Brilliant Energy vs Fortification [Archive] - Wizards Community

Brilliant Energy vs Fortification [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Kliqueman
01-02-06, 05:28 PM I haven't seen confirmation on this question, so I was wondering what the general consensus is on the the topic.

Brilliant Energy bypasses the armor & sheild + enhancement bonus of a character's AC, but what if the armor has Hvy Fortification? Does the Fortification still protect the wearer against critical hits?

Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus?
Gnarl
01-02-06, 06:10 PM The underlying idea behind your question make sense, it's even logical (no matter what that means in a world with magic), but that's not what the rules say, you still are immuned to critical hits with a heavy fortification armor, as would your fire resistance apply to a flaming brilliant energy weapon, or your death ward armor against a brilliant energy 9 live stealer.
Oliver D'Argent
01-02-06, 07:59 PM Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus?

I would say that would not be correct - the description for the Brilliant Energy ability specifically states that it ignores nonliving matter, while the Mage Armor spell grants its protection via a field of energy that hinders even incorporeal attacks.

Personally, I think that the Brilliant Energy ability is one of the least useful of all the weapon special abilities since it renders the weapon useless against three categories of targets (undead, constructs and objects) and gives no advantage against targets that get most of their protection from natural armor (such as dragons).

If you were to take an adamantine longsword, enchant it to +5 and give it the abilities Holy and Bane: Dragons, it would do 1d8 + 7 + (Str mod) + 2d6 + 2d6 against evil dragons and 1d8 + 5 + (Str mod) against most golems - for a cost of 131,015 gp.

If you take that same sword and give it the Brilliant Energy ability instead of the Holy ability, it would do 1d8 + 7 + (Str mod) + 2d6 against dragons (with no improvement to your chance to hit) and no damage at all to any golem - for a cost of 203,015 gp.

I'm not saying that anyone would actually do such a thing, I'm just using it as a comparison to make a point - you could just as easily make it a regular masterwork steel weapon and add "- DR" to the damage equation for golems and reduce each of the final costs by 2,700 gp.
CelestialBarbarian
01-02-06, 08:46 PM I haven't seen confirmation on this question, so I was wondering what the general consensus is on the the topic.

Brilliant Energy bypasses the armor & sheild + enhancement bonus of a character's AC, but what if the armor has Hvy Fortification? Does the Fortification still protect the wearer against critical hits?

Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus?

I'd say that if the weapon bypasses the armor, it bypasses the armor's special abilities. That makes sense on its own and it parallels both the text describing brilliant energy as bypassing any enhancement bonuses to the armor, and the way that if damage reduction prevents an attack from doing any hit points of damage it also prevents any special damage that the attack normally inflicts (such as poison or vorpal). As for mage armor I agree with Gnarl that since it uses force rather than matter to provide its armor bonus to AC that brilliant energy does not ignore mage armor (or bracers of armor).
kalmbob
01-02-06, 08:57 PM The underlying idea behind your question make sense, it's even logical (no matter what that means in a world with magic), but that's not what the rules say, you still are immuned to critical hits with a heavy fortification armor, as would your fire resistance apply to a flaming brilliant energy weapon, or your death ward armor against a brilliant energy 9 live stealer.

The crux of this quesiton, is what how do force effects interact with brilliant energy weapons.

Fortification provides a force that protects the vital areas of the fortified person.

There is no statement in Brilliant energy that it ignores or doesn't ignore force effects. However, it does explicitly say it ignores Armor bonuses (including the enhancement bonuses of that armor).

You can say several different things.

A. Brilliant energy does only what it says it does, which means in some cases it ignore force effects (like bracers of armor or mage armor), while other times it doesn't (like fortification). This appears to be what the mechanics specificly say.

B. Brilliant energy weapons do not ignore force, because force is not 'non living matter' it is instead, force.

C. Brilliant energy weapons do ignore force because included in armor bonuses, because they include mage armor and bracers of armor. (as opposed to deflection bonuses, which don't really make sense anyway that they still apply..., how do you deflect an energy weapon?)

