Merges what?[]
what is the meaning of 'armor'? actually, helmet also merges into elemental shape don't know about shield though --81.5.111.121 December 2007
- Armor, shield, and helmet. (It's explained under shifter, but should be here also.) --The Krit 18:46, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
Whirlwind?[]
What on earth is 'Whirlwind'? I can't find the meaning of it anywhere. --82.9.227.110 7 March 2009
AC type?[]
Is there a way to test what kind of AC is granted by these forms? The Earth form suggests that it should be a low AC form, given the size and 10 Dex, however an additional 7+(Any size penalty) has been given from some source. I'd guess Natural Armour, but I'm not sure. Is it a dodge bonus, or another source? --82.9.227.110 3 April 2009
- All polymorphs (shifter forms are implemented as polymorphs) can have an AC bonus inherent in their definition. The .2da column defining this bonus is called "NATURALACBONUS", but I've seen it reported that the bonus is actually dodge. The way to test this would be to enable combat debugging and see what gets reported and whether or not this bonus is lost when flat-footed (and whether or not it counts to the dodge AC cap). --The Krit 17:06, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
- Just finished a session of testing: The AC bonus is to dodge and it is capped. And... I see WhiZard has just updated the table to account for the size and size modifier to AC. I will add a couple other notes regarding damage immunities and damage reduction. - MrZork 05:40, February 21, 2012 (UTC)
Elemental form bypassing damage reduction[]
It appears that since none of the elemental shapes have an innate weapon enhancement to bypass DR (I'm interpolating this from the analogous creature description since there are none described in this article), the only possible way would be to cast Magic Weapon/Greater Magic Weapon on the character. Is this true... will the weapon property merge into the form? I suspect even MW/GMW won't work since weapon bonus isn't supposed to merge, but perhaps the bonus is applied differently by the spell than if present on the weapon item itself (i.e. not sure if there is a different overall effect if the spell targets a character vs. an item). Thanks for any clarification. --Iconclast 17:21, August 9, 2010 (UTC)
- Casting magic weapon on a character is no different than casting it directly on whatever is in that character's right-hand slot (or creature weapon slot, if the right hand is empty). It will not merge into elemental shape because "Only armor (including shield and helmet) merges into elemental shape." However, you could have someone cast it on you after shifting. As for innately bypassing damage reduction, the creature weapons of these forms should be treated as +3 weapons because of the damage reduction the forms possess. (That's "should" as in that is what others say happens.) If you need to bypass higher damage reduction, getting a little stoneskin should up the penetration power to +5. --The Krit 00:04, August 10, 2010 (UTC)
- "If you need to bypass higher damage reduction, getting a little stoneskin should up the penetration power to +5." Now THAT is excellent trivia and opens up some useful possibilities with shapes that don't allow weapon merge (I am assuming that it functions the same for all polymorph shapes with similar merge limitations)! I am just now learning about creature weapon idiosyncrasies. So then... does Greater Stoneskin and Premonition have similar bypass capability or is this enhancement just limited to stoneskin? Maybe the target (caster vs. single) influences its use?--Iconclast 20:09, August 10, 2010 (UTC)
- It's a general game mechanism. See damage reduction and/or creature weapon. --The Krit 03:23, August 11, 2010 (UTC)
Creature weapon column[]
I added a "Creature weapon" column to summarize the damage each form does with its creature weapon (with strength bonus). I also moved the note on fire elemental bonus damage to the new column, since that seemed the more natural place for it. Possibly the column name would be more descriptive as "Creature weapon damage", but that was making the table a bit wide. -- MrZork (talk) 00:29, September 26, 2012 (UTC)
- Simply "damage" would probably get the point across, possibly with less confusion as to what a creature weapon is. --The Krit (talk) 16:35, October 13, 2012 (UTC)
Immunity to Petrification[]
Would it be a good idea to mention that these elemental shapes are immune to petrification? (I'm playing a druid and noticed that I'm not even rolling a saving throw vs. petrification while in elder water elemental form. The Petrified article also seems to indicate that druids in elemental form/shape can expect immunity to petrification but it's not mentioned in this article.) HolyGuardian80 (talk) 12:42, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
- Given how hard it is to resist petrification, this seems like a good idea. It's a bit finicky though, since the immunity assumes standard petrification scripts and standard appearances (meaning that custom content could accidentally break the immunity). I'll put off updating the articles until I have a larger chunk of time to devote to it, since updating only some of the affected creatures/feats/etc. would be an invitation for people to question why only some have the note. --The Krit (talk) 22:08, 3 January 2024 (UTC)