# Resist 5 - how does it work



## Istar (Sep 15, 2011)

How does Resist damage actually work.

Say  the enemy attacks you and hits, and does.

10 weapon damage and 10 additional fire damage.

Does your resist kick in on both of these, or is just resist on 5 out of the 20.

Our DM was hitting us with these ranged attacks, they inflicted many conditions, but also did damage as above.

The way he read it out individually, I resisted a heap of it.

He then started wondering out aloud if he did it right.
As it was a total of 20 damage from the 1 attack, even though the damage was 2 different types.


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## Pentius (Sep 15, 2011)

Most attacks don't do separate damage types.  A flaming sword, for example, would just be fire damage.  A fire and ice spell would do X fire and ice damage(all mixed together).  If he's specifically separating it like that, then I could see an argument for separate resists working on each type, but for mixed types of damage, you need to resist both types to avoid any of the damage.


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## wedgeski (Sep 15, 2011)

I thought I knew the answer to this, then checked the Glossary entry on the Compendium and realised that I did not, in fact, know the answer after all. I'm going to let someone more knowledgeable than me handle the definition of "Combined Damage Types" because I suspect it's quite thorny.


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## Istar (Sep 15, 2011)

Pentius said:


> Most attacks don't do separate damage types. A flaming sword, for example, would just be fire damage. A fire and ice spell would do X fire and ice damage(all mixed together). If he's specifically separating it like that, then I could see an argument for separate resists working on each type, but for mixed types of damage, you need to resist both types to avoid any of the damage.




He was rolling seperately for each damage type, after the hit.

2D8 normal damage

Plus

2D6 Fire


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## Pentius (Sep 15, 2011)

Yeah, for completely separate damage types and rolls, I don't see why resist wouldn't work twice, if you resisted each type.  The attack is almost certainly homebrew, so he may think differently, but there you have it.


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## Grydan (Sep 15, 2011)

wedgeski said:


> I thought I knew the answer to this, then checked the Glossary entry on the Compendium and realised that I did not, in fact, know the answer after all. I'm going to let someone more knowledgeable than me handle the definition of "Combined Damage Types" because I suspect it's quite thorny.




They've changed how it works at least once, which can add to the confusion. Someone using the _Player's Handbook_ without errata and updates is going to have a very different answer than someone with a more up-to-date source.

[MENTION=80713]Istar[/MENTION] I believe you had the right of it. 

Weapon damage isn't a type: attacks that don't have a specific damage type listed do *untyped* damage. Any time an attack does both untyped and typed damage, the two are listed separately. 

While two or more types of damage can be combined in an attack, untyped never combines. It either gets over-written (a flaming weapon's At-Will power turns all untyped damage into fire damage), or has some amount of typed damage done in addition to it.

As those damages are listed separately, even if they're coming from the same attack, they are resisted separately.


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## Nullzone (Sep 15, 2011)

I rule it per attack.

If you have Resist 5 all and take 2d8 weapon+2d6 fire damage from a single attack roll, you resist 5 damage from the sum total.

If you have Resist 2 all and Resist 10 fire, and take the same 2d8 weapon+2d6 fire from a single attack roll, you're going to resist 2.

If you have Resist 2 all and Resist 10 fire, and take 2d8 weapon damage, plus 2d6 fire from the secondary attack, then you resist 12.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 15, 2011)

I would rule that you resist 5 of the total 20.

If you have Resist X All, you could resist all the damage, but if you had Resist X Fire, you would only resist the fire part of it and at least 10 points (the untyped weapon damage) would go through.


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## Colmarr (Sep 15, 2011)

Pentius said:


> Yeah, for completely separate damage types and rolls, I don't see why resist wouldn't work twice, if you resisted each type. The attack is almost certainly homebrew, so he may think differently, but there you have it.




FWIW, I believe that some of the MM1 fire giants did AdX untyped damage and BdY fire damage, so this may not be a homebrew power at all.

I personally would find it strange that a creature with 'resist all 5' resists 5 points of damage from a "2d10" attack, but resists 10 from a "1d10 and 1d10" attack, so I would rule the other way, but I don't think RAW (or at least the rules compendium) has a clear answer for this... probably because that method of recording damage was abandoned before it was written.


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## Mengu (Sep 15, 2011)

I recall using a number of monsters who do this, such monsters certainly exist. Recently I used an Orium Dragon Wyrmling, who does 1d8+6 damage plus 1d6 acid damage. If you have resist acid, it would only apply to the acid portion of the damage. So for instance if DM rolled a 3 on the d6, and PC had resist 5 acid, PC would take no damage from the acid, but none of the untyped damage is reduced. If the PC has resist 5 all, then both the untyped damage, and the acid damage would be reduced by 5. They are separate damage rolls, and the resistance will apply separately.


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## S'mon (Sep 15, 2011)

Per attack.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 15, 2011)

Resistance works whenever you take damage, not whenever a power functions or whenever you are attacked.  Thus, if an attack/power does 1d10 weapon damage and 1d10 fire damage, resist 5 all would resist 5 from the first damage and 5 from the second.  This is merely an artifact of bad design in the attack/power, not of the resistance mechanic.  The simple solution to this if you have a problem with it like [MENTION=59182]Colmarr[/MENTION] is to change the damage to 2d10 weapon/fire damage.

The fire giant trooper (a minion) has this attack:


> *Searing Longsword* (standard, at-will)
> 
> 
> 
> ...



