beating DR 15/silver [Archive] - Wizards Community

beating DR 15/silver [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Winternova
06-27-04, 01:28 PM One of my players has a weretiger character, carried over from 2nd edition when I was pretty big into the whole lyanthrope thing. Back then, it was as simple as a 6+ HD beast, or a +1 or silver weapon to get under his skin.

In 3rd edition, it seems more difficult to do any damage to him until his enemies get wise to his tricks, and plan for it - or a nice-sized fireball.

I've looked through the Lycanthrope entry, notes on DR, and such topics throughout the SRD, and it looks like Silver is absolutely positively the only way to go. It doesn't matter how many pluses are on a sword, or how many hit dice a given critter has, he's just gonna keep that DR.

Or so it seems to me. Is there something I might have overlooked, and there are other ways to get through this? I mean, aside from the obvious - massive strength modifiers, new character, tons of magic, or equipping every creature with silver weapons for no reason.

Thanks in advance.
hfolkense
06-27-04, 01:36 PM Yup that's it, now Dr works that way.

if it is 6/football balls then NO attack that's not a football ball will ignore the DR.

so 15/silver will always need alchemical silver to bypass it.

Take into account that 15 is the maximum DR number under the courrent rules, and i think you made some kind of mistake giving your character a natural lycanthrope. Afflicted lycanthropes only give them 5/silver.

I think that Natural Lycanthropes are good for BBEG and minions but not for characters, but each DM to their PC's, whatever floats your boat.

But anyway, just vary the themes accordingly to their leves and you should be just fine i hope you have read all the ECL, CR, HD and class level sections, because maybe you are bypassing some kind of balancing new system now... you need to always check those sections when you get a weird character. Hell i think i need to give them another look.
CzarGarrett
06-27-04, 01:39 PM There's some sort of alchemal silver stuff that when added to a weapon acts as silver, so no one has to have a silver sword, they just need the oil to make it a silvered sword.

Also, as DM, you can take the player aside, say "Lycantheropes have become too powerful in 3rd. We need to do something."
Suggestions to the sort:
If bitten, lower DR to 7/silver. Afflicted are weaker than natural born.
Add 'magic' to overcoming DR until level X (something around 20ish) at which point many enemies of the player will know about the lycanthropy or they'll be doing enough damage to begin with.
Let player obtain some sort of moon amulet. It will control the changes, but lessen the positive aspects.

Or something of the like. It's your campaign, and I'd like to think that your player is willing to make some changes if the 2E to 3E switch made him too powerful.
Inigo Carmine
06-27-04, 01:46 PM I don't know where you're getting 15/Silver from.

It's 5/silver for afflicted lycanthropes, and 10/silver for natural ones. Which one is he?

It's still very powerful either way, and I wonder if you are taking this into consideration? He gains the base hitdie of the "animal" (in this case it's 6 HD for a tiger) and a lvl adjustment on top of that. +2 for afflicted, +3 for natural.

This means that compared to everyone else in the party, he will have 8-9 class lvls less.

For instance, if your party is:
Human Rogue 10
Elf Wizard 10
Halfling Druid 5/Barbarian 5

and the were-tiger is supposed to fit in with them, he would only have one or two class lvls. He'd be something like:

Weretiger Fighter 1 (or Fighter 2, depending on whether he's natural or afflicted).
Xyplex
06-27-04, 02:49 PM From the SRD.

