This literally happened in real life tonight and I can't

>>49759929
The way it sounds you didn't let them do any damage with anything other than blunt weapons.

In which case your a fucking dickhead. If you rules lawyer so much that six people in starting gear can't kill three fucking skeletons because 'muh damage resistance' then you pribably shouldn't DM.

But as everyone knows, your story is fake and all your doing is trying to grab attention.

Congrats. You got me.

>>49759929
> dropped more hints about damage resistances?

Well, you mentioned PF so I assume that's what you're playing. In that case, yeah, you should have. The Knowledges in PF exist almost exclusively to give character knowledge about creatures. If they just made their characters, they probably didn't know enough about the game to invest well in Knowledge, so there was nothing they could do except trial and error, which is kind of bullshit.

> Am I an asshole for killing them off?

You're an asshole for laughing at them. The dice should fall where they do.

>>49759929
>This literally happened in real life tonight

Shit that never happened.

>they wake up 3 skeletons armed with long swords, axes and shields
>three meager skeletons that I thought nothing of including almost manage to TPK
>Am I an asshole for killing them off?

Nah.

>Should I have just let them have the fight or dropped more hints about damage resistances?

What's the knowledge check for knowing that skellies are hurt by blunt weapons and resist other types? Is it something so obvious in-setting that it would pass for common knowledge that everyone knows?


On a 'realism' point, axes at least would be great for smashing skellies.

>>49759997
>What's the knowledge check for knowing that skellies are hurt by blunt weapons and resist other types?
At the very least, it's a DC "don't bother rolling" Perception check to notice that your piercing and slashing weapons are passing through the spaces between their bones, and MAYBE a DC 10 Intelligence check (if I want to be a dick about it) or automatic success to think "Hmm, maybe something blunt would work better?"

This isn't exactly rocket science here, all it takes is a basic level of situational awareness.

>>49760190

So, DM at fault for not rolling passive perception, and players at fault for fighting a losing battle without trying anything other than basic attack with the currently equipped weapon.

>>49759929
>The fighter HAD a hammer that he didn't bother using the entire fight.

Glad to see he knows how to not metagame. There's hope for our hobby yet.

Starting at level 1? Do people really still do that?

>>49760229
>So, DM at fault for not rolling passive perception
More for lack of a basic description. My point was that there doesn't need to be any Perception at all for you to notice that your weapons are passing through an opponent's bones, that's just something that your GM should tell you. I was trying to say that sarcastically, that may have muddled my point a bit.

If the GM wasn't telling them what was going on ("Your attack doesn't do shit, hur hur hur."), at level 1 they don't really have many other options, it's not like they can assume they need a magic weapon like some enemies might need... hell, if they don't even know about skeletons and bludgeoning damage yet, they might not have even thought to try magic weapons anyway.

Players can only act based on the information they have. If the GM isn't explaining to them what's happening right in front of their eyes, it's entirely the GM's fault if they can't figure out what's up.

>>49760245
>Glad to see he knows how to not metagame.
That's not metagaming, it's basic observation. "My weapon is passing through the gaps in this thing's bones. Maybe I should use a weapon that wouldn't pass through the gaps in this thing's bones?" The problem is that (I assume from the story and tone) the GM wasn't giving the players the descriptive cues they needed to figure out what was up.

>>49760309
Anon I'm fairly sure that was a joke.

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OP, you're a cunt. Plain and simple.
Let's assume you have a reasonably balanced party, at least as far as class diversity is concerned. So there's probably a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Wizard, which means that they have several relevant Knowledge skills. Arcana, History, Nature, Local can all be used to identify monsters and their abilities. PF, under the Knowledge skill rules, says that "Identify a monster's abilities and weaknesses" uses "varies" as the relevant skill, and has a DC equal to 10+CR. Skeletons have a 1/3 CR, so rounding down, you get a DC 10.

At any point you, as the GM, seeing something going terribly wrong, should point out that the PCs can attempt any relevant Knowledge check and give them that information. They only need to roll a 6+ to hit the target number.

You are a dick. Not only for not using these rules as written, but for laughing about it afterwards.

>>49760275
I just started running a game at level 1. Some of the players are comparatively new, and it's a lot easier to start at 1, in my experience.

I'm just using level 1 and 2 as a tutorial, they're going to roar through those levels way faster than the game intends.