 Note that the damage is split out, so in fact it does 10 untyped damage and 1d8 fire damage.  Let's assume he rolls an 8 on 1d8, so with resist 5 all the target would take 5 untyped and 3 fire.  With resist 5 fire, he would take 10 untyped and 3 fire.  This is clearly (IMO) within the scope of a minion.  The fire damage is an extra rider effect and resisting it "twice" is okay.  If the design wanted it to be a combo-effect, then it should have been 1d8 + 10 fire damage.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 15, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> Note that the damage is split out, so in fact it does 10 untyped damage and 1d8 fire damage.  Let's assume he rolls an 8 on 1d8, so with resist 5 all the target would take 5 untyped and 3 fire.  With resist 5 fire, he would take 10 untyped and 3 fire.  This is clearly (IMO) within the scope of a minion.  The fire damage is an extra rider effect and resisting it "twice" is okay.  If the design wanted it to be a combo-effect, then it should have been 1d8 + 10 fire damage.



That might be RAW or it might not be. I don't have the books here at work, so I can't check the fine print.

But it certainly doesn't make any sense to me. "10 damage plus 1d8 fire damage" is one single damage expression, some of which is fire. You can apply your resistance whenever you take damage from an attack. One attack, one damage expression, one resist.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 15, 2011)

I wouldn't sign my life away on it, either, so the point is certainly arguable.  The two places I checked were the on-line compendium glossary on "damage type" and "resist."  However, I do argue that it _does _make sense.  Specifically, that is *not *one single damage expression, it's two.  It's "10 damage" and "1d8 fire damage."  The word damage is used twice, not once.  For your point to hold water, IMO, it would need to say 10 plus 1d8 weapon/fire damage.  In other words, if it's one expression then I would argue that the damage must be a _combined type_.


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## Selganor (Sep 15, 2011)

Resist kicks in on each damage type affected by the resist.

So in the example with X normal (weapon) damage and Y fire damage you would reduce up to 10 points (up to 5 weapon and up to 5 fire). If you only take 1 fire damage and 9 weapon damage you would take no fire damage and 4 weapon damage.

Usually "normal" (i.e. untyped/unnamed) damage like normal weapon damage is only resisted by "resist X *all*" resists.

But if you get hit with an attack that does multiple damage types at once (like "cold and necrotic" or "fire and acid") the lowest of your resistances will apply.
If you got a "Resist X all" you needn't worry as all types are at X, but if you only got "Resist 5 cold" and would get hit with "8 cold and necrotic" you would take the full 8 points as your lower resistance (in this case "Resist 0 Necrotic") would apply.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 15, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> I wouldn't sign my life away on it, either, so the point is certainly arguable.  The two places I checked were the on-line compendium glossary on "damage type" and "resist."  However, I do argue that it _does _make sense.  Specifically, that is *not *one single damage expression, it's two.  It's "10 damage" and "1d8 fire damage."  The word damage is used twice, not once.  For your point to hold water, IMO, it would need to say 10 plus 1d8 weapon/fire damage.  In other words, if it's one expression then I would argue that the damage must be a _combined type_.



Well, a combined type has its own very specific rules (eg "10 necrotic damage plus 10 cold damage" is very different from "20 necrotic and cold damage"), so I see that as something else entirely.

Let's reason around the case of "10 necrotic damage plus 10 cold damage". With Resist 5 Cold, I would take 15 points of damage (10 necrotic and 5 cold). With Resist 5 Necrotic, I would also take 15 points of damage (5 necrotic and 10 cold), but with Resist 5 All you're saying that I only take 10 points of damage (5 necrotic and 5 cold). So Resist X All gets more effective the more (separate) components the damage consist of?

Two things, though:

1. I still think that it can be considered a single damage expression, even though it has two parts. A price of four dollars and 50 cents is still a single price. A man of six foot two inches only has a single height.

2. Would you also apply the resist multiple times if the damage consist of both weapon damage and sneak attack damage? Fire damage and curse damage?


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## the Jester (Sep 15, 2011)

Oldtimer said:


> Two things, though:
> 
> 1. I still think that it can be considered a single damage expression, even though it has two parts. A price of four dollars and 50 cents is still a single price. A man of six foot two inches only has a single height.
> 
> 2. Would you also apply the resist multiple times if the damage consist of both weapon damage and sneak attack damage? Fire damage and curse damage?




1. A more appropriate analogy would be a book costing four dollars and ten dollars, or a man of 6'2" and 5'10" height.

2. Weapon and sneak attack damage are the same type of damage (untyped). Curse damage adds to the existing damage of a power IIRC (IDHMBIFOM). If your curse did "1d8 psychic damage" on top of the normal damage inflicted by the power, then yes, it would apply twice.


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## wedgeski (Sep 15, 2011)

Yup. Glad I stayed out of this man-trap!


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## Traveon Wyvernspur (Sep 15, 2011)

It would depend on the resistance that is in question. If you are resistant 5 to fire you'd remove that from just the fire damage taken. 

Say the DM rolled 2d6 for the fire damage and rolled a 1/2 (3 points fire damage) and 2d8 for the weapon damage for rolls of 3/5 (8 points weapon damage)

In the case of resist 5 FIRE I'd rule that since you only took 3 points of fire damage and could resist UP TO 5, you would not be subject to any fire damage, but you'd still be subject to the entire *8 points of weapon damage*.

If you are resist 5 ALL, then you'd take the sum of 2d6 (3 points fire) + 2d8 (8 points weapon) for a total of 11 - 5 (resist all) = *6 points total damage after resistance taken.
* 
So as you can see the "all" is better, but it doesn't (IMHO) from my understanding of the readings take 5 points from each source (weapon & fire) and give you a total of 10 resistance and only give you 1 point of damage taken. That would only be the case if you were resist 10 ALL.


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## the Jester (Sep 15, 2011)

Another point to consider: 

Let's say you have resist 5 cold and resist 5 fire. 

If you take 20 points of _cold and fire_ damage, you end up taking 15 points of damage.

However, if you take 10 points of cold and 10 points of fire damage, you end up taking only 10 damage (each resistance cuts out its own damage type separately).

