Breath weapons and damaging gear?

[Yogibear41]

Are their any rules for breath weapons and things like them, such as fireball doing damage to the gear being worn by the individual targeted? For example if a person gets hit by an acidic breath weapon and fail their reflex save or even makes it taking half damage, should their armor and weapons take some, all, or any of the damage from the actual breath attack?

Common Sense would make one believe that their stuff is indeed damaged at least a little bit, but I'm just wondering if their is anything in the rules, even optional rules that says they do.

[animewatcha]

Something like necklace of fireballs has specific blerb about that. Otherwise, IIRC unless specifically targeted ( rust monster ), rolling a nat 1 on saving throw would trigger for some effects like fireball.

Could be wrong.

[Occasional Sage]

There are rules for items having to make saves. IIRC the priority is armor-shield-then-hat-then-I-forget, but details escape me. Search the relevant srd for "damaging magic items".

EDIT: That's close. Attended items are safe, except when their owner rolls a natural 1. In that case they need to make independent saves, hence the "giant shrunk wizard hat" shenanigans.

[Yogibear41]

What if the item is non-magical? Can you specifically target a weapon with something like a breath weapon that has a cone? How does that make sense?

[Crake]

What if the item is non-magical? Can you specifically target a weapon with something like a breath weapon that has a cone? How does that make sense?

Unfortunately area spells cannot be used to target attended items. Were it say, a ray, you could definitely attempt a sunder with it (assuming it did damage, and enough so to bypass the item's hardness, most forms of energy get halved BEFORE applying hardness).

[MesiDoomstalker]

What if the item is non-magical? Can you specifically target a weapon with something like a breath weapon that has a cone? How does that make sense?

If there is no attack roll, it does not target anything. So we default to attended items and saving throws as others pointed out; no damage unless the wielder crit fails his save.

[Maginomicon]

If the effect doesn't say it can affect objects, it can't affect objects. If it says it can affect objects, then you have a problem.

The in-flavor reason why most spell/power damage can't affect objects (things that have a hardness rating, even if that hardness rating is 0) is that the damage from spell/power effects is so transient and instantaneous that at best it can lightly singe objects. However, it can cause serious damage to creatures in that instant.

The saving throw rules against attended objects only matter against effects that can affect objects in the first place. This becomes obvious when you consider the potential edge cases that would crop up if this weren't true.

However, damage from non-spell non-power effects such as supernatural effects (such as a breath weapon) can affect objects fine. This thematically makes sense because if they couldn't, dragons couldn't raze villages to the ground.


Unfortunately area spells cannot be used to target attended items. Were it say, a ray, you could definitely attempt a sunder with it (assuming it did damage, and enough so to bypass the item's hardness, most forms of energy get halved BEFORE applying hardness).

Where are you getting that you can use a ray to make a sunder attempt? The SRD and Rules Compendium only say "You can make a melee attack with a slashing or bludgeoning weapon to strike an object that a defender is holding."

[Diarmuid]

Here is how attended/worn itemsare handled for AoE effects.


Items Surviving after a Saving Throw: Unless the descriptive text for the spell specifies otherwise, all items carried or worn by a creature are assumed to survive a magical attack. If a creature rolls a natural 1 on its saving throw against the effect, however, an exposed item is harmed (if the attack can harm objects). Refer to Table: Items Affected by Magical Attacks. Determine which four objects carried or worn by the creature are most likely to be affected and roll randomly among them. The randomly determined item must make a saving throw against the attack form and take whatever damage the attack deal.
If an item is not carried or worn and is not magical, it does not get a saving throw. It simply is dealt the appropriate damage.

[TuggyNE]

The in-flavor reason why most spell/power damage can't affect objects (things that have a hardness rating, even if that hardness rating is 0)

That is not how objects are defined. :smallsigh: Rather, objects are distinguished from creatures by lacking Wis and Cha scores*; even in Core, animated objects are creatures with hardness.
Wisdom
Any creature that can perceive its environment in any fashion has at least 1 point of Wisdom. Anything with no Wisdom score is an object, not a creature. Anything without a Wisdom score also has no Charisma score.

Charisma
Any creature capable of telling the difference between itself and things that are not itself has at least 1 point of Charisma. Anything with no Charisma score is an object, not a creature. Anything without a Charisma score also has no Wisdom score.

*There is, so far as I know, one partial exception in the whole of 3.x to this principle, and it's an extremely-poorly-designed template that allows Wis -. Nothing comparable for Cha.