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TheElfLord
2008-01-21, 12:32 PM
Pretty much what the title says, can a creature "turn off" its damage reduction?

For example, say a werewolf or vampire is terrorizing the streets of a town at night. If DR is always active, the PCs could really narrow the field of suspects by cutting everyone slightly and taking everyone who heals instantly (or whose skin is not cut by the same amount of pressure) in for further investagation.

DR seems great for combat but lacking in an undercover investagative plot.

So, is it voluntary or forced to be always active?

Lord Lorac Silvanos
2008-01-21, 12:36 PM
It is always active and cannot be turned off, except for the supernatural kinds of DR that disappear in an Antimagic Field.

Tokiko Mima
2008-01-21, 12:53 PM
Also, Lycanthropes don't have DR in their human forms, only in their animal/hybrid ones. So you couldn't pick out a werewolf with that method, but you could find a vampire since they keep their DR.

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 12:54 PM
Of course, if its a vampire they could.. you know... have everyone walk into the sunlight :smallbiggrin:

Narmoth
2008-01-21, 12:56 PM
what about the "regenerates to fast to get sun dmg" variety of vampire?

I actually run DR or the equivalent as only affecting HP. They look as if they take dmg

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 01:01 PM
Not aware of that type of vampire offhand. Normal vampires are disoriented for a round, then dead. They don't take x dmg/round as far as I'm aware.

Ok, plan B then. Take each villager, stake them through the heart, cut off their heads and fill their mouths with holy wafers, and then put the bodies in running water for a few minutes. Any villager that dies to this known set of vampire weaknesses was obviously a vampire.

Tokiko Mima
2008-01-21, 01:02 PM
The problem with this method of using DR is that there's a lot of perfectly good reasons for people not to want to get hurt in the first place, even if it is to sniff out a monster.

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 01:10 PM
Key has a good point. Especially as a vampire can dominate some townsfolk to aid in this. The priests refuse to let their patriarch be tested because he is a "living saint". The local noble refuses, because he "knows he's not the one," and won't let the common-born PCs manhandle him or his family. The stonemason is stubborn and hates the noble, and so refuses to be tested until the noble is. His buddies rally around him and do the same. Various mothers don't want their children/babies cut.

Half of these are dominated under the Vampire's will, and one of them is the vampire. How would the PCs react to this?

AKA_Bait
2008-01-21, 01:14 PM
Pretty much what the title says, can a creature "turn off" its damage reduction?

For example, say a werewolf or vampire is terrorizing the streets of a town at night. If DR is always active, the PCs could really narrow the field of suspects by cutting everyone slightly and taking everyone who heals instantly (or whose skin is not cut by the same amount of pressure) in for further investagation.

DR seems great for combat but lacking in an undercover investagative plot.

So, is it voluntary or forced to be always active?

Silvanos is dead on in terms of the rules (not that anyone should be surprised by that. Our resident beholder is more than well versed in RAW).

That's not a bad plan for uncovering vampires in the town mechanically, but the main problem is an RP one with that kind of plot. There would need to be a serious, and obvious, vampiric threat to the entire town before anyone is going to agree to the PC's walking around cutting everyone. If the DM is halfway sensible a plan like that would get shot down in seconds for a few reasons I can come up with off the top of my head.

1. Smart vampires keep their threat covert. There simply aren't going to be a dozen corpses showing up on a nightly basis.

2. Vampires make good use of their Dominate ability. Any vampire worth his undead salt is going to have a few of the people in power (mayor, town council, local lord etc.) under their thrall. If the PC's suggest it they would probably be met with a stare and a comment like "So, to get rid of the threat to our town you propose to stab everyone?"

3. If the town is large enough, the plan simply won't be practical. 4 PC's are going to wander around and cut on 4,000 people? Might take a while and most, even if the party has the local authorities permission, aren't going to be all that cooperative.

4. Assuming the plan even makes it that far, there is a fair chance that any PC who gets assigned the job of running a dagger across Dracula's palm is going to be gingerly holding a knife and the fellow's hand just long enough for the Vamp to dominate them.