This is why the way the damage is expressed matters here. The fire damage is separate. The question becomes whether to apply the resist 5 all to each damage type separately (including the 'untyped' damage) or only once. I can see an argument either way.


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## Traveon Wyvernspur (Sep 15, 2011)

I can see the argument either way, but at my table I'd rule it the way I stated above, otherwise the resistance is way over powered. 

Of course this is just my opinion and how I do it, others may think differently and that's up to them and their table rules. I just say that as long as everyone is having fun that's what matters most.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 15, 2011)

Oldtimer said:


> So Resist X All gets more effective the more (separate) components the damage consist of?



 Yes.  And, I don't see a problem with that and it's certainly not way overpowered.  It's rare that a power is written this way and it's a design issue of the power itself, not the resistance.  Simply, just change it to "20 necrotic and cold damage" and it's fixed.  Note that as [MENTION=1210]the Jester[/MENTION] points out, you have the exact same problem with multiple resistances.  In your example of 10 necrotic damage and 10 cold damage, if you have resist 5 necrotic and resist 5 cold, you take only 10 damage right (otherwise the only way to rule it is to take all 20 damage, making such a damage expression unresistable except by all)?  But, if the damage were 20 necrotic and cold damage, you would take 15 damage, right?  Isn't that an equally appalling outcome?


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## Ryujin (Sep 15, 2011)

Didn't they errata away this whole issue by saying that 10 of this type plus 10 of that type is now 20 of thisthat type?


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## Grydan (Sep 16, 2011)

Ryujin said:


> Didn't they errata away this whole issue by saying that 10 of this type plus 10 of that type is now 20 of thisthat type?




Not quite.

Originally, when an attack specifically did two types of damage (not the "1d10+4 damage + 1d6 cold damage" sort of thing being discussed here, but stuff like "2d10+4 fire and radiant damage"), you had to arrive at the total damage, then divide it amongst the various damage types equally. If the numbers didn't divide equally, the first listed type got the remainder. Which was a mess and a hassle. Especially when you encountered damage that had more than two types.

That got simplified down into all of the damage of an attack with multiple types on it being combined, as you said. But that's still specifically for damage that is "x and y damage", not for things that split "damage + x damage". If the damage is already split like that, there was never a need to figure out how to split it afterwards, so it's not covered by the revision.


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## Unwise (Sep 16, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> Resistance works whenever you take damage, not whenever a power functions or whenever you are attacked.  Thus, if an attack/power does 1d10 weapon damage and 1d10 fire damage, resist 5 all would resist 5 from the first damage and 5 from the second.  This is merely an artifact of bad design in the attack/power, not of the resistance mechanic.  The simple solution to this if you have a problem with it like [MENTION=59182]Colmarr[/MENTION] is to change the damage to 2d10 weapon/fire damage.




I agree with this, if it were based on per attack, then resistance should not help with ongoing damage. It would also not work for environments or other damage that does not make an attack.

That being said, generally those attacks written with multiple types of damage are poorly conceived so I tinker with them a bit. In effect I do just let people use resistance against one of the damage types, but I don't pretend it is RAW and consider it a house rule.


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## Istar (Sep 16, 2011)

Colmarr said:


> FWIW, I believe that some of the MM1 fire giants did AdX untyped damage and BdY fire damage, so this may not be a homebrew power at all.
> 
> I personally would find it strange that a creature with 'resist all 5' resists 5 points of damage from a "2d10" attack, but resists 10 from a "1d10 and 1d10" attack, so I would rule the other way, but I don't think RAW (or at least the rules compendium) has a clear answer for this... probably because that method of recording damage was abandoned before it was written.




I may have mixed my examples, its just Goliath racial power resist 5.

This is one of the standard campaigns, dont think anything modified much at all.


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## S'mon (Sep 16, 2011)

Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.

DR 5 (untyped) applies once, to any.
DR 5 (fire) applies once, to fire damage.
DR 5 (cold) applies once, to cold damage.

If you have all three, and you take 8 cold, 8 fire and 8 untyped damage from 1 attack, you can apply them all and take 3+3+3=9 damage.

If you have only DR 5 (untyped) you can ony apply it once, and take 3+8+8=19 damage.

Simples.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 16, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> In your example of 10 necrotic damage and 10 cold damage, if you have resist 5 necrotic and resist 5 cold, you take only 10 damage right (otherwise the only way to rule it is to take all 20 damage, making such a damage expression unresistable except by all)?  But, if the damage were 20 necrotic and cold damage, you would take 15 damage, right?  Isn't that an equally appalling outcome?



No, not quite. To me it makes sense. A single resistance is useful against damage of a single type. Against damage of a combined type (necrotic and cold) you need to combine your resistances into a single value before applying it (and there are clear rules for that).

The suggested rule for Resist X All, however, goes the other way and consider it like white light that can be split up into its constituent resistances before applying it to the damage.

So it comes down to whether you consider Resist X All to be an amalgam of all different resistances (and so can be split up into several when needed) or if it's just a single resistance that can be applied against any type of damage.

My personal preference is the latter option. But I think the rules are unclear on this.


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## Nullzone (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.
> 
> DR 5 (untyped) applies once, to any.
> DR 5 (fire) applies once, to fire damage.
> ...




Uh. No. If you have DR 5 fire and DR 5 cold, you resist 5. It's the same principle as differing resistance values; if you have DR 2 fire and DR 7 cold and get hit by a fire and cold attack, you're only going to resist 2. Lowest common denominator (except resist all, which trumps everything else) is all you get.


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## S'mon (Sep 16, 2011)

Nullzone said:


> Uh. No. If you have DR 5 fire and DR 5 cold, you resist 5. It's the same principle as differing resistance values; if you have DR 2 fire and DR 7 cold and get hit by a fire and cold attack, you're only going to resist 2. Lowest common denominator (except resist all, which trumps everything else) is all you get.