LYCANTHROPES AS CHARACTERS
Becoming a lycanthrope does not change a character’s favored class but usually changes alignment (see above). This alignment change may cause characters of certain classes to lose some of their class features.
Lycanthrope characters possess the following racial traits.
— +2 Wisdom. Physical abilities are increased by the animal form’s ability modifiers when a lycanthrope changes to its hybrid or animal forms.
—Size same as the base creature or the base animal form.
—Low-light vision in any form.
—Scent in any form.
—Racial Hit Dice: A lycanthrope adds the Hit Dice of its animal form to its base Hit Dice for race, level, and class. These additional Hit Dice modify the lycanthrope’s base attack bonus and base saving throw bonuses accordingly.
—Racial Skills: A lycanthrope adds skill points for its animal Hit Dice much as if it had multiclassed into the animal type. It gains skill points equal to (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1) per Hit Die of the animal form. Any skills that appear in the animal’s description are treated as class skills for the lycanthrope’s animal levels. The lycanthrope’s maximum skill ranks are equal to its animal form Hit Dice + its racial Hit Dice (if any) + its class levels + 3. Any racial skill adjustments of the lycanthrope’s base race and its animal form (but not conditional adjustments) are added to its skill modifiers in any form.
—Racial Feats: Add the animal’s Hit Dice to the base character’s own Hit Dice to determine how many feats the character has. All lycanthropes gain Iron Will as a bonus feat.
— +2 natural armor bonus in any form.
—Special Qualities (see above): Alternate form, lycanthropic empathy, curse of lycanthropy (in animal or hybrid form only).
—Afflicted lycanthrope: damage reduction 5/silver (in animal or hybrid form only).
—Natural lycanthrope: damage reduction 10/silver (in animal or hybrid form only).
—Automatic Languages: As base creature.
—Favored Class: Same as the base creature.
—Level adjustment: Same as the base creature +2 (afflicted) or +3 (natural).

So it's either a +2 or +3 Level adjustment, with a 5/silver or 10/silver adjustment respectively. Further, as you can see, those damage reductions only kick in if they're in animal or hybrid form. So maybe something that'll come out in combat, but it'll be obvious that the creature is what it appears to be ... at least in my opinion ... and so enemies will be able to react accordingly (which gives me an idea ... there would be a fair number of silvered weapons around, IMO, because how can you tell if that Wolf is a Animal Wolf, a Dire Wolf, a Druid who has Wildshaped into a Wolf, or a Werewolf? Better safe than sorry ... )

WRT Silvered weapons ...

Silver, Alchemical: A complex process involving metallurgy and alchemy can bond silver to a weapon made of steel so that it bypasses the damage reduction of creatures such as lycanthropes.
On a successful attack with a silvered weapon, the wielder takes a –1 penalty on the damage roll (with the usual minimum of 1 point of damage). The alchemical silvering process can’t be applied to nonmetal items, and it doesn’t work on rare metals such as adamantine, cold iron, and mithral.
Alchemical silver has 10 hit points per inch of thickness and hardness 8.
Type of Alchemical Silver Item Item Cost Modifier
Ammunition +2 gp
Light weapon +20 gp
One-handed weapon +90 gp
One head of a double weapon +90 gp
Two-handed weapon +180 gp
Both heads of a double weapon +180 gp

So I'd say that a lot of people would have a silvered dagger, if they have any amount of money, to protect themselves when facing a Lycanthrope. It's not that great of an expense, and while a -1 damage on 1d4 sucks, it's better than not doing any damage.
Winternova
06-27-04, 02:55 PM The character is a natural lycantrope, and to be honest, I don't know where I'm getting 15 from. He's got the +3 level adjustment and everything else is in place.

..And here's where we screwed up. We usually play d20m, where werecreatures have DR 15/silver, and so it says "A werewolf in wolf or hybrid form ignores the first 15 points of damage dealt by a nonsilver or nonmagical weapon but takes full damage from silvered weapons or weapons with a +1 or better magic bonus. There are no lycanthrope characters in my d20m game.

Looks like the problem's solved, thanks.
hfolkense
06-27-04, 03:47 PM That's because they haven't made the revision to the new D20 system that, amongst other changes drops the DR's from like 30 to a maximum of 15, so when there was a 15 in the new system is about 5 or 10. Also now magical weapons don't break through DR as before, but only specific weapons qualities do and nothing more.

you should read the PHB, DMG and MM 3.5 Ed. and compare them to your old systems, also many of the sourcebooks on store right now are old versions of the 3.0 ED. so be careful of the systems used in ther too.

