How long does a thunderstone deafen a creature?

[CanadienneBacon]

A player of mine used a thunderstone as a grenade-like weapon. He threw the thunderstone into melee and deafened another PC. How long does a thunderstone deafen a creature? We looked in the core books for a rule, were unable to find one, and then today I checked the WotC errata, FAQ and SRD without finding an answer. Perhaps I missed the rule and someone here can give an answer? I ad-hoc ruled that it deafened the PC for five rounds.

 

[KarinsDad]

One hour. 3.5 PHB page 129.

The duration is not listed in the 3E PHB.

 

[James McMurray]

In 3E the duration is permanent until healed.

 

[KarinsDad]

In 3E the duration is permanent until healed.

Source?

 

[dcollins]

The 3E "permanent" answer was given by the Sage, not sure if it's in the 3E FAQ or not. The reasoning was that no duration was given in the PHB because there is no limitation to it.

 

[James McMurray]

What he said.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Thank you. The source is not the FAQ; I looked in the 3.0 FAQ this morning. Is there a record of Sage answers somewhere that I can download or view?

 

[KarinsDad]

The 3E "permanent" answer was given by the Sage, not sure if it's in the 3E FAQ or not. The reasoning was that no duration was given in the PHB because there is no limitation to it.

Just another example of where the Sage and I disagree as to what is reasonable and what is not.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

I ruled that the noise is akin to an artillery blast and temporarily deafens a character for five rounds. I'm considering whether I ought to go with a permanent duration, but it doesn't make a lot of common sense to me. It makes rules mechanics sense; every time the PCs throw a thunderstone and they deafen an ally, they will want the cleric to burn a spell to restore the hearing loss. It's basically a resource drain. IRL, the deafness of arty usually lasts for about half a minute but repeated exposure will permanently deafen a person or at least reduce one's capacity to hear. Perhaps a -1 to listen checks for X numbers of exposures to thunderstone noise?

 

[dcollins]

Just another example of where the Sage and I disagree as to what is reasonable and what is not.

I agree, that was a cruddy ruling. (1 hour is far more reasonable.) At the time he defended it by saying it wasn't that bad a penalty since it's so easy in D&D to get magical healing (remove deafness).