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ShortQuests -- Pocket Sized Adventures! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed for 1-2 game sessions.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pielorinho" data-source="post: 1065043" data-attributes="member: 259">It makes sense, but I'm pretty sure it's incorrect.Ability damage reduces your score.  If you get a new score, that score is still reduced by the ability damage.  That's all that matters in this debate.There's a significant difference between CHANGING a score and REDUCING a score, in D&D terms.  If you CHANGE a score, the relationship to the original score is meaningless -- when you change a strength score (because of polymorph or something else), nobody cares what the original strength score was.When you REDUCE a score, however, it's reduced in relation to what the original/normal score was:  reduce a strength of ten by two, and you get a very different result from reducing a strength of eighteen by two.Ability damage is a reduction of your score, no matter what your score is.  Turn into a new form, you change your ability score -- but your ability score (whether old or new) is reduced by the ability damage you took.Do you have a strength of ten, and two points of ability damage?  Fine -- your strength of ten is reduced by two, and is now eight.  Do you then change into a bear with a strength of 29?  Fine, but you didn't get rid of those two points of ability damage (there are specific rules for getting rid of ability damage, and polymorph specifically states that it doesn't get rid of ability damage).  You still have those two points of ability damage, and so they reduce your strength of 29 by two, giving you a strength of 27.That's the key distinction between changing a score and reducing a score:  a reduction is in relation to the normal score, whereas a change is a transformation of the normal score to a new normal score.Daniel</blockquote>

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