Discussion:Dealing multiple damage types

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Vobria (talk) 23:42, 1 October 2016 (MDT)

So I'm sure that this question has come up more than once but I've not had any luck finding it. I'm essentially looking for how other people would manage someone who wants to deal different types of damage with the same weapon. I'm not speaking of enchantments or the like, but base damage types. So suppose my PC runs a halberd and is facing an opponent that has resistance/immunity to slashing damage. Well, realistically the solution would be to simply use the spear tip instead to deal piercing damage, but what would the ramifications of allowing this be?

It doesn't immediately strike me as something that would be problematic but perhaps I'm overlooking some more obscure details. I want to know how others would deal with this issue.

Marasmusine (talk) 02:21, 2 October 2016 (MDT)

DM adjudication.

Sometimes it will be an improvised attack (halberd haft strike, 1d6 bludgeoning, make with disadvantage). Sometimes it will be a fair use of the weapon (halberd spear tip, 1d6 piercing, regular attack). Or the DM might say "no, let's keep it simple".

I think that if the DM formally wishes to introduce alternate damage types to all weapons where applicable, increase the cost of the weapon by 5 gp. (there's not many... warhammers usually had a blunt end and a piercing end; possible homebrew polearms like a bill-guisarme...)

Vobria (talk) 17:45, 2 October 2016 (MDT)

This is something that I'd be inclined to allow my PCs to do at will. There's nothing about this optional ruling that strikes me as potentially broken, just that enemy damage resistances would be far less of an obstacle for parties that are outfitted properly. I suppose that if you intend for enemy damage resistances to be a recurring thing in your campaign then this may be an optional rule that you'd want to leave out, otherwise I don't ever see it becoming an issue.

My initial reaction was to "okay" this for my PCs but I wanted to ensure that they wouldn't be able to abuse it first.

EDIT: Supposing a PC wanted to do something like this, I could rule that a spear-thrust with a halberd would use the same damage dice as a spear (1d8). Basically, it would act like a spear for the duration of the attack action. Would that be reasonable?