"Let me just check this out sir" says Bob the Barbarian.
"Certianly my good man," Replies Count Bloodsucker, "Ow, my look at all that blood."
"Yep. Lots of blood here..."

Grey Watcher
2008-01-21, 01:25 PM
Ok, plan B then. Take each villager, stake them through the heart, cut off their heads and fill their mouths with holy wafers, and then put the bodies in running water for a few minutes. Any villager that dies to this known set of vampire weaknesses was obviously a vampire.

And any that survive are holy, and promptly sacrificed to the Gods to maintain their purity? :smallwink:


Key has a good point. Especially as a vampire can dominate some townsfolk to aid in this. The priests refuse to let their patriarch be tested because he is a "living saint". The local noble refuses, because he "knows he's not the one," and won't let the common-born PCs manhandle him or his family. The stonemason is stubborn and hates the noble, and so refuses to be tested until the noble is. His buddies rally around him and do the same. Various mothers don't want their children/babies cut.

Half of these are dominated under the Vampire's will, and one of them is the vampire. How would the PCs react to this?

Heck, the don't even have to be dominated, Those are all perfectly normal reasons for not wanting random strangers cutting you, looking to see if they're going to cut you some more. Even if I believed in such a thing as vampires or werewolves, the idea of a roving band of vigilantes assuming everyone's a monster unless they submit to a test, convienently administered and judged by the aforementioned vigilantes, in which failure calls for an immediate and lethal response scares me a lot more than one vampire operating for hiding. In short, the PCs should expect widespread resistance on the part of the community if they try this plan. And that's without any supernatural influence from their actual target.

Of course, remember, if you're the DM, you can always houserule it whichever way you want. And if you're not the DM, he or she can always houserule it whichever he or she wants.

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 01:29 PM
And any that survive are holy, and promptly sacrificed to the Gods to maintain their purity? :smallwink:
Good point. I approve of this message.

edit: regarding the point regarding the resistance to the PC efforts to go about stabbing people, I'd have someone named Franklin Benjamin say "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." :smallsmile:

Tokiko Mima
2008-01-21, 01:51 PM
Well, if this wasn't a pure medieval setting...

I would suggest dispensing free measles/flu injections, keeping records on who has been innoculated and making sure no one's injections heal instantly. It wouldn't seem odd, and that way you can eliminate a lot of people from the list of possible vampires. Cross reference that list with people that are normally seen in the daytime and in mirrors to eliminate them. By the time you're done you should have a short list of possible vampire suspects.

With the much shorter list, it would be easier to convince people that the remaining people need to be tested under the knife.

VanBuren
2008-01-21, 02:18 PM
Use your magic to destroy the town. Quick, easy and simple. If anyone survives, they're probably the vampire.

Narmoth
2008-01-21, 03:11 PM
Not aware of that type of vampire offhand. Normal vampires are disoriented for a round, then dead. They don't take x dmg/round as far as I'm aware.

Not normally, no. But how fun is it to have a vampire who's also the tax collector?

Tokiko Mima
2008-01-21, 03:20 PM
Heck, the don't even have to be dominated, Those are all perfectly normal reasons for not wanting random strangers cutting you, looking to see if they're going to cut you some more. Even if I believed in such a thing as vampires or werewolves, the idea of a roving band of vigilantes assuming everyone's a monster unless they submit to a test, convienently administered and judged by the aforementioned vigilantes, in which failure calls for an immediate and lethal response scares me a lot more than one vampire operating for hiding. In short, the PCs should expect widespread resistance on the part of the community if they try this plan. And that's without any supernatural influence from their actual target.

This villager perspective made me laugh! QFT! :smallbiggrin:

Sometimes in trying to root out evil, you become more evil than the evil you're trying to uproot. Irony!

ZeroNumerous
2008-01-21, 03:36 PM
Use your magic to destroy the town. Quick, easy and simple. If anyone survives, they're probably the vampire.

