Are there benefits to +1~+5 Weapon Enhancements besides AB/Dmg bonus?

[WickedRequiem]

With armor, I believe enhancements increases AC benefit, max dexterity bonus, and decrease armor penalty to skills.

With weapons, do the enhancements do anything beyond providing AB/Dmg bonus? Do some creatures require certain minimum enhancement bonus to hit?

Oh, and yes, I do understand that improvement in AB/Dmg is a pretty nice effect.

[valium]

AB is extraordinarily important in the higher difficulties, to the point you would be willing to prioritize the + over any other weapon stats.

But no, monsters do not require specific +1-5 to hit. They DO have damage reduction or immunities to damage types, so keep an eye on things like cold iron and such.

[happybjorn]

Yes, they can overcome damage resistances. I don't think there are any to hit restrictions (there can always be some kind planar nonsense or dimensional pocket of protection, but these shouldn't interact with to hit). What exactly can be overcome for DR depends on how big the enhancement bonus is, and not all DR can be overcome (except by doing more damage than the DR).

If you want a general idea of how this works look at a Monk's Ki pool. If you want specifics try the game's encyclopedia entry for damage reduction.

There can be some other minor benefits/interaction: For example, the Magus (and subclasses) Arcane Pool can be used to make a weapon flaming (among other things), but the weapon has to be magical. I'm pretty sure enchanting also has this requirement, but that's not in the normal game and I don't know how mods handle it.

For armor I'm almost completely certain that enhancement doesn't affect max dexterity bonus. This should be a result of the material the armor is made of, like Mithril.

[Finrod]

I don't know if they applied it into the videogame but in tabletop, the +3, +4 and +5 weapons (basic bonus when fabricated, not when enhanced with the spell) had a damage reduction bypass.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/special-abilities/

+3 bypass silver/cold iron
+4 bypass adamantine
+5 bypass alignment based reduction

[valium]

They did not, the +1-5 are purely for AB/damage.

[grognardgary]

Originally posted by happybjorn:

Yes, they can overcome damage resistances. I don't think there are any to hit restrictions (there can always be some kind planar nonsense or dimensional pocket of protection, but these shouldn't interact with to hit). What exactly can be overcome for DR depends on how big the enhancement bonus is, and not all DR can be overcome (except by doing more damage than the DR).

If you want a general idea of how this works look at a Monk's Ki pool. If you want specifics try the game's encyclopedia entry for damage reduction.

There can be some other minor benefits/interaction: For example, the Magus (and subclasses) Arcane Pool can be used to make a weapon flaming (among other things), but the weapon has to be magical. I'm pretty sure enchanting also has this requirement, but that's not in the normal game and I don't know how mods handle it.

For armor I'm almost completely certain that enhancement doesn't affect max dexterity bonus. This should be a result of the material the armor is made of, like Mithril.

Correct the only thing that affects max dex is mithril and adamantite. Note many moons ago in one of the old rule books there were rules for Orichalcum and a host of other magical or esoteric metals but it is not here,