While I understand that hp are hp and that is how damage is done in D&D, it bothers me a little bit that with enough arrows somebody could destroy something as large as a spelljammer.
Thinking of going the Robotech (Palladium) route and making some things virtually immune to mundane attacks.
Yeah, attacking a structure/vehicle can require some DM adjudication on what is able to damage the object in question. The DMG has some good thoughts on the subject in the “Objects” section.
If you want to stick with RAW in terms of how damage functions, air envelopes are implied to be magical creations of the Spelljammer Helm connected to the ship. You could rule that, while the arrows are causing insignificant, cosmetic damage to the vessel, those arrows poking into the wood are disrupting the Helm’s magical air envelope energies. When the ship hits zero hitpoints, the envelope pops, rendering the ship effectively dead.
5e has damage thresholds that render large objects immune from damage below a certain value, so those would need to be some pretty big arrows to even leave a dent.
5e has damage thresholds that render large objects immune from damage below a certain value, so those would need to be some pretty big arrows to even leave a dent.
This is the Damage Threshold stat for the ships. It is 15 damage for most ships. A few ships have a damage threshold of 20.
Gameplay wise as your dex bonus gets higher you could damage a spelljamer with a bow. This would be explained not as damage to the hull but damage to some important feature of the ship. The rudder, the captians wheel, ropes holding the sails. Some aimed shot that harms the functions of the ship. Remember 0 health points don't represent destruction of a creature. 0 is a creature going unconsious. For a ship it is the ship being disabled.
5e has damage thresholds that render large objects immune from damage below a certain value, so those would need to be some pretty big arrows to even leave a dent.
This is the Damage Threshold stat for the ships. It is 15 damage for most ships. A few ships have a damage threshold of 20.
Seems functional.
A Fighter with a Longbow(1d8), 20 dex (+5), and would still need a +2 magical weapon to have a 12.5% chance of dealing any damage at all to a DT15 ship without further augmentation.
It's barely manageable with a standard heavy crossbow, but at that point, it's a small ballista, so that's not surprising.
So a +3 arrow doing max damage (8+5=13) does 16 damage (ignoring crits). This means that it actually does 1 point of damage to a threshold 15 ship and 0 damage to a threshold 20 ship. The real problem is how to handle crit damage. Personally I would have crits double the damage done after deducting the threshold value from the raw (non crit) damage roll. So if you don’t roll an 8 for damage the crit does nothing, if you do then it does 2 damage. This is why ships mount Balistae. Arrows deal with crew not ship structures.
Damage threshold doesn't deduct, it's a breakpoint.
If an object has a damage threshold of X, damage < X is ignored and damage => X is applied in full.
For example, if you deal between 1 and 14 damage to an object of damage threshold 15, you deal no damage. However, if you dealt 15 damage, the entirety of that damage would go through
We could always wait for WOTC to bring out actually consistent ship combat rules (be that sea, land, air or space); but that will probably be a long, and ultimately fruitless wait at this point.
Ultimately: the rules are, to quote Captain Barbosa: "more like guidelines": at some point you WILL encounter a "rules as written versus Common sense/logic" or "Rules as written versus Rule of cool" dichotomy, and you'll just have to make a call.
An arrow shot can deal a great ammount of damage, especially at high level with magic, feats and features. It may not be always logical, especially against vessels and building but it's how the rules handle HP and damage.
You can always explain it as having the arrow cause a crack that expand on a significant portion of the structure despite being a small point of contact.
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While I understand that hp are hp and that is how damage is done in D&D, it bothers me a little bit that with enough arrows somebody could destroy something as large as a spelljammer.
Thinking of going the Robotech (Palladium) route and making some things virtually immune to mundane attacks.
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Yeah, attacking a structure/vehicle can require some DM adjudication on what is able to damage the object in question. The DMG has some good thoughts on the subject in the “Objects” section.
If you want to stick with RAW in terms of how damage functions, air envelopes are implied to be magical creations of the Spelljammer Helm connected to the ship. You could rule that, while the arrows are causing insignificant, cosmetic damage to the vessel, those arrows poking into the wood are disrupting the Helm’s magical air envelope energies. When the ship hits zero hitpoints, the envelope pops, rendering the ship effectively dead.
5e has damage thresholds that render large objects immune from damage below a certain value, so those would need to be some pretty big arrows to even leave a dent.
This is the Damage Threshold stat for the ships. It is 15 damage for most ships. A few ships have a damage threshold of 20.
Gameplay wise as your dex bonus gets higher you could damage a spelljamer with a bow. This would be explained not as damage to the hull but damage to some important feature of the ship. The rudder, the captians wheel, ropes holding the sails. Some aimed shot that harms the functions of the ship. Remember 0 health points don't represent destruction of a creature. 0 is a creature going unconsious. For a ship it is the ship being disabled.
Seems functional.
A Fighter with a Longbow(1d8), 20 dex (+5), and would still need a +2 magical weapon to have a 12.5% chance of dealing any damage at all to a DT15 ship without further augmentation.
It's barely manageable with a standard heavy crossbow, but at that point, it's a small ballista, so that's not surprising.
So a +3 arrow doing max damage (8+5=13) does 16 damage (ignoring crits). This means that it actually does 1 point of damage to a threshold 15 ship and 0 damage to a threshold 20 ship. The real problem is how to handle crit damage. Personally I would have crits double the damage done after deducting the threshold value from the raw (non crit) damage roll. So if you don’t roll an 8 for damage the crit does nothing, if you do then it does 2 damage. This is why ships mount Balistae. Arrows deal with crew not ship structures.
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Damage threshold doesn't deduct, it's a breakpoint.
If an object has a damage threshold of X, damage < X is ignored and damage => X is applied in full.
For example, if you deal between 1 and 14 damage to an object of damage threshold 15, you deal no damage. However, if you dealt 15 damage, the entirety of that damage would go through
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We could always wait for WOTC to bring out actually consistent ship combat rules (be that sea, land, air or space); but that will probably be a long, and ultimately fruitless wait at this point.
Ultimately: the rules are, to quote Captain Barbosa: "more like guidelines": at some point you WILL encounter a "rules as written versus Common sense/logic" or "Rules as written versus Rule of cool" dichotomy, and you'll just have to make a call.
An arrow shot can deal a great ammount of damage, especially at high level with magic, feats and features. It may not be always logical, especially against vessels and building but it's how the rules handle HP and damage.
You can always explain it as having the arrow cause a crack that expand on a significant portion of the structure despite being a small point of contact.