damage reduction

Devil Dog · Feb 2, 2017

In the last two meetings, my players faced various skeletons that had damage reduction 5 for Slashing. Calling up the character sheet for the monster (i.e. pressing E) showed clearly dr 5/slashing. However, during the battle, the computer was applying the DR to piercing attacks not slashing attacks.

edwardcd · Feb 2, 2017

Hi Devil Dog!

I think there is a misconception on what Damage Reduction is and how it works. Let's first goto the book...

In 3.5 OGL: Damage Reduction (Important parts) http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Damage_Reduction

The entry indicates the amount of damage ignored (usually 5 to 15 points) and the type of weapon that negates the ability.
Some monsters are vulnerable to piercing, bludgeoning, or slashing damage (Ex).
Some monsters are vulnerable to certain materials, such as alchemical silver (Su), adamantine (Ex), or cold-forged iron (Su). Attacks from weapons that are not made of the correct material have their damage reduced, even if the weapon has an enhancement bonus.
Some monsters are vulnerable to magic weapons (Su). Any weapon with at least a +1 magical enhancement bonus on attack and damage rolls overcomes the damage reduction of these monsters. Such creatures’ natural weapons (but not their attacks with weapons) are treated as magic weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. Ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an enhancement bonus of +1 or higher is treated as a magic weapon for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
When a damage reduction entry has a dash (–) after the slash, no weapon negates the damage reduction (Ex).
Click to expand...

In Pathfinder: Damage Reduction (important parts) http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/glossary.html#damage-reduction

The numerical part of a creature's damage reduction (or DR) is the amount of damage the creature ignores from normal attacks. Usually, a certain type of weapon can overcome this reduction (see Overcoming DR). This information is separated from the damage reduction number by a slash. For example, DR 5/magic means that a creature takes 5 less points of damage from all weapons that are not magic. If a dash follows the slash, then the damage reduction is effective against any attack that does not ignore damage reduction.

Whenever damage reduction completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates most special effects that accompany the attack, such as injury poison, a monk's stunning, and injury-based disease. Damage reduction does not negate touch attacks, energy damage dealt along with an attack, or energy drains. Nor does it affect poisons or diseases delivered by inhalation, ingestion, or contact.

Overcoming DR: Damage reduction may be overcome by special materials, magic weapons (any weapon with a +1 or higher enhancement bonus, not counting the enhancement from masterwork quality), certain types of weapons (such as slashing or bludgeoning), and weapons imbued with an alignment.

Ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an enhancement bonus of +1 or higher is treated as a magic weapon for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. Similarly, ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an alignment gains the alignment of that projectile weapon (in addition to any alignment it may already have).

Weapons with an enhancement bonus of +3 or greater can ignore some types of damage reduction, regardless of their actual material or alignment. The following table shows what type of enhancement bonus is needed to overcome some common types of damage reduction.

DR Type Weapon Enhancement Bonus Equivalent
cold iron/silver +3
adamantine* +4
alignment-based +5
* Note that this does not give the ability to ignore hardness, like an actual adamantine weapon does
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Thus if the DR is 5/slashing...
If a hit with an attack of a slashing weapon hit for 10 damage. The creature would take 10 damage, as "slashing" was the requirement to bypass or overcome damage reduction.
If a hit with an attack of a piercing weapon hit for 10 damage. The creature would take 5 damage, as "slashing" was not met to bypass or overcome damage reduction.
In this case D20PRO has performed Damage Reduction correctly according to RAW (Rules as Written).

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damage reduction

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