Using Vital Strike with spells and other craziness

[tylermalan]

From the Pathfinder SRD (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons):

"All weapons deal hit point damage."

So, first of all, that solves one of your problems.

However, I can't seem to find anything that backs Dogbackward's or GamerPrinter's points. The only thing close that I can find is under the description of the Weapon Focus feat:

"You can also choose unarmed strike or grapple (or ray, if you are a spellcaster) as your weapon for the purposes of this feat."

The emphasis is mine. The description of this feat seems to imply that, unless specified, unarmed strikes, grapples, and rays are not weapons, but are sometimes considered to be weapons for the purpose of other game effects. This would make me think that these other game effects would specifically need to allow these non-weapons to be considered as weapons within the text of said game effects.

Of course, there may be other counter-examples that I'm unaware of that blow this last point out of the water (situations in the rules where rays are considered weapons but are not explicitly stated as weapons in the entry for the game effect in question).

 

[DogBackward]

My point was that it's obviously far too powerful to allow double damage for spells, so a DM who knows what they're doing will simply say "No, it doesn't work that way." Even if a strict rules-as-written interpretation would allow it. That's what a DM is there for, to make judgement calls and keep things running smoothly. A lot of people act like these obviously incredibly overpowered combos and rules are breaking their game, when the only possible way to actually get something like this into play is to have a squid* for a DM.

Some rules issues need clarifications, and a word from the people in charge to let you know what the rules were meant to do. These issues involve rules that are unclear or vague, or that don't obviously affect game balance in one way or another, without elucidation. This is not one of those issues.

[* squid have no spine...]

 

[tylermalan]

My point was that it's obviously far too powerful to allow double damage for spells, so a DM who knows what they're doing will simply say "No, it doesn't work that way." Even if a strict rules-as-written interpretation would allow it. That's what a DM is there for, to make judgement calls and keep things running smoothly. A lot of people act like these obviously incredibly overpowered combos and rules are breaking their game, when the only possible way to actually get something like this into play is to have a squid* for a DM.

Some rules issues need clarifications, and a word from the people in charge to let you know what the rules were meant to do. These issues involve rules that are unclear or vague, or that don't obviously affect game balance in one way or another, without elucidation. This is not one of those issues.

[* squid have no spine...]

I don't know, man...

I've been playing D&D for a long time, and at times it has been my primary hobby. At some point my main role in this game became to DM.

Despite having done this for years, through multiple different systems, I STILL, almost ALWAYS, can't tell whether something that is powerful was designed to be powerful or whether it is broken and overpowered unless it is directly explained to me as to why this is the case by someone with a deeper understanding of game mechanics.

It has nothing to do with having no spine, or not being able to stand up for rules interpretations that you believe in - it has to do with a difficulty in understanding both THAT something is broken and HOW it is broken within the greater framework of the entire game rules (which, by the way, is a HUGE field).

 

[N'raac]

From the Pathfinder SRD (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons):

"All weapons deal hit point damage."

So, first of all, that solves one of your problems.

However, I can't seem to find anything that backs Dogbackward's or GamerPrinter's points. The only thing close that I can find is under the description of the Weapon Focus feat:

"You can also choose unarmed strike or grapple (or ray, if you are a spellcaster) as your weapon for the purposes of this feat."

The emphasis is mine. The description of this feat seems to imply that, unless specified, unarmed strikes, grapples, and rays are not weapons, but are sometimes considered to be weapons for the purpose of other game effects. This would make me think that these other game effects would specifically need to allow these non-weapons to be considered as weapons within the text of said game effects.

Of course, there may be other counter-examples that I'm unaware of that blow this last point out of the water (situations in the rules where rays are considered weapons but are not explicitly stated as weapons in the entry for the game effect in question).

It also bears noting that the Monk description

A monk's unarmed strike is treated as both a manufactured weapon and a natural weapon for the purpose of spells and effects that enhance or improve either manufactured weapons or natural weapons.

If effects that apply to one could automatically apply to the other, this text would be meaningless, and an unarmed strike and dagger strike seem a lot closer than a swordblow to a spell.

 

[DogBackward]

I don't know, man...

I've been playing D&D for a long time, and at times it has been my primary hobby. At some point my main role in this game became to DM.

Despite having done this for years, through multiple different systems, I STILL, almost ALWAYS, can't tell whether something that is powerful was designed to be powerful or whether it is broken and overpowered unless it is directly explained to me as to why this is the case by someone with a deeper understanding of game mechanics.

It has nothing to do with having no spine, or not being able to stand up for rules interpretations that you believe in - it has to do with a difficulty in understanding both THAT something is broken and HOW it is broken within the greater framework of the entire game rules (which, by the way, is a HUGE field).

Okay, I really don't mean this to be harsh, but I fully believe that a thorough understanding of the game and the mechanics behind the game are required to DM properly. You can't really run a game when you don't know how it works. This is why I strongly support rules simplification: I'm currently playing under a DM in Pathfinder who is great with a story, and has tons of creativity and ideas... but he doesn't really know the way the mechanics work, and the way they work together. So he constantly misses effects, forgets rules and the like. While we all enjoy the story, this does interfere with gameplay fairly significantly. The game could be much better if he had a simpler system to run it with, but we're all mostly familiar with D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder.

