[PF] Vague damage notation - Acidic Ray

[Volkspanzer]

I was messing about making npcs for a campaign I'm creating, and I came across this ability within the Sorceror's aberrant bloodline abilities and powers:


Acidic Ray (Sp): Starting at 1st level, you can fire an acidic ray as a standard action, targeting any foe within 30 feet as a ranged touch attack. The acidic ray deals 1d6 points of acid damage + 1 for every two sorcerer levels you possess. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Charisma modifier.


As you can see by the bold text, I'm not quite sure if the scaling of the damage applies to the d6 AND the +1, or just the +1. For example, would a lvl 8 sorceror with Acidic Ray deal 4d6+4 acid damage, or 1d6+4.

For the sake of argument, is there a spell that scales by number of die AND bonus damage, and how would it be notated, according to pathfinder rules?

[Starbuck_II]

I was messing about making npcs for a campaign I'm creating, and I came across this ability within the Sorceror's aberrant bloodline abilities and powers:


Acidic Ray (Sp): Starting at 1st level, you can fire an acidic ray as a standard action, targeting any foe within 30 feet as a ranged touch attack. The acidic ray deals 1d6 points of acid damage + 1 for every two sorcerer levels you possess. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Charisma modifier.


As you can see by the bold text, I'm not quite sure if the scaling of the damage applies to the d6 AND the +1, or just the +1. For example, would a lvl 8 sorceror with Acidic Ray deal 4d6+4 acid damage, or 1d6+4.

For the sake of argument, is there a spell that scales by number of die AND bonus damage, and how would it be notated, according to pathfinder rules?

No, compare:
1) The acidic ray deals 1d6+1 of acid damage for ever two Sorceror levels you possess.
2) The acidic ray deals 1d6 points of acid damage + 1 for every two sorcerer levels you possess

Magic missile is #1 (xdy+1).
So you deal 1d6 and +1 for every two levels.

[Steward]

I think I get it. Basically, you do 1d6 points of damage. Then you add on 1 point of damage for every two sorcerer levels you have. So a 10th level sorcerer would first inflict 1d6 damage, then add five points to whatever she rolled.

Does that make sense? The phrasing does look a little ambiguous. I'm not sure if there are any spells where both the base damage and the bonus damage per level increase at the same rate, though I don't really know much about spells.

[icefractal]

Although honestly, it would be better if it were the higher amount. 1d6 + L/2 is such a tiny amount past 1st-2nd level that it may as well not scale. For an at-will ability, it would merely be extremely niche. For a times/day ability, it's completely worthless.

[tyckspoon]

Although honestly, it would be better if it were the higher amount. 1d6 + L/2 is such a tiny amount past 1st-2nd level that it may as well not scale. For an at-will ability, it would merely be extremely niche. For a times/day ability, it's completely worthless.

These abilities (almost all the sorcerer bloodlines/wizard specialties/cleric domains have one) aren't really meant to scale. They're so your spellcasters can do something magical to do when you would otherwise be looking at crossbow time; basically a flavor tidbit, something that's a little bit stronger than a cantrip, but not meant to compete with casting an actual spell.

[The Glyphstone]

These abilities (almost all the sorcerer bloodlines/wizard specialties/cleric domains have one) aren't really meant to scale. They're so your spellcasters can do something magical to do when you would otherwise be looking at crossbow time; basically a flavor tidbit, something that's a little bit stronger than a cantrip, but not meant to compete with casting an actual spell.

Which is sort of his point - at higher levels (particularly for sorcerers) you'll have so many spells that unless your DM likes grueling marathon adventuring days, you'll never get to the point where you'd actually be shooting crossbow bolts instead of casting spells, thus the lackluster 'scaling' on the damage is more-or-less irrelevant.