No, you are right that _if you have DR 2 fire and DR 7 cold and get hit by a fire and cold attack, you're only going to resist 2
_ BUT I'm not talking about post-MM style "20 fire and cold" damage attacks; I'm talking about MM-style "10 fire damage and 10 cold damage" attacks.  Kapeesh?


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## Nullzone (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> No, you are right that _if you have DR 2 fire and DR 7 cold and get hit by a fire and cold attack, you're only going to resist 2
> _ BUT I'm not talking about post-MM style "20 fire and cold" damage attacks; I'm talking about MM-style "10 fire damage and 10 cold damage" attacks.  Kapeesh?




Gotcha, misunderstood the distinction you were making.


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## Mengu (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.
> 
> DR 5 (untyped) applies once, to any.
> DR 5 (fire) applies once, to fire damage.
> ...




I don't understand this logic... There is no such thing as "DR 5 (untyped)". It's Resist All. "All" means all encompassing. If I was going to just take 8 cold damage, and I had Resist 5 All, I would apply the resistance would I not? In this example, I'm taking 8 cold damage, I apply resist 5. I'm taking 8 fire damage, I apply resist 5. I'm taking 8 untyped damage, I apply resist 5. I take 3+3+3=9 damage.

If there was such a thing as "Resist Untyped" I could agree, but such is not the case.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.



As I pointed out earlier in the thread, this isn't necessarily true.  Below is the wording from the compendium.  It doesn't use the word attack until it talks about combined types.  The section on not cumulative resistances also doesn't mention attacks, so I think your interpretation isn't technically supported on two counts.


			
				DDI Compendium said:
			
		

> A creature that has resistance takes less damage from a specific damage  type. For example, a creature that has resist 10 fire takes 10 less  damage whenever it takes fire damage.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 16, 2011)

Oldtimer said:


> The suggested rule for Resist X All, however, goes the other way and consider it like white light that can be split up into its constituent resistances before applying it to the damage.
> 
> So it comes down to whether you consider Resist X All to be an amalgam of all different resistances (and so can be split up into several when needed) or if it's just a single resistance that can be applied against any type of damage.



 That's actually a really good analogy and I yes I think that's what we're saying.  I think you were right earlier and the interpretation on this point really comes down to deciding if the damage expression is combined or not.  I'm arguing for only two types of damage expressions: combined or not combined.  I'm inferring from your comments that you're arguing for three types of damage expressions by separating out this specific example of "X <type> damage plus Y <other_type> damage."

Is this a correct inference?


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 16, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> As I pointed out earlier in the thread, this isn't necessarily true.  Below is the wording from the compendium.  It doesn't use the word attack until it talks about combined types.  The section on not cumulative resistances also doesn't mention attacks, so I think your interpretation isn't technically supported on two counts.




True, but the wording doesn't make it entirely clear, either.

The example given in my hard copy says "a creature has resist 10 lightning and resist 5 thunder, and an attack deals 15 lightning & thunder damage to it.  The creature takes 10 lightning & thunder damage, because the resistance to the combined damage types is limited to the lesser of the two (in this care, 5 thunder).  If the creature had only resist 10 lightning, it would take all 15 damage from the attack."


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## Ryujin (Sep 16, 2011)

Grydan said:


> Not quite.
> 
> Originally, when an attack specifically did two types of damage (not the "1d10+4 damage + 1d6 cold damage" sort of thing being discussed here, but stuff like "2d10+4 fire and radiant damage"), you had to arrive at the total damage, then divide it amongst the various damage types equally. If the numbers didn't divide equally, the first listed type got the remainder. Which was a mess and a hassle. Especially when you encountered damage that had more than two types.
> 
> That got simplified down into all of the damage of an attack with multiple types on it being combined, as you said. But that's still specifically for damage that is "x and y damage", not for things that split "damage + x damage". If the damage is already split like that, there was never a need to figure out how to split it afterwards, so it's not covered by the revision.




Apparently there's a reference, in the Rules Compendium, as follows:

"If a power gains or loses damage types, the power gains the keywords for any damage types that are added, and loses the keywords for any damage types that are removed."

To me, this would imply that (for example) additional cold damage (say from Gloves of Eldrich Admixture), to a power having the Fire keyword, would then result in the power having both the Cold and Fire keywords.

Unfortunately I don't have the Companion, myself, to verify this. It's how I play it though.


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## the Jester (Sep 16, 2011)

Ryujin said:


> Unfortunately I don't have the Companion, myself, to verify this. It's how I play it though.




The printed word trumps the Compendium every time (unless there's errata for that printed word), so play it by the RC and don't worry about it.


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## S'mon (Sep 16, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> As I pointed out earlier in the thread, this isn't necessarily true.  Below is the wording from the compendium.  It doesn't use the word attack until it talks about combined types.  The section on not cumulative resistances also doesn't mention attacks, so I think your interpretation isn't technically supported on two counts.




Well maybe not, but (a) your interpretation turns DR 5 into DR 15 when an attack has 3 separate damage types and (b) My approach does not, so I will be sticking with it.


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## Ryujin (Sep 16, 2011)

the Jester said:


> The printed word trumps the Compendium every time (unless there's errata for that printed word), so play it by the RC and don't worry about it.




Sorry, I mis-typed it once. I meant to write "Rules Companion", whenever I referenced the apparent source of this comment, which is a printed book. I could find no errata to reference this either.


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## Xris Robin (Sep 16, 2011)

The book is the "Rules Compendium".  And that is the rule, but that's about keywords, which is not exactly the same thing as damage types.


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## Mengu (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Well maybe not, but (a) your interpretation turns DR 5 into DR 15 when an attack has 3 separate damage types and (b) My approach does not, so I will be sticking with it.




