Better Poisons (3.5e Variant Rule)

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Revision as of 18:18, 21 September 2012 by Surgo (talk | contribs) (more poisons)
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Author: Surgo (talk)
Date Created: 9/21/2012
Status: Complete
Editing: Clarity edits only please
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Better Poisons

The default D&D rules for poisons are very unsatisfying. They are either extremely overpowered or extremely underpowered, depending on whether you abuse them or just use them. The rules for creating poisons are extremely unclear and at times contradictory. Simple use of minor creation would give exceptional power to characters at very low level. Once you hit the double digits the power of poison would immediately fall off a cliff, as everyone began making their static DC. We want to improve this situation and make poison-users a viable and desirable character to have on the team. To that end, we introduce the following rules to poison:

  • You need a Craft (Alchemy) check to make poison. The DCs are given in the poison table below.
  • The poison DC will scale. It is a fortitude save, equal to 10 + 0.5 ½ CR + the Int or Wis mod of the creator, whichever is higher. Poison with the "magic" makeup has a minimum DC, listed in the table in parenthesis.
  • Poisons have a specific makeup they are crafted from. This is either animal, vegetable, mineral, or magic matter. Yes, this means you can use minor creation and similar spells to create poisons, so long as you make your Craft check. Magic matter can't be created short of a polymorph any object or spell specifically designed to create the matter.
  • Secondary damage does not exist. Nobody cared about it anyway, because 10 rounds was after combat ended. Now you don't have to track another number.

To balance out poisons, we have introduced a new poison table. If you see something, like animal parts, that should be poisonous but aren't on the table, use the closest available item on the table. For example, the venom of most snakes would fall under "Wyvern Venom".

Table: Revised Poisons
Poison Type Craft (Alchemy) Check Makeup Damage Price
Black Locust Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Con
Drow Poison Contact 25 Magic (14) Sleep (5 rounds)
Id Moss Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Int
Lich Dust Inhalation 30 Magic (18) Paralysis (permanent)
Myconid Extract Injury 20 Animal 1d8 Cha
Nightshade Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Wis
Purple Worm Poison Injury 20 Animal 1d8 Str
Scorpion Venom Injury 20 Animal 1d8 Dex
Snakeroot Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Str
Striped Toadstool Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Cha
Terinav Root Injury 15 Vegetable 1d6 Dex
Wyvern Venom Injury 20 Animal 1d8 Con

Balance Analysis

Poisons should no longer have a power curve that looks like exponential decay. It is expected that characters who want to use poison (mainly rogues and similar classes) and are willing to make the skill investment will have access to all the basic ability-damaging poisons from a very low level, thanks to psionic minor creation and the use magic device skill. This should be okay, and they get some cool status effect on top of their sneak attacks, but it isn't an instant-kill on everyone ever like it was in the old rules.

As these characters level up and gain access to spells like major creation and can make the higher Craft DCs, they gain access to more awesome status effects in-line with other abilities available at their level. This is controlled by the Craft DC. In addition, if the DM feels like dropping some awesome poison into the party's lap (via a corpse of a slain enemy or something), they can do that with the Magic poisons that aren't otherwise creatable by lower-level spells.


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AuthorSurgo +
Identifier3.5e Variant Rule +
Rated ByHarrowedMind + and Ghostwheel +
RatingRating Pending +
TitleBetter Poisons +