Does Burning Hands set creatures on fire?

[HeapThaumaturgist]

IIRC, isn't there a rule in there about rolling a 1 on a save Vs something and then having to roll to see if one of the items you have gets damaged?

I never used it, myself, for time purposes but we've used it in the group I'm a player in. (Sweet, magical rod of empower ... unsweet, guy just blew it, and me, up, nevermind.)

Here it is:

Items Surviving after a Saving Throw

Unless the descriptive text for the spell specifies otherwise, all items carried or worn by a creature are assumed to survive a magical attack. If a creature rolls a natural 1 on its saving throw against the effect, however, an exposed item is harmed (if the attack can harm objects). Refer to Table: Items Affected by Magical Attacks. Determine which four objects carried or worn by the creature are most likely to be affected and roll randomly among them. The randomly determined item must make a saving throw against the attack form and take whatever damage the attack deal.

If an item is not carried or worn and is not magical, it does not get a saving throw. It simply is dealt the appropriate damage.

 

[frankthedm]

See that's the part that confused me. The duration of the spell is "instantaneous", but clearly it's "non-instantaneous" enough to ignite flammable objects (such as foliage or the paper curtain). So the flash of heat and flame clearly has the potential to ignite flammable objects. If these are unattended objects, it's a no-brainer. But what about objects held by a PC? Or, for that matter, their clothing?

I don't know if I totally agree with this line of reasoning or not, but I am playing a fire specialist (evoker) and I can foresee the issue coming up over a career of using fire spells.

Unattended objects suffer damage from area affect spells and most instantaneous duration fire spells do state they ignite flammable objects.

Sadly the rules assume a creature does not catch on fire from a fireball and that its equipment survives attacks it survives. What is worse the Rules also assume those who do die to area affect don’t have their stuff cooked as well.

Though when a creature rolls a Natural “1” on a reflex save, one of their carried / worn / attended objects suffers damage from the affect that caused the reflex save. [object typically take half damage from energy unless the DM decided that particularly energy type is “especially successful against” that object.]

Also see this if you want to ignite people…

Catching On Fire

Characters exposed to burning oil, bonfires, and noninstantaneous magic fires might find their clothes, hair, or equipment on fire. Spells with an instantaneous duration don’t normally set a character on fire, since the heat and flame from these come and go in a flash.

Characters at risk of catching fire are allowed a DC 15 Reflex save to avoid this fate. If a character’s clothes or hair catch fire, he takes 1d6 points of damage immediately. In each subsequent round, the burning character must make another Reflex saving throw. Failure means he takes another 1d6 points of damage that round. Success means that the fire has gone out. (That is, once he succeeds on his saving throw, he’s no longer on fire.)

A character on fire may automatically extinguish the flames by jumping into enough water to douse himself. If no body of water is at hand, rolling on the ground or smothering the fire with cloaks or the like permits the character another save with a +4 bonus.

Those unlucky enough to have their clothes or equipment catch fire must make DC 15 Reflex saves for each item. Flammable items that fail take the same amount of damage as the character.

I personally rule “exposed to” counts as ending one’s action “in flames”. Thus not putting out flaming oil or remaining adjacent to a Wall of Fire is a Bad Idea.

I also rule the fireball that cooks you to death also cooks your stuff.

 

[Rabelais]

I'd say that under ordinary circumstances you won't have to worry about setting the forest alight. The fire is instantaneous, but it IS fire.

Lets say for instance you're pursuing a Arqbuzir Mercenary through the woods, and you drop an empowered, widened fireball on his flammable tushy. He's going to worry if that small powder keg in his backpack will esplode...

Generally though, the ranger and druid in the party will be wearing the Smokey the Bear hats.

 

[taliesin15]

As someone who gets burned a lot in my profession (I am a cook), I thought it might help to point out that if your skin gets burned, it tends to kind of keep burning until you put some ice on it.

 

[PallidPatience]

Ah. But those are grease burns. Those aren't flame burns. There's a difference between still having hot grease on you, and being on fire.

 

[Dracorat]

As someone who gets burned a lot in my profession (I am a cook), I thought it might help to point out that if your skin gets burned, it tends to kind of keep burning until you put some ice on it.

Actually, it smolders until you put ice on it. There is a difference.

 

[taliesin15]

Ah. But those are grease burns. Those aren't flame burns. There's a difference between still having hot grease on you, and being on fire.

sure, hot grease, accidentally touching a 400 degree oven, either way it burns, or smolders...whatever you call it, there is no open flame...

 

[Plane Sailing]

A cone of searing flame shoots from your fingertips. Any creature in the area of the flames takes 1d4 points of fire damage per caster level (maximum 5d4). Flammable materials burn if the flames touch them. A character can extinguish burning items as a full-round action.

The fact that the burning hands spell talks not only about flammable materials burn but also characters extinguishing the burning items led us to rule that burning hands could indeed set light to things. Fighter in tin can didn't worry, wizard in gauzy robes gets to make the DC15 reflex save to avoid catching on fire.

Basically hairy critters and targets that are wearing clothes rather than armour are the ones which we decided to give the chance of ignition too.

Works rather nicely in game terms, and made burning hands a viable spell choice even at very low levels.

Cheers

 

[Einan]

According to Stormwrack, which has a nice section on page 29 on how certain spells affect a ship, scorching ray does not start fires, but fireball does. Since it is sadly silent on burning hands, I cannot say with certainty, but given that fireball, an area effect that allows a saving throw for half damage does start fires, burning hands, also a saving throw half area effect, would also start fires.

Take that as you may.

Einan