Best possible plan suggested thus far. :smallamused:

TheElfLord
2008-01-21, 04:28 PM
Heck, the don't even have to be dominated, Those are all perfectly normal reasons for not wanting random strangers cutting you, looking to see if they're going to cut you some more. Even if I believed in such a thing as vampires or werewolves, the idea of a roving band of vigilantes assuming everyone's a monster unless they submit to a test, convienently administered and judged by the aforementioned vigilantes, in which failure calls for an immediate and lethal response scares me a lot more than one vampire operating for hiding. In short, the PCs should expect widespread resistance on the part of the community if they try this plan. And that's without any supernatural influence from their actual target.


But an important thing to remember is that the PCs will often not be a group of strangers/random vigilantes. By the time a group gets to be over level 10, it is quite likely that they are famous throughout the countryside, legends in their own time. Its not just a random guy with a sword wanting to test you, its Marauk, Hero of the Northlands, Savior of the Town of Hillsbend, Champion of the Five gates, Slayer of the Blake Drake of Hartsdale etc. The guy all the villige children fight over bein when they play make believe. Who saved the princess and has the king's personal thanks. The PC may even be a noble himself, traveling through the area on royal buisness. Many people follow the guidline/assumption that level 5-6 represents the peak of human achivement, and characters over level 3 are super rare. PCs at level 3-4 might face some resistance, but if your world's equivilent of Hercules walks up and says he wants to give you a small cut, how are you going to react.

Felius
2008-01-21, 04:33 PM
But an important thing to remember is that the PCs will often not be a group of strangers/random vigilantes. By the time a group gets to be over level 10, it is quite likely that they are famous throughout the countryside, legends in their own time. Its not just a random guy with a sword wanting to test you, its Marauk, Hero of the Northlands, Savior of the Town of Hillsbend, Champion of the Five gates, Slayer of the Blake Drake of Hartsdale etc. The guy all the villige children fight over bein when they play make believe. Who saved the princess and has the king's personal thanks. The PC may even be a noble himself, traveling through the area on royal buisness. Many people follow the guidline/assumption that level 5-6 represents the peak of human achivement, and characters over level 3 are super rare. PCs at level 3-4 might face some resistance, but if your world's equivilent of Hercules walks up and says he wants to give you a small cut, how are you going to react.

Well, considering that they are famous for being extremely strong AND prone to violence, I'd be very "glad" to help.

Collin152
2008-01-21, 04:44 PM
One could just cast detect undead, but wheres the fun in that?
Of course, if you must, say it's part of a simple blood test. You aren't really testing the blood, you just want to see them bleed.

holywhippet
2008-01-21, 04:50 PM
Locating a vampire is pretty easy - detect undead is only a first level spell. Cast it out of sight then walk into wherever the suspect(s) are. Preferrably have a non-good character cast it so they won't get overwhelmed. If you need to prove they are a vampire to others, slip some holy water into their drink.

Not sure how to detect a werewolf though. My best guess would be to rely on it's scent ability - produce a smell at a distance and look to see who reacts.

Premier
2008-01-21, 04:50 PM
Because medieval peasants know what a "blood test" is. Or any medieval person, really.

NullAshton
2008-01-21, 04:56 PM
What if the adventurers were using a diseased needle, to kill off the entire village with a fatal disease? Unlikely, but could happen, and things like that would be why villagers wouldn't want to just be randomly tested like that by strangers.

Also, how are you keeping track of who's been tested, and who hasn't? The werewolf/vampire could simply say he's been tested, when that's not the case. Alternatively, choose that moment to travel out of town on an errand. They wouldn't just stick around not doing nothing when they know that powerful people are coming, and they want to kill you.

Though that could work in your advantage... when you go into town, act like weak adventurers, slipping up all over the place. Magical items hidden back at camp, going into the city with non-magical equipment ahoy. Then when the werewolf/vampire decides they don't want the additional attention and decides to dispose of you silently in your sleep... you'll be back at camp, fully equipped with your magical equipment, and ready to kill them. Easy.