I'm also not sure if fire resistant armor effects flaming brilliant weapons. Is the person flame resistant because the armor grants him flame resistance, or is he flame resistant because his armor is flame resistant. Think about it. The weapon ignores the armor, and suddenly the flaming sword is inside of the armor.
Seeker of Undeath
01-02-06, 09:35 PM To date I've only found shy of a handful of creatures that ignore force effects. One of them (the force dragon) is in the epic level handbook. I've yet to find a weapon/enchantment/etc that ignores a force effect.

I'd also have to agree with the idea that brilliant energy weapons "do what they say they do" and no more (no less either). A force effect isn't matter at all. It's exerted effort. Barring some explanation to the contrary, I'd think that a brilliant energy weapon couldn't ignore Mage Armor.
mvincent
01-03-06, 04:21 PM The rules state:
"A brilliant energy weapon ignores nonliving matter. Armor and shield bonuses to AC (including any enhancement bonuses to that armor) do not count against it because the weapon passes through armor. (Dexterity, deflection, dodge, natural armor, and other such bonuses still apply.)"

By RAW, it would ignore armor and shield bonuses provided by force affects. From a pseudo-physics point of view, I wouldn't even find this implausible (at least, not in a world that allows magic force-fields in the first place). From science, it seems that force-fields have enough in common with non-living matter.

As for ignoring fortification, that is a DM call.

Although the description doesn't specifically detail this, I personally would allow brilliant energy to bypass DR from say, adamantine armor (especially since I consider brilliant energy to be underpowered anyway).

Fortification is similar to DR in this way because it doesn't actually make the wearer immune to crits, but negates them before they get to the wearer (for our purposes, this distinction could be crucial).
CelestialBarbarian
01-03-06, 07:59 PM The rules state:
"A brilliant energy weapon ignores nonliving matter. Armor and shield bonuses to AC (including any enhancement bonuses to that armor) do not count against it because the weapon passes through armor. (Dexterity, deflection, dodge, natural armor, and other such bonuses still apply.)"

By RAW, it would ignore armor and shield bonuses provided by force affects. From a pseudo-physics point of view, I wouldn't even find this implausible (at least, not in a world that allows magic force-fields in the first place). From science, it seems that force-fields have enough in common with non-living matter.

Force effects have their own little category with various rules that apply only to them. Force effects are not nonliving matter, so by RAW brilliant energy weapons do not ignore them. You have to read the second sentence in conjunction with the first sentence to get RAW. If you ignore what's written in one sentence by definition you're ignoring rules as written. Since the first sentence clearly states that I]brilliant energy[/I] weapons ignore non-living matter, you have to read the armor and shield bonuses in the next sentence as armor and shield bonuses from non-living matter.
mvincent
01-03-06, 09:12 PM Force effects have their own little category with various rules that apply only to them.I think the point is that we don't really know how force effects interact with brilliant energy

Force effects are not living matter, so by RAW brilliant energy weapons do not ignore them.I believe you meant "Force effects are not nonliving matter". However, from a scientific standpoint, force-fields and non-living matter have much in common. It's not a call we should have to make.

Since the first sentence clearly states that I]brilliant energy[/I] weapons ignore non-living matter, you have to read the armor and shield bonuses in the next sentence as armor and shield bonuses from non-living matter.That is not a truism, especially in D&D rules. In D&D, the first part of a description is often fluff text, followed by game mechanics. The second part does not necessarily modify or rely on the first part. Example, the description for a reflecting shield reads:
"This shield seems like a mirror. Its surface is completely reflective. Once per day, it can be called on to reflect a spell back at its caster exactly like the spell turning spell."
The first part gives an impression that say, a ray spell could be 'reflected' back to it's caster, however a reflecting shield actually has no effect on ray spells. Additionally, if someone somehow made the shield non-reflective, it would not stop it from turning spells.

But let's say we do incorporate the term "ignores non-living matter" fully into it's mechanics (I'm ok with that idea), that means that it can indeed ignore things like DR and elemental resistance from armor, as well as being unable to be sundered by a normal weapons, can attack through walls (or even hundreds of feet of stone), etc.

Cool stuff, but open to some abuse. However, even then we still aren't certain that force effects don't constitute non-living matter in regards to brilliant energy.
CelestialBarbarian
01-03-06, 09:34 PM I think the point is that we don't really know how force effects interact with brilliant energy

I believe you meant "Force effects are not nonliving matter". However, from a scientific standpoint, force-fields and non-living matter have much in common. It's not a call we should have to make.