So if I fall in an elemental pool and take 8 fire, 8 cold, 8 acid damage, and have resist 5 fire and cold, I take 3+3+8=14 damage, but if I have resist 5 fire, cold, acid, lightning, thunder, radiant, necrotic, poison, and everything else under the sun (i.e. resist 5 all), I take 3+8+8=19 damage? I don't think that's right. Resist 5 all means resist 5 all, not resist 5 one out of three.


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 16, 2011)

Mengu said:


> So if I fall in an elemental pool and take 8 fire, 8 cold, 8 acid damage, and have resist 5 fire and cold, I take 3+3+8=14 damage, but if I have resist 5 fire, cold, acid, lightning, thunder, radiant, necrotic, poison, and everything else under the sun (i.e. resist 5 all), I take 3+8+8=19 damage? I don't think that's right. Resist 5 all means resist 5 all, not resist 5 one out of three.




No, you subtract 5 from any type of damage you take, so if you take the 19 damage from falling in the pool of elemental evil (8 fire, 8 cold, 8 acid)

Then, you're later hit by an attack that does 10 necrotic damage.  That attack does 5 points to you, but the person that has resist 5 fire & cold takes the full 10.


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## Mengu (Sep 16, 2011)

NewJeffCT said:


> No, you subtract 5 from any type of damage you take




Nowhere does it say to subtract from any *one* type of damage. I don't think this is a rule. I guess we just have to disagree on our interpretation of resist all.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 16, 2011)

And if you have resist 5 cold and then gain resist 5 all, when you fall into this pool of elemental evil, you take 14 damage instead of 19, right?  The cold applies to one and then you can choose which to apply the "all" to, right?

That really doesn't make sense to me.  While I understand and appreciate the position [MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION] is taking, I think the only part he has a problem with is the corner case where I think the real problem lies in the description of the attack damage.  I think it's a rare case and not common at all.  As [MENTION=10503]Oldtimer[/MENTION] pointed out, the issue is more about how you interpret the damage expression.  I think a single attack should a single damage expression, and thus the type of damage should be either a single type (possibly untyped) or a combined type.  Not what we kind of have here.  For our current problem, though, I prefer to view them as multiple single types and therefore rule that resist All applies to each.  I don't like viewing them as a third category of neither a single type nor combined type, but rather a "multi-type" where resist All actually becomes a resistance that is WORST case.  How does that make sense?  "No, don't give me resist all, give me resist cold because I can resist more damage that way."  Huh?  Really?


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## Traveon Wyvernspur (Sep 16, 2011)

In the case of the acid/cold/fire 8+8+8 if someone had resistance 5 ALL, I'd go with -5 off each of those damages so that it would be 3+3+3 = 9 pts of damage.

If that person just had Resistance 5 on cold/fire then they'd take 3+3+8 = 14.

ALL is ALL to me, which means it's a much better type of resistance to have compared to specific resistances. Now in the case of it being say a combined damage of 24 acid/fire/cold not broken up, then you'd only get 5 resistance total. 

I think people make this way too complicated when (to me) it's rather simple how I do things at my table and how I interpret it. To each their own though, this is a game of a lot of different personalities and opinions, I won't tell you that you are wrong, just different from my game.


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## Nullzone (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Well maybe not, but (a) your interpretation turns DR 5 into DR 15 when an attack has 3 separate damage types and (b) My approach does not, so I will be sticking with it.




???

Your own post shows DR 15, or am I totally missing you again?



> Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.
> 
> DR 5 (untyped) applies once, to any.
> DR 5 (fire) applies once, to fire damage.
> ...




8+8+8 = 24?
24-15 = 9?


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## Nullzone (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> Well maybe not, but (a) your interpretation turns DR 5 into DR 15 when an attack has 3 separate damage types and (b) My approach does not, so I will be sticking with it.




???

Your own post shows DR 15, or am I totally missing you again?



> Each type of DR only applies once each per attack.
> 
> DR 5 (untyped) applies once, to any.
> DR 5 (fire) applies once, to fire damage.
> ...




8+8+8 = 24
24-15 = 9?


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## S'mon (Sep 16, 2011)

Nullzone said:


> ???
> 
> Your own post shows DR 15, or am I totally missing you again?
> 
> ...




DR 5x3=15 from 3 separate resistances.  IMO 3 separate resist-5s should potentially be better than a blanket DR 5.  I think that an effect that grants Res 5 (Fire) should sometimes be useful alongside DR 5 (all). But obviously some people disagree.  And I can understand not wanting them ever to stack; I can't understand people who think DR 5 should apply 3 or more times to a single damage effect though.

Luckily this is all pretty theoretical since WoTC no longer do the "1d12+5 weapon damage + 1d10 Fire damage" thing!


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 16, 2011)

S'mon said:


> DR 5x3=15 from 3 separate resistances.  IMO 3 separate resist-5s should potentially be better than a blanket DR 5.  I think that an effect that grants Res 5 (Fire) should sometimes be useful alongside DR 5 (all). But obviously some people disagree.  And I can understand not wanting them ever to stack; I can't understand people who think DR 5 should apply 3 or more times to a single damage effect though.
> 
> Luckily this is all pretty theoretical since WoTC no longer do the "1d12+5 weapon damage + 1d10 Fire damage" thing!




true, they don't do that type of damage anymore, but I don't think the old MM1/MM2 monsters that had that sort of damage have been superseded.  They're kind of just there without any updates/changes to them.  So, it's certainly possible that you could have those monsters in a published adventure, or if somebody pulls them out of the Monster Builder.  (I think the older monsters have not been updated for the new damage iterations, either, unless there was a new book that updated them.)


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## Grydan (Sep 16, 2011)

They've been running a series of Monster Manual Updates through Dungeon (not behind the paywall, even!), which may eventually resolve the issue entirely, but it's slow going. They're tackling a handful of monsters a month... and they haven't listed one for September.