VanBuren
2008-01-21, 05:00 PM
Not sure how to detect a werewolf though. My best guess would be to rely on it's scent ability - produce a smell at a distance and look to see who reacts.

Drop a bunch of colloidal silver in the water supply. Everyone who's skin turns irreversibly blue is fine, but the guy who wretches and pukes while the silver burns his innards might be a good person to suspect.

Collin152
2008-01-21, 05:01 PM
Because medieval peasants know what a "blood test" is. Or any medieval person, really.

Say it's a wizard thing, then use some minor illusion for fluff. If the blood turns blue, you'r okay. Make the blood turn blue.
Why, you might be able to use prestidigitation for this.
If you can get the government to sanction it...

holywhippet
2008-01-21, 05:05 PM
Drop a bunch of colloidal silver in the water supply. Everyone who's skin turns irreversibly blue is fine, but the guy who wretches and pukes while the silver burns his innards might be a good person to suspect.

Would that actually work? Were creatures have DR which is overcome by silver, but I think that requires an actual attack. I don't think the mere touch of silver does them harm.

VanBuren
2008-01-21, 05:08 PM
Would that actually work? Were creatures have DR which is overcome by silver, but I think that requires an actual attack. I don't think the mere touch of silver does them harm.

Ah, but it isn't touching them. It's being ingested internally.

Collin152
2008-01-21, 05:08 PM
Would that actually work? Were creatures have DR which is overcome by silver, but I think that requires an actual attack. I don't think the mere touch of silver does them harm.

It should, but it does not.
Likewise, silver needs to be a bigger influence on Vampires.

Crimson Avenger
2008-01-21, 05:11 PM
Kill them all, and let their *respective* god(s) sort them out.



Doing God's work through violence since 413.

holywhippet
2008-01-21, 06:14 PM
Kill them all, and let their *respective* god(s) sort them out.


Any paladins in the party would hit fallen status so hard they'd leave a dent in the ground. Any non-evil clerics in the party would probably be in trouble with their gods as well.

Actually, I thought of another way to spot a vampire. Provided you can get close enough to them, have your cleric present their holy symbol and declare that they have been sent by their god to deal with the vampire. A true vampire would flinch or cringe when faced with a holy symbol presented like that.

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 06:17 PM
I believe Crimson Avenger's comment was supposed to be as tongue in cheek as my suggestion that "anyone that dies when staked, beheaded and then drowned is a vampire."

VanBuren
2008-01-21, 06:23 PM
I believe Crimson Avenger's comment was supposed to be as tongue in cheek as my suggestion that "anyone that dies when staked, beheaded and then drowned is a vampire."

Sort of like the Witch trials where, if you died you were obviously innocent yet if you managed to survive, you were a witch and needed to be killed.

spotmarkedx
2008-01-21, 07:36 PM
Sort of like the Witch trials where, if you died you were obviously innocent yet if you managed to survive, you were a witch and needed to be killed.Indeed the very mentality I was considering when I posted that :smallwink:

Tequila Sunrise
2008-01-22, 01:58 AM
Even if by RAW there is no way to turn off DR, it wouldn't be bad for a DM to rule otherwise. In the case of supernatural DR, it actually makes sense. Really, if SR can be turned off why not sup. DR? I think this is just one of those areas of the rules that the designers didn't think through fully (and justifiable so IMO); the standard D&D game is pretty focused on defeating enemies through combat so why would the designers specify that a creature can turn off its DR?

TS

Lord Lorac Silvanos
2008-01-22, 03:38 AM
Even if by RAW there is no way to turn off DR, it wouldn't be bad for a DM to rule otherwise. In the case of supernatural DR, it actually makes sense. Really, if SR can be turned off why not sup. DR? I think this is just one of those areas of the rules that the designers didn't think through fully (and justifiable so IMO); the standard D&D game is pretty focused on defeating enemies through combat so why would the designers specify that a creature can turn off its DR?
TS

I can see the argument for "turning off" Supernatural DR as per the SR argument.
However, for extraordinary it makes no sense at all. You cannot make your skin any thinner or stop your body from healing by the force of will.