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>>49759929
>DR 5 / bludgeoning
>AC 16
>init +6
>better weapons than their statblock suggests (1d8+2 instead of 1d4+2 or 1d6)
>undead immunities to some good low-level spells

>lol why aren't my level 1s curbstomping this fight

You should be dropping more hints about damage resistance. And give a know(religion) check, if not just handing it to them because this is some really basic shit.

>>49761753

Psh, that's why sometimes it's just nice to have a powergamer as long as he doesn't get a big ego about it. A guy that can carry fights is more useful than harmful, even if he steals the spotlight in combat.

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>>49762003
OR, you. Could be a competent DM and help your party out with hints.
It's okay to let them die, but a fresh party all dead from three skellies while you laugh at them? Fuck off mate.

>>49759929

Skeletons have four HP. Fucking *four*. A 1st-level Fighter wielding a longsword with a STR of at least 16 (very common) deals an average of 7.5 damage per attack. DR or not, he should be dropping a skeleton in two hits. Skeletons have very good AC even before you gave them a shield, so it might reasonably take one Fighter up to 3 rounds (BAB +1, +3 STR, +4 MAB against AC 18, hits on 14 or higher, odds of hit are 35%) to land one blow and about 6 rounds to land the second and kill a skeleton.

Now, you armed these skeletons with weapons that do not appear in their MM entry and which are not simple weapons. Undead are only proficient with simple weapons and the weapons in their entry. This means your skeletons are at a -4 to-hit (total MAB -2, and they can hardly claw anything while wielding a shield so they're down to just one attack) and dealing an average of 6.5 damage per hit. A starting Fighter's AC is reasonably going to be in the neighborhood of 16. So a skeleton hits the Fighter about as often as the Fighter hits the skeleton (way too fucking rarely). Fighter likely has about 12 HP if his CON is any good, so skeleton needs two blows to bring him down. This means each of your skeletons, which were outnumbered 2:1, is the match of one level 1 Fighter in a fight. Paladins and Rangers work out much the same. Barbarians have lower AC, but their attack is just as good and they deal two points more damage with a greataxe - enough to drop a skeleton in one hit on an average roll even hacking through DR.

Casters? Unless for some reason they stocked up on nothing but mind-affecting or sleep-inducing spells, casters operate at full potency against skeletons, and they are plenty potent if they're willing to drop all their spells on a problem, because energy damage of any source as well as any kind of damage dealt by spells all ignore DR outright.

How the fuck did your party lose? Are they all Rogues?

>>49762151

I give my players plenty of hits, but sometimes nothing can fix shittily made characters played by people that didn't read the rulebook past the table of contents. These guys will only improve upon proving to them that difficulty exists, and even then they may never reach proficiency. I can only see people playing monks and speccing full dex in PF so many times before sadism sets in. If you never get that sadistic twinge then you've either got some real nice player stock or deserve a medal for patience and understanding of incompetence. Plus i'm not the OP that posted the fake ass story.

>>49762369
>How the fuck did your party lose?
I'm going to bet $50 on the DM being a dick.

>>49762644
An appropriate first encounter for a level one party should be resolvable even if all the warrior does it hit things and all the wizard does it throw fireworks.

My first encounter was three rogues and a cleric vs three groups of four zombies each back in 4th ed.
We were all pushing deaths door by the end but even then, with just hitting things with our knives, sling stones and the occasional heal spell we made it through.

The only way four Skelies TPKed the party is with simple DM fuckery.

>>49763055
>four Skelies
sorry, three.
Even worse. The DM was a cunt, pure and simple.

>>49759979
>But as everyone knows, your story is fake and all your doing is trying to grab attention.
I can believe its real. Something similar happened to me years back as a player. None of us were equipped for blunt damage and we were level 1 against six skelly-men.

>>49763092
Jesus christ how are people so autistic

Find a nearby tree

Pry off a branch

Ta-da you have a club, or at least an improvised weapon that does blunt damage

AN IMPROVISED WEAPON IS BETTER THAN NOTHING

This story is exactly why Undead are terrible first level encounters, I mean yeah your a dick for not going 'hey make a knowledge religion or arcana' but even then a dr 5 monster is gonna shrug off anything but magic and maybe a dedicated melee hitter, everyone else can just sit and spin.

>>49763206
We were in the middle of a burning field of wheat with a farm house full of wounded civilians nearby that would have been slaughtered if we'd run away.

There were no trees around.

>>49763206
considering the DM didn't even give them a hint to make a knowledge check do you really think he'd put a fucking tree nearby to make a club out of, this dm just wanted to murder and party and feverishly jerk off about it.

>>49763225
Figure out a way to use your sword as a blunt weapon, turn if on its side and use the broad side to beat them.

