Armor rating against fireball??

[tmbn]

I am running 1Ed rules and just wonder how you guys do it with AR when someone is hit by a 1D6 magic fireball by a mage?

Do you throw strike for the Fireball? Does the fireball only damage armour since no strike? Or does it always go directly on hit points?

I cant seem to find any information on how this type of spell will be used with Strike and AR. Maybe some more information in 2ed.

[Kraynic]

I apply it direct to hit points. I could see applying to armor as well, though I would probably keep it to cloth and maybe light leather. This isn't sustained heat after all, but simply a flash burn, so most materials will survive it just fine. I don't have a problem depleting armor sdc with mundane damage as it is, so I don't generally go after armor with damage from magic. If this plays out differently in your games and armor is holding up for long periods of time without repair, then I would say go ahead and apply magic damage like fireball to both sdc and hp.

[kiralon]

I apply direct to hp as well, unless someone has the fire resistance enchantment on the armour, then the armour takes half.

[Veknironth]

Well, the book states that you need an 18 or higher to dodge, so I treat the attack as an 18 strike roll. That would make it past all normal armor and would go straight to HP.

-Vek
"But what about Armor of Ithan?"

[kiralon]

There is also an enchantment for armour that adds 2 AR to it.

[Library Ogre]

I severely dislike the "flat number to dodge" spells because of this.

If I'm wearing armor that covers my full body, there should be a decent chance that some of that armor protects me from the fireball.

[tmbn]

Thank you! Yes. There is also spells that dont have attached strike roll, like call lightning. If you dont use armor on call lightning you can apply instant death with high level mage. So I at least applied saving throw and strike roll on these spells.

[kiralon]

I currently allow the players to have a free dodge save for half with target getting hth dodge bonus only and casters (lvl+spell strength+10) as the number to beat, but have used the AR of the armour absorbs that much damage (and takes it as damage) and the rest goes through.

[green.nova343]

Target is wearing:

• typical feudal-style clothing (no flame-retardant treatments, all-natural clothing that will mostly provide little to no protection against heat or flame);
• metal armor (extremely good conductor of heat);
• cloth or padded armor that may or may not be reinforced with pieces of metal (materials easily combustible and/or great conductors of heat);
• running around full "Diablo Barbarian" mode (fur loincloth, bare-chest, maybe some fur-lined boots, so lots of bare skin that burns easily); or
• some form of leather armor (may provide some protection from heat & flame, but extremely limited)

Given that you're being hit by magic fire...it's probably just easier to say that unless you're wearing armor with AR 18+ the Fire Ball is going to damage the character directly & not the armor (although it should go to SDC first), & even if it's hitting the armor that's going to damage the armor.

But maybe I'm adding too much realism to it...

[Kraynic]

After reading the different responses here, I think it will really boil down to answering the following question: "In your games, what is a fireball?"

In my daily work (during heating season), I tend to a decent sized coal boiler system. At least twice each day, this entails opening up a couple doors to the fire chamber to clear ashes and such. I wear long sleeved shirts and a pair of medium thickness cowhide gloves while doing so. While I obviously turn off the electrical systems so that the fire isn't being fed extra air at this time, there is a lot of heat from the pile of glowing coal (for reference, this is a max 1.75 million BTU input boiler). I have been using the same gloves for about 4 years, and while they can get uncomfortably hot if I take too much time with my hands at the entrance of the fire box, the leather is still fine. They are about to be retired due to stitching at seams starting to go however. One aspect about the gloves and this source of heat seem applicable to this thread's purpose. With a normal source of heat, you have a place of high heat energy concentration with the heat radiating out to anywhere with a lower concentration of heat energy. This means that it doesn't matter that the cuffs of these gloves are open, since the open part of the cuffs still shield the parts of my wrist left exposed by my sleeves from being in a direct line from the glowing coals. The heat is intercepted by the gloves.

Does the fireball spell work that way? Is it a central point of heat that radiates heat with enough intensity to do physical harm within a 3' radius of that point? This is an elemental spell, which may be opening some tiny portal to the elemental plane of fire and spews the atmosphere of that plane in that short radius. With that sort of setup, then any armor is going to likely be of help. Even if the armor takes damage, it would be a physical barrier between the character and the source of heat. Of course, that means that probably the most likely place to be hit is the character's face, because sight and breathing are usually pretty important, so coverage is least likely to be sufficient there. I have never totally lost my eyebrows while doing this job, but they have gotten a bit crispy...

On the other hand, what if the 3' radius is more of a containment field that is holding some of the atmosphere from the elemental plane of fire. It doesn't have a direction to protect against, it is simply contained heat energy that will permeate the air through anything but hermetically sealed armor. If your armor has any gaps that air can pass through (I mention the air simply because it will absorb heat faster than the armor will), then you get cooked if any of your fleshy bits break through the barrier. In that sort of setup, then armor rating likely means nothing and dodging (so as to not be in the radius at all) is the only protection.

Not to say that those are the only ways to look at the fireball spell. I guess I mostly think of mine being closer to the second example.

[drewkitty ~..~]

I am running 1Ed rules and just wonder how you guys do it with AR when someone is hit by a 1D6 magic fireball by a mage?

Do you throw strike for the Fireball? Does the fireball only damage armor since no strike? Or does it always go directly on hit points?

I cant seem to find any information on how this type of spell will be used with Strike and AR. Maybe some more information in 2ed.

using the PF1r main book to answer...

general Body Armor AR rules....anything above a attack roll 4 hits, unless the GM has some sort of ranged strike roll rules in play. Any attack with an attack roll less than the AR of the armor hits the armor. Any attack over the AR hits the wearer of the armor. No page 43 of the PFRPG 1st ed book in the bold print of the Armor Rating section of the combat terms section.

The Fireball strike roll is automatically a strike of 18. See Save vs fire ball for where the number is represented in the fire ball spell.
Note:

Spoiler:

As a GM I would allow a parry from a shield to intercept the Fire Ball, but that is but a side track thought to this subject.

Damage: Unless the GM of the game has some house rule that armor takes a portion of the damage, the all the damage of a strike roll above the Armor's AR strikes the wearer.

Now a little bit of otherness...strictly speaking, the Fire ball spell is a elemental spell so the spell would only be coming from a warlock in 1st ed PFRPG.

[The Dark Elf]

Well, the book states that you need an 18 or higher to dodge, so I treat the attack as an 18 strike roll. That would make it past all normal armor and would go straight to HP.

Same.