quick poison question.

[mabriss lethe]

Does anyone know if there's a rule limiting the number of poisons a character can layer onto a weapon?

[Phantom Monk]

As far as I know, the is no rule stating you CAN'T put more than one type of poison on a weapon at once, though there is also no rule that says you CAN. I would say that is a DM choice.

However, it is stated that you cannot stack the same poison to increase its effect.

[mabriss lethe]

It's mostly for a low-level thought exercise, so DM call doesn't matter, just if there's a hard and fast rule. If the rules make a specific note of stacking the same poison, but not for stacking different poisons, that will be good enough.

[Rizban]

There's no rule that I've ever seen that limits you to having only a single type of poison on a weapon, though the rules imply that only a single dose can be on an object at a time, being removed as soon as the object is used/touched. It depends on how you interpret this rule.
1 - An item can hold only one dose of each type.
2 - An item can hold only one dose across all types.

Either way, only one dose of a poison is effective on the item, as having more of the poison somehow does not increase potency. By a hard reading of the rules, falling into a 5000 gallon vat of black lotus extract hits you with 1 dose of it and instantly destroys the rest. After all, you just touched the poisoned object and were affected by it, and it could only contain a single 'dose'.

[9mm]

3.5: no there is no rule against it.
Pathfiner: yes a new aplication of poison will over rule the previous, however there are class ablities to mix poisons togeather.

[Segev]

Back in 2e, I had a friend who liked to play using a trident as his weapon of choice because he could justify a dose of poison on each tine.

[Rizban]

Back in 2e, I had a friend who liked to play using a trident as his weapon of choice because he could justify a dose of poison on each tine.

By that logic, a pitchfork would give you 4, potentially 5... :smallamused:

[Segev]

A always thought there was something off about it, myself, but could never come up with a rules- or common-sense reason it shouldn't work.

[Frostthehero]

There's no rule that I've ever seen that limits you to having only a single type of poison on a weapon, though the rules imply that only a single dose can be on an object at a time, being removed as soon as the object is used/touched. It depends on how you interpret this rule.
1 - An item can hold only one dose of each type.
2 - An item can hold only one dose across all types.

Either way, only one dose of a poison is effective on the item, as having more of the poison somehow does not increase potency. By a hard reading of the rules, falling into a 5000 gallon vat of black lotus extract hits you with 1 dose of it and instantly destroys the rest. After all, you just touched the poisoned object and were affected by it, and it could only contain a single 'dose'.

Pretty sure the rules state that a weapon can only hold one dose of poison. The rules never state that multiple doses do not affect you. The way I usually rule is that any more than a singe does of poison and it just starts dripping off the weapon. Three poisoned arrows will require three saves. Falling into a 5000 gallon vat will require approximately 1.34 buttloads.

I do however agree that only one dose is effective across the weapon.

[Rizban]

Pretty sure the rules state that a weapon can only hold one dose of poison. The rules never state that multiple doses do not affect you. The way I usually rule is that any more than a singe does of poison and it just starts dripping off the weapon. Three poisoned arrows will require three saves. Falling into a 5000 gallon vat will require approximately 1.34 buttloads.

I do however agree that only one dose is effective across the weapon.

The one dose per weapon rule you're referencing also applies to surfaces on which a contact poison has been applied. In my example, the black lotus extract is a contact poison, and the interior of the vat is the surface to which it is applied.

Edit: Also, the rules treat poisons and diseases as a boolean value. You either have it or you don't. Being poisoned/diseased with a second instance of the same item still only has one save at each recurring save and only affects you once with each save.

[Frostthehero]

I went and looked. I can't find anything supporting either of our arguments. Can you find the "one dose per item" rule and the "Boolean value" rule?

Also, the way I see it, the doses of black lotus in the middle of the vat are applied to doses around them, and so on and so forth.