Wielding a stabby weapon like a spear? See if you can use the wooden haft to smack them around

Is your entire party literally using rapiers and daggers? You deserve to die for being dex fags and having literally no backup plan

FOR FUCKS SAKE A CLUB IS LITERALLY FREE WHY DO YOU NOT ALL HAVE CLUBS JUST IN CASE

YOU CAN SPEND LITERALLY ZERO GOLD COINS AND BUY AS MANY CLUBS AS YOU WANT.

ITS A PARTICULARLY LUMPY STICK

>>49759929
Skeletons in the boom add nothing to hit and nothing to damage. Even if each person only dealt one damage each round due to DR, the 6 person party should have won in a few rounds. Clearly you didn't play this right.

>>49763233
I AM LESS REFERRING TO OP WHO IS CLEARLY A SHIT DM WHO DIDN'T GIVE INFO AND MORE TO PLAYERS WHO CANNOT PLAN TO BRING A BLUNT WEAPON INTO SITUATIONS

I will literally never have a martial type character leave their house without a stab/slash/blunt, and later on they best be packing a silver and cold iron weapon, cause at early levels before you boost your swords + high enough to just ignore all this shit getting through DR is super important.

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>>49763250

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>lmao your weapon passes through gaps in skelly bones

wait

are there people who actually do/believe that?

>>49761753
Stat block says their weapons are broken, the damage is accurate. It's +0 to hit and 1d6+0 damage. They may have DR5 but they have 4 fucking health. This encounter should last two rounds before the skeletons die.

>>49763281
My DM did.

>>49763250
I actually did try arguing that with the DM since I'm a HEMA-fag, but he wouldn't allow it since it was outside his understanding of the RAW.

This was a 4th ed game, just so you know.

>>49763312
Shit DMs are cancer upon us all

player creativity that is sensible should be rewarded

>>49763312
wow, D&D DOES make people retarded.

>>49763312
thats still no excuse for not BRINGING A CLUB

>>49759929
>3 skeletons
>Against 6 lvl players
>1 survives

Dude, that just does not happen.
You did a fucked up job of dropping hints or granting them knowledge checks, you fucked up by not even in the first place giving them subtle hints of what they were gonna face, you fucked up by allowing almost a TPK at level 1 (do you realize how fucked up that is) and worst of all, you fucked up by laughing at your players.

TRPGs are about having fun, not bending your players over a barrel and laughing at them.

But yeah, fake and gay.

>>49759929
This sounds stupid and fake, but nonetheless:
Before considering whether you've been a bitch of a DM for killing them off in a fight they weren't prepared for, you've surely been a bitch of a DM by pitching them against enemies they're not prepared for. I mean, maybe you gave them enough hints for them to figure out that they shouldn't have done what they did to awake the skeletons, but the way you describe it it sounds like you've gone 'Suddendly skeletons' and laughed as they fell.

So who's rules illiterate, players who don't always bring blunt weapons with them or DMs who pitch newly created characters against enemies they can't harm? (Hint: it's a rhetorical question and you're a moron).

Also, when you handle monsters with damage resistances you should make them quite clear with your descriptions. "You slash at the skeleton with your sword and hit it, but it seems to produce no effect as the blade finds no flesh to sever or blood to spill", shit like this.
So it's your fault for pitching them against the wrong encounter, your fault for not letting them understand they had no chance, your fault for not fudging them a way out, and you fault for laughing at them like a retarded child. You're a bitch.

>>49759979
>The way it sounds you didn't let them do any damage with anything other than blunt weapons.
That's how skeletons work.

>>49763640
It's never been that way, a properly statted party should be dropping them anyway unless they have shit luck.

>>49763640
No, as >>49761753 pointed out, they only have DR 5 against non-bludgeoning stuff.

Unless your players were all rolling like shit, they should have easily killed off the skeletons. Even two rounds of everyone dealing just 1 point should kill them off.

Were all of them Wizards with Daggers and illusion spells or something? Did nobody roll a cleric with a mace? Did nobody have a Strength score higher than 12?

I just don't know how you could have 6 players and the inability to do more than 5 damage in a single hit.

>>49763640
>confirmed for never having played any RPG ever
>confirmed for being one of those DMs that won't let spears = quarterstaves or swords = light maces when using the flat of the blade/grabbed by the blade and swung for flexibility's sake
Fuck those pansy ass rapier-users though. No blunt damage for you, except upside your bitch head.