That is not a truism, especially in D&D rules. In D&D, the first part of a description is often fluff text, followed by game mechanics. The second part does not necessarily modify or rely on the first part. Example, the description for a reflecting shield reads:
"This shield seems like a mirror. Its surface is completely reflective. Once per day, it can be called on to reflect a spell back at its caster exactly like the spell turning spell."
The first part gives an impression that say, a ray spell could be 'reflected' back to it's caster, however a reflecting shield actually has no effect on ray spells. Additionally, if someone somehow made the shield non-reflective, it would not stop it from turning spells.

But let's say we do incorporate the term "ignores non-living matter" fully into it's mechanics (I'm ok with that idea), that means that it can indeed ignore things like DR and elemental resistance from armor, as well as being unable to be sundered by a normal weapons, can attack through walls (or even hundreds of feet of stone), etc.

Cool stuff, but open to some abuse. However, even then we still aren't certain that force effects don't constitute non-living matter in regards to brilliant energy.

All well argued, and thanks for the proof-read. I'm not too worried about attacking through walls, especially through hundreds of feet of stone--I haven't seen too many weapons with a blade or head that's hundreds of feet long :D--but you're right that we shouldn't have to infer the interaction between a brilliant energy weapon and force effects. This sounds like a good question for the Sage.
Kliqueman
01-03-06, 09:43 PM The reason I posed this question, is that coming in a couple months our group will be making 15th level characters of each of the core classes and upto one prestige class with the core books and the complete books available to them for an arena battle to pit bards vs bards, clerics vs clerics ect..

Brilliant Energy and Fortification would be very valuable magic item enhancements due to everyone being very living characters.

What we've decided is to go with BE bypasses ALL armor & sheild + enhancement bonuses but not the magical special abilities of the armor like fire protection or fortification.

I would love to see what sage would say on this.
CelestialBarbarian
01-03-06, 10:19 PM The reason I posed this question, is that coming in a couple months our group will be making 15th level characters of each of the core classes and upto one prestige class with the core books and the complete books available to them for an arena battle to pit bards vs bards, clerics vs clerics ect..

Brilliant Energy and Fortification would be very valuable magic item enhancements due to everyone being very living characters.

What we've decided is to go with BE bypasses ALL armor & sheild + enhancement bonuses but not the magical special abilities of the armor like fire protection or fortification.

I would love to see what sage would say on this.

I've just written to the sage to see if he will answer this question. So far he has never chosen to publish one of the questions I've asked, and it might help to get it in Dragon if more than one person writes. Here's what I wrote:

Dear Sage,

The text under the brilliant energy special ability says both that it ignores nonliving matter and that it ignores armor and shield bonuses to AC. Does brilliant energy ignore force effects--which are not matter--that grant armor or shield bonuses to AC, such as mage armor?

When a brilliant energy weapon ignores armor or a shield for purposes of armor class bonuses, does it also ignore the special abilities of the armor or shield, such as fortification or energy resistance?

Thanks!
mvincent
01-04-06, 01:56 AM I haven't seen too many weapons with a blade or head that's hundreds of feet longI was actually thinking of brilliant energy arrows, but I wasn't so much concerned as I was thinking it was actually an interesting idea (and a reasonable interpretation of it's description).

Your viewpoint (which could very well be right) actually got me thinking about things in a different light. From a roleplaying perspective, brilliant energy arrows and such could have original, unthought of uses... and that could be fun to an extent.

The listed brilliant energy mechanics may not be absolute, and it may well not ignore certain armors and shields. For example: living armors or shields (like a swarm shield from A&EG) should still be valid defenses for brilliant energy weapons.

Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know.
Kliqueman
01-04-06, 02:06 AM Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know.

I'd be amused to see their viewpoints on warforged. BE doesn't affect constructs, but it does affect living things. I'd also be amused to see their viewpoint on living spells, if on the silly side, a living mage armor spell.
CelestialBarbarian
01-04-06, 04:11 AM I was actually thinking of brilliant energy arrows, but I wasn't so much concerned as I was thinking it was actually an interesting idea (and a reasonable interpretation of it's description).

Your viewpoint (which could very well be right) actually got me thinking about things in a different light. From a roleplaying perspective, brilliant energy arrows and such could have original, unthought of uses... and that could be fun to an extent.

