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Starbuck_II
2009-04-30, 10:57 AM
Okay, Dragon Magazine has a creature template called Gheden:

Somehow through Necromancy one of your parents is a mindless undead but still either got preggers or got "it" up with a human/other species.

So you are different.

Ghden are immune to stunning, but get this:
If someone uses Rebuke/Turn undead and would have otherwise controlled or destroyed you on the turning check...
You are stunned for 2d6 rounds.

So since you are immune to stunning...does this other racial feature actually affect you?
Is this a "special" stunning condition that goes through Stunning immunity?

I'm not really sure what RAI or RAW is.

Why give someone immunity to stunning if you are just going to make them stunned by turning?

Anyone have any ideas?

Tyrmatt
2009-04-30, 11:14 AM
Assuming I'm understanding this, I'd simply apply the rule of thumb here that Specific Beats General. Turning is a general rule, Gheden is a specific template and thus trumps the general rule. If on the other hand the rule on being stunned by turning is specific to the Gheden template, it trumps the "Standard" immunity.

If this is a case of using it as a player, maybe ask the DM about say possibly rather than being insta-gibbed by a really good turning check, have your Gheden knocked out cold by a sucessful check (in the case of destruction) and forced to flee/cower (as per usual turning).

Starbuck_II
2009-04-30, 11:38 AM
Assuming I'm understanding this, I'd simply apply the rule of thumb here that Specific Beats General. Turning is a general rule, Gheden is a specific template and thus trumps the general rule. If on the other hand the rule on being stunned by turning is specific to the Gheden template, it trumps the "Standard" immunity.

If this is a case of using it as a player, maybe ask the DM about say possibly rather than being insta-gibbed by a really good turning check, have your Gheden knocked out cold by a sucessful check (in the case of destruction) and forced to flee/cower (as per usual turning).

This is specifics:

Basics: No effect non-lethal, Stunning, and death from massive damage.

Vulnerable to turning:
A turn attempt that would turn ½ his HD gives him -4 hit, saves, skill, and ability checks for 10 rd or till turner attacks him. If would have destroyed / controlled him, instead he is stunned 2d4 rounds.

Basically he isn't treated fully as undead so not cower/fleeing: instead he just gets a big penalty as if sickened or something.

So you think this would be a "special" stunning? I mean, it would be simpler to just have it say dazing since they aren't immune to dazing: then no need to invent special bypassing of immunities.

AbyssKnight
2009-04-30, 11:57 AM
The immunity to Stunning applies to all normal circumstances that would normally stun a member of your race (spells, monks, etc).

Turning Undead normally does nothing to a living member of your race. For you however, with your connection to the undead, it imposes a penalty.

The closest thing to this penalty is the Stunned condition, so we will use that.

So, Yes, it is a special exception. This is the ONE circumstance under which you can be Stunned.

If it makes you feel better, copy the description of the Stunned condition from the PHB. Now delete Stunned from what happens if you are Turned and "destroyed" and insert the description from the PHB. There! Now you are not Stunned (since you are immune to that) but your nameless condition is exactly the same mechanically.

They probably should have used a different condition or just wrote out the penalties, but they were lazy.

Douglas
2009-04-30, 12:05 PM
RAW, he is immune to stunning. A successful turn attempt from a sufficiently high level cleric would attempt to stun him and fail because he's immune.

RAI, there's no point even mentioning a special weakness of a template if the very same template negates that weakness. This stunning is obviously intended to ignore the immunity granted by the template.

Personally, I would go even further and say that this stunning is intended to ignore stun immunity entirely regardless of source; the effect fits the mechanic the writer wanted, but negating it should require Turn Resistance or similar abilities instead.

lsfreak
2009-04-30, 02:47 PM
This is specifics:
I mean, it would be simpler to just have it say dazing since they aren't immune to dazing: then no need to invent special bypassing of immunities.
Daze and stun are very different mechanics. Daze is you stand there, do nothing, but take no penalties. Stun you drop everything, take -2 to AC, and lose Dex to AC.

The Glyphstone
2009-04-30, 07:26 PM
Stunning also makes you helpless and vulnerable to CdG as well.

Talic
2009-04-30, 08:06 PM
No, it doesn't.

If the Gheden template is what includes the "is stunned", you can safely assume it bypasses the stun immunity granted by the Gheden template.

Douglas
2009-04-30, 08:09 PM
No it doesn't. Just about nothing besides unconsciousness and paralysis can render you actually helpless.

Starbuck_II
2009-04-30, 11:53 PM
No it doesn't. Just about nothing besides unconsciousness and paralysis can render you actually helpless.

Bands of Steel can in Complete Arcane (they weakened it to immobile in Spell Compendruim).

Back to Gheden:
Still wish the designers wouldn't be lazy to say stun when they granted the immunity to that.

They should like make up a new condition or something. But so RAI seems to lean toward Super Stunning that bypasses stun immunity because it is super (effective).

Talic
2009-05-01, 12:05 AM
It's along the lines of "Demons are immune to poison"... Unless a poison is developed specifically to affect demons.

Alleine
2009-05-01, 12:20 AM
Also take note of things that make you immune to fatigue but not exhaustion, although that is a bit more specific. Creatures immune to fatigue can't be affected by fatigue except in situations where they would become exhausted, in which case they are merely fatigued.

Considering how few examples I know of where a creature is immune to stunning but can still be stunned(Gheden being the only one) then it would just be more work to include an extra condition that will pretty much only ever come into play when there's a Gheden being played.

Also keep in mind that this is Dragon Magazine material, which is notorious for being broken, or at least not playtested before publication.