>>49763225
Was the farm house made of dirt and thus unsuitable to salvage a blunt instrument from its wreckage?

>>49764021
Was there no farm tools like a fucking shovel nearby?

>>49764037
Did the corpses of the murdered farmers not have femurs that could be wielded as a makeshift club?

>>49764077
OR GRAB THE WHOLE CORPSE

OR A SKELETON
THE WALKING AROUND ONES I MEAN

>>49759929

DM proves he wasn't actually trying to help the players learn the rules as he says he
>forgot how fucking rules illiterate so many players are
Yet seeing the battle was going badly for PCs DM proceeded to
>curb stomp
every player rather than teach players the rules.

Still, if players are
>moderately experienced
then they should have been questioning why the battle went so badly. Maybe DM thought they needed a wakeup call but
>more hints about damage resistances
and a disscussion after the session about being awake while playing would probably have been better than party killing.

Don't spoon feed players but do give them a little aid at the start of a campaign unless THEY want hardcore insane mode from the start.

>>49764085
Or hell, did nobody buy a torch? I would imagine that could function quite well as a club. Possibly even better if you lit it on fire.

>>49764021
>>49764021
>>49764077
How much of a malus would a shit GM put on improvised weaponry to hit, again?

>>49764077
I know this is a fantasy setting but you have about zero idea how strong a human femur is.

>>49764288
Club made out of the bone material

Done

>>49763640
>That's how skeletons work.
(you)

>>49764249
Who cares.
As demonstrated by this thread, a shitty GM is already a malus all by himself.

>>49764249
ts a -2 I think.

>>49764288
It is at least as strong as the animated skeletons in the OP.

>>49759929
>>49763092
I started my first campaign DMing recently, and in the second session I nearly TPKd with 6 skeletons. I gave them a break and didn't kill anyone, but at the time I didn't realize they had a vulnerability to bludgeoning (not that the party had any outside of the druid's quarterstaff anyway, who was the first one to go down.)

>>49765451
I should also mention that my campaign is using 5e, not PF.

>>49764987
-4

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>>49763272
>>49763250
I don't know if you're taking the piss with your copypasta reply to that post or not, but here's a page from a German fencing manual that shows how the common way to attack an armoured foe was by gripping the sword by the blade and attacking with the blunt hilt.

>>49759929
Wow you're one garbage dm lmao, not only you don't have hints towards one of the most common undeads in every fucking fantasy setting ever, but you also belittled your players.
If you were one of my players i would just kill you to laugh back at you.

>>49763788
>two rounds of everyone dealing just 1 point
If the skellies won initiative, or the players rolled poorly on damage or tohit, it could have been very bad. Either of those are possible due to the skellies' AC, initiative, and DR. Also the fighter not using a weapon that bypasses the DR.

>>49763294
>the damage is accurate
OP said that he gave them longswords and axes (which would be 1d8+2) instead of broken scimitars (1d6+0).

>>49759979
This.

The DM failes pretty hard in explaning what is going on if the players are wailing at enemies ineffectually for several turns.

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>DMing Adventure's League
>There's a fresh level 1 at the table of level 3's
>First encounter, throw down minis
>The level 1 happens to be in front by 5 feet
>Gets downed in round one by charge attacks
>He fails his DST
>Fight goes on
>Party doesn't get him up
>He nat 1's his DST and dies
>Picks up his shit and leaves

Party was basically playing hot potato with a good berry to avoid taking AoOs and would have gotten him up the next turn but RNG didn't allow it.

>>49766826
I know that feel.

I had reasonably fleshed out character with open adventure hook coming up but he died to bad rolls on stairs while walking back to town.

Had to skip the next sessions because I felt really bummed out.

>>49765526
Only works with armor around the hands, though that's less a complaint and more a requirement.

>>49766826
He just got in and he got insta killed, wtf did you put in front of him and why do you think it's ok to kill off a PC after the first 5 minute?

>>49766979
How does your character die to stairs? Unless you were rolling acrobatics and critfailed three times straight you should not have died from use of conveyance between high and low areas.

>>49763640
You see, when you cut somebody's something off with a blade, which can happen frequently, you are cutting through the bone as well (with skin, fat and muscles draining the energy of the blow). A heavier sword is very much capable of fucking up any sort of tissue in the human body. Also, even if it doesn't cut it, the weight of a skeleton would be thrown around like nothing by a swing from a 2hander.
That's for real life. Most systems that don't suck give them a 50% resistance or so against non-blunt stuff.

>>49767135
Boars man.

