D&D 3E/3.5 D&D 3.5 Rule Oddities

[Jack Simth]

Never noticed the drowing "you're dead" spiral before. I know there are an infinite number of situations that can crop up in D&D, but you would've thought that the writers would run through some of the more plausible scenarios before publishing.

Well... the Drowning bit, you're basically at full activity until you lose. Then you have one round to be saved (while the rules don't actually say you stop drowing once you're somewhere you can breath, if the writers had to cover that level of inanity for everything, the player's handbook would be the size of an entire set of Encyclopedias... and still wouldn't cover it). It's a granularity bit.

A great many of the absurdities in D&D are either granularity issues, or things where the designers didn't think about how two items would interact (and with the sheer number of things in D&D, that's not unexpected).

 

[Dandu]

Actually, it's quite possible to drown after leaving the water if there's still liquid in your lungs. It's called secondary drowning. Example.

 

[Axel]

Actually, it's quite possible to drown after leaving the water if there's still liquid in your lungs. It's called secondary drowning. Example.

Ha! Detail retentiveness strikes again!! Why don't we also include a percentile chance for contracting amoebic meningitis if you partially drown in a stagnant pool? Or copping blood poisoning when you get hit by a zombie?

 

[Dandu]

I'm sure there are some on this board would heartily approve of your idea.

 

[Jhaelen]

Did you spot the oddity? Everyone within 90 feet of where it hits is stunned for a round, but its range increment is 30 feet.

Well, so you better make sure you're more than three range increments away when throwing it

Or copping blood poisoning when you get hit by a zombie?

Adding rules for blood poisoning (irrespective of zombie interaction) might actually be worthwhile considering it caused more fatalities than the actual battles in (pre)medieval times.

There also RPG system that _do_ have rules for blood poisoning. E.g. DSA/TDE immediately comes to (my) mind.

 

[Jimlock]

What about not losing the Dex modifier on a Reflex save while flat-footed?
I've always thought that's weird... I mean you remove it from the AC but not from the Reflex save?
Some could even argue that one should not be allowed a Ref save at all while flat-footed... Then again the Ref save is the least important of the three as it is, i guess they didn't want to make it even weaker.

For what it's worth, they did mention in 2007's Rules Compendium that "You can make a Reflex save whenever one is called for, but your Dexterity or whether you can apply its modifier might be altered by the situation."

(still 7 years is a long time to realize something so obvious!)

 

[Greenfield]

I'll toss this in from the Familiar thread:

An animal that becomes a Familiar gains a lot of abilities, but somehow loses the ability to communicate with its own kind until the master gains 7th level.

 

[Dandu]

Ordinary housecats can communicate with each other, but can't tell each other to go up the stairs and take a left to get a free snack. The familiar of a 7th level wizard presumably could.

 

[baxterzeppo]

Here's one.

Did you spot the oddity? Everyone within 90 feet of where it hits is stunned for a round, but its range increment is 30 feet.

And, realistically, most battles take place at closer ranges anyway, so it's a great weapon that you really don't want to use, since you can stun yourself and all your allies every time you use it.

Hmmmm....sounds like that's just the range for the thunderclap stun effect and not the range for the hammer. Past that range, the thunderclap is ineffective as a stunner...but it probably lets every monster within a mile-radius know you're there....
At least, that's how I'd DM it



EDIT: Well, duh to me. I just realized the oddity. You're within the radius. Facepalm!

 

[Vegepygmy]

EDIT: Well, duh to me. I just realized the oddity. You're within the radius. Facepalm!

Correction: You may be within the radius (90 feet). The range increment is 30 feet, so you could be throwing the hammer up to 150 feet (5 range increments).

I don't think this really qualifies as a "rules oddity." There's nothing odd about being caught within your own area effect; that's been a feature of D&D since Day One.