Poisons are weird -_-

[flamewolf393]

In the real world, poisons are used for the purpose of killing. Or at least making someone so sick that they are unable to function in any meaningful way.

But in dnd/pf, they really do comparatively little. Out of every poison on the pfsrd there are only 8 that could reliably kill a level 1 commoner with 10 Con, the cheapest being 800 gold. Anyone with a 14 con and a level or two can survive any poison listed unless they get really unlucky and the damage maxxes out. Most of the poisons you just end up with a few minuses to your rolls.

[MisterKaws]

Housecats are a death threat to commoners. That's just how life goes in Greyhawk.

[jdizzlean]

dnd also has magic, and psionics, and lots of other things that don't exist in real life. you would expect adventurers in general, who are considered to just be amazing compared to a common person, to be able to weather a few things.

that said, in a minutes time, or less, you could still drop someone to 0 con and kill them outright

[tyckspoon]

In the real world, poisons are used for the purpose of killing. Or at least making someone so sick that they are unable to function in any meaningful way.


There are a ton of real-life poisons that do little to nothing to a human, especially if they can afford to take a day or two easy to wait out the effects (heal off the ability damage). Suffering the equivalent of 2 ability damage isn't really debilitating (in D&D terms, the average human goes from a 0 mod to -1) unless you're doing something actually dangerous.. like being in a life or death fight. Many real-life poisoners actually would seek to repeatedly dose their victims over time in order to build up the effects to lethality or disabling. (Arsenic, in particular, is actually not that lethal. Highly toxic, but relatively hard to kill somebody with. A lot of its popularity as a poison is because it's fairly easy to acquire thanks to its useful industrial functions, and it's tasteless, so could be easily used as a hard to detect food additive. D&D Arsenic has a fairly hefty damage die of Con damage as its secondary effect, and is arguably more lethal than reality.)

If anything, D&D poisons err on the side of being too potent, in that they take effect immediately on exposure. No waiting for the poison to go through the digestive system, doesn't need to be disseminated through the blood, no worries about if you managed to subject the victim to enough to apply an effective dose - nick your victim with Drow Sleep Poison and they just immediately pass out.

[HouseRules]

Every food is poisonous.
Every species develop immunity to many poison, just so they could eat.

[Malphegor]

Honestly I’m more impressed by there being poisons that are universally applicable to most living species who haven’t trained to be immune to poisons. Like, there is enough variety in D&D species that it seems unlikely that store bought arsenic would work on everyone the same way, from Aaracokra to Zebrapersons.

You’d think the dosages at least would vary by target, but nope, one size fits all because D&D has made poisons really simple.

(drugs too are similarly weird. Spread across 3 or so books, their effects aren’t that great (there’s an amphetamine equivalent that gives you temporary haste at the cost of ability score damage) and while they could be handy in low magic settings are kind of abysmal at actually being a fun addition to the game mechanics.)

[Selion]

When i was DM i had a poison based PC (pathfinder). I felt in the need of changing a lot of rules, game ended before i house ruled something.
First thing that would upset me is that a single dose of poison would be effective against gargantuan and colossal monsters, it's just plain wrong, to affect larger creatures it would be necessary i larger dose of poison.
Note that there are firearms with a capacity of 4 and 8 rounds, charge them with pillet cartridge and drow poison, if you have a character whit 4-5 attacks per round you have something that has around 20% of probability to give the unconscious status to whatever is not immune at the price of 200 GP, if poison is self produced. This makes encounters extremely difficult to balance, because you either use monster immune to poison, which makes this PC useless, or you accept that 1 time on 5 the encounter would be one shot by that single character.
(this is exactly what happened in my game, that's because as a DM i'm pretty naive, i purposely had a gnome merchant having a colt, i explained my player how firearms worked, the player liked it).

I'd have probably ruled that for every size difference over medium and every 5 HD (whichever is higher), it's necessary a additional dose to proc the saving throw.
To balance the nerf on a already weak tool i'd ruled that poison DC would increase on subsequent doses delivered even in case of a successful saving throw.

[ShurikVch]

You’d think the dosages at least would vary by target, but nope, one size fits all because D&D has made poisons really simple.Not entirely correct: bigger critters are tend to have higher Con - thus, better save vs. poison; and even if poison actually works - damaging poison may be less dangerous for larger monsters (unless it targets Dex or Int)

As for the Pathfinder - the last time I checked it, they nerfed poison to the 7th circle of Hell.
Rat poison may be incapable to actually kill a venerable Rat!
That is poisons in Pathfinder!