They went to fight boars in the woods.

It's not like a coup de grace'd him.

He's also played before.

>>49767146
The skellies in my setting always have metal worked into the bones and joints by necromancer.
That gives me a good excuse to ignore piercing and slashing damage.

Zombies are imbued with dark magics, so crushing the muscles and bones with a blunt weapon wont work.
The limb needs to be completely severed by a hack or slash for it to lose effectiveness.

>>49767135
>Only works with armor around the hands, though that's less a complaint and more a requirement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwuQPfvSSlo

>>49767135
besides the sword argument, you nailed the other argument.

>>49767304
Huh, actually great to know, thanks anon.

>>49761753
>You should be dropping more hints about damage resistance

> I'M SERIOUSLY SO FUCKING STUPID THAT I THINK MOST PLAYERS DON'T KNOW SKELLIES HAVE DR

>>49763640
>guaranteedreplies.png

>>49767503
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>new players

>>49767568
Nope.

From OP
>adventurers are 6 moderately experienced players

DUUURRRRR

>>49765526
I'm not taking the piss i know its a way to fight with a sword

the point i was making was that there's numerous ways to get a blunt weapon to fight a skellington with.

Congrats everyone, these are the wonderful diverse new demographics we need to let into the hobby! Isn't it going to be so much fun!

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>>49759929
here is what you do when someone's trying something ineffectual

>roll
>not a 20
>"your attack is ineffectual"

>>49766826
>starting new players at lower level than rest of party
Is that an AL-required thing?

>>49767776
it's just sensible

EXP is a reward for participating

>>49767584
>From OP: I forgot how fucking rules illiterate so many players are
If you can be considered rule illiterate, then you are a newbie in my book

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>>49767801

>>49767801
If you need to reward people for participating, there's something horribly wrong with your game.

>>49767146
>That's for real life
Please, anon, enlighten us - precisely how many hours each day do you use two-handed swords to sever the limbs of your enemies?

>>49759929
You did nothing wrong. It is not your job to keep the player characters alive.

>>49766826
Couldn't you start him at level 3?
I'd have just let him reroll his character tbqh

>>49767776
Yes.

For some reason AL is fun police incarnate.

>>49767135
>Why do you think it's ok to kill off a PC after the first 5 minute?
If that's what the dice cause then that's what the dice case - without risk the game is meaningless

>>49764249
Hold your sword by the other end like one of those fancy olde time swordsmanship manuals. Bam, no penalty, its the exact same sword.

>>49767776
>>49767801
It's so that there's a track record of your character progressing from nothing to whatever he is now, all RAW

This is so that he can take his character to a different store/DM and still use it.

>>49767955
Wouldn't be a sanctioned event if I did that.

>>49767861
precisely none, but I've heard of/saw the untold numbers of accounts limbs have been severed by slashing weapons.
Precisely how many times have you been into outer space yourself to observe that the Earth is a globe?

>>49767247
>I'm not very nice - the post

>>49768437
None, because the Earth is flat.

>>49759929

>Implying any hard object doesnt do bludgeoning damage
>Implying a group of above-average people with fighting background just make thrust attacks
>Implying skeletons weight enough to make meaningful damage

If any of this happened I seriously hope your players dump you and they go find a good GM with common sense

>ITT
Guillotines couldn't actually decapitate people due cervical vertebrae

>>49768248
A friend of mine played in a game back in reign of 2e where he tried to mordhau a skeleton and the DM ruled that he cut his hands in half by grasping the blade. I mean literally, "it bisects your hands through your palm, and your fingers go with them."

At first I didn't believe him. Surely he must be exaggerating? I ended up talking to another guy who was in the game. Nope. The DM was just that terrible.

If nothing else, stories like this help me be more comfortable in my own DMing.

>>49768149
You do realize the the rule in the beginning of the book that tells the GM explicitly not to follow the rules when it's makes the game stop being enjoyable is there for shit like this, right.

>>49763206
i wouldn't have thought blunt damage to kill skeletons, but thats just me.

You give me a weapon, i won't try and find another weapon.

>>49768914
You might realize it after the dm notes your sword seems ineffective or if you make the knowledge check to know that skellingtons are only vulnerable to blunt damage

>>49763312
>4th edition

I'm so glad 5e has weapon improvisation rules so they deal 1d4.

>>49763640
Anon resistance means half damage not damage immunity.

>>49763312

4e doesn't have blunt damage and skeletons have no resistance to non-blunt damage.

Weapon damage is weapon damage.

