Unusual poison applications

[Curmudgeon]

I'm looking for out-of-the-ordinary rules for using poisons. For instance:
Inhaled
Inhaled poisons are usually contained in fragile vials or eggshells. They can be thrown as a ranged attack with a range increment of 10 feet. When it strikes a hard surface (or is struck hard), the container releases its poison. One dose spreads to fill the volume of a 10-foot cube. Each creature within the area must make a saving throw. (Holding one’s breath is ineffective against inhaled poisons; they affect the nasal membranes, tear ducts, and other parts of the body.)
This doesn't explain what happens to a character who isn't holding their breath, but rather doesn't breathe at all. However, that's answered in the description of the Dust Para-Genasi (Dragon # 297, page 64) thusly:
Breathless (Ex): Dust para-genasi do not breathe, so they are immune to drowning, suffocation, and attacks that require inhalation (such as some types of poison).


I already know that Poison Use only prevents accidents while applying poison to a weapon, and doesn't help if you roll a natural 1 while using the poisoned weapon. Ravages are magical and Evil-specific, but really just poisons with a different label.

Are there rules for ingesting injury poisons? Rules for changing effects by altering the dose? Poisons which have really short duration effects (like 1 round)?

[NevinPL]

Official or house ?

[frogglesmash]

One thing I've considered doing, but have not yet had the opportunity to try is using a steady flow of nonlethal and non-Con damage poison as a more effective and more foolproof version of bindings/shackles.

[Spore]

Poison is ineffective as is. If you enter a grey area such as this I would personally rule in favor of poisons in order to not make them even more obsolete than they already are. For specific creatures and poisons affecting them just go for RAW. If it is not written in their description that they are immune to (inhaled) poison then they are affected.


Are there rules for ingesting injury poisons?

I can't tell as I am leaving for work but I'd go for sickened until you throw up as a (house-)rule of thumb.

[frogglesmash]

Poison is ineffective as is. If you enter a grey area such as this I would personally rule in favor of poisons in order to not make them even more obsolete than they already are. For specific creatures and poisons affecting them just go for RAW. If it is not written in their description that they are immune to (inhaled) poison then they are affected.



I can't tell as I am leaving for work but I'd go for sickened until you throw up as a (house-)rule of thumb.
It would probably make more sense if poisons worked as described when ingested regardless of intended delivery method seeing as any chemicals you ingest will make it into your bloodstream just as surely as if you'd injected it.

[Spore]

It would probably make more sense if poisons worked as described when ingested regardless of intended delivery method seeing as any chemicals you ingest will make it into your bloodstream just as surely as if you'd injected it.

Some poisons can't pass the stomach's acidic properties. They are not lethal but they cause nausea due to possibly changing pH of the stomach acids.

[Darrin]

Might want to check out the Mister (DotU p. 92). Outside of a mister, I've never been entirely clear on how inhaled poisons were supposed to be delivered. A vapor/mist isn't something you can spread on a weapon, and the rules never mention if you're delivering it as a splash weapon/flask/whatever. Presumably, a poison gas should have some sort of burst/spread effect, but the only description I've seen of such a thing is Sleep Smoke (Waterdeep: City of Splendors p. 152): 10' radius globe on first round, 20' radius globe on second round, harmless after that.

[Curmudgeon]

Official or house ?
Official rules, please.

[Dondasch]

The A&EG has the Sprayer, which could let you turn certain poisons into an AoE. The A&EG also has some unusual poisons. Gehennan Morghuth-Iron from the same book is a weapon special material that acts as a weak poison (but is always applied on hit).
Pathfinder has rules for poison stacking (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/afflictions/poison).
The Alchemist Savant from Magic of Eberron gains the ability to mix a poison with an alchemical item at 4th level (Atramen Oil is a good option).
DotU has rules for obtaining poison from Vermin. It also has the Poison Spell feat, Toxic weapon property (lets you use the poison twice), and Virulent weapon property (halves the time until the secondary damage).
Cityscape (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20070314a) has the Assassination weapon enhancement.