3.5, by comparison, is chock-full of useful poisons for reasonable prices: say, Fire Coral Extract (Stormwrack) initial effect makes victim nauseated (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/conditionSummary.htm#nauseated), it's contact poison (thus, just a touch attack), and costs just 150 gp
The main problem with poisons in 3.5 is rampant poison immunities: say, Molydeus Venom can poison a god (seriously!), but still doesn't works on "constructs, oozes, plants, or undead"

[Ashtagon]

Among the things that plants evolved to be poisonous or otherwise disable animals in order to protect themselves from predators are ginger, mint, red pepper, caffeine, and the numbing qualities of poppies. Humans are weird.

[ShurikVch]

Among the things that plants evolved to be poisonous or otherwise disable animals in order to protect themselves from predators are ginger, mint, red pepper, caffeine, and the numbing qualities of poppies. Humans are weird.On the other hand, squirrels are eating fly agaric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanita_muscaria) (rumors of berserker squirrels are unconfirmed), and vultures are routinely eating things which contains ptomaine

[Segev]

When I saw the thread title, I was thinking it would be about how confusing the poison rules tend to be. Primary/secondary effects, onset times, durations and frequencies, etc. etc. On the topic the title is actually about, I think a huge part of the reason that poisons are seemingly weak is because they're save/lose effects. A great many poisons have effects which either start a death spiral or which remove the victim from a combat on a failed save, thus they need to have low save DCs or be very expensive.

I actually think 5e had a good innovation, here. The Poisoned condition doesn't do much, by itself. I mean, don't knock having Disadvantage on attack and ability checks; that's nearly every d20 roll in the game (aside from Saves), but that's pretty blanket and generic. But every poison has a unique rider of, "While Poisoned, they suffer these effects," and those effects are then spelled out specifically for a given poison. This lends itself well to having unique and different effects while having a very simple basic mechanic.

PF poisons are weird in that their potency is not as closely tied to cost as you might think. Drow sleeping poison is incredibly cost efficient for its effect. There aren't many cheaper, and most of those are jokes. (Though a house centipede familiar's stat damaging poison could be pretty nice for somebody who can use Alchemy to preserve it.)

[Gallowglass]

I've had long conversations with at least one player who really wanted to be a poison based assassin.

The problem is poisons, if they work the way you want them to, are win buttons.

Imagine if you had a poison that you could put on your dagger blade and, when you cut someone, they died. It removes the challenge of combat to "I paid 800 gp to kill you".

Imagine if you had a poison that, if you could get them to ingest it, they died. How hard is it to get someone to ingest something? A diplomacy or bluff check? Just telling the DM. "I wait around in the inn until I see them order a beer, then make a sleight of hand check to drip it in the beer". Either way, one d20 skill roll to kill someone.

They seem expensive, but by the time you are fifth level or so, the money is pretty immaterial. (Even discounting the -I can make black lotus extract with prestidigitation- loons that frequent this board)

So Pathfinder took the path of turning all poisons into, what amounts to, minor debuffs. A poison based PC is basically spending money to become a melee witch equivalent. Sadly, this makes poisons fairly boring and unsatisfying compared to what you are hoping/expecting/envisioning them to be.

So, how to fix this? I don't have a full fledged fix but I can give you two ideas that have had some success in my experience.

1> If its a solo game or small table game where everyone is into it, then make "delivering the poison" more than a single skill check. Turn it into an encounter. Make them describe how they get past the guards, sneak into the bed chamber, yadda yadda. Then, when they deliver the poison its Okay to make it a win button because the adventure was getting there, not the poisoning itself. This only works by increasing the power of ingestible poisons, but leaving knife-blade poisons and gas poisons fairly weak.

2> We had some success by custom-creating some assassin-talents to allow the assassin to greatly increase the viability of some poisons. So the same -2 con/2 save poison in the hands of a normal person could turn into a far more potent -10con/3 save poison in the hands of an assassin who devoted resources to making it a better option. This worked to give the assassin the poison she was expecting without making it so every party member was like "well, gosh, I'm going to buy 70 doses of that!"

3> Help the poisoner understand that being a debuffer witch for cash isn't such a bad thing to be.

[Willie the Duck]

In the real world, poisons are used for the purpose of killing. Or at least making someone so sick that they are unable to function in any meaningful way.

But in dnd/pf, they really do comparatively little. Out of every poison on the pfsrd there are only 8 that could reliably kill a level 1 commoner with 10 Con, the cheapest being 800 gold. Anyone with a 14 con and a level or two can survive any poison listed unless they get really unlucky and the damage maxxes out. Most of the poisons you just end up with a few minuses to your rolls.

As silly as it sounds, the problem is that commoners are too robust :smalltongue:. If you had something with a cost reasonable to use on a commoner, that would take out a commoner, it would be an incredibly cheap and effective way to use two doses and take out a PC (or the PCs use it on all their opponents).

