One of my players looted an extra bow in case his main breaks and it got me to thinking I haven’t seen any rules on when and how equipment takes damage. I’m sure I’ve just missed it in the dmg or phb but where should I start looking?
I guess I had seen that a while back. I think unless we start running a hyper realistic game I’m just gonna say that weapons are essentially invulnerable unless specifically targeted then probably make on the fly rulings
RAW, the only way to damage equipment is if an attack specifically states that it does so. For example, if a character is hit by an attack by a gray ooze or a rust monster, their equipment would decay because those monsters have an ability which specifically says they decay equipment.
Other than that, equipment is effectively invulnerable.
RAW, the only way to damage equipment is if an attack specifically states that it does so. For example, if a character is hit by an attack by a gray ooze or a rust monster, their equipment would decay because those monsters have an ability which specifically says they decay equipment. Other than that, equipment is effectively invulnerable.
Not quite. Attacks can target objects by default, though spells and monster attacks can be picky about what they work on. The Adventuring chapter in the Basic Rules and Player's Handbook also explicitly says you can attack objects. Ultimately, the DM decides whether it's possible and how much AC and HP the object will have, but I don't think anyone would argue that it's not possible for a great axe to chop a wooden bow in half.
Yeah, and if you've been on any Breath of The Wild forums you'd see how much people like weapon durability...
People complain about that in BotW because previous games in the franchise weren't like that, but BotW still balances that well by having almost every enemy drop usable weapons, with tougher monsters dropping better weapons. It also gives you infinite bombs, environmental damage like setting grass on fire, one-hit kill sneak attacks, and you can drown many monsters. Weapon durability's been a mainstay of Fire Emblem since forever and few people complain about that.
The main reason the rules for D&D kinda handwave durability is that tracking that in a pen and paper game is a chore. You're assumed to be keeping your equipment in good shape whenever you're in town as part of your lifestyle costs. So you're not forced to think about the normal wear and tear, and most spells are designed to leave your equipment alone, but the rules still leave the door open for someone to make an active effort to break a piece of equipment if the DM thinks it's reasonable.
Sorry to revive an old topic but, I actually had a situation come up that made me run durability for an axe and you guys are the first ones that actually pointed out useful information.
The situation: My half-orc barbarian was gifted a great axe by her father on his deathbed and told to embrace her orc side and prove she was a better warrior. She treasured that axe but, one day, a necromancer hit her with a spell on the edge of the cliff that actually sent her tumbling off. In the fall, she dropped the axe and it hit quite a lot of rocks on the way down. When she found it, the wooden handle was cracked and splintered and there was a crack in the axe head. She's going to continue to use it because it's special to her and, the goal is to have the pieces used and upgraded into a custom axe called The Blooddrinker that was homebrewed together later on with the aid of a voodoo priestess if/when it finally shatters.
The thing is, I was at a loss on how to do this mechanically so, I want to thank you for the helpful links cause I can use that to calculate AC and HP on the weapon before it shatters and she is forced to get it fixed or lose the last piece of her father she has.
The rules unfortunately offer no guidance on how to adjudicate worn or used items such as your weapon. To reflect item degradation, you could use disadvantage or a penalty (-2) to attack and/or damage roll.
Personally 1 only have the item damage if something state it is damage or sometimes on crit (fails for weapon and sometime on hit on armor). For about every 5 damage to weapons it gets a -2 to hit and for armor it is -1 ac. This stack up to 3 time at that point it is beyond use until fixes. Any one with the right skill (blacksmith tool for metal ect.) can fix it during a long rest or the Mend spell can.
So far I only had one person ever get it to level 3 and funny enough it was from a new sword when the fight rolled 3 1's in the first round of combat. The player just played it off as he brought a lemon lol.
In AD&D we had a custom rule's (home brew and from other systems) for item HP but I have not seen any official rules for 5e.
I can say that tracking such things can add RP elements and dramatically change play style and PC creation. Repair tools, skills, spells and magic items become more important and if you have trouble with a lack of skills or tools introducing item HP tracking can require you to make adjustments else where in your game. Also some players like such things and others do not, some find it adds to their game emersion and others say I do not want to track or think about such things.