I think they are dropping a new D20M update under the new rules soon, but i am not quite sure.
Surgo
06-27-04, 03:55 PM You can get weapons made out of actual silver (not alchemical silver), and they won't have the -1 penalty on damage rolls. The stats for them are in Magic of Faerun.
Winternova
06-27-04, 03:57 PM Oh, we're full on 3.5 now. Core books only, actually (I'm dead broke.) To alleviate confusion I just ended the 2E part of the campaign with a godlike magical burst that stripped them of their gear, levels, and deposited them on some damn island somewhere. They were tangling with an ancient evil, and I figure it was bound to happen sooner or later.

I'm honestly hoping they revise the D&D SRD to include the same "or a +1 or better weapon" bit that the MSRD has.
hfolkense
06-27-04, 04:04 PM Actually i wouldn't advise you to change the DR part. Now it is much more balanced and adds a lot of more flavor now that you need to know your enemy weaknesses, and investigating them instead of just getting a BIGGER bonus weapon. BEsides that the DR now is not that intimidating and if you give your player that full 15 DR you could have a lot of more troubles.

Leave it like that now, and you'll see it will work much better.
Winternova
06-27-04, 04:26 PM When next we roll, he'll know it's 10, or I'm turning him into a were-virgin.
trapspringer
06-27-04, 06:07 PM DR only applies to physical damage. Fire, (energy) spells, all that good stuff ignore it.
Nick Soapdish
06-27-04, 07:05 PM Does he also have the racial HD?