[Rijan_Sai]

They seem expensive, but by the time you are fifth level or so, the money is pretty immaterial. (Even discounting the -I can make black lotus extract with prestidigitation- loons that frequent this board)
???
I don't think I've ever seen someone claim that you could use Prestigitation (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/prestidigitation.htm), though (arguably) you could use Minor Creation (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/minorCreation.htm) (or the psionic (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/minorCreationPsionic.htm) version) to make several gallons of the stuff!



Humans are weird.
My real reason for replying: May I please have permission to add just this part to my signature line? :smallsmile:

[liquidformat]

Housecats are a death threat to commoners. That's just how life goes in Greyhawk.

House cats do actually kill people, there are a few deaths every year from cats sleeping on the faces of babies and infections from getting clawed. In my research on the Googles though I didn't find anything about it a cat killing a human while in mortal combat but there are some comical articles out there.

On the main topic, poisons are quite underwhelming and a headache to use in d&d so I normally just ignore them. If you want to make them viable I would suggest pulling augmented alchemy from Epic and adjusting it to work for poisons and at the teens would be a good idea to keep poison viable.

[Efrate]

Sidenote, as for vultures their stomach acid is so potent stuff does not last. Their feces is actually sterile, random useless fact.

As for poisons in pf they are generally useless for pcs, seeing as how they are very minor debuffsand target an often strong save and have miserable dcs because monster saves generally outpace pc.

However against players I find them effective because instead of an immediate save then a save a minute after, which is 10 rounds and likely after combat in 3.5, you get 1x/round for 6 rounds, cure 1 save. That has the potential to be an escalating if minorish debuff, and as a pc you have to deal with the results after, where a monster is dead.

[Segev]

So Pathfinder took the path of turning all poisons into, what amounts to, minor debuffs. A poison based PC is basically spending money to become a melee witch equivalent. Sadly, this makes poisons fairly boring and unsatisfying compared to what you are hoping/expecting/envisioning them to be.

I largely don't have a problem with this. The main issue lies in the fact that they made them too expensive for one-off debuffs. They really should have either made the doses cheaper, or made multiple doses for the price. Drow poison is actually either just right or too cheap; nearly everything else is too pricey for what it does. Unless you're getting it "for free" by having pets excrete it for you.

[Particle_Man]

In defence of house cats, the death by cat sleeping on babies thing is a myth busted by snopes among others. I think there was one case ever and even that was ambiguous.

I do find it amusing that in 3.5 most ability poisons cannot kill you directly if they don’t target con (well I guess you could drown in a vat of chr poison but that is different). 3.5 had one of the last vestiges of “save or die” poisons in the green part of the prismatic spray/wall/sphere spells but later editions did away with that.

[ShurikVch]

The problem is poisons, if they work the way you want them to, are win buttons.

Imagine if you had a poison that you could put on your dagger blade and, when you cut someone, they died. It removes the challenge of combat to "I paid 800 gp to kill you".Well, firstly, there are no poisons in the game which are outright kill the victim (green portion of Prismatic effects aside), so - unless you either using the poison on somebody who're pretty low-CR, or just frail enough to die from your poisoning and neither used any measures to prevent it, nor protected by default - "they died" wouldn't happen.
Also:
What if you rolled badly and poisoned yourself during the poison application?
What if you rolled natural 1 on attack and poisoned yourself?
What if they rolled good enough and ignored your poison?
What if they're secretly immune to poison?As you can see, it's far from easy or simple (favorable circumstances aside)
Besides that - is it really worse then UMD a wand and wipe the whole encounter with it?
Isn't it "I paid ... gp to kill you"?
Wouldn't it "remove the challenge of combat"?
What's now - nerf wands/scrolls?


Imagine if you had a poison that, if you could get them to ingest it, they died. How hard is it to get someone to ingest something? A diplomacy or bluff check? Just telling the DM. "I wait around in the inn until I see them order a beer, then make a sleight of hand check to drip it in the beer". Either way, one d20 skill roll to kill someone.Wouldn't work for many possible targets (try to do it with, say, Mind Flayer)
IMHO, such things usually work either for some dumb monster (in which case it's completely OK), or in a social intrigue campaigns (where it's OK - if DM and other players are OK with it)


They seem expensive, but by the time you are fifth level or so, the money is pretty immaterial.Unless the DM will straight stop to give money to your PC
Or, alternately, you have money, but poisons are out of stock
Sure, it wouldn't stop Psionic Minor Creation, but not all tables allow psionics...

[Uncle Pine]

If you haven't already, check out the Arsenic & Old Lace (http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=2714.0) handbook: it has plenty of stuff that can help make poisons more viable at higher levels (provided you're ready to invest into them).