The listed brilliant energy mechanics may not be absolute, and it may well not ignore certain armors and shields. For example: living armors or shields (like a swarm shield from A&EG) should still be valid defenses for brilliant energy weapons.

Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know.

I see what you're saying. If you take the nonliving matter sentence as part of the mechanic rather than just window dressing, you might be able to shoot a brilliant energy arrow through a wall. (Of course there's still the problem of aiming at a target that you can't see through a wall.) It would make sense to rule, on the flip side, that only the arrowhead penetrates nonliving matter, so that the arrow would stop when the wooden shaft hit the wall.
Gnarl
01-04-06, 07:37 AM The crux of this quesiton, is what how do force effects interact with brilliant energy weapons.

I see it differently. The rules are pretty clear. Brilliant Energy weapons ignore armor and shield bonuses to armor class and don't do damage to items, undeads and constructs. That's all it does.

That's what I like the most about 3.5 rules. There is little room for 'logical' explanations. There is the flavore text and there is the rules text. The flavore text is there just to have something a bit more interresting and colorful than 'weapon of ignore shield and armor bonuses to armor class'.

Of course as the DM, you're the final judge of what a special ability does or not. If it makes sense in your games that Fortification is a force effect that doesn't interact with brilliant energy weapons, well that's just the way the brilliant energy weapon works.
CelestialBarbarian
01-04-06, 04:01 PM I see it differently. The rules are pretty clear. Brilliant Energy weapons ignore armor and shield bonuses to armor class and don't do damage to items, undeads and constructs. That's all it does.

That's what I like the most about 3.5 rules. There is little room for 'logical' explanations. There is the flavore text and there is the rules text. The flavore text is there just to have something a bit more interresting and colorful than 'weapon of ignore shield and armor bonuses to armor class'.

Of course as the DM, you're the final judge of what a special ability does or not. If it makes sense in your games that Fortification is a force effect that doesn't interact with brilliant energy weapons, well that's just the way the brilliant energy weapon works.

