Vincent Takeda wrote:Typically when magic enters an mdc arena, it starts doing megadamage all by itself, so in terms of magic, the question is moot.
RUE202 spell "Energy Bolt" does 4D6 SDC.
RUE205 spell "Fire Bolt" has an option for a mage to choose for the spell to do 1D6x10 SDC instead of 4D6 MD.
RUE207 spell "Circle of Flames" does 6D6 SDC.
This is a moot point for the Splugorth since their vulnerability is to "magic weapons" (not magic in general) but it's something important to consider for other beings who might have magic listed as a vulnerability. Should these normally inferior spells suddenly become better than the MD spells?
It is worth taking a look at page 153 of Atlantis which has "Miscellaneous Bio-Wizard Weapons". The "Jolt Gun" should qualify as a magic weapon. Instead of using the highest (1D4 MD) setting to do 1D4*3 MD to Splynncryth, if the house rule proposed by HWalsh to convert SDC is applied, you would be better off to use the 2nd-highest 4D6 SDC setting to inflict 4D6*3 MD to him.
Page 125 the "Barge Blasters" are in a similar situation.
Vincent Takeda wrote:There's no such thing as 'megadamage silver', so if it didn't work that way, whats the point of it having a vulnerability to a weapon that only does laughable amounts of damage to it.
Well firstly because it makes the threshold (100) more achievable in the first place (34x3=102) meaning a wider variety of weapons would have a chance of doing minor harm in the first place.
We are told that those with supernatural PS use the greater of weapon damage or punch damage when using weapons, so that would be a way to inflict MD using mundane silver. That's been around since CB1.
Is there anything preventing a rune weapon from being made of silver? Also around since CB1.
CB1 also, pg 54 had Holy Weapons which would convert to MD for supernatural beings of selfish/evil alignment, which would apply to Splynncryth since he is Anarchist.
Apoks can wield silver weapons and cause them to inflict MD. They've been around since DB1.
Vampire Kingdoms (WB1) pg 29 mentions that falling into a wooden stake tiger pit inflits 2D4x10 SDC for example, and I don't see any reason why you couldn't make a pit trap out of silver spikes too. 2D4x30 damage more often than not will inflict over 100 damage (or view it as 2D4x10 doing more than 33 damage) most of the time.
Raoul Lazarious has a silver polearm that does 3d6, if he lent that to Mii-Tarr who has +15 damage he could do 33, just shy of 100, but a critical on an 18-20 would bridge that gap!
You could also specify that the Flaming Weapon made from a magical tattoo is silver. That's been around since WB2.
Sea Inquisitors can wield silver weapons and cause them to inflict MD (WB7)
Larhold Renegades (WB9) can add their MD punch damage when using weapons.
Can you cast "Power Weapon" on a Silver weapon? That's been around since WB16.
Page 124 (right column) of Mystic Russia (WB17) explicitly mentioned that when Kuznya forge weapons out of silver they will convert to MD for free, bypassing the normal "Inflict Mega-Damage" costs from right column of 123 to left column of 124.
Splynn Dimensional Market (WB21) pg 172 has Techno-Wizard "Mega Blade" attachments for weapons change their damage to mega-damage.
Mercenary Adventures 25 as the Magebane OCC which can temporarily change dmg to MD.
There's plenty of ways to get MD-inflicting silver which essentially get shafted by this house rule upgrading all silver to do MD to Splugorth.
kaid wrote:The whole point of the vulnerabilities from early rifts on was that these supernatural demon/creatures where as strong as tanks but had weird vulnerabilities so that they could be hurt/killed via mundane means.
Are you referring to the random supernatural beings table at the back of RMB by "early Rifts".
That's not the case for those with a vulnerability to energy or light, you still needed MD to hurt them.
kaid wrote:If they needed to be MDC silver/wood attacks it would totally defeat the purpose of a vulnerability as they would be just as strong to those as to anything else.
Random supernatural beings in early rifts had a note to convert silver/wood. Nobody is talking about altering them.
We're talking about whether or not alien intelligences (the Splugorth) should for some reason inherit the weakness of those Shifter-slave wusses.
kaid wrote:One amusing example of this is from one of the chaos earth books where there is a demon that takes MDC damage from rooster crowing.
Chaos Earth may be "early Rifts" in the in-universe timeline, but it came out much later in our publication history.
kaid wrote:These things are not of this earth and have some very odd flaws that if you have the right equipment can be very effective against them. Stuff like this is why monster hunter/slayers have an edge. They understand what they are hunting and ways some seemingly unbeatable opponent is vulnerable to strangely common things.
They would also understand, assuming they knew about Splugorth (who probably fall outside normal monster lore, as not many would fight them and live to tell the tale, or be able to discern damage to something with thousands of MDC...) that unlike other silver-vulnerable monsters, they can shrug off most normal silver weapons unless they are wielded by a particularly strong person or are quite gruesome (enough to manage 34 damage so that when applying the x3 it exceeds 100)
kaid wrote:I should also note that if you look at NG2 the dedicated monster slaying power armor has two SDC machine guns specifically to equip silver/wood flechette rounds for use on supernatural creatures vulnerable to wood/silver. If that did not indicate the damage basically converts into MDC on applicable targets there would be no point having them.
I don't think the intention of that power armor is for engaging the Splugorth in particular.
There are plenty of monsters who do convert the damage into mega-damage, such as randomly generated monsters in RMB or the Russian Demons in Mystic Russia.
Splugorth do not happen to be one of those examples.
kaid wrote:Also I think the reason they don't specify MDC damage is some of the targets those weapons get used on are things like vampires/undead where instead it converts to HP damage.
You don't need to specify it under the weapons: you specify it under the monster. You define what a vulnerability means.
"Vulnerable" can simply mean noting something a creature isn't immune to, for example. It doesn't by default mean "convert damage to mega-damage" and there has never been any grounds for that to be assumed where it isn't written: that would be a house rule (non-canon).
An example of this can be found under Conversion Book Revised under page 49's "Energy Absorption":
Is still vulnerable to kinetic energy, meaning punches, kicks, thrown weapons, bullets, explosions and so on, which will do full damage.This would not mean, for example, that if a mutant had another power giving them MDC, that 1d4 SDC punches would suddenly inflict 1d4 MD to them.
Similarly on 49 "Intangibility":
the intangible character is still vulnerable to all electric attacksThat wouldn't mean, if they had another power making them MDC, that SDC electrical attacks would directly convert to MD against them.
Page 87, the Algor:
Vulnerability: Heat and fire based magic does 50% greater damage than usualThis does not in any way mean that Algor (who are now MDC creatures as of Revised) would convert SDC fire damage like Circle of Fire into mega-damage. It's an increase of 50%, not 14,950%. When conversion happens (such as the Scarecrow on pg 194) we're told!
Same with Nimro on page 94, damage from ice magic would not convert to MD. Nor does it happen with Fire Worms (186-187) who only take double from cold, not dmg>MD from cold.
Pg 177 says Spectres are "vulnerable to magic". That doesn't mean SDC magic like energy bolt does 4D6 MD to them.