[Asmotherion]

Not sure how poisons function in PF but in 3.5 the main purpose is to effectivelly change an encounter to easy mode;

The most potent have a high chance to cause death directly (Blac Lotus Extract 3d6 con damage+3d6 on secondary save... Even if they survive their hp will be low) or indirectly (Drow Poison causes unconsiousness->easy coup de grace).

Milder ones may lower Dex (lower to-hit bonus/AC) or a mental stat responsible for casting effectivelly removing the threat of high level spells.

Poisons are a cool way to balance a boss fight but not that reliable for usual use because of the cost of the most potent ones... unless you use some RAW shenanigans to mass produce them and your DM is cool with it.

[Darrin]

Poisons in 3E were an over-correction from 1E/2E. In earlier editions, poisons were often save-or-die effects, and I think the 3E designers felt they were too unforgivably harsh. They didn't scale well... higher-level characters tended to have better Save vs. Poison numbers, but the odds of higher-level characters getting killed outright was still pretty harsh. The effects of various poisons were also arbitrary and all over the place... some poisons didn't kill outright, they did HP damage, but that didn't scale well either... 30 HP damage kills most low-level characters, but higher-levels could conceivably shrug that off and chug a cure potion.

I think the problem the 3E designers tried to fix is that in earlier editions, getting poisoned wasn't particularly *dramatic*. They are instant effects, and there's nothing a poisoned PC can do after getting hit with poison to affect the outcome. They make a saving throw, and they are either instantly dead, lose some HP (indistinguishable from weapon damage), or absolutely fine. In 3E, once you get poisoned, there's an initial effect, and then the PC has an opportunity to mitigate or negate the secondary effects. Tying most poisons to some sort of ability damage does several things mechanically... it gives some purpose to having ability scores (instead of just ability modifiers), there are a variety of spells/effects that can manipulate ability scores/ability damage/etc., and it allows you to differentiate what some poisons do (reduce Str for weakening effects, reduce Dex for clumsiness/paralysis, reduce Wis/Int for neurological damage, etc.). It's also more *dramatic*, in that the PC has to suffer through a particular condition that doesn't outright kill him but makes him more vulnerable, and gives him a chance to correct that condition.

However, the 3E designers also didn't fix one of the fundamental problems with poisons... they don't scale well, and by tying them to a particular GP price, they allow a lower-level PC who saves/spends/steals his GP wisely to completely upend the balance of the Challenge Rating/Encounter Level system. This allows a low-power character to "cheat" against a higher-power creature, ignoring huge disparities between level/HD, HPs, class abilities, etc., that would make combat very risky for one side or the other. Also, the range and variety of poisons is still widely arbitrary. Some low-priced poisons are much more powerful than they should be (aboleth mucus, hmmm?), some higher-priced poisons are meh, and some poisons have oddball effects that aren't tied to ability damage (sleep? paralysis? blindness?).

At higher levels, immunity to poison becomes somewhat ubiquitous (usually through creature type immunities via polymorph shenanigans but sometimes via class ability), so poison becomes less effective, but bringing poison into a game at any level can lead to a lot of unpredictable results. I'm not sure if that's something the designers intended, but I don't think they put a lot of thought into how poison use has an effect on the game as a whole.

[Willie the Duck]

Tying most poisons to some sort of ability damage does several things mechanically... it gives some purpose to having ability scores (instead of just ability modifiers), there are a variety of spells/effects that can manipulate ability scores/ability damage/etc., and it allows you to differentiate what some poisons do (reduce Str for weakening effects, reduce Dex for clumsiness/paralysis, reduce Wis/Int for neurological damage, etc.). It's also more *dramatic*, in that the PC has to suffer through a particular condition that doesn't outright kill him but makes him more vulnerable, and gives him a chance to correct that condition.

Ability damage in general seems like a mechanic that was implemented 'because it makes sense' or because it does give purpose to ability scores (both scores over modifiers, and for not dumping stats). It doesn't seem like the designers thought through all the implications (unless they wanted Ogres taken down with Int-penalty effects and dragons to Dex-killers).

[Segev]

Ability damage in general seems like a mechanic that was implemented 'because it makes sense' or because it does give purpose to ability scores (both scores over modifiers, and for not dumping stats). It doesn't seem like the designers thought through all the implications (unless they wanted Ogres taken down with Int-penalty effects and dragons to Dex-killers).

I don't actually think those were as unintended as people often assume. Ability damage is supposed to take down creatures weak in those abilities. Where unintended consequences arise, I suspect it's because the designer of a particular Ability-damaging effect didn't think through the implications of Ability damage of the type they're dealing, and overdid it.