So far they've updated Ghosts & Wights, Kuo-Toa & Sahuagin, and Aberrations (Gibbering Beasts, Chuuls, and Grells).

Also, some of the MM1 monsters (and possibly MM2? Not sure...) have been over-written by versions printed in Monster Vault.


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 16, 2011)

I posted on the WotC 4E rules forum to get more input, since I'm curious as to the answer.


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## mudlock (Sep 17, 2011)

Resistances should never stack. Having resist 5 x and resist 5 y against an attack that does damage of type x and y means you only resist 5.

We all agree on that, yes?

So, having resist 5 x and resist 5 x _again_ shouldn't stack either.

I think we can agree on that.

Now, say you take 5 fire + 5 cold and have resist 5 fire and resist 5 all. Some of the comments here suggest you should apply the resist all only once, to the cold damage, and you'd have to apply the fire resist to the fire damage, so that you can take no damage.

What if you have two separate sources of resist 5 all?

That shouldn't work. You can't stack resistances, and there isn't suppose to be any added benefit from having multiple instances of the same effect.

And yet, if the "apply each resist to any part of the attack once" theory is correct, then having multiples of resit all SHOULD help. I think that's wrong by RAI, and so I'm drawn to the argument that resist 5 all, versus a 5 fire + 5 cold attack, deals 0 damage, because you can only benefit from one resist all and so it should apply to every damage group. It's the only thing that's consistent.

A similar argument can be made from the opposite side, for an attack that does the same damage type twice, such as 5 fire + 5 fire: could you use MULTIPLE resist 5 fires to negate it? Because you're not suppose to get more than one.

So I say, an attack that does 5 cold + 5 fire + 5 acid + 5 lightning, does zero damage to a target with resist 5 all.

(But to reiterate a half dozen other comments, this style of damage has seriously fallen out of favor since MM1, so it's probably not a big deal in practice.)


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## Dedekind (Sep 17, 2011)

My guess is the intent is that you get the DR per attack. 

Anybody send this to WotC as a question?


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## FireLance (Sep 17, 2011)

Personally, I'd rather apply Resist all once per damage type rather than once per attack because the per attack interpretation can result in some odd corner cases.

For example, consider the power _invoked devastation_ (Invoker Attack 29, Divine Power). The user makes a single attack roll and compares the result against each target's Fortitude, Reflex and Will defenses. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Fortitude, it takes force damage and ongoing cold damage. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Reflex, it takes lightning damage and ongoing fire damage. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Will, it takes radiant damage and ongoing psychic damage. Is this considered one or three attacks? If this is considered one attack, than you get the odd case that the attacks would be resisted separately if the power had been worded so that the user made a separate attack roll against each defense. 

Compare this example with the deathrattle viper (L5 Brute, MM), which has a bite attack that deals untyped damage and the target is subject to a secondary attack which deals poison damage. Is this considered one or two attacks? If it is considered two attacks, then you get the odd case that resistance would have been applied only once if the viper's bite dealt untyped damage plus poison damage, such as an ixitxachitl demon ray's (L3 Skirmisher, Demonomicon) tail barb.


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## the Jester (Sep 17, 2011)

I think the whole point of all these various cases is that _they interact with resistances differently._ So "X fire damage plus Y cold damage" is supposed to be less effective than "X+Y cold and fire damage" and easier to resist (in pieces). Likewise with followup attacks.


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 17, 2011)

Dedekind said:


> My guess is the intent is that you get the DR per attack.
> 
> Anybody send this to WotC as a question?




I posted it on the WotC rules forums, but got no official response.  

Most responders agreed the rule is not clear, but tended to believe the resist all should apply to each attack once.  So, my example of a Fire Giant's Searing Greatsword attack that did 13 points of weapon damage and 9 points of fire damage would mean the 22 total damage is reduced to 17 and not 12.

However, that is in no way official.

http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/28278867/Question_on_Resist_All_damage


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## Nullzone (Sep 18, 2011)

FireLance said:


> Personally, I'd rather apply Resist all once per damage type rather than once per attack because the per attack interpretation can result in some odd corner cases.
> 
> For example, consider the power _invoked devastation_ (Invoker Attack 29, Divine Power). The user makes a single attack roll and compares the result against each target's Fortitude, Reflex and Will defenses. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Fortitude, it takes force damage and ongoing cold damage. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Reflex, it takes lightning damage and ongoing fire damage. If the attack roll exceeds the target's Will, it takes radiant damage and ongoing psychic damage. Is this considered one or three attacks? If this is considered one attack, than you get the odd case that the attacks would be resisted separately if the power had been worded so that the user made a separate attack roll against each defense.
> 
> Compare this example with the deathrattle viper (L5 Brute, MM), which has a bite attack that deals untyped damage and the target is subject to a secondary attack which deals poison damage. Is this considered one or two attacks? If it is considered two attacks, then you get the odd case that resistance would have been applied only once if the viper's bite dealt untyped damage plus poison damage, such as an ixitxachitl demon ray's (L3 Skirmisher, Demonomicon) tail barb.




It's "odd" sure but certainly not errant. Some powers do it all with one attack, others use two. It's a flavor difference, sometimes with mechanical motivations to give the target a fighting chance when both effects are potentially very punishing.


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## Argyle King (Sep 19, 2011)

I prefer to use the PHB1 way of doing it due to a lot of the issues brought up in this thread.  It tends to be more consistent with how it interacts with other rules.  However, it does carry its own baggage as well.


On the topic of the OP and the current RAW, I'd say there is indeed a difference between an attack saying it does (for sake of example) 5 fire and 5 cold and an attack saying it does 10 fire & cold.  It's my opinion that someone with Resist 5 All would take 0 damage from the former, and 5 from the latter.  Yes, that does lead to some strange edge and corner cases, but -as others have already said- that's a side effect of the design.


