Is every attack against a weapon/shield a sunder attempt? (Also, Mountain Hammer relation to this)

Question

The first question is self-explanatory, and if the answer is yes, is Mountain Hammer and it's upgrades usable on such items without counting as sunder attempts? If not, can they be used instead of an attack in a sunder attampt?

Answer 1

No

Not every attack you make against a weapon/shield is a sunder attempt, for the same reason that not every attack you make after moving 10' or more in a straight line is a charge. A sunder attempt has a lot of rules (attack of opportunity, opposed rolls, etc) that a normal attack doesn't.

In fact, many attacks that don't pass AC are actually striking a shield/armor, and they won't have a chance to sunder them. It's an abstraction thing.

Now, the answer for "can I do a special attack as a sunder attempt" is more open to debate, and will almost always have to be at the DM's discretion.

As for Mountain Hammer in particular, it says "Target: One creature or unattended object", which would show that they specifically singled out "attended object" of the maneuver scope, so it seems RAI is "No, you cant", but again, DM's call.

Answer 2

Technically, sunder and mountain hammer are incompatible…

Tome of Battle on (Type) on Strike, in part, says that "you cannot combine special attacks such as sunder or bull rush with strikes, even if you have feats that make such special attacks more potent. However, some strikes enable you to make special attacks as part of their initiation…" (43). Sadly, the 2nd-level Stone Dragon maneuver mountain hammer [strike] (84) doesn't say anything about enabling a special attack like a sunder attempt. (See also here.)

Further, the mountain hammer maneuver and its relatives have the entry Target: One creature or unattended object, and a sunder attempt is made against an attended object rather than a creature or an unattended object: The Player's Handbook on Sunder begins by saying, "You can use a melee attack with a slashing or bludgeoning weapon to strike a weapon or shield that your opponent is holding" (158). Just to be clear, an attended object is one that's "being grasped, touched, or worn" by a creature (Player's Handbook 166).

Finally, in response to the question's title, it's more accurate to say that a sunder attempt is typically an attack against a foe's shield or weapon. That is, an average creature can't accidentally or as a rider make a sunder attempt in addition to the creature's normal attack! (Shields and weapons in 3.5 don't normally suffer damage during use—the game just doesn't roll that way.) That is, making a sunder attempt usually replaces completely one of a typical creature's melee attacks, and that attack is aimed squarely at just the shield or weapon. A special ability is needed—something specific beyond just being able to initiate maneuvers—for a creature to make, for example, a lone attack that's simultaneously both a sunder attempt and a standard attack!

…But a DM might allow it anyway

All that said, this reader agrees that, in the abstract, making a sunder attempt with the mountain hammer maneuver should probably be a thing. Such a possibility is even implied by the description of the 5th-level Stone Dragon maneuver elder mountain hammer [strike] (ToB 82–3) that, in part, says that a "strike delivered by a Stone Dragon adept can shatter a warrior's shield." I think only a very small segment of readers imagined that describing a warrior's shield on display in a museum or something! Further, without being able to sunder with the maneuver its ability to overcome hardness is otherwise generally wasted in combat except against rare foes like animated objects.

Still, because these maneuvers ignore hardness and deal so much damage, sunder attempts using those maneuvers will be almost universally successful. While most agree that destroying treasure is bad—Don't shoot food! and all that—, a more cavalier player could view it as the price of doing business, assuming wealth by level will catch up with her despite her recklessness. The problem is that the DM may feel obligated to do the same thing: Monsters should realize that the special attack sunder has received an upgrade if it can be used with the mountain hammer maneuver, and it's trivial for the DM to change a monster's Alertness feat to the feat Martial Study (mountain hammer) (ToB 31–2) and vastly increase that monster's danger to the party.

In addition to an arms race that may develop between the players and DM to find ways around constantly broken weapons, this change also tends to hurt martial PCs more than casters as martial PCs tend to invest heavily in a lone main weapon. If enemies are constantly breaking PCs' weapons, players will gravitate to PCs that don't need weapons—like casters. In other words, consider carefully the ramifications on both sides of the screen before allowing the sunder special attack to be used with the mountain hammer-style maneuvers.

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Note: See also the Player's Handbook on Sundering a Carried or Worn Object (158 and here) for ways to break things a foe is wearing or carrying that aren't a shield or weapon, the Complete Warrior feat Combat Brute (110) for one way to follow up a successful sunder attempt with an attack, and the Stormwrack special material riverine (128) as an example of a material out of which one can make a nearly unbreakable weapon.