That's all the unusual poison-related stuff I can remember.

[Darrin]

Another unusual poison... one of those "not explicitly a poison" kind of poisons:

Blister Oil Bomb (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=12138520&postcount=94).

My idea was lasso + sovereign glue means the rope will stick to the tarrasque, requiring a Fort save every round, and if you wait around long enough (admittedly not an entirely healthy thing to do around a tarrasque), it will eventually roll a '1' on the Fort save.

But there are other weapons that explicitly stay attached to the target. Harpoon is the easiest example. Net would be in Core. I'm not sure I've seen anyone try "Blister Oil Arrows" yet. Loading several dozen applications on a single arrow wouldn't be all that expensive. Presumably, the arrowhead stays inside the body until the target explicitly says he's removing it, but the rules don't really cover how you keep track of that or establish an action type for removal. Even if the DM rules that the arrow is destroyed after it hits the target, that's still a DC 15 Fort save vs. a stupendously large amount of untyped Xd4 damage. Hit your target with 20 arrows, and odds are good you'll get a '1' in there somewhere. Maybe dip the arrow in Atramen Oil (50 GP, Planar Handbook p. 75) for a -4 save penalty?

[Curmudgeon]

One specific need I'm trying to address is to get a Raptoran out of trouble as a swift action. If they've used a full-round action for a dive attack, they're stuck hovering in mid-air next to an enemy. If that enemy is another flier, the foe can make a full attack against the Raptoran. Raptorans have this racial trait where they can fall safely, but only if they're helpless. My thought was that I might be able to leverage this somehow, using a Capsule Retainer (Complete Adventurer, page 120), which allows consuming one dose as a swift action. If there were some poison which made the character paralyzed or asleep, but only briefly, the Raptoran could drop safely rather than be forced to hover. It's the "only briefly" part I'm having trouble with.

[NevinPL]

Official rules, please.
Well, beside the things already mentioned there's Slarkfish from Dragon 293 (1d4 Dex, Unconsciousness), Nightvenom from Dragon 301 (additional Fort save or sleeping until the secondary effect kicks in), Dragon 322 has magical improvements to poisons that could be interest you Concentrated, Potent).


Raptorans have this racial trait where they can fall safely, but only if they're helpless. My thought was that I might be able to leverage this somehow, using a Capsule Retainer (Complete Adventurer, page 120), which allows consuming one dose as a swift action. If there were some poison which made the character paralyzed or asleep, but only briefly, the Raptoran could drop safely rather than be forced to hover. It's the "only briefly" part I'm having trouble with.


A helpless character is paralyzed, held, bound, sleeping, unconscious, or otherwise completely at an opponent’s mercy.


A character with Strength 0 falls to the ground and is helpless. A character with Dexterity 0 is paralyzed. [...] A character with Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma 0 is unconscious.
So there's room for "creative thinking": you don't necessary need a sleep, paralyzing poison, just a strong one that zeros those abilities.
You could also play with nonlethal damage (Subdual Substitution feat, some psionic powers).

[Necroticplague]

Some poisons can't pass the stomach's acidic properties. They are not lethal but they cause nausea due to possibly changing pH of the stomach acids.

Some poisons don't even do that. Snake venom, off the top of my head, is merely a very complex arrangement of proteins. As long as you don't have any cuts in your mouth, tongue, or esophagus, your body is more than easily capable of flat-out digesting it with no ill effect. Other things would simply not be absorbed by the intestines, meaning it's simply excreted as waste without ever entering the bloodstream. Plenty of very good mechanisms by which a poison can be injury but not ingested.

[frogglesmash]

Some poisons can't pass the stomach's acidic properties. They are not lethal but they cause nausea due to possibly changing pH of the stomach acids.