The rules unfortunately offer no guidance on how to adjudicate worn or used items such as your weapon. To reflect item degradation, you could use disadvantage or a penalty (-2) to attack and/or damage roll.
They do, although it might not have the granularity desired. As specified in the rules for damaging objects, reducing an object to 0 hit points is defined as when you've reduced its structural integrity to the point it can no longer function. That's why a lock is listed as more delicate than a brick: it takes a lot less damage to render a lock non-functional.
Applied to weapons, that would mean they're at full functionality while above 0 hp and at no functionality at 0, like a creature. 0 functionality means not functioning as a weapon, so you could use the Improvised Weapon rules on the object you're holding, but that's it.
I'll throw this out as Rust Monster has the ability to degrade weapons that may give you some ideas or baseline.
Rust Metal. Any nonmagical weapon made of metal that hits the rust monster corrodes. After dealing damage, the weapon takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to damage rolls. If its penalty drops to −5, the weapon is destroyed. Nonmagical ammunition made of metal that hits the rust monster is destroyed after dealing damage.
The rules unfortunately offer no guidance on how to adjudicate worn or used items such as your weapon. To reflect item degradation, you could use disadvantage or a penalty (-2) to attack and/or damage roll.
They do, although it might not have the granularity desired. As specified in the rules for damaging objects, reducing an object to 0 hit points is defined as when you've reduced its structural integrity to the point it can no longer function. That's why a lock is listed as more delicate than a brick: it takes a lot less damage to render a lock non-functional.
Applied to weapons, that would mean they're at full functionality while above 0 hp and at no functionality at 0, like a creature. 0 functionality means not functioning as a weapon, so you could use the Improvised Weapon rules on the object you're holding, but that's it.
Exactly, OP is not asking about complete destruction of items but partial degradation of its quality while remaining usable. There's no rules for that precisely.
When playing earlier editions, there were crushing blow saves for items under certain circumstances. Very handy for torturing your players, or getting OP items out of the game.
So if the player is climbing a tree with their bow, and they critically fail a climbing check, maybe the bow breaks from the fall. Or they rip their magic cloak, then break a bunch of potions which mix together and burst into flames. Depending on falling damage and distance, I've had players make crushing blow saves on every item they have on them.
If players use their weapon to pry open a door and the door holds, the weapon should make a save. Depending on how bad it fails, it could break or just bend and get a penalty till it's fixed.
It can add a lot of survival flavor to the game in the right setting, if the players can handle the loss. Twenty years later, I have a friend who is still mad about a sword that broke. But the circumstances of that sword breaking are more memorable now than the rest of that adventure.
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One of my players looted an extra bow in case his main breaks and it got me to thinking I haven’t seen any rules on when and how equipment takes damage. I’m sure I’ve just missed it in the dmg or phb but where should I start looking?
https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/running-the-game#Objects
This is about the only reference to item damage I've seen. I've also seen a rule that says magic items have double HP.
I guess I had seen that a while back. I think unless we start running a hyper realistic game I’m just gonna say that weapons are essentially invulnerable unless specifically targeted then probably make on the fly rulings
Yeah, and if you've been on any Breath of The Wild forums you'd see how much people like weapon durability...
But yeah, making weapons invulnerable is probably for the best.
RAW, the only way to damage equipment is if an attack specifically states that it does so. For example, if a character is hit by an attack by a gray ooze or a rust monster, their equipment would decay because those monsters have an ability which specifically says they decay equipment.
Other than that, equipment is effectively invulnerable.
Yup, those are the rules for object damage. Magic items don't have double HP, but they usually have have resistance to all damage which is kind of the same thing.
Not quite. Attacks can target objects by default, though spells and monster attacks can be picky about what they work on. The Adventuring chapter in the Basic Rules and Player's Handbook also explicitly says you can attack objects. Ultimately, the DM decides whether it's possible and how much AC and HP the object will have, but I don't think anyone would argue that it's not possible for a great axe to chop a wooden bow in half.
