Damage Susceptibility (3.5e Creature Ability)

Author: Havvy (talk) Date Created: June 29th, 2012 Status: First Draft Editing: Clarity edits only please

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Damage Susceptibility

Some creatures are resistant to damage. Others, not so much. Some creatures are weak against certain elements to the point it hurts. Such creatures have Damage Susceptibility.

Damage Susceptibility (DS) is the counterpart to Damage Reduction and Energy Resistance. If a creature with damage susceptibility is damaged by a source that is the same as the susceptibility, the creature takes an extra amount of damage as defined by the susceptibility. If a source of damage is partially mitigated by damage reduction, damage susceptibility is ignored.

The standard way of describing damage susceptibility is DS <Damage>/Source.

The following table includes common sources of damage susceptibility. Note that more specific damage sources could exist.

Type	Sources	Trigger
—	—	All damage. For example, an Ironclad Turtle.
physical	slashing, bludgeoning, piercing	Weapon attacks of the corresponding source.
general	physical, magical	Physical attacks are any non-magical attacks and force effects. Magical attacks are those caused by spells, psionic powers, and other similar effects, except in the cases where they deal a physical type of damage or are a force effect.
alignment	good, evil, chaos, law	From aligned sources of damage, such as holy weapons.
material	wood, steel, crystal, adamantium	If the source is made up of this material, it deals more damage. Steel swords deal damage against those with DS n/steel.
energy	fire, ice, sonic, acid, electricity	As per the magical energy types.

Example: Paper

Standard paper products have DS 5/Slashing, Piercing, or Fire. If a rogue stabbed a book with a dagger and rolled 3 damage, the book would take an extra 5 damage, because it is susceptible to piercing. In a similar vein, if a conjurer cast a fire spell on the book for 12 damage, the book would take 17 damage.

It is possible to be susceptible to multiple sources, or for there to have to be multiple sources to be susceptible. Use 'and' and 'or' as per the damage reduction rules.

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