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## thewok (Sep 19, 2011)

Mengu said:


> So if I fall in an elemental pool and take 8 fire, 8 cold, 8 acid damage, and have resist 5 fire and cold, I take 3+3+8=14 damage, but if I have resist 5 fire, cold, acid, lightning, thunder, radiant, necrotic, poison, and everything else under the sun (i.e. resist 5 all), I take 3+8+8=19 damage? I don't think that's right. Resist 5 all means resist 5 all, not resist 5 one out of three.



There's already a mechanic for "Resist 5 fire, cold, acid, lightning, thunder, radiant, necrotic, poison."  It's listed as "Resist 5 fire, Resist 5 cold, resist 5 acid, resist 5 lightning, resist 5 thunder, resist 5 radiant, resist 5 necrotic, resist 5 poison."

Resist all is a special case, and nowhere do the rules support separating "all" into discrete damage types.  That would make "untyped" a type, which is not the case.


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## DracoSuave (Sep 19, 2011)

mudlock said:


> Resistances should never stack. Having resist 5 x and resist 5 y against an attack that does damage of type x and y means you only resist 5.
> 
> We all agree on that, yes?




Nope.



> So, having resist 5 x and resist 5 x _again_ shouldn't stack either.
> 
> I think we can agree on that.




Only because resist foo doesn't stack with itself.



> Now, say you take 5 fire + 5 cold and have resist 5 fire and resist 5 all. Some of the comments here suggest you should apply the resist all only once, to the cold damage, and you'd have to apply the fire resist to the fire damage, so that you can take no damage.




If the damage is 5 fire and 5 cold, and you have resist 5 fire, and resist 5 cold, you will take zero damage.

If, however, the damage is 10 fire and cold, and you have resist 5 fire, and resist 5 cold, you will take five damage.



> What if you have two separate sources of resist 5 all?




Resist all doesn't stack with resist all.



> That shouldn't work. You can't stack resistances, and there isn't suppose to be any added benefit from having multiple instances of the same effect.




You can't stack the -same- resistance.



> And yet, if the "apply each resist to any part of the attack once" theory is correct, then having multiples of resit all SHOULD help. I think that's wrong by RAI, and so I'm drawn to the argument that resist 5 all, versus a 5 fire + 5 cold attack, deals 0 damage, because you can only benefit from one resist all and so it should apply to every damage group. It's the only thing that's consistent.




If the hit does '5 fire and 5 cold' damage, it's one incident of damage, and resist 5 all will only affect that one incident of damage.



> A similar argument can be made from the opposite side, for an attack that does the same damage type twice, such as 5 fire + 5 fire: could you use MULTIPLE resist 5 fires to negate it? Because you're not suppose to get more than one.




There's no such thing as 5 fire + 5 fire.  You're taking 10 fire damage in that single incident.  



> So I say, an attack that does 5 cold + 5 fire + 5 acid + 5 lightning, does zero damage to a target with resist 5 all.




No, you're taking 20 damage.  20 - 5 = 15.  This is one incident of damage.  Resist only applies once per -incident.-

However, if you had resist 5 all, resist 5 fire, and resist 5 acid, then you'd only end up taking 5 damage.  Each resist can apply, as they are not the same resist.



> (But to reiterate a half dozen other comments, this style of damage has seriously fallen out of favor since MM1, so it's probably not a big deal in practice.)


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 19, 2011)

DracoSuave said:


> If the hit does '5 fire and 5 cold' damage, it's one incident of damage, and resist 5 all will only affect that one incident of damage.



No, it's not.  The confusion here is because you wrote it incorrectly.  Count the number of times "damage" appears in the sentence and that tells you how many "incidents" are present.  That said, I have no new arguments to make, but just making sure you're not trying to present a straw man.


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## Ryujin (Sep 19, 2011)

Or do what I do and combine all damage types, and keywords, then apply the resistance once (if applicable). Splitting everything up, into separate damage types and resistances, isn't conducive with easy and fast play. I really don't like bogging things down any more, than they already are.


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## DracoSuave (Sep 19, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> No, it's not.  The confusion here is because you wrote it incorrectly.  Count the number of times "damage" appears in the sentence and that tells you how many "incidents" are present.  That said, I have no new arguments to make, but just making sure you're not trying to present a straw man.




Alright.  Here's a hypothetical excerpt of a power with a single incident of damage.  Damage occurs as a single event, and is thus a single incident.

Attack: Charisma vs Reflex
Hit: 1d6 fire damage and 1d6 cold damage.

Here's an excerpt of a power with multiple incidents of damage.

Attack:  Charisma vs Fortitude
Hit: 1d6 + Charisma modifier lightning damage.
Effect:  1d6 thunder damage and push the target 4 squares.

Resist 5 all would only work once in the first power, because its one damage incident.  In the second case, it's two damage incidents, and thus would work twice.

Another example of a single damage incident:

Attack:  Strength vs AC
Hit: 1[W] + Strength modifier damage.
Special:  If you are raging, the target takes 1[W] additional thunder damage.


If I would have meant 'damage roll' I would have said 'damage roll.'  I'm more precise in my game language than that.


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## Nullzone (Sep 19, 2011)

Draco: Do you realize that, by your interpretation, the Arcane Admixture feat actually makes your powers *weaker* for using it? More keywords means more chances to apply resistance, and thus less damage.

Sense, it makes none.


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## Mengu (Sep 19, 2011)

Draco: You're equating single hit line with single damage instance. I'm not sure how you arrive at this conclusion. Also monster powers often don't have the same clarity of PC powers, which makes rules applications a bit more vague.

If the hit line said something like:

Hit: 1d6 fire damage and if the target is undead, 1d6 extra radiant damage.

