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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannyalcatraz" data-source="post: 4878867" data-attributes="member: 19675">I'll continue to quibble...IMHO, there are some corporeal undead with "vital" areas and some who don't...and the "don'ts" outnumber the "dos."Zombies, Ghouls, Ghasts?  Definitely seem to be more lifelike than most of their undead "kin."  The argument for them being vulnerable to SA is strongest.  But even for zombies, that's a later addition to the legend.Wights and Revenants?  Could go either way.Skeletons?  No organs whatsoever- they're animated purely by magic and negative energy.  No vitals.  Ditto anything with a similar physiology, as far as I'm concerned.Vampires and similar undead have defined vulnerabilities that, while they exist within their bodies, require specific methods of destruction, not mere strikes with any old weapon.  No vitals.Liches require you destroy their phylactery, which need not even be on their person.  No vitals.Mummies, like skeletons, have no organs within their bodies at all- they were all removed during the mummification process.  No vitals.But even if a corporeal undead creature has its organs, odds are they are entirely non-functional.  Magic and energy are all that they need to exist, and as such, have no true vital organs that a mere weapon strike can disrupt.Actually, I'd counter-assert that the extra damage from SA is precisely an abstraction of a rogue puncturing a lung, hamstringing someone, and the like.  Whittling down a foe for the killing blow is the Fighter's shtick- its what his repeated strikes do, after all- the Rogue's is making his foe gawp in pained surprise as he finds a couple more ounces of metal inside him than at the beginning of the day.Ditto fireballs:Its just that D&D has no mechanical abstraction for injuries other than by HP.  Perhaps the first few points of damage are your blisters...and everything else is your flesh being carbonized.</blockquote>

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