If the rules were really clear we wouldn't be having this debate. It's not clear at all how you decided that the part about nonliving matter should be regarded as flavor and not part of the mechanics of the special ability.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Kliqueman 01-02-06, 05:28 PM	I haven't seen confirmation on this question, so I was wondering what the general consensus is on the the topic. Brilliant Energy bypasses the armor & sheild + enhancement bonus of a character's AC, but what if the armor has Hvy Fortification? Does the Fortification still protect the wearer against critical hits? Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus?
Gnarl 01-02-06, 06:10 PM	The underlying idea behind your question make sense, it's even logical (no matter what that means in a world with magic), but that's not what the rules say, you still are immuned to critical hits with a heavy fortification armor, as would your fire resistance apply to a flaming brilliant energy weapon, or your death ward armor against a brilliant energy 9 live stealer.
Oliver D'Argent 01-02-06, 07:59 PM	Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus? I would say that would not be correct - the description for the Brilliant Energy ability specifically states that it ignores nonliving matter, while the Mage Armor spell grants its protection via a field of energy that hinders even incorporeal attacks. Personally, I think that the Brilliant Energy ability is one of the least useful of all the weapon special abilities since it renders the weapon useless against three categories of targets (undead, constructs and objects) and gives no advantage against targets that get most of their protection from natural armor (such as dragons). If you were to take an adamantine longsword, enchant it to +5 and give it the abilities Holy and Bane: Dragons, it would do 1d8 + 7 + (Str mod) + 2d6 + 2d6 against evil dragons and 1d8 + 5 + (Str mod) against most golems - for a cost of 131,015 gp. If you take that same sword and give it the Brilliant Energy ability instead of the Holy ability, it would do 1d8 + 7 + (Str mod) + 2d6 against dragons (with no improvement to your chance to hit) and no damage at all to any golem - for a cost of 203,015 gp. I'm not saying that anyone would actually do such a thing, I'm just using it as a comparison to make a point - you could just as easily make it a regular masterwork steel weapon and add "- DR" to the damage equation for golems and reduce each of the final costs by 2,700 gp.
CelestialBarbarian 01-02-06, 08:46 PM	I haven't seen confirmation on this question, so I was wondering what the general consensus is on the the topic. Brilliant Energy bypasses the armor & sheild + enhancement bonus of a character's AC, but what if the armor has Hvy Fortification? Does the Fortification still protect the wearer against critical hits? Also along the subject, I'm assuming it bypasses mage armor, being that its an armor bonus? I'd say that if the weapon bypasses the armor, it bypasses the armor's special abilities. That makes sense on its own and it parallels both the text describing brilliant energy as bypassing any enhancement bonuses to the armor, and the way that if damage reduction prevents an attack from doing any hit points of damage it also prevents any special damage that the attack normally inflicts (such as poison or vorpal). As for mage armor I agree with Gnarl that since it uses force rather than matter to provide its armor bonus to AC that brilliant energy does not ignore mage armor (or bracers of armor).
kalmbob 01-02-06, 08:57 PM	The underlying idea behind your question make sense, it's even logical (no matter what that means in a world with magic), but that's not what the rules say, you still are immuned to critical hits with a heavy fortification armor, as would your fire resistance apply to a flaming brilliant energy weapon, or your death ward armor against a brilliant energy 9 live stealer. The crux of this quesiton, is what how do force effects interact with brilliant energy weapons. Fortification provides a force that protects the vital areas of the fortified person. There is no statement in Brilliant energy that it ignores or doesn't ignore force effects. However, it does explicitly say it ignores Armor bonuses (including the enhancement bonuses of that armor). You can say several different things. A. Brilliant energy does only what it says it does, which means in some cases it ignore force effects (like bracers of armor or mage armor), while other times it doesn't (like fortification). This appears to be what the mechanics specificly say. B. Brilliant energy weapons do not ignore force, because force is not 'non living matter' it is instead, force. C. Brilliant energy weapons do ignore force because included in armor bonuses, because they include mage armor and bracers of armor. (as opposed to deflection bonuses, which don't really make sense anyway that they still apply..., how do you deflect an energy weapon?) I'm also not sure if fire resistant armor effects flaming brilliant weapons. Is the person flame resistant because the armor grants him flame resistance, or is he flame resistant because his armor is flame resistant. Think about it. The weapon ignores the armor, and suddenly the flaming sword is inside of the armor.
Seeker of Undeath 01-02-06, 09:35 PM	To date I've only found shy of a handful of creatures that ignore force effects. One of them (the force dragon) is in the epic level handbook. I've yet to find a weapon/enchantment/etc that ignores a force effect. I'd also have to agree with the idea that brilliant energy weapons "do what they say they do" and no more (no less either). A force effect isn't matter at all. It's exerted effort. Barring some explanation to the contrary, I'd think that a brilliant energy weapon couldn't ignore Mage Armor.