You could perhaps allow your opponent to inflict a critical hit on you, but that is not compatible with putting a needle on the tip of the finger.

Khanderas
2008-01-22, 04:00 AM
One could just cast detect undead, but wheres the fun in that?
Of course, if you must, say it's part of a simple blood test. You aren't really testing the blood, you just want to see them bleed.
- "Ill just cut you alittle... nothing serious. heh heh."
- "Why do you want to do that ?"
- "Oh no reason really, just like to see people bleed..."
:smalleek:

GutterRunner
2008-01-22, 08:50 AM
Well, if you were trying to find Superman with this technique, he could just put a small amount of Kryptonite on his person and he'd bleed like the next guy. Werewolves and Vampires also have supernatural weaknesses: perhaps if they knew this kind of test was being caried out they could find something which would weaken their regeneration to about that of an average human.

Worira
2008-01-22, 10:14 AM
Just pump ravages from BoED into the water supply. If anyone dies, they were evil!

Crimson Avenger
2008-01-22, 10:22 AM
I believe Crimson Avenger's comment was supposed to be as tongue in cheek as my suggestion that "anyone that dies when staked, beheaded and then drowned is a vampire."

Actually, I was paraphrasing a famous quote by an early Christian cardinal. When faced with a stronghold of heretics, his generals asked how they were supposed to tell the heretics from the innocent, and he replied, "Kill them all and let god gather up his own." Hence, let god sort them out.

The 413 is a reference to Emperor Constantine, and 413 AD.

Mewtarthio
2008-01-22, 10:29 AM
Just pump ravages from BoED into the water supply. If anyone dies, they were evil!

How can you not love the BoED? Ravages that horribly kill all Evil people in the city, a spell that traps someone inside a gem for a year to brainwash them...

13_CBS
2008-01-22, 10:35 AM
Wait, so what if the guy who heals quickly turns out to be a Warlock or something?

...unless warlock DR is Supernatural :smallconfused:

Fighteer
2008-01-22, 10:45 AM
DR is also a feature of certain PC classes. Imagine the embarrassment of mistaking the Barbarian for the vampire.

Social aspects aside, any vampire or lycanthrope who fell for this trick would deserve to die, in my opinion. Well, any true lycanthrope, in any case - not necessarily an infected one.

"Hey, all you villagers! There's a vampire among you. Everyone come out into the sunlight. Quickly, now, there's no time to lose. Okay, I'm guessing it was the guy over there who just burned up into a pile of ash. No, no thanks needed, it's all in a day's work."

Felius
2008-01-22, 10:57 AM
How can you not love the BoED? Ravages that horribly kill all Evil people in the city, a spell that traps someone inside a gem for a year to brainwash them...

Yes, everything the epitome of goodness. Oh and don't forget, if you have a vow, it's better let the universe be destroyed than break your vow.

Fighteer
2008-01-22, 02:06 PM
Yes, everything the epitome of goodness. Oh and don't forget, if you have a vow, it's better let the universe be destroyed than break your vow.
The BoED is not solely about being the paragon of virtue. It also discusses the pitfalls of this kind of absolute, black & white morality. For example, under the Vow of Nonviolence and the Vow of Pacifism (if I remember the names correctly), the book is very clear to state that allowing these can easily break the game (or the character) if the DM fails to take them properly into account.

Moreover, a lot of the material in the BoED only makes sense in the context of truly despicable evil - stuff that makes Xykon-esque villains look tame. Otherwise it can be horribly game-breaking to throw in things like Vows and Sacred damage when there's no corresponding threat to justify their presence. Hey, look, I just took a Vow of Chastity. Thank goodness my game world is PG-rated, so I just got a bunch of free bonuses without any real risk of breaking the vow.

Zandolit
2008-01-22, 04:17 PM
I can see the argument for "turning off" Supernatural DR as per the SR argument.
However, for extraordinary it makes no sense at all. You cannot make your skin any thinner or stop your body from healing by the force of will.

I agree with that.