>>49769160
Pathfinder, not 5e

Damage resistance in 3rd edition and PF, when it applies, subtracts a fixed value from damage dealt, to a minimum of zero. Skeletons have DR 5/bludgeoning, meaning that attacks that deal slashing or piercing deal 5 less damage against skeletons.

So, say I swing a glaive at a skeleton and roll 7 slashing damage. The skeleton's DR subtracts 5 from that, meaning it only took 2. Had I rolled 5 or less damage, the skeleton would be unharmed.

>>49769434
>Damage resistance

Bah, I meant "damage reduction"

>>49767607
>Dm is a fucknugget
>Somehow it's the new players' fault

I know you're baiting, I just wanted to use the word fucknugget

>>49769152
4e has improvised weapons too, ya know. Guy just had a shit DM.

>>49769164
IME a lot of the bad games people report with 4e are simply due to DMs who tried to shove back in 3.5 rules.

>>49765526
>I don't know if you're taking the piss with your copypasta reply to that post or not, but here's a page from a German fencing manual that shows how the common way to attack an armoured foe was by gripping the sword by the blade and attacking with the blunt hilt.
Different anon here, but did you miss the part about holding the sword with your buttcheeks

>>49769619
I've wondered the same thing when I've seen it posted alongside that sword fighting technique.
To me at least, it seems like a noticeable detail.

>>49763281
as someone with v little experience, if i were running a game and a lvl 1 swung a sword at a skele (and didn't elaborate any further), I'd make them roll WIS their very first slash and use that to determine if they went to stab the chest (lol) or slash an arm/the neck, giving them +/- 3 or something based on their WIS role and more importantly describing it to the players what da fuq happened and let them figure it out naturally.

I dont find OP's scanario too retarded
I saw a minmaxed metagaming rouge warlock (5th edition) get absolutely bitchslapped in a 1v1 with a drider
It came down to two things
minmaxefag:AHAH I BETS ITS CR IS LIKE 4 LMAO I CAN WRECK HER
>drider casts hold person with a dc of like 15
minmaxfag:HAHA THATS EZ
>cue him failing every single roll by a large margin three turns in a row while the drider just skewered his character repeatedly
minmaxfags face when he realized he fucked up was great

>>49769607

Seems that way. 4e ime is actually very good at 'Hey, I wanna do the thing' due to being very refluff happy.

>>49759929

>PF

found your problem OP

>>49763312
>not allowed to murderstrike with a longsword
this makes me confused and angry. It only makes srnse that a fighter or paladin would know how to use said technique since swords are martial weapons to begin with. I really doubt it'd be considered that solely for edge aligbment when striking.

>>49767135
you can use the technique with your bare hands and you'll be fine.
your argument about the armoured hands being a requirement is also retarded in that any type of gauntlet people used didnt armour the insides of the hand. It was bare, or just leather at best.

can you imagine the grip, or lackthereof in trying to hold something with metal between it and your hand?

>>49762369
>Undead are only proficient with simple weapons and the weapons in their entry
What are you willing to bet the DM didn't factor this in to their math?

>>49759929
Sounds like they need a DM whos not a fuck

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>>49759929
>le blunt damage meme

A longsword is an iron bar, more than capable of cracking bones. Rapiers, swords which were never meant to be swung, have the same weight on average as longswords. Axes can cleave through a skull, ribcage, femur or spine with ease. All this aside, the blades would be able to sever whatever was connecting and articulating the bones.

>>49759929
>lol u died because I withheld important information that would have been obvious to your character

>>49777319
You know what? I still think that OP is retarded, but this shit won't fly at my table. The rules categorize weapon damage not because it's a meme, but because that's part of the balancing and there are rules stemming from there. If you start going down the rabbit hole of "um AKCHUALLY muh realism" you have basically stopped playing. (I would still allow to use a weapon as an improvised weapon of a different kind, with the prescribed penalty)

>>49779501

I don't think the effects of a slashing weapon on a skeleton should be hashed out on the table in the middle of a game. I do think they should make sense. Skeletons deserve their DR5 against piercing attacks, because stabbing a skeleton is fucking hard and D&D doesn't have any readymade mechanics for having higher AC against only one type of attack. They shouldn't have any particular defenses against slashing attacks. Monsters need to be fluffed so that they actually have the mechanics they're supposed to, you can't just slap on whatever mechanics you want them to have and tell players to pretend it makes sense. That's bad for roleplay, and it's a roleplaying game.

