Armor question

[1batman4u]

Armor with the anti-impact quality (see “Complete Warrior”) is designed to cushion the blow from massive blunt traumas. Anti-impact armor doesn’t give extra protection against weapon damage (beyond its AC bonus), but bludgeoning damage that affects all or most of the entire body (such as constriction and falling damage) is halved.

Question: Does the anti-Impact quality gives protection from pressure damage* as described in “Stormwrack”? Isn’t pressure damage similar to construction in that it applies force to the whole body?

*1d6 points of damage per minute for every 100 feet the character is below the surface. A Fortitude save (DC15, + 1 for each previous check) means you take no damage in that minute.

[BowStreetRunner]

My first instinct was to say that this does not work. The key phrase I was looking at in the Anti-Impact Armor description is "bludgeoning damage that affects all or most of the entire body" with the emphasis in this case on bludgeoning. Constriction (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#constrict) damage is explicitly described as bludgeoning, while pressure damage is not.

However, when I took a look at the rules for Falling (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/environment.htm#falling) damage I found no mention of this being bludgeoning damage either. The description here is much more like that given for pressure damage, in that it does not specify a damage type.

So my inclination after reading through both descriptions would be to classify pressure and falling damage as bludgeoning, as they are both physical damage and neither piercing nor slashing is as appropriate.

[HalfQuart]

RAW, I'd say no. Bludgeoning is a specific damage type and if the damage doesn't specifically say it's bludgeoning, then it isn't. The SRD says " it deals water pressure damage of 1d6 points per minute for every 100 feet the character is below the surface." -- so it sounds like the type is "water pressure damage" as opposed to "bludgeoning damage".

That said, it's a fairly rare damage source, I'd say, so it probably wouldn't be broken if a DM ruled it that way in their game.

Note that there is also the Deepdweller armor enhancement (MIC 10) that gives you protection from the pressure damage, as well as a bunch of other benefits for +12,000 gp.