I don't think DR should be able to be turned off if it is due to race/species. It just doesn't make sense to me that it would be. A physical immunity is a physical immunity, and DR is a relative concept.

Baseline for a DR race is having DR, and one could no more turn it off than a human would be able to turn off, say, blood-clotting rather than bleeding to death from a paper cut. Clotting is normal. Dying from a minor abrasion is an aberration. What is a "normal" reaction to injury varies from species to species (as indicated by the DR,) but within each species there would be some level of uniformity about what is lethal and what isn't and what constitutes a major or minor wound, whether it's getting a paper cut or getting stabbed fifty times.

DR shows how an individual is affected in comparison to a human/generic baseline creature, not in comparison to another of its species. It's not that each individual vampire resists damage more than some abstract average, it's that as a race vampires can take more than humans can. An individual vampire who didn't have DR would be a weak vampire, not an average one, even if it then averaged out with a human. A vampire with a DR normal for the species is an average vampire, even if it was much stronger than the average human.

For a species that has DR, that DR is standard and normal. The rule, not an exception. To eliminate DR would be not be a return to average, it would be a deviation from the species norm. One can't simply stop having physical species characteristics at will.

I can think of a number of situations where reducing DR would be handy. (One obvious example: Creature needs/wants to be killed.) I just don't think it makes sense.


For example, say a werewolf or vampire is terrorizing the streets of a town at night. If DR is always active, the PCs could really narrow the field of suspects by cutting everyone slightly and taking everyone who heals instantly (or whose skin is not cut by the same amount of pressure) in for further investagation.

Good in theory, but wildly impractical if you actually tried to do it. What would force anyone who would fail this test to actually take it?

For one thing, I don't think it's likely that a medieval town or village would have an accurate list of every single person who lived there. Without a list to compare with, how would you know you'd tested everyone? Couldn't someone simply lay low till it was all over? Or... heck, claim to be someone else, since what are the chances they have any identification?

Even if you did have a census list that was accurate enough, what about visitors? Plus unless it was up to the exact moment, you also might find yourself spending hours or days searching for someone who had died or was out of town. Or new people might have quietly moved into town since the list was made. And so on.

And even assuming you had a list, and everyone was on it, and the population was exactly the same as when it was made, and there were no visitors or newcomers... what do you do if you can't find someone? Do you search every building, every street, every face trying to locate that person? What if you never find them at all?

After all of that, what if the vampire/werewolf/whatever didn't live in town, but just came there to feed when the powers that be weren't paying attention?

This just doesn't seem like a viable strategy, though it is interesting from a theoretical standpoint.

Collin152
2008-01-22, 05:40 PM
Any paladins in the party would hit fallen status so hard they'd leave a dent in the ground. Any non-evil clerics in the party would probably be in trouble with their gods as well.

Actually, I thought of another way to spot a vampire. Provided you can get close enough to them, have your cleric present their holy symbol and declare that they have been sent by their god to deal with the vampire. A true vampire would flinch or cringe when faced with a holy symbol presented like that.

Hey, if you shove something in my face and shout at me, I think I'd flinch too.

You could just look for the one guy who dresses in a black suit all the time.

Tequila Sunrise
2008-01-22, 10:00 PM
I can see the argument for "turning off" Supernatural DR as per the SR argument.
However, for extraordinary it makes no sense at all. You cannot make your skin any thinner or stop your body from healing by the force of will.

You could perhaps allow your opponent to inflict a critical hit on you, but that is not compatible with putting a needle on the tip of the finger.

Yeah, my argument definately only works for supernatural DR. Extraordinary...not so much! Then again, even if a vamp could turn off its DR would it have flowing blood to bleed? Or would a fine brown dust spill out? :smallconfused:

TS

Collin152
2008-01-22, 10:04 PM
What do you think happens to all that blood they drink?

Demented
2008-01-22, 10:36 PM
...Can't you just look for the fangs?

I'd be more concerned about someone with DR and diabetes.

Collin152
2008-01-22, 10:42 PM
If you can see the fangs, you're already losing constitution points.