>>49779501
>b-but muh weapon balance

Damage types are the absolute worst way to balance weapons

>lol this monster resists everything except cold iron
>kek this one can only be harmed by silver
>this one needs adamantine
>this one only takes damage from slashing!

So everyone just carries a golf bag of weapons around to compensate and you've done nothing but waste time and add rules bloat

>>49779789
>Everyone
Only fighters. Wizards can acquire different types of damage easily, and they don't even NEED damage spells when they have Save or Fuck You.

So basically damage types only serve to make fighters worse.

>>49779501
>You know what? I still think that OP is retarded, but this shit won't fly at my table.
Good thing i won't be playing at your table, then.

>>49779842
That makes the two of us. The second you start complaining about realism, you are out.

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>>49759929
>they wake up 3 skeletons
>irl
Holy shit anon, did you really practice necromancy? Who were the three people you killed to take their bones?

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>>49779501
>The rules categorize weapon damage not because it's a meme, but because that's part of the balancing and there are rules stemming from there.

But anon, D&D balancing IS a meme.

>>49759929
In Pathfinder you a required by RAW to inform the players every time damage resistance occurs. You don't have to tell them why or how, but you have to tell them that it went into affect.

>>49763788
Or what about improvised weapons? Nobody bashed the skeletons with their shields or picked up a rock or a frying pan or anything like that?

>>49762644
>I can only see people playing monks and speccing full dex in PF so many times before sadism sets in. If you never get that sadistic twinge then you've either got some real nice player stock or deserve a medal for patience and understanding of incompetence
Indeed! How can one resist the natural inclination to sadistically toy with lesser fools who make their ignorance and incompetence at meta-gaming so obvious!?
*tips fedora*

>>49767146
>Let me use a wall of text to sound smarter.
Doesn't matter, its a fantasy game. And in this fantasy game, are fantasy monsters(i.e. Jack Skellingtons) And damage to a human wouldn't be the same as damage to a walking set of bones. Damage isn't a video game indicator of health. It's also wear to a player or monster, it's stamina, it's life source. So a sword to a set of bones would crack and damage, and with a high enough roll for damage, maybe even sever a femur, or chip a jaw off a skull. But it wouldn't be as effective, damaging-wise to deal the same impact as a mace or hammer.

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>>49783039

>>49759929
>PF
found the mistake
even if you ignore a sword's sharpness, it#s still a hard as fuck piece of metal

>>49783039
>And damage to a human wouldn't be the same as damage to a walking set of bones.

This is true. The damage would be significantly worse. It is not hard to hit bones in such a way as to sever a femur or chip a jaw off a skull. In fact, that kind of damage is the expected result of hitting exposed bone as hard as you can with seven pounds of metal concentrated into a small point of contact. Baseball bats weigh less than half of what a longsword does and they are perfectly effective at breaking bones when used as a weapon, and that's with a coating of flesh to disperse the impact force on the outside. Swords will have a much easier time of it. Swords are in fact /exactly/ as effective as a mace or a hammer, because all of those are things that will completely wreck any set of bones they're swung into at full force.

>>49779836
>Save or Fuck You
Undeads are generally immune to those at lower levels.

>>49777319
>swords which were never meant to be swung
They were meant to be swung, Silver

>>49769607
Same in 5e, most of the horror stories I heard from friends usually end and start with "the DM houseruled in shit from 3.5"

>>49759929
>I forgot how fucking rules illiterate so many players are.
>Look at these faggots not memorizing the bestiary so they can metagame.

Dice should fall where they may, but the flipside of that is that you should be giving a clear indication of the efficacy of their actions (and maybe even a bit of the reason behind that efficacy) so they can make informed decisions. Even if it's just the decision to run like hell.

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>>49788206

>magic must adhere to physics

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>>49774741
>murderstrike

>>49779501
D&D is about as balanced as a one-legged gymnast, which about half the coordination and twice the bloat.

It makes no sense that an axe could decapitate, sever, and crush limbs like it's nobody's business on fleshy enemies but once it's a skeleton, suddenly it gains /DR and I'll never be able to do anything.

Not to mention the fact that all it does is give the mage the edge, again, because out of the hundreds of spells at his disposal, chances are that he'll have a greater chance at using spell that deals bludgeoning damage than you'll have at having an appropriate weapon that deals bludgeoning damage after sacrificing most of your resources to be awesome at wielding longswords and just longswords.

>>49788249
Tell that to my force cage faggot.

>>49781812
-4 penalty basically says that a level 1 party will be missing more often than they're not.