Some poisons don't even do that. Snake venom, off the top of my head, is merely a very complex arrangement of proteins. As long as you don't have any cuts in your mouth, tongue, or esophagus, your body is more than easily capable of flat-out digesting it with no ill effect. Other things would simply not be absorbed by the intestines, meaning it's simply excreted as waste without ever entering the bloodstream. Plenty of very good mechanisms by which a poison can be injury but not ingested.

Well it seems I was very wrong, but I guess that's what happens when you talk about topics you know nothing about. I think from now on, I'll take to doing a little more research before making baseless assertions.

[Spore]

Which is why poisons are substances that are very hard to portray in a simplified RPG. Personally I would ignore contact with poison other than the intended contact type. But I would rather have rules for diminished effect on a successful Fort save. Because you can be the toughest meanest mountain of muscles. But you can't just growl away a dose of Black Lotus into non existence...

[frogglesmash]

Which is why poisons are substances that are very hard to portray in a simplified RPG. Personally I would ignore contact with poison other than the intended contact type. But I would rather have rules for diminished effect on a successful Fort save. Because you can be the toughest meanest mountain of muscles. But you can't just growl away a dose of Black Lotus into non existence...

I dunno, some barbarians can growl pretty ferociously.

[Darrin]

One specific need I'm trying to address is to get a Raptoran out of trouble as a swift action.

Would Travel Devotion work here? Wand of updraft? Glyph Seal + dimension hop?

[Curmudgeon]

Would Travel Devotion work here?
Travel Devotion is an excellent suggestion, but only good 1/day for someone who can't turn undead. I was hoping for some solution to the problem that wouldn't require a feat slot, let alone 4 feats for the expected daily encounters.

Wand of updraft? Glyph Seal + dimension hop?
Not a spellcaster (in fact no spellcasters in the group — only characters with SLAs), and no Use Magic Device skill.

[Darrin]

Ok, this is kinda silly, but if you can get Evasion from somewhere... swap it for the Feign Death ACF (Exemplars of Evil). You can enter a deathlike state as an immediate action (or a swift if it's on your turn). If you trigger this after your full attack, then you'd fall 150' (oddly, while the Raptoran wings reduce your fall damage, they do nothing to reduce the falling distance). The drawback is you need to use a standard action on the next round to wake up. There doesn't seem to be a limit to the number of times you can use this ability.

Hmm. Now I'm wondering if there is any other situations where repeatedly dropping into a deathlike state over and over again would be beneficial. Offers immunity to mind-affecting, poison, sleep, paralysis, stunning, disease, ability drain, negative levels, and death effects. I'm not sure what would happen if you tried to use it to get out of transcend mortality.

[Curmudgeon]

Ok, this is kinda silly, but if you can get Evasion from somewhere... swap it for the Feign Death ACF (Exemplars of Evil). You can enter a deathlike state as an immediate action (or a swift if it's on your turn). If you trigger this after your full attack, then you'd fall 150' (oddly, while the Raptoran wings reduce your fall damage, they do nothing to reduce the falling distance). The drawback is you need to use a standard action on the next round to wake up. There doesn't seem to be a limit to the number of times you can use this ability.
This might work. I've got Evasion, but not from any of the 3 classes the ACF is specified for (Monk, Ranger, or Rogue): Shadow Scout (Oriental Adventures). I don't think it would be unreasonable to extend Feign Death to work with any other class which has Evasion as a class ability. Literally dropping out of a fight to avoid an enemy's full attack would be very helpful.

[Troacctid]

Are you sure Raptorans can only fall safely while they're helpless? I thought their Gliding (Ex) ability negates damage from any fall.

[Curmudgeon]

Are you sure Raptorans can only fall safely while they're helpless? I thought their Gliding (Ex) ability negates damage from any fall.
That's not the issue. If you use Gliding it takes your movement. If you have no movement left you're forced to hover. If instead you become helpless then you're not allowed to hover, and gravity moves you: you fall. The Raptoran physiology makes falling fairly safe, causing only 1d6 damage.