It makes a big difference - probably too big. His effective level is going to be the +3 LA + racial HD + actual levels since he actually gets something for those racial HD (hit points, some BAB, and a few skills). They're usually (if not always, I'm not sure about dragon racial HD for example) a lot weaker than class levels.
Xyplex
06-27-04, 10:13 PM Magic of Faerun was produced before 3.5 (the page reference in Adamantine to the DMG pg 242 points to the scroll page in the 3.5 DMG) ... I'm not sure how the Special Materials section will be thus affected when they get around to issuing an Eratta.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Winternova 06-27-04, 01:28 PM	One of my players has a weretiger character, carried over from 2nd edition when I was pretty big into the whole lyanthrope thing. Back then, it was as simple as a 6+ HD beast, or a +1 or silver weapon to get under his skin. In 3rd edition, it seems more difficult to do any damage to him until his enemies get wise to his tricks, and plan for it - or a nice-sized fireball. I've looked through the Lycanthrope entry, notes on DR, and such topics throughout the SRD, and it looks like Silver is absolutely positively the only way to go. It doesn't matter how many pluses are on a sword, or how many hit dice a given critter has, he's just gonna keep that DR. Or so it seems to me. Is there something I might have overlooked, and there are other ways to get through this? I mean, aside from the obvious - massive strength modifiers, new character, tons of magic, or equipping every creature with silver weapons for no reason. Thanks in advance.
hfolkense 06-27-04, 01:36 PM	Yup that's it, now Dr works that way. if it is 6/football balls then NO attack that's not a football ball will ignore the DR. so 15/silver will always need alchemical silver to bypass it. Take into account that 15 is the maximum DR number under the courrent rules, and i think you made some kind of mistake giving your character a natural lycanthrope. Afflicted lycanthropes only give them 5/silver. I think that Natural Lycanthropes are good for BBEG and minions but not for characters, but each DM to their PC's, whatever floats your boat. But anyway, just vary the themes accordingly to their leves and you should be just fine i hope you have read all the ECL, CR, HD and class level sections, because maybe you are bypassing some kind of balancing new system now... you need to always check those sections when you get a weird character. Hell i think i need to give them another look.
CzarGarrett 06-27-04, 01:39 PM	There's some sort of alchemal silver stuff that when added to a weapon acts as silver, so no one has to have a silver sword, they just need the oil to make it a silvered sword. Also, as DM, you can take the player aside, say "Lycantheropes have become too powerful in 3rd. We need to do something." Suggestions to the sort: If bitten, lower DR to 7/silver. Afflicted are weaker than natural born. Add 'magic' to overcoming DR until level X (something around 20ish) at which point many enemies of the player will know about the lycanthropy or they'll be doing enough damage to begin with. Let player obtain some sort of moon amulet. It will control the changes, but lessen the positive aspects. Or something of the like. It's your campaign, and I'd like to think that your player is willing to make some changes if the 2E to 3E switch made him too powerful.
Inigo Carmine 06-27-04, 01:46 PM	I don't know where you're getting 15/Silver from. It's 5/silver for afflicted lycanthropes, and 10/silver for natural ones. Which one is he? It's still very powerful either way, and I wonder if you are taking this into consideration? He gains the base hitdie of the "animal" (in this case it's 6 HD for a tiger) and a lvl adjustment on top of that. +2 for afflicted, +3 for natural. This means that compared to everyone else in the party, he will have 8-9 class lvls less. For instance, if your party is: Human Rogue 10 Elf Wizard 10 Halfling Druid 5/Barbarian 5 and the were-tiger is supposed to fit in with them, he would only have one or two class lvls. He'd be something like: Weretiger Fighter 1 (or Fighter 2, depending on whether he's natural or afflicted).
Xyplex 06-27-04, 02:49 PM	From the SRD. LYCANTHROPES AS CHARACTERS Becoming a lycanthrope does not change a character’s favored class but usually changes alignment (see above). This alignment change may cause characters of certain classes to lose some of their class features. Lycanthrope characters possess the following racial traits. — +2 Wisdom. Physical abilities are increased by the animal form’s ability modifiers when a lycanthrope changes to its hybrid or animal forms. —Size same as the base creature or the base animal form. —Low-light vision in any form. —Scent in any form. —Racial Hit Dice: A lycanthrope adds the Hit Dice of its animal form to its base Hit Dice for race, level, and class. These additional Hit Dice modify the lycanthrope’s base attack bonus and base saving throw bonuses accordingly. —Racial Skills: A lycanthrope adds skill points for its animal Hit Dice much as if it had multiclassed into the animal type. It gains skill points equal to (2 + Int modifier, minimum 1) per Hit Die of the animal form. Any skills that appear in the animal’s description are treated as class skills for the lycanthrope’s animal levels. The lycanthrope’s maximum skill ranks are equal to its animal form Hit Dice + its racial Hit Dice (if any) + its class levels + 3. Any racial skill adjustments of the lycanthrope’s base race and its animal form (but not conditional adjustments) are added to its skill