mvincent 01-03-06, 04:21 PM	The rules state: "A brilliant energy weapon ignores nonliving matter. Armor and shield bonuses to AC (including any enhancement bonuses to that armor) do not count against it because the weapon passes through armor. (Dexterity, deflection, dodge, natural armor, and other such bonuses still apply.)" By RAW, it would ignore armor and shield bonuses provided by force affects. From a pseudo-physics point of view, I wouldn't even find this implausible (at least, not in a world that allows magic force-fields in the first place). From science, it seems that force-fields have enough in common with non-living matter. As for ignoring fortification, that is a DM call. Although the description doesn't specifically detail this, I personally would allow brilliant energy to bypass DR from say, adamantine armor (especially since I consider brilliant energy to be underpowered anyway). Fortification is similar to DR in this way because it doesn't actually make the wearer immune to crits, but negates them before they get to the wearer (for our purposes, this distinction could be crucial).
CelestialBarbarian 01-03-06, 07:59 PM	The rules state: "A brilliant energy weapon ignores nonliving matter. Armor and shield bonuses to AC (including any enhancement bonuses to that armor) do not count against it because the weapon passes through armor. (Dexterity, deflection, dodge, natural armor, and other such bonuses still apply.)" By RAW, it would ignore armor and shield bonuses provided by force affects. From a pseudo-physics point of view, I wouldn't even find this implausible (at least, not in a world that allows magic force-fields in the first place). From science, it seems that force-fields have enough in common with non-living matter. Force effects have their own little category with various rules that apply only to them. Force effects are not nonliving matter, so by RAW brilliant energy weapons do not ignore them. You have to read the second sentence in conjunction with the first sentence to get RAW. If you ignore what's written in one sentence by definition you're ignoring rules as written. Since the first sentence clearly states that I]brilliant energy[/I] weapons ignore non-living matter, you have to read the armor and shield bonuses in the next sentence as armor and shield bonuses from non-living matter.
mvincent 01-03-06, 09:12 PM	Force effects have their own little category with various rules that apply only to them.I think the point is that we don't really know how force effects interact with brilliant energy Force effects are not living matter, so by RAW brilliant energy weapons do not ignore them.I believe you meant "Force effects are not nonliving matter". However, from a scientific standpoint, force-fields and non-living matter have much in common. It's not a call we should have to make. Since the first sentence clearly states that I]brilliant energy[/I] weapons ignore non-living matter, you have to read the armor and shield bonuses in the next sentence as armor and shield bonuses from non-living matter.That is not a truism, especially in D&D rules. In D&D, the first part of a description is often fluff text, followed by game mechanics. The second part does not necessarily modify or rely on the first part. Example, the description for a reflecting shield reads: "This shield seems like a mirror. Its surface is completely reflective. Once per day, it can be called on to reflect a spell back at its caster exactly like the spell turning spell." The first part gives an impression that say, a ray spell could be 'reflected' back to it's caster, however a reflecting shield actually has no effect on ray spells. Additionally, if someone somehow made the shield non-reflective, it would not stop it from turning spells. But let's say we do incorporate the term "ignores non-living matter" fully into it's mechanics (I'm ok with that idea), that means that it can indeed ignore things like DR and elemental resistance from armor, as well as being unable to be sundered by a normal weapons, can attack through walls (or even hundreds of feet of stone), etc. Cool stuff, but open to some abuse. However, even then we still aren't certain that force effects don't constitute non-living matter in regards to brilliant energy.
CelestialBarbarian 01-03-06, 09:34 PM	I think the point is that we don't really know how force effects interact with brilliant energy I believe you meant "Force effects are not nonliving matter". However, from a scientific standpoint, force-fields and non-living matter have much in common. It's not a call we should have to make. That is not a truism, especially in D&D rules. In D&D, the first part of a description is often fluff text, followed by game mechanics. The second part does not necessarily modify or rely on the first part. Example, the description for a reflecting shield reads: "This shield seems like a mirror. Its surface is completely reflective. Once per day, it can be called on to reflect a spell back at its caster exactly like the spell turning spell." The first part gives an impression that say, a ray spell could be 'reflected' back to it's caster, however a reflecting shield actually has no effect on ray spells. Additionally, if someone somehow made the shield non-reflective, it would not stop it from turning spells. But let's say we do incorporate the term "ignores non-living matter" fully into it's mechanics (I'm ok with that idea), that means that it can indeed ignore things like DR and elemental resistance from armor, as well as being unable to be sundered by a normal weapons, can attack through walls (or even hundreds of feet of stone), etc. Cool stuff, but open to some abuse. However, even then we still aren't certain that force effects don't constitute non-living matter in regards to brilliant energy. All well argued, and thanks for the proof-read. I'm not too worried about attacking through walls, especially through hundreds of feet of stone--I haven't seen too many weapons with a blade or head that's hundreds of feet long :D--but you're right that we shouldn't have to infer the interaction between a brilliant energy weapon and force effects. This sounds like a good question for the Sage.
