Sunbolt Damage Type [magic]

[Tinman]

I'm not sure how to deal with this issue:

1) In Magic p.114 it lists sunbolt's damage as 1d-1 imp* damage.
*(I think it's a holdover form 3e where where lasers were imp.)
2) In pyramid 3-28 p.15 Yellow Goblin Magic, it confirms/repeats sunbolt doing 1d-1 imp.
3) In the gca5 program it showes sunbolt at 1d-1 burn
4) In the DFRPG spells p.48 it has sunbolt at: 1d burn

Question: what is the correct damage for sunbolt?

my thoughts:
Lasers are now tightbeam burn & that's prob what sunbolt should be.
The 1d-1 works when it's imp as ice dagger is also 1d-1 imp.
However, if it's 1d-1 burn it's low compared to flat damage spells such as fireball, ice sphere, stone missile, acid ball, ect...
.

[Varyon]

Something called Sunbolt strikes me as something that a lot of enemies would be weak against (assuming it's treated as though it were natural sunlight, which a lot of evil creatures don't handle very well) and very few would be resistant/immune to. If that's the case, 1d-1 burn could still be balanced - sure, it's not as powerful against typical foes as fireball, but there are a lot of atypical foes that it's more powerful against (due to presence of Vulnerability and Weakness and lack of properly-aspected DR and IT:DR), which may balance out overall.

[Anaraxes]

The "correct" value is going to be whatever you decide it is.

1. The errata for 1st printing of Magic says

Originally Posted by Errata

P. 114. Under Sunbolt, change "and does impaling damage" to "and does burning damage".

http://www.sjgames.com/errata/gurps/4e/magic.html

So imp is out.

2. That Pyramid is from 2011, so evidently they missed the errata. My PDF of Magic doesn't contain that change, so perhaps SJG hasn't ever released an updated book.

3. If you're looking for a purely lawyerly argument, I don't think GCA is supposed to be canonical, or a means of delivery of changes to the rules. But note that GCA incorporates the errata mentioned above, exactly officially correct. It may not be canonical for rules arguments, but that doesn't mean it doesn't do a good job of implementing things...

4. DFRPG does change rules from GURPS. Strictly speaking, they're not the same game. So, that value tells you what Kromm would have chosen when he had the chance to make a change, but doesn't officially override GURPS. It both corrects the damage type to "burn", as you suggest and the errata mentions, and also bumps the damage a bit perhaps to make up for the loss in damage multiplier. (1d per FP is the baseline for Missile spell damage. The -1 / +1 here and there for different types is nice for flavor and balance, so it's not unreasonable for the imp attacks to get a -1 on their die.) You might well want to make that same choice in your houserule.

[Harald387]

in GURPS I treat it as 1d-1 tight-beam burning.

DFRPG isn't GURPS (it's got a few differences from the core rules, and one of those is 'tight-beam burning doesn't exist'), and in DFRPG it's 1d burn.

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Tinman

Question: what is the correct damage for sunbolt?

What are you running? Regular GURPS or DFRPG?

[Tinman]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

What are you running? Regular GURPS or DFRPG?

Regular GURPS DF

[zoncxs]

It is an errata. The discription itself in Magic p.114 states it is burning damage.

[Tinman]

Originally Posted by zoncxs

It is an errata. The discription itself in Magic p.114 states it is burning damage.

OK, but at 1d or 1d-1?

[zoncxs]

Originally Posted by Tinman

OK, but at 1d or 1d-1?

Your choice.

Magic has it at 1d-1 br

DFRPG, which is it's own, stand alone product, has it at 1d br.

Pyramid 3-28 is NOT sunbolt, it is SUNBURST:

"This spell creates a sunbolt that does impaling damage to
whatever it hits, remains in quasi-solid form (but cannot be
removed – it will simply flow like quicksilver if anyone makes
an attempt to grab or teleport it), and then explodes after a
three-second delay"

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by zoncxs

Pyramid 3-28 is NOT sunbolt, it is SUNBURST:

"This spell creates a sunbolt that does impaling damage to
whatever it hits, remains in quasi-solid form (but cannot be
removed – it will simply flow like quicksilver if anyone makes
an attempt to grab or teleport it), and then explodes after a
three-second delay"

This implies the existence of a spell that creates a non-exploding "sunbolt" - which I assume is meant to be something like "a crossbow bolt made of sunlight". Maybe in a setting where Sunburst is available the "laser beam" version should be renamed Sunbeam (and probably do 1d burn, as in DFRPG), with Sunbolt dealing 1d-1 imp?