Items that have taken damage in excess of half their total hit points gain the broken condition, meaning they are less effective at their designated task.

The broken condition has the following effects, depending upon the item.

* If the item is a weapon, any attacks made with the item suffer a –2 penalty on attack and damage rolls.

Such weapons only score a critical hit on a natural 20 and only deal ×2 damage on a confirmed critical hit.

* If the item is a suit of armor or a shield, the bonus it grants to Damage reduction(armor) or Defense(Shield) is halved, rounding down.

Broken armor doubles its armor check penalty on skills.

* If the item is a tool needed for a skill, any skill check made with the item takes a –2 penalty.

* If the item is a wand or staff, it uses up twice as many charges when used.

* If the item does not fit into any of these categories, the broken condition has no effect on its use.

Items with the broken condition, regardless of type, are worth 75% of their normal value. If the item is magical, it can only be repaired with a mending or make whole spell cast by a character with a caster level equal to or higher than the item's. Items lose the broken condition if the spell restores the object to half its original hit points or higher. Non-magical items can be repaired in a similar fashion, or through the Craft skill used to create it. Generally speaking, this requires a DC 20 Craft check and 1 hour of work per point of damage to be repaired. Most craftsmen charge one-tenth the item's total cost to repair such damage (more if the item is badly damaged or ruined).

Material Special Quality: Fragile

Fragile weapons and armor cannot take the beating that sturdier weapons can. A fragile weapon gains the broken condition if the wielder rolls a natural 1 on an attack roll with the weapon. If a fragile weapon is already broken, the roll of a natural 1 destroys it instead.

Armor with the fragile quality falls apart when hit with heavy blows. If an attacker hits a creature wearing fragile armor with an attack roll of a natural 20 and confirms the critical hit (even if the creature is immune to critical hits), the armor gains the broken condition. If already broken, the armor is destroyed instead. Fragile armor is not broken or destroyed by critical threats that are not generated by natural 20s, so if a creature wielding a weapon with a 19–20 or 18–20 critical range scores a critical hit on the wearer of this armor with a roll of less than a natural 20, that critical hit has no chance to break or destroy the armor.

Masterwork and magical fragile weapons and armor lack these flaws unless otherwise noted in the item description or the special material description.