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Hey Guys,

Now I know you've been running Carrion Crown, and I have stumbled across a few issues as my party (I'm GMing) doesn't have a Cleric or a Paladin (and I think your party doesn't either).

In the rules, a Haunt can only be affected by Positive Energy either through the use of spells that inflict that energy type (i.e. Cure Light Wounds, Disrupt Undead, etc) or through Channel Positive Energy such as that used by Clerics and Paladins.

I have a few questions:

1) What affect does Holy Water have on a haunt?
2) If it has an affect, how is it used against the haunt (i.e. missile splash weapon, needing an attack roll, just poured on, etc)?
3)Also, if it does, is it a requirement that it has to be used in the area of the haunt or on a specific place within the haunt?
4) What affected does a Cure potion (any type) have on the haunt?
5) If it has an affect, how is it used against the haunt (i.e. missile splash weapon, needing an attack roll, just poured on, etc)?

I'm not sure if I have my head around how a haunt can be affected by anyone other than a spell caster (using the spells mentioned above) or a Cleric/Paladin.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Might make more sense if you think about a haunt more like a trap than a monster.

its not meant to be something you can simply bash away at until it can't hurt you any more. Like a trap it has a nasty effect and once its over, its over, something you'll survive more often than defeat.

in other words don't just look for ways to damage a Haunt look for ways to avoid it, trick it, hide from it, survive it, or work out what causing it and how you might create a condition to stop it.

Perhaps you find out that it died in agony while church bells were ringing, make some huge bell noise when you encounter it and maybe it'll flee from the memory of pain.

The whole point of Haunts is to create a challenge no one is well equipped to deal with.

There plenty of monster you can kill with brute force and traps for the rogue to disarm Haunts were meant to be something different and approaching them like any other monster is a mistake and a missed opportunity for some interesting gaming.

Firstly you as Vlade pointed out, Haunts are supernatural traps - generally very localised traps.

You can't do squat to them until they manifest as a rule of thumb but channel energy will work (and other things that replicate it like Haunt Siphons) once they are manifesting.

Some GMs will rule Holy Water does nothing as they don't have anything that you can target (unlike other undead which occupy spaces even if incorporeal), others will allow it if you use it on the area.

The thing to remember is that unless you "solve" the haunt, you can't permanently defeat it.

My question stems from the fact that the party that I'm running through Carrion Crown is made up of the following:

* Dhampir Inquisitor
* Tierfling Magus
* Wererat Rogue

And before you say it, its a weird combination I know. Ravengro has been an interesting place for them to deal with.

The only thing they can do is use Disrupt Undead (which the Magus and the Inquisitor has). They have only experienced 2 haunts, one being an animated cauldron (I used the D0 module which I radically changed for the adventure) and the other was the upstairs haunt (for those that have played it, you will know what I mean).

They had some big problems with that haunt, not from damage but from being forced to run away. The players were frustrating claiming module design flaws. "What would happen if it was a party of fighters?" was one claim.

I personally think it was more the fact that they rolled like crap that night and were forced to flee. I have since explained the comparison between Traps and Haunts but only one of the players is not convinced.

While I'm here though, how does a Cure Light Wounds spell affect a haunt which doesn't have a thing to target? Do you just target the area where the haunt is affecting (i.e. their 5ft x CR area of affect)?