[Willie the Duck]

I don't actually think those were as unintended as people often assume. Ability damage is supposed to take down creatures weak in those abilities. Where unintended consequences arise, I suspect it's because the designer of a particular Ability-damaging effect didn't think through the implications of Ability damage of the type they're dealing, and overdid it.

Well, yes, I do think there was a general idea of 'this spell targeting Dex is supposed to take down clumsy things.' I think, the greater issue is that abilities, although not as purely 3-18 as in editions past (certainly not when it comes to monsters), is still a much smaller range of variance than hit points, and thus using them as alternate 'hit point' pools has some far reaching implications. Poison and the commoner vs. PC example above is a great example. A commoner might have 1d4 hp, while a reasonable level PC might have dozens or hundreds. A commoner will have a ~10 Con, and the PC will have... 14-30, I suppose. If you're going to use that score as form of hit points, you'd better thing through exactly how frequently and how damaging those ability damage effects are.

[liquidformat]

I don't actually think those were as unintended as people often assume. Ability damage is supposed to take down creatures weak in those abilities. Where unintended consequences arise, I suspect it's because the designer of a particular Ability-damaging effect didn't think through the implications of Ability damage of the type they're dealing, and overdid it.

Ya a lot of the scary ones are creatures that can do repeated ability damage with natural attacks or things like that. Though in general I think it would be nice to figure out a way to adjust poisons so you can get scaling DCs and effects. Alchemical items have similar problems, acid and alchemist fire are great at level 1 -3 but they don't scale at all so they quickly become worthless.

[Segev]

I think a family of poisons that do ability damage on a small scale over a significant number of rounds would probably be the sweet spot. A dex-damaging poison is going to have a hard time affecting a dragon through the dragon's Constitution modifier to Fort saves, but if you can, you still need 4-10 rounds of affect for it to take him down if poisons do 1, 1d2, or 1d3 points of ability damage per failed save every round.

This is about what it would take to bring down a commoner with such a poison, too. And tougher creatures would be much harder to bring down if you don't hit a weak spot. But the stacking penalties every round or two would still make it have serious effect.

Now, the other side of this coin is multiple applications of poison, and the DC being "fixed." PF has rules for multiple doses against which the initial save is failed leading to a stacking DC on future exposures, but it still requires failing that initial DC. I think there are class features which can allow you to concentrate poison doses for higher DCs, but this compounds the expense problem and limits it to a narrow subset of probably rare classes.

A safe assumption for the "dabbler" in poison use would be that they're getting only 1 or 2 doses applied to a target in a given fight. They poison their one or two weapons, and then it's done when the target is exposed. The trouble arises for poison-focused builds, which will either get around this problem by having quick draw and multiple poisoned weapons (arrows are a good choice for this), or will have tricks which allow them to apply poison with every hit. The PF rules for hiking up the DC are actually pretty good, here: there's no additional damage, but it is more likely to go through.

A formula for poison pricing that scales based on DC, duration, iteration speed, and damage amount (maybe also damage type - some stats might be more valuable than others) would be nice. Specialized poisons would get special rider effects; generic "poisons" would be designed for particular stats.

The overall price should be comparable to a similarly-effective spell on a scroll or in a wand.

[Starbuck_II]

3.5 Poisons to focus on:
1) Wild Dwarf Knockout Poison: Wild dwarves coat their blowgun darts with poison made from a plant tha grows only in the Jungles of Chult. Wild dwarves are immune to the effects of the poison.
Type: Injury DC 14; Initial Damage: slow effect for 5 rounds; Secondary Damage: Unconsciousness for 1 minute; Price: 150 gp.

2) Blister Oil: Blister oil is a highly refined alchemical liquid that causes painful blisters upon contact. To use it, a thin coat must be applied to a surface, such as a sword hilt or door handle. One application covers roughly a 6-inch-by-6-inch square area. Once applied, it remains effective for 2d4 hours. Each vial of blister oil contains 1d8 applications.
When the oil touches bare skin, the victim must make a DC 15 Fortitude save to avoid painful red blisters that spring up on the affected area of skin, dealing 1d4 points of damage per application used. In addition, the victim takes a -2 penalty on Dexterity-based checks, including Reflex saves, for 2d4 days. Magical healing applied to this damage removes the blisters and the penalty. Natural healing can remove the damage normally, but the penalty on Dexterity checks remains until magical healing is applied or the 2d4 days elapse.