Kliqueman 01-03-06, 09:43 PM	The reason I posed this question, is that coming in a couple months our group will be making 15th level characters of each of the core classes and upto one prestige class with the core books and the complete books available to them for an arena battle to pit bards vs bards, clerics vs clerics ect.. Brilliant Energy and Fortification would be very valuable magic item enhancements due to everyone being very living characters. What we've decided is to go with BE bypasses ALL armor & sheild + enhancement bonuses but not the magical special abilities of the armor like fire protection or fortification. I would love to see what sage would say on this.
CelestialBarbarian 01-03-06, 10:19 PM	The reason I posed this question, is that coming in a couple months our group will be making 15th level characters of each of the core classes and upto one prestige class with the core books and the complete books available to them for an arena battle to pit bards vs bards, clerics vs clerics ect.. Brilliant Energy and Fortification would be very valuable magic item enhancements due to everyone being very living characters. What we've decided is to go with BE bypasses ALL armor & sheild + enhancement bonuses but not the magical special abilities of the armor like fire protection or fortification. I would love to see what sage would say on this. I've just written to the sage to see if he will answer this question. So far he has never chosen to publish one of the questions I've asked, and it might help to get it in Dragon if more than one person writes. Here's what I wrote: Dear Sage, The text under the brilliant energy special ability says both that it ignores nonliving matter and that it ignores armor and shield bonuses to AC. Does brilliant energy ignore force effects--which are not matter--that grant armor or shield bonuses to AC, such as mage armor? When a brilliant energy weapon ignores armor or a shield for purposes of armor class bonuses, does it also ignore the special abilities of the armor or shield, such as fortification or energy resistance? Thanks!
mvincent 01-04-06, 01:56 AM	I haven't seen too many weapons with a blade or head that's hundreds of feet longI was actually thinking of brilliant energy arrows, but I wasn't so much concerned as I was thinking it was actually an interesting idea (and a reasonable interpretation of it's description). Your viewpoint (which could very well be right) actually got me thinking about things in a different light. From a roleplaying perspective, brilliant energy arrows and such could have original, unthought of uses... and that could be fun to an extent. The listed brilliant energy mechanics may not be absolute, and it may well not ignore certain armors and shields. For example: living armors or shields (like a swarm shield from A&EG) should still be valid defenses for brilliant energy weapons. Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know.
Kliqueman 01-04-06, 02:06 AM	Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know. I'd be amused to see their viewpoints on warforged. BE doesn't affect constructs, but it does affect living things. I'd also be amused to see their viewpoint on living spells, if on the silly side, a living mage armor spell.
CelestialBarbarian 01-04-06, 04:11 AM	I was actually thinking of brilliant energy arrows, but I wasn't so much concerned as I was thinking it was actually an interesting idea (and a reasonable interpretation of it's description). Your viewpoint (which could very well be right) actually got me thinking about things in a different light. From a roleplaying perspective, brilliant energy arrows and such could have original, unthought of uses... and that could be fun to an extent. The listed brilliant energy mechanics may not be absolute, and it may well not ignore certain armors and shields. For example: living armors or shields (like a swarm shield from A&EG) should still be valid defenses for brilliant energy weapons. Off-hand, my guess would be that WotC (if pressed) would rule to have brilliant energy ignore basically all armor and shields (including force effects, but not including rare living materials), but you never know. I see what you're saying. If you take the nonliving matter sentence as part of the mechanic rather than just window dressing, you might be able to shoot a brilliant energy arrow through a wall. (Of course there's still the problem of aiming at a target that you can't see through a wall.) It would make sense to rule, on the flip side, that only the arrowhead penetrates nonliving matter, so that the arrow would stop when the wooden shaft hit the wall.
Gnarl 01-04-06, 07:37 AM	The crux of this quesiton, is what how do force effects interact with brilliant energy weapons. I see it differently. The rules are pretty clear. Brilliant Energy weapons ignore armor and shield bonuses to armor class and don't do damage to items, undeads and constructs. That's all it does. That's what I like the most about 3.5 rules. There is little room for 'logical' explanations. There is the flavore text and there is the rules text. The flavore text is there just to have something a bit more interresting and colorful than 'weapon of ignore shield and armor bonuses to armor class'. Of course as the DM, you're the final judge of what a special ability does or not. If it makes sense in your games that Fortification is a force effect that doesn't interact with brilliant energy weapons, well that's just the way the brilliant energy weapon works.
CelestialBarbarian 01-04-06, 04:01 PM	I see it differently. The rules are pretty clear. Brilliant Energy weapons ignore armor and shield bonuses to armor class and don't do damage to items, undeads and constructs. That's all it does. That's what I like the most about 3.5 rules. There is little room for 'logical' explanations. There is the flavore text and there is the rules text. The flavore text is there just to have something a bit more interresting and colorful than 'weapon of ignore shield and armor bonuses to armor class'. Of course as the DM, you're the final judge of what a special ability does or not. If it makes sense in your games that Fortification is a force effect that doesn't interact with brilliant energy weapons, well that's just the way the brilliant energy weapon works. If the rules were really clear we wouldn't be having this debate. It's not clear at all how you decided that the part about nonliving matter should be regarded as flavor and not part of the mechanics of the special ability.