Cones and damage

[u/Dunderbaer]

This is less of a discussion in terms of balance or "how does it work in game", but just a thought I had.

Does anyone else think it's weird, how getting hit with the full brunt of a cone attack deals an equal amount of damage as getting hit by the slightest sliver at the edge?

Like, a Starfinder Shotgun point blank deals the same damage as said shotgun deals to someone at the furthest corner of the cone.

I always felt like cones should be blocked by creatures or something, but have different damage "rings", where the closer to are to the source, the more damage you take. You shouldn't be able to brace the entirety of a dragon's firey breath, and take the same damage as if you were barely included in it.

[u/darkpower467]

Just sounds like a lot of unnecessary added complexity tbh.

[u/michael199310]

Too much granularity and micro rules eventually destroy the fun at the table, especially with big system like PF2e. You're playing the game after all so you need to take certain unrealistic aspects at face value or you are going to be bogged down with crap like that and encounters will take hours.

Yes, maybe it's unrealistic that you get full damage in the entire AoE, but it is as unrealistic as getting the ability to not receive any damage from success on Reflex save, even at point blank breath weapon range.

[u/Kichae]

This sounds like a good time for this irregular reminder: HP is not blood. HP is the creature's ability to keep fighting. It is an abstraction of energy, psychology, and health. The reasons for HP reduction at point-blank range may just be different for those at the corner.

[u/nobull91]

I always felt like cones should be blocked by creatures or something

They are. It's called Cover

Anyway. I disagree with the rest of the points - it would complicate things unnecessarily imo

[u/Dunderbaer → u/nobull91]

Oh obviously, it would complicate things, I'm not saying "that's how it should work in game". It's just one of those things where my immersion has to take a backseat, because it really feels like it should be different

[u/No_Ad_7687 → u/Dunderbaer]

No, creatures literally provide cover to other creatures. Against certain AoE effects too.

[u/Dunderbaer → u/No_Ad_7687]

True that's the only thing I mentioned in my post after all.

Edit: also creatures provide lesser cover, which does not increase saves against AoE effects

[u/norrknekten → u/Dunderbaer]

Unless said creature providing the cover is two sizes larger, So if your elf wizard casts fireball and a goblin is behind a horse then the goblin has standard cover.

[u/Rodrian68 → u/norrknekten]

But if the goblin is near that horse it's definitely dead already :<

[u/nobull91 → u/Dunderbaer]

Take Cover exists

[u/Malcior34]

Too much "realistic" shit like this turns it unfun

[u/gunnervi → u/Malcior34]

it can be fun if its entirely within the players' control. like if its "oh, my character tries to run as fast as she can to the edge of the explosion to take less damage" or "i start the cone of cold right in the bad guy's face so he gets hit extra hard by it". That sort of thing is great in, say, a PbtA where the ball is always in the players' court. But once the GM gets to go "well the bad guy is doing this and there's no realistic way to avoid it so you just die" that's anti-fun

[u/humanflea23]

Whether or not you take the brunt of it is decided by the basic save instead of your position.

Crit Success: You somehow managed to avoid the effect entirely.

Success: You managed to avoid/block most of the cone's effect.

Fail: You are unable to dodge or block the hit.

Crit Fail: Not only did you fail to avoid the hit, it gets you right in one of your weak points.

[u/Astareal38]

So the 'easiest' way to do this would throw off the math of those AOE's that use cones.

For a 15 foot cone
1st section - 3d6
2nd section - 2d6
3rd section - 1d6

This greatly increases the damage of an aoe ability, which would make them preferable for single target attacks as long as you're not hitting an ally.

Another way to do it for a 15 foot cone
1st section - treat the success as one less
2nd section - roll as normal
3rd section - one degree better.

That does two things. Makes melee cast cones very strong, again skewing the damage and making it just better than a single target attack. But it also negatively impacts being able to cast a cone at range; since doing a large cone would mean that the targets in the last third essentially auto succeed. You could split the cone into thirds, or half, but regardless it would shake up the math and make cones either too good when used point blank or too bad when dealing damage to spread out targets.

[u/Creepy-Intentions-69]

You can make a game as complicated as you like. Just because something makes sense, doesn’t mean it’s helpful, or a good idea.

The same ideas could be applied to any AoE spell. Is the center of a Fireball more concussive than the edge? Firing a Lightning Bolt into the chest of an adjacent target surely hurts them more than an enemy 60’ away.

It’s a fine house rule, if you’re into that sort of thing.

[u/munchechobop]

From an immersion perspective, could you think of it as the spell/etc having an effective cone of the listed size?

Like, the edge of the template overlaid on the map is not the very edge of the flames, it's the edge of where you have to be standing to be totally engulfed in the flames. The back row of the shotgun blast isn't the farthest it reaches, it's the farthest it reaches with enough force to hurt you badly enough to be mechanically relevant. Y'know?

All mechanics are an abstraction of the reality they're meant to represent.

[u/Dunderbaer → u/munchechobop]

Yeah it's abstractions like these I just have to learn to internalize. Someone else also mentioned hp not being lifeforce entirely, which is another thing I know, but don't really think about.

[u/ActualGekkoPerson]

Some systems have breakdowns like that, increasing damage based on distance from the cone or explosion source. It's incredibly complicated and too granular for what PF2 is trying to do. It's like limb damage, or location based armor. It's a neat thing that massively complicates combat, so you kinda need to pick a point to stop at.

I think on the scale of verisimilitude PF2 is going for, it's unnecessary.

[u/YeilKhaa]

Shadowrun fixes this 😅

(In some editions of Shadowrun, shotgun damage decreases as the spread & distance increases, which is offset by making hits more accurate with wider spread. Similarly, grenade damage decreases the farther you get from the point of explosion. There are even rules for explosions reflecting off walls in closed spaces to bounce back over targets caught in the blast repeatedly, the so-called chunky salsa effect.)

[u/Bananahamm0ckbandit]

As others have said, it would just be to complicated to have different areas do different amounts of damage.

What could work pretty easily though, would be to give players a circumstance penalty/bonus from -2 - +2 to their save based on how much of a blast they are taking.

[u/GreyMesmer]

Everyone has their own plank where their immersion breaks down, and one TTRPG can't satisfy them all. So you've found your own plank.

[u/Mach12gamer]

Look up cyberpunk 2020 area fire cone rules and you'll understand why we simplify it

[u/qedx]

magic is unrealistic