3) Cheap for effect:
25g: Sleep-Smoke (Waterdeep, City of Splendors Pg. 152. Unconsciousness/Unconsciousness!)
40g: Tiny Centipede poison (Core; 1 dex woo!)
40g: Stun Gas (A&EG 37, Stuns!)
50g: Roach paste (DoTU 94; Nauseates!)
50g: Darkeye (Sharn, City of Towers; Paralysis!)
75g: Drow poison (Core; Unconsciousness!)
75g: Snowflake Lichen PowderFrostburn (1 Dex/1 Str!)
90g: Oil of Taggit (Core; 0/Unconsciousness and ingested
100g: Taxine (Yew tree poison. Ingested: 1d3 Con/2d6, each subsequent exposure increases DC by 2 and +1d2 Con damage)

4) DC 12: Roach paste (Nausea for 1 round/Filth Fever) (DoTU 94)

5) Weird but good: from Complete Scoundrel:
1. Blasphemix (Injury): it's got a DC of 22 and is only 750gp, but forces divine spellcasters to make a stiff CL check for 10 rounds! (DC 15+spell level) Requires Knowledge (Religion) to make.
2. Elemental Rime (Injury): At 200g, this is cheap to make, and though the save DC is low at 16, forcing a creature to gain Fire Vulnerability can set up some awesome combos with a blaster mage. A duskblade, for example, can hit his opponent with Elemental Rime poison, and then swift action cast a Scorching Ray at the opponent. Also requires Knowledge (the Planes) to make.
3. Goodbye Kiss (Ingested/Injury): The initial effect is fatigued, and the secondary Exhausted is a great effect! Since it's both injury and ingested, it has decent applications in a fight and in roleplay situations.
4. Siren's Breath (Inhaled): gives -5 penalty to saves against enchantment spells. A little pricey at 300g though.
5. Salvo (Injury): Notable for the incredibly low Craft DC of 12. The effect isn't particularly good, but this could be a potent money-making poison to create in drow cities or large metropolises.

Pathfinder:

1) Hag Spittle Type poison (injury, ingested); Save*Fortitude DC 16
Frequency 1/round for 6 rounds
Effects Initial: blindness for 1d10 rounds; Secondary: 1d4 Wis damage;
Cure 2 saves
Price 1,500 gp
Fire Jackal Saliva: (Dhabba Spittle) This poison burns the flesh near the point of injury as well as sickening the victim.
Type poison (injury); Save Fortitude DC 12; Frequency 1/round for 6 rounds
Initial Effect 1d6 acid damage plus*nausea; Secondary Effect 1d4 Dex; Cure 1 save.
Cost: 50 gp for 1 dose (liquid).

2) Wound Weal (100 gp)
This gritty black paste is a poison that interferes with an afflicted creature's ability to recover from injuries. All Heal checks applied to the creature suffer a –10 penalty. In addition, anyone using magical healing on the target must make a DC 25 caster level check to succeed.
Type poison, injury; Save Fortitude DC 18
Onset 1 round; Frequency 1/day
Effect impaired healing (see above); Cure 2 consecutive saves

3) Red Tears: Save Fortitude DC 15; Price 50 gp
Frequency 1/rd for 10
Effect 1d6 damage, Counts as a Bleed effect; Cure 1 saves

4) Rainbow Jellyfish
Acting through contact or a wound, this poison can cause paralysis Type poison (contact, injury); Save Fortitude DC 14
Frequency 1/round for 2 rounds
Effects Initial: staggered for 1d6 rounds; Secondary:*paralyzed for 1d6 minutes;
Cure 1 save
Price 400 gp

5) Laughing Gas
Price 500 gp; Weight 1/2 lb.
Type inhaled; Save Fortitude DC 12
Onset immediate; Frequency 1/round for 5 rounds
Effect The subject experiences a bout of uncontrollable laughter and is dazed for 1 round
Cure 1 save

6) Baneberry
90 gp
Fiddleback venom Type poison (contact, injury, ingested); Onset: 1 min, Save Fortitude DC 13
Frequency 1/minute for 6 rounds
Effects Initial: naeseated for 1d4 rounds; Secondary:*1d3 str and 1d4 Con
Cure 2 save
Price 500 gp

7) Tongue Twister DC 16
Frequency: 1/rd for 1d6 rd
Effects Initial: 1d2 Int
Cure 2 save; Price 600 gp
Additionally, the creature loses the ability to speak one language at random from the languages he knows for 1 minute. Additional failed saves cause the target to lose the ability to speak additional languages if the target has the ability to speak more than one language. Any creature that can no longer speak a language speaks only gibberish, which prevents casting spells with verbal components; Cure 2 saves

7) Alchemical Isolation Save Fortitude DC 13
One of the unique poisons to be developed by the Daggermark Poisoners' Guild, this deafens then blinds the victim within minutes.
Frequency: 1/min for 2 min
Effects Initial: Deafen 10 Min; Secondary:*Blind 10 min
Cure 1 save
Price 175 gp

8) Vampire’s Kiss (Injury) Save Fortitude DC 15
Frequency: 1/rd for 2 rd
Effects Initial 1d2 Con; Secondary:*Bleed increases by 1 for 1 min (from non-poisons)
Cure 1 save
Price 75 gp

9) Confabucation Powder: (inhaled) Save Fortitude DC 18
Frequency: 1/min for 2 min
Effects Initial Stagger 1 min; Secondary:*If stagger, stunned, unconscious, highly suggestable. Pg 11 Alchemy Manual
Cure 1 save
Price 75 gp

[Conradine]

I think core poisons are too weak too.