>>49788620
This isn't about magic though, this is about weaponry.

What sense does it make that I could cleave through a dude's arm when he's alive but as soon as he's an undead, suddenly it means that he's practically immune to it?

I could stab through a dog-bone with a butter knive if I wanted to right now, and I'm not even trained in using a knife.

>>49789832
Necromatic energy animates and probably makes the skeleton more resilient otherwise it would be brittle and also be unable to walk.

>>49767861
There was this one account I heard of a guy cutting through someone's jaw with a 1917 cavalry sabre. This is the same account that said he cut through a spear shaft or something though.

>>49759929
Yes, you were being a cunt.

>>49789998
Even if we accept that as an excuse, why doesn't dispel magic cause the bones to just break down on account of the negative energy no longer enchanting the bones to move?

>>49790158
Actually i think there is rules for things like casting dispel magic on a construct and im sure plenty of people might consider a skeleton purposefully raised by a necromancer as one
altho that being said I think it just stuns em.
Sometimes you have to improvise or make something up the rules are just a structure mang you adjust em to fit your style
Also there is no we,some people like the rules as written some people like to add on and some people like to take away and its up to the individual to find a good middle ground for their party

>>49790223
But that's not what we're arguing though.

We're arguing about how an axe can slice a dude's arm off while he's alive yet is somehow incapable of slicing through that same dude now that's he's dropped about 250 pounds of flesh, when anyone with even basic understanding on anatomy would tell you that they should be falling apart now that there's less cushion between the verterbrae and the 10 lbs. of steel that flying towards it.

You can't say "oh well it's magically enhanced" to justify damage types that don't make sense but then say "just homebrew it" when people tell you that if negative energy was in use then spells like dispel magic should in fact be capable of returning them to undeath or something.

I could homebrew fixes to make D&D a good game but by that point I might as well be using another system.

>>49790327
A walking skeleton isint just a regular set of bones floating around
raising the dead is a ritualistic process that binds magical energies amongst other things to a mortal vessal just like an animated set of armor or golem
I can just say "its magically enhanced" because for that same reason +2 weapons have more damage hardness and HP than standard weapons by virtue of being magically enhanced the same goes for the bones or for the armor and if you'll notice its not SO enhanced that its immune it just resists the wear and tear the normal version doesn't take
Hp represents a well of stamina as well as physical condition so imagine the small smidge of damage resitance the skeletons get from none bludgeoning weapon such as your standard sword or axe not quit breaking through what is essentially a +2 femur or not hurting the skeleton
but because bludgeoning weapons are designed in such a way to specifically subvert resistances to piercing and slashing the small well of magical energy fails to make up for the force exerted.
Also the real damage from a sword strike or stab (which never intends to break bones) is to make someone bleed and pierce important organs neither of which is possible on a skeleton.

>>49790452
The moment you start to introduce abstractions to explain away plot holes and shitty logic is the moment when I'm going to have to end the conversation.

I can accept that skeletons have DR/5 against non-B weapons for the same reasons as I can accept that I cannot jump over a chest high wall.

It's a shallow game that was never meant to reward actions that the developers didn't take into account when designing the game and most people who play it either drink the kool-aid by the gallon or have already moved on to better games.

>>49790327
Where are the rules for slicing arms off in D&D?
HP is an abstraction. Realism = autism.

>>49793878
see >>49790675

>>49793878
>HP is abstracted so I'm free to introduce DR that makes no sense and fucks over some wepons with otherwise no meaningful difference in some sort of twisted sense of realism.

>dropped more hints about damage resistances
>dropped more hints about damage resistances
>dropped more hints about damage resistances

i can't find the page but i am 100% sure that in PF/D&D characters are supposed to be able to see if their weapons do NO FUCKING DAMAGE AT ALL WHEN THEY HIT.

like you are fucking supposed to explicitely say " your strike hit the skeleton in the back, but the blade passing inbetween its bones left it absolutely unscathed".

Generally speaking characters are always supposed to know an estimate of how much one of their strikes damaged the opponent or how much damaged anything/anyone they could see is., even if without giving the accurate HP number.

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>>49795768
>but the blade passing inbetween its bones left it absolutely unscathed

Does anyone else get annoyed by this 'blade passing through the bones' bullshit? Any sort of swinging or chopping motion with any bladed weapon will have absolutely no problem whatsoever hitting a skeleton at full force; thrusting is literally the only ineffective way to attack a skeleton.

The only weapons skeletons should get bonus damage resistance against are non-bladed thrusting weapons.