People complain about that in BotW because previous games in the franchise weren't like that, but BotW still balances that well by having almost every enemy drop usable weapons, with tougher monsters dropping better weapons. It also gives you infinite bombs, environmental damage like setting grass on fire, one-hit kill sneak attacks, and you can drown many monsters. Weapon durability's been a mainstay of Fire Emblem since forever and few people complain about that.
The main reason the rules for D&D kinda handwave durability is that tracking that in a pen and paper game is a chore. You're assumed to be keeping your equipment in good shape whenever you're in town as part of your lifestyle costs. So you're not forced to think about the normal wear and tear, and most spells are designed to leave your equipment alone, but the rules still leave the door open for someone to make an active effort to break a piece of equipment if the DM thinks it's reasonable.
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Sorry to revive an old topic but, I actually had a situation come up that made me run durability for an axe and you guys are the first ones that actually pointed out useful information.
The situation: My half-orc barbarian was gifted a great axe by her father on his deathbed and told to embrace her orc side and prove she was a better warrior. She treasured that axe but, one day, a necromancer hit her with a spell on the edge of the cliff that actually sent her tumbling off. In the fall, she dropped the axe and it hit quite a lot of rocks on the way down. When she found it, the wooden handle was cracked and splintered and there was a crack in the axe head. She's going to continue to use it because it's special to her and, the goal is to have the pieces used and upgraded into a custom axe called The Blooddrinker that was homebrewed together later on with the aid of a voodoo priestess if/when it finally shatters.
The thing is, I was at a loss on how to do this mechanically so, I want to thank you for the helpful links cause I can use that to calculate AC and HP on the weapon before it shatters and she is forced to get it fixed or lose the last piece of her father she has.
The rules unfortunately offer no guidance on how to adjudicate worn or used items such as your weapon. To reflect item degradation, you could use disadvantage or a penalty (-2) to attack and/or damage roll.
Personally 1 only have the item damage if something state it is damage or sometimes on crit (fails for weapon and sometime on hit on armor). For about every 5 damage to weapons it gets a -2 to hit and for armor it is -1 ac. This stack up to 3 time at that point it is beyond use until fixes. Any one with the right skill (blacksmith tool for metal ect.) can fix it during a long rest or the Mend spell can.
So far I only had one person ever get it to level 3 and funny enough it was from a new sword when the fight rolled 3 1's in the first round of combat. The player just played it off as he brought a lemon lol.
I spell Goodly.
In AD&D we had a custom rule's (home brew and from other systems) for item HP but I have not seen any official rules for 5e.
I can say that tracking such things can add RP elements and dramatically change play style and PC creation. Repair tools, skills, spells and magic items become more important and if you have trouble with a lack of skills or tools introducing item HP tracking can require you to make adjustments else where in your game. Also some players like such things and others do not, some find it adds to their game emersion and others say I do not want to track or think about such things.
They do, although it might not have the granularity desired. As specified in the rules for damaging objects, reducing an object to 0 hit points is defined as when you've reduced its structural integrity to the point it can no longer function. That's why a lock is listed as more delicate than a brick: it takes a lot less damage to render a lock non-functional.
Applied to weapons, that would mean they're at full functionality while above 0 hp and at no functionality at 0, like a creature. 0 functionality means not functioning as a weapon, so you could use the Improvised Weapon rules on the object you're holding, but that's it.
I'll throw this out as Rust Monster has the ability to degrade weapons that may give you some ideas or baseline.
Exactly, OP is not asking about complete destruction of items but partial degradation of its quality while remaining usable. There's no rules for that precisely.
When playing earlier editions, there were crushing blow saves for items under certain circumstances. Very handy for torturing your players, or getting OP items out of the game.
So if the player is climbing a tree with their bow, and they critically fail a climbing check, maybe the bow breaks from the fall. Or they rip their magic cloak, then break a bunch of potions which mix together and burst into flames. Depending on falling damage and distance, I've had players make crushing blow saves on every item they have on them.
If players use their weapon to pry open a door and the door holds, the weapon should make a save. Depending on how bad it fails, it could break or just bend and get a penalty till it's fixed.
It can add a lot of survival flavor to the game in the right setting, if the players can handle the loss. Twenty years later, I have a friend who is still mad about a sword that broke. But the circumstances of that sword breaking are more memorable now than the rest of that adventure.