If you think that a single arrow poisoned with curare takes down a friggin' elephant ( 6000 pounds at least ).

[Willie the Duck]

I think core poisons are too weak too.

If you think that a single arrow poisoned with curare takes down a friggin' elephant ( 6000 pounds at least ).

Well, enough Curare will take down any creature that uses diaphragm breathing, so I guess an elephant would be included (although I would be impressed if you could get an reliably-elephant-downing sized dose onto an arrow). However, historically elephant hunters used ouabain, not curare (given that the later was, y'know, South American).

[Particle_Man]

Is this the place to mention the book of exalted deeds and their near cousins to poisons that only affect evil people? Touch of golden ice gives you one permanently for free as a feat which is nice for a monk or other unarmed or natural attack build.

[Spore]

I would not have a problem with poisons killing NPCs, because usually D&D poisons are balanced around "smear some on your weapon and try to hit a creature with it".

IRL, poisoning is so much more varied. You can have radiation poisoning (ingested via liquids), you can use syringes instead of blades, you can choke someone on poison. Imho the way you apply the poison should vary its strength and DC to resist.

If you take a fullround action to jab the king with a syringe after sneaking into his bed room (picking his lock, sneaking around guards, or pickpocketing his chamber key), you should be guaranteed a kill that more or less looks like "he died in his sleep". After all you have to exfiltrate too.

[Doctor Awkward]

Housecats are a death threat to commoners. That's just how life goes in Greyhawk.

No they're not.

That's a holdover from 2nd Edition that no longer holds true in 3.5.

Also, imminently fatal poisons are not all that common in real life as well, with the deadliest either being synthesized in laboratories or derived from exotic animals (pufferfish and poison dart frogs, for example). Most of the time you will get very sick for a couple of days and eventually recover.

[MisterKaws]

No they're not.

That's a holdover from 2nd Edition that no longer holds true in 3.5.

Both have the same HP, with the cat having higher AC and three attacks, two of which have a higher to-hit. If it hits twice it's 1+1 and the Commoner's dead. The chance of it hitting twice in one round is 14/20=50%, with it having a higher initiative and lower chance of getting hit.

If that isn't a death threat I don't know what is.

[Elkad]

Housecats are a death threat to commoners. That's just how life goes in Greyhawk.


No they're not.

That's a holdover from 2nd Edition that no longer holds true in 3.5..

Analysis says it depends what weapon the commoner chooses. If it's a club or dagger (probably his most likely choices), the cat has the odds.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?318517-Commoner-vs-Cat-A-Mathematical-Analysis

[King of Nowhere]

poisons in real life are useless to smear on weapons, because they take far too long to act. even the fastest poisons would still need several rounds to diffuse into the blood. most would take a few hours, with some requiring weeks.

then there is the matter of dosage. every substance is poisonous above a certain level, and every substance is harmless below a certain amount. And dosage is always related to body weight, because a bigger body just have more stuff that the poison has to disable. Take for example cyanide, it binds to hemoglobine, stops it from carrying oxygen, you suffocate (it's a bit more complex, but let's not go into details). so let's say you have enough cyanide to disable the hemoglobin in 20 liters of blood; that's lethal to a human, but harmless to a whale, because the whale has several cubic meters of blood and won't notice that small loss of effectiveness.

then again, poison stays in the body at least for a while. most are excreted with urine, but it still takes a few hours. Some poisons stay in your body for years. So if you are poisoned several times in a few hours, the doses cumulate. yet in d&d there is no increase of DC for multiple doses.

another thing is that they are all very expensive. some poisons are easily found in nature. the poison hemlock should at least be dirt cheap. killing someone with black lotus is almost more expensive than raising the guy.

Ultimately, accurately modeling poisons would be too complicated, not worth the effort, and there would be no poisons to be used in battle.

Now, regarding the part about use in a campaign: I've found that black lotus is still effective up to the mid levels. It is effective even at high levels when used inside an antimagic field. I had a cleric villain and I expected the party to try antimagic field on him, so I gave him a crossbow with black lotus tipped bolts for that circumstance. too bad the druid retains poison immunity in antimagic, though.
Outside of combat, I handwave that a big enough dose will knock out a high level character. Say you captured a high level enemy and you want to keep them drugged, you can do it, and there are no rolls involved (except perhaps a heal check or a knowledge check).