 

[tylermalan]

Okay, I really don't mean this to be harsh, but I fully believe that a thorough understanding of the game and the mechanics behind the game are required to DM properly. You can't really run a game when you don't know how it works. This is why I strongly support rules simplification: I'm currently playing under a DM in Pathfinder who is great with a story, and has tons of creativity and ideas... but he doesn't really know the way the mechanics work, and the way they work together. So he constantly misses effects, forgets rules and the like. While we all enjoy the story, this does interfere with gameplay fairly significantly. The game could be much better if he had a simpler system to run it with, but we're all mostly familiar with D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder.

Let's say a 3rd party publishing company creates and releases a feat that gives you a +2 or +3 dodge bonus to your AC when fighting Magical Beasts. I have a very strong grasp of the rules but I couldn't tell you, off the top of my head (without research), whether or not this feat is overpowered. Nor do I think a "good" DM should be able to. I also can't tell you for SURE whether or not the Magus is overpowered, without it causing a debate. Every DM doesn't need to be a professional game designer (and have a pro designers know-how with rules balance) to DM "properly".

 

[Asmo]

I'm currently playing under a DM in Pathfinder who is great with a story, and has tons of creativity and ideas... but he doesn't really know the way the mechanics work, and the way they work together. So he constantly misses effects, forgets rules and the like. While we all enjoy the story, this does interfere with gameplay fairly significantly. The game could be much better if he had a simpler system to run it with, but we're all mostly familiar with D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder.

Hey, you´re talking about me!

Asmo

 

[DogBackward]

Let's say a 3rd party publishing company creates and releases a feat that gives you a +2 or +3 dodge bonus to your AC when fighting Magical Beasts. I have a very strong grasp of the rules but I couldn't tell you, off the top of my head (without research), whether or not this feat is overpowered. Nor do I think a "good" DM should be able to. I also can't tell you for SURE whether or not the Magus is overpowered, without it causing a debate. Every DM doesn't need to be a professional game designer (and have a pro designers know-how with rules balance) to DM "properly".

Getting a +2 or +3 vs. magical beasts is a situational bonus, and thus its power is situational. If you're in a game with a lot of magical beasts, then it's a little overpowered. Otherwise, it's not really a big deal. Similar to how a Dwarf would really shine in a game that mostly deals with fighting giants. The Magus is about equal in power to most mainline classes, and if it's unbalanced at all, it's going to be a little toward the "underpowered" category.

It's entirely possible to run a game and just accept that rules are going to be missed or misinterpreted. But you're not running a "proper" game at that point. There's nothing wrong with it, but as a DM, you either need rules mastery or the ability to handwave and adjudicate fairly. And if you have the second, but not the first, you're still going to be better off using a simpler system. When you don't know the rules, the rules will just get in your way.

 

[tylermalan]

Man... you're making a lot of assumptions and/or generalizations that I just can't/don't agree with. I don't mean to hijack Stream's thread, but exactly which definition of "proper" are you using, and how does that allow you to judge whether or not another DM is running a proper game? I'm not trying to come off as irritated or something, but I just don't know where all of these absolutes are coming from. Isn't "rule zero" usually quoted as being "DM fiat", making this rule trump all of the others and, also, making the ability to adjudicate (in your example above) more important than pure rules mastery?

 

[DogBackward]

"Proper" means "by the rules as presented in the books". But you're focusing on the wrong bits here. It's a word, not a value judgement. The main point was that when you don't know how to implement or judge the rules of a given system... why are you using that system? When you don't have a firm grasp of a set of rules, the rules just get in the way of you telling your story. When you don't have rules mastery, you have three options:

Run the system anyway, and stumble and stutter through trying to figure the rules out while you're playing.
Run the system anyway, and attempt to handwave and shift around the rules to make the game work.
Run a system for which you do possess system mastery. Then you can work with the rules to make the game run smoothly.

If you don't know how the rules work, and how they interact... then you'll constantly be either fighting the rules or finding ways to work around them, or you'll be trying to figure out how the rules work mid-game, which slows things down to a crawl. It's better to find a system where you don't have to fight the rules... which is why simpler systems work better for people without a thorough grasp of the mechanics. Something like Risus is incredibly simple and easy to run, while still allowing you to tell the story you want to tell.

To be honest, I'm probably being much more blunt about this than I usually would, and I apologize for that. But I've sat through far too many boring, tedious, lackluster games that could have been awesome... except that the GM's insisted on fighting against a rules system that they weren't familiar enough with.

Rule zero works as a handwave, yes... but again, you're having to take extra effort to make up your own rules, contradictory to the rules of the system you're playing in. And again, using Rule zero requires system mastery to know the effects of the changes you're making, otherwise you could have a cascading series of side-effects you hadn't expected. Knowing why a rule exists, and how it's balanced against other rules, is very important when you're trying to change a rule. And if you just use Rule zero to hand-wave any problems caused by your rules changes... again, why are you playing with a set of rules that you're constantly ignoring or changing? What's the point of playing a system if you're just going to ignore the details of that system?