Poison is not a Damage Type in 3.5/PFRPG

[DeltChar]

So I was DMing this weekend, and the alchemist got hit with a poison coated dagger. Dagger description reads 1d4 melee + 1d2 poison. Alchemist has the Effect: IMMUNE: poison, but still took the poison damage from the knife. I tried making a new spell that dealt only poison damage to test RESIST: 10 poison and IMMUNE: poison and make sure they were behaving like RESIST: fire. Come to find out, poison isn't considered a damage type in the current ruleset. I couldn't even make a spell do poison damage. Reading the Effects library in FG Wiki, doesn't have poison listed as a damage type either. I check the 4ed and 5ed Effects libraries, and it's listed there as a damage type.

TL: DR - How do we get poison set as a damage type in 3.5/PFRPG Ruleset so IMMUNE, RESIST, and Spells will work like they should?

[Callum]

The reason that poison isn't a damage type in the 3.5/PFRPG ruleset is that poison isn't a damage type in the 3.5/PFRPG rules. According to Ultimate Magic, poisons don't cause hit point damage. What is the source of your dagger that deals poison damage?

[LordEntrails]

And welcome to the forums!

[DeltChar]

Interesting to know, and thank you for warm welcome. I'm curious to know how the Dagger of Venom is supposed to work then? That's what I based the Custom weapon on, but I didn't want to give the party that nice of a weapon this early, but needed to challenge them.

Dagger of Venom: "Allows the wilder to use a poison effect (as the spell, save DC 14) upon a creature struck by the blade."
I couldn't make a spell with a poison damage type, so what Poison effect are we talking about? Something along the lines of Reefclaw Poison (STR:-1d2; save FORT DC 13; cure: 1 save ) from what I gathered from you link?

Also, Effects for abilities (STR, DEX, CON, INT, WIS, CHA) do not like the dice moniker. Am I supposed to use ABIL: -1d2 natural strength for 3.5ed poisons like Reefclaw. I tried using the ABIL modifier but I couldn't determine if it was actually reducing the Strength like it was supposed to. Sorry I'm dumping a lot of questions on everyone, I'm just trying to understand the mechanics to be a good and (somewhat) fair GM.

[LordEntrails]

In 3.X poison usually does ability damage. And it does it twice or has two saves. Usually, their is an immediate save or suffer ability damage (or sleep), and then one minute later you save again for a secondary effect. The DMG has the rules and sample poisons somewhere. You can also check the poison spell for PF here; https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/p/poison/

[DeltChar]

So, the Alchemist in the group would just have to have the effect: "Resist Poisson: RESIST: 2 poison" that wouldn't really do anything automatically in the game except remind him to use a +2 modifier when rolling his saves? Is there a way to make Effects do the 1d3 CON damage automatically and report it in the PC Character sheet? Or is that something I need to keep track of manually?

Also, he's hinted that he wants to reanimate corpses using Alchemical Zombies (this guy like to make my head hurt). "The alchemist gains the ability to animate a relatively complete corpse as an alchemy-powered zombie. This process takes 1 hour and costs 100 gp in alchemical reagents per HD of the corpse being animated; the dead creature gains the zombie template." Is there a FG Template for NPCs like there's a Story Template for doing this sort of thing? I search the forums and saw someone say something along the lines of using an Effect to make those types of changes, but I'm not sure how well that would work.

[Ken L]

The PF ruleset works its resistance based on damage types, these are listed in the files and can be changed.

Adding a 'poison' damage type won't work however as in pathfinder there is no 'poison' damage per say. Poison is considered a damage source not a damage type if PF. It usually is raw hit point damage or attribute damage/drain. In this case the 'damage type' varies even though the source is 'poison'. Given that FG calculates its resistances by damage type rather than by source, it's something it doesn't handle.

[DeltChar]

@Ken L
Yeah, I gathered that from the other posts. But I didn't want to give him a SAVE: 2 FORT bonus in the Effects window as there are Fortitude saves other than poisons. I would be giving that "Resist poison effect" mainly just to remind the Player to use a +2 modifier when rolling saves against Poison.

How can I make an effect that does ability damage and automatically report it on the PC Character Sheet? The ABIL modifier only seems to apply to ability check rolls and doesn't stack for multiple rounds of poison.

[kwarner1986]

Hey DeltChar

Welcome to the forum. This is what you need for the alchemist class

Poison Resistance (Ex)
At 2nd level, an alchemist gains a +2 bonus on all saving throws against poison. This bonus increases to +4 at 5th level, and then again to +6 at 8th level. At 10th level, an alchemist becomes completely immune to poison.

Have your player or yourself, create an effect that looks like this: Poison Resistance; SAVE: 2
On the far left hand side the effect line, left click the word "Target" and this will change to "Self". Below that left click the word "All" twice and it will change to "Roll" When your player is faced with a save that deals with poison have him apply the effect and roll the save. The effect will roll off his sheet once the save is made. It will grant him the bonus and not effect anything else.

Now on to poison your victims! I like to two effects on the character when I poison them. First one is a reminder they are poisoned.

Poisoned (Set the duration to the poison duration, this is usually 6 rounds.)

Second effect your original question, X = the amount of damage they took.

Poisoned; STR: -X
Poisoned; DEX: -X
Poisoned; CON: -X
Poisoned; INT: -X
Poisoned; WIS: -X
Poisoned; CHA: -X

You can also just open the character's sheet and put in the ability damage next to the corresponding ability.

[DeltChar]

@KWarner1986
Thanks for the suggestion.

I just have one more question about Poisons. Does the ability damage last beyond the duration of the poison if they don't make their saves for cure? Also, does the ability damage stack for poisons? The D20PFSRD Poison Page was not too clear on the matter.