[Doctor Awkward]

Both have the same HP, with the cat having higher AC and three attacks, two of which have a higher to-hit. If it hits twice it's 1+1 and the Commoner's dead. The chance of it hitting twice in one round is 14/20=50%, with it having a higher initiative and lower chance of getting hit.

If that isn't a death threat I don't know what is.

The cat is incapable of doing more than a single point of damage unless it rolls a natural 20 and confirms a critical hit. It is likewise incapable of winning the combat during a surprise round. My analysis assumes a surprise round because cats are naturally stealthy and their common tactics involve them ambushing targets, and under even typical conditions the commoner is incapable of spotting the cat, and has only a 9% chance of hearing it.

With only a +2 to initiative, it has only a 10% chance of acting first in combat. If it does, it is only a threat if it had a successful surprise round. And even then, it must succeed in hitting with at least two of it's three attacks on a full attack-- two of which have a 75% chance of hitting and one of which only has a 45% chance-- in order to disable the commoner before it has a chance to retaliate.

Otherwise, it's in exactly the same situation as before: it cannot ever win the combat outright in the first round.

Meanwhile, the commoner has a 45% chance to strike the cat in return if it charged him first (remember the -2 to AC for charging). If it does hit, then even on an average damage roll with a dagger the cat is immediately disabled. It can take only a single move or standard action, and any standard action puts it into the negatives.


Analysis says it depends what weapon the commoner chooses. If it's a club or dagger (probably his most likely choices), the cat has the odds.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?318517-Commoner-vs-Cat-A-Mathematical-Analysis

Analysis is incorrect.

It ignores the fact that as a tiny creature the cat has a reach of zero feet, does not threaten adjacent squares, and must enter it's opponent's square to attack it. Doing so provokes an attack of opportunity (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/movementPositionAndDistance.htm#bigandLittleCreatu resInCombat), giving the commoner another free shot at him every round in which he wishes to attack. Meanwhile the commoner can 5-foot step backwards, forcing the cat to provoke when it advances on him again.

After 1 round of combat when the cat fails initiative, even with surprise, there is roughly a 50% chance it has been disabled, and only a 5% chance the commoner has been. And this is when the commoner is armed with a dagger, let alone anything marginally more effective.

[Elysiume]

Why does the cat having +2 to initiative give it a 10% chance to win initiative? A level 1 commoner isn't likely to have higher than a +2 to initiative.

[Mechalich]

The excessive lethality of small animals - it's not just cats - to much larger single hit die entities is an artifact of having low absolute numbers for HP for the purpose of simplifying arithmetic at tables combined with a minimum damage rule that drastically magnifies the ability of tiny creatures to injure larger ones. Greater granularity in the system erases the issue, so it's nothing more than a mathematical artifact and not a critique of any real consequence.

A broader issue is that in 3.X D&D many relatively common animals are presented as being far more dangerous to armed humans than they ought to be. The cat math may be arguable, but something as meager as a Donkey has a very good chance of killing a spear wielding commoner due to it's remarkable durability (assuming a spear strike of 4.5 dmg (1d8) on average, it will take three hits to take down a donkey, which is ridiculous).

[Doctor Awkward]

The excessive lethality of small animals - it's not just cats - to much larger single hit die entities is an artifact of having low absolute numbers for HP for the purpose of simplifying arithmetic at tables combined with a minimum damage rule that drastically magnifies the ability of tiny creatures to injure larger ones. Greater granularity in the system erases the issue, so it's nothing more than a mathematical artifact and not a critique of any real consequence.

A broader issue is that in 3.X D&D many relatively common animals are presented as being far more dangerous to armed humans than they ought to be. The cat math may be arguable, but something as meager as a Donkey has a very good chance of killing a spear wielding commoner due to it's remarkable durability (assuming a spear strike of 4.5 dmg (1d8) on average, it will take three hits to take down a donkey, which is ridiculous).

It's certainly not that ridiculous. Donkeys are extremely durable animals and are physically stronger than a horse of the same size.

I think the problem is that you are greatly overestimating the physical capabilities of an average human being. We are a singularly unimpressive species when considering physical traits that are suited for survival in nature. We have no teeth or claws that are usable for defense. We have a far weaker muscle system than other animals similar to our size. We have no fur to help keep us warm and no hide to speak of to help protect against injury. We have absolutely terrible vision, especially at night. We are poor swimmers, mediocre climbers, and are far slower runners than the majority of other animals.

Being a tool-using species and having comparatively high endurance are the only natural advantages that we possess. Every other victory that human beings have ever achieved in the natural world is a result of our ability to learn and solve problems.