modifiers in any form. —Racial Feats: Add the animal’s Hit Dice to the base character’s own Hit Dice to determine how many feats the character has. All lycanthropes gain Iron Will as a bonus feat. — +2 natural armor bonus in any form. —Special Qualities (see above): Alternate form, lycanthropic empathy, curse of lycanthropy (in animal or hybrid form only). —Afflicted lycanthrope: damage reduction 5/silver (in animal or hybrid form only). —Natural lycanthrope: damage reduction 10/silver (in animal or hybrid form only). —Automatic Languages: As base creature. —Favored Class: Same as the base creature. —Level adjustment: Same as the base creature +2 (afflicted) or +3 (natural). So it's either a +2 or +3 Level adjustment, with a 5/silver or 10/silver adjustment respectively. Further, as you can see, those damage reductions only kick in if they're in animal or hybrid form. So maybe something that'll come out in combat, but it'll be obvious that the creature is what it appears to be ... at least in my opinion ... and so enemies will be able to react accordingly (which gives me an idea ... there would be a fair number of silvered weapons around, IMO, because how can you tell if that Wolf is a Animal Wolf, a Dire Wolf, a Druid who has Wildshaped into a Wolf, or a Werewolf? Better safe than sorry ... ) WRT Silvered weapons ... Silver, Alchemical: A complex process involving metallurgy and alchemy can bond silver to a weapon made of steel so that it bypasses the damage reduction of creatures such as lycanthropes. On a successful attack with a silvered weapon, the wielder takes a –1 penalty on the damage roll (with the usual minimum of 1 point of damage). The alchemical silvering process can’t be applied to nonmetal items, and it doesn’t work on rare metals such as adamantine, cold iron, and mithral. Alchemical silver has 10 hit points per inch of thickness and hardness 8. Type of Alchemical Silver Item Item Cost Modifier Ammunition +2 gp Light weapon +20 gp One-handed weapon +90 gp One head of a double weapon +90 gp Two-handed weapon +180 gp Both heads of a double weapon +180 gp So I'd say that a lot of people would have a silvered dagger, if they have any amount of money, to protect themselves when facing a Lycanthrope. It's not that great of an expense, and while a -1 damage on 1d4 sucks, it's better than not doing any damage.
Winternova 06-27-04, 02:55 PM	The character is a natural lycantrope, and to be honest, I don't know where I'm getting 15 from. He's got the +3 level adjustment and everything else is in place. ..And here's where we screwed up. We usually play d20m, where werecreatures have DR 15/silver, and so it says "A werewolf in wolf or hybrid form ignores the first 15 points of damage dealt by a nonsilver or nonmagical weapon but takes full damage from silvered weapons or weapons with a +1 or better magic bonus. There are no lycanthrope characters in my d20m game. Looks like the problem's solved, thanks.
hfolkense 06-27-04, 03:47 PM	That's because they haven't made the revision to the new D20 system that, amongst other changes drops the DR's from like 30 to a maximum of 15, so when there was a 15 in the new system is about 5 or 10. Also now magical weapons don't break through DR as before, but only specific weapons qualities do and nothing more. you should read the PHB, DMG and MM 3.5 Ed. and compare them to your old systems, also many of the sourcebooks on store right now are old versions of the 3.0 ED. so be careful of the systems used in ther too. I think they are dropping a new D20M update under the new rules soon, but i am not quite sure.
Surgo 06-27-04, 03:55 PM	You can get weapons made out of actual silver (not alchemical silver), and they won't have the -1 penalty on damage rolls. The stats for them are in Magic of Faerun.
Winternova 06-27-04, 03:57 PM	Oh, we're full on 3.5 now. Core books only, actually (I'm dead broke.) To alleviate confusion I just ended the 2E part of the campaign with a godlike magical burst that stripped them of their gear, levels, and deposited them on some damn island somewhere. They were tangling with an ancient evil, and I figure it was bound to happen sooner or later. I'm honestly hoping they revise the D&D SRD to include the same "or a +1 or better weapon" bit that the MSRD has.
hfolkense 06-27-04, 04:04 PM	Actually i wouldn't advise you to change the DR part. Now it is much more balanced and adds a lot of more flavor now that you need to know your enemy weaknesses, and investigating them instead of just getting a BIGGER bonus weapon. BEsides that the DR now is not that intimidating and if you give your player that full 15 DR you could have a lot of more troubles. Leave it like that now, and you'll see it will work much better.
Winternova 06-27-04, 04:26 PM	When next we roll, he'll know it's 10, or I'm turning him into a were-virgin.
trapspringer 06-27-04, 06:07 PM	DR only applies to physical damage. Fire, (energy) spells, all that good stuff ignore it.
Nick Soapdish 06-27-04, 07:05 PM	Does he also have the racial HD? It makes a big difference - probably too big. His effective level is going to be the +3 LA + racial HD + actual levels since he actually gets something for those racial HD (hit points, some BAB, and a few skills). They're usually (if not always, I'm not sure about dragon racial HD for example) a lot weaker than class levels.
Xyplex 06-27-04, 10:13 PM	Magic of Faerun was produced before 3.5 (the page reference in Adamantine to the DMG pg 242 points to the scroll page in the 3.5 DMG) ... I'm not sure how the Special Materials section will be thus affected when they get around to issuing an Eratta.