, but I don't think it's cut and dried. I believe that DR would apply, as the spell does physical slashing damage without any enhancement bonus.
kreynolds
First Post
Christian said:No, no, no, kreynolds. Look at Souljourner's post right above yours. He took seven paragraphs to say basically the same thing. Nobody pays attention to terse posts like yours!
LOL
This is just one of those things where I'm so 100% convinced, I just don't see any point to further explaining it. Well, ok, that and I knew that Caliban would find his way to this post eventually.
Ya' see, there are two different opinions on this, and it has been argued to death in a previous thread. So technically, if someone was to come to this thread, they would inevitably be drawn to the previous thread, which would illustrate that there are two very solid arguments for either option. Thus, they would make their decision based upon that. So I didn't figure it was required of me to regurgitate the entire argument yet again.
But, I will go ahead and explain why I believe that blade barrier negates damage reduction. First of all, it just doesn't make sense to me that it wouldn't negate damage reduction, for if that were the case, you can bet your life that I'd be dropping that spell level down. Secondly, and most importantly, every time I have ever seen blade barrier illustrated in any kind of fictional work, it seemed to be a pretty powerful spell, not one that had a hard time with tough creatures. The most notable example I can think of is in R. A. Salvatore's The Silent Blade, in which a particular cleric shreds the hell out of a Balor, a creature that has really nice damage reduction. I don't remember reading anything in that passage that suggested the spell was having any difficulty in bypassing the Balor's tough hide. In fact, that poor Balor got sliced and diced with ease. There was even mentioning of the extensive "cleaning" that would need to be done in the cleric's summoning room.
Put both of those two reasons together, and that's where I draw my opinion from. I suppose you could say, I don't think it was in the "spirit" of the spell for it to not bypass DR, neither do I think it wouldn't bypass DR if you just read the spell description and take a close look at the spell level. Just my opinion though, and it's pretty much rooted in stone, for now anyway.