Then I would say that's 1 instance of damage. But if the word "and" is used instead of "extra" (like in your example: 1d6 fire damage and 1d6 cold damage) I'm tempted to interpret that as 2 instances of damage.

In the case of the Fire Giant Trooper, it says (paraphrased for brevity):

Hit: 10 damage plus 1d8 fire damage.

So in that case, I can see it as a single damage instance because of the word "plus".

It still seems open to interpretation, based on what words were used for the exact power in question.


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## Infiniti2000 (Sep 19, 2011)

DracoSuave said:


> If I would have meant 'damage roll' I would have said 'damage roll.'  I'm more precise in my game language than that.



I didn't say damage roll, either, but you created a new term "incident" and suddenly act like that proves your point somehow.  I'd say that using the word "damage" twice in the same line makes it two separate incidents.  Even in your explanation you create a new word "event" to corroborate your unsupported premise.  I could say that one power is equal to one event, thus completely negating your argument.  If you're more precise in your game language then please make your points in game language.

The fact is that the ruling on this issue is not clear.  As was said, this is a corner case that may not even exist anymore, but I still have two pieces of advice for any DM's reading this:



Whatever your ruling, I urge you to not make "resist all" be a worse option than "resist <specific damage>."  I really don't think that the intent of resist all is to be a worse option.
When you design new monsters that deal multiple types of damage in one power, be aware of this issue and design accordingly.  I strongly recommend you use a very clear design approach on this.


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## mudlock (Sep 19, 2011)

thewok said:


> There's already a mechanic for "Resist 5 fire, cold, acid, lightning, thunder, radiant, necrotic, poison."  It's listed as "Resist 5 fire, Resist 5 cold, resist 5 acid, resist 5 lightning, resist 5 thunder, resist 5 radiant, resist 5 necrotic, resist 5 poison."
> 
> Resist all is a special case, and nowhere do the rules support separating "all" into discrete damage types.  That would make "untyped" a type, which is not the case.




What about resist weapon, resist melee, resist attacks of target creature; all effects that exist in the game.

If a fire giant makes its melee weapon attack that deals "damage + fire damage" and I have resist 5 all and resist 5 weapon, I should take the same amount of damage if I only have resist 5 all; only the "all" should matter. And resist 5 fire should be no different.

I can (now) see two ways to be consistent here: either the "resist 5 all" applies twice (to the damage and the fire damage), or you combine all the types together (so all the damage from the giant's attack is fire (and melee and weapon)) and apply the resistance once. (Wait, weren't fire giants rewritten in MV? What did they do for their damage expressions?)

But this pick-and-choose thing, where you're encouraged to have multiple resistances that normally wouldn't stack... and then you have to say "well, the _precise_ type won't stack" (so now I want resist 5 fire & ice, and also resist 5 fire) just seems fraught with contradictions.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 19, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> That's actually a really good analogy and I yes I think that's what we're saying.  I think you were right earlier and the interpretation on this point really comes down to deciding if the damage expression is combined or not.  I'm arguing for only two types of damage expressions: combined or not combined.  I'm inferring from your comments that you're arguing for three types of damage expressions by separating out this specific example of "X <type> damage plus Y <other_type> damage."
> 
> Is this a correct inference?



Well, yes. There are three different kinds of expressions. Single type damage (including untyped damage) which presents no problems. Then there is split damage (1d10 damage plus 1t6 fire damage) and combined damage (2d8 cold and necrotic damage). The combined one gives no problems, but the split one obviously does.


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## Oldtimer (Sep 19, 2011)

Nullzone said:


> Draco: Do you realize that, by your interpretation, the Arcane Admixture feat actually makes your powers *weaker* for using it? More keywords means more chances to apply resistance, and thus less damage.



How on earth do you figure that? If you admixture fire into an attack that does 2d6 acid damage, you get 2d6 acid and fire damage. The first one can be resisted with Resist X Acid, but against the second one you need both Resist X Acid _and_ Resist X Fire. How does that make the power weaker?


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## Oldtimer (Sep 19, 2011)

Infiniti2000 said:


> Whatever your ruling, I urge you to not make "resist all" be a worse option than "resist <specific damage>."  I really don't think that the intent of resist all is to be a worse option.



I don't even see how that is possible with any of the rulings. Even with Dracos ruling, which I have argued for also, Resist X All is vastly superior to Resist X <specific damage type>, since you can apply it against any type of damage, even untyped damage. What kind of ruling would make it worse? And who has been arguing such a ruling?


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## Nullzone (Sep 20, 2011)

Oldtimer said:


> How on earth do you figure that? If you admixture fire into an attack that does 2d6 acid damage, you get 2d6 acid and fire damage. The first one can be resisted with Resist X Acid, but against the second one you need both Resist X Acid _and_ Resist X Fire. How does that make the power weaker?




According to DracoSuave, having Resist 5 Acid and Resist 5 fire against an Arcane Admixture: Fire augmented Acid Orb means that you're going to resist 10 damage of the Acid Orb. Whereas if you had just left the Admixture out, you'd only resist 5.


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## DracoSuave (Sep 20, 2011)

Nullzone said:


> According to DracoSuave, having Resist 5 Acid and Resist 5 fire against an Arcane Admixture: Fire augmented Acid Orb means that you're going to resist 10 damage of the Acid Orb. Whereas if you had just left the Admixture out, you'd only resist 5.




Except it doesn't and never did.

Arcane Admixture adds a damage type to existing damage.  Thusly making 2d6 acid damage into 2d6 fire and acid damage.  If you have resist 5 acid, and resist 5 fire, the rules for 'X and Y damage' already tell you that you only resist the -lowest- resistance, if it exists at all.



mudlock said:


> What about resist weapon, resist melee, resist attacks of target creature; all effects that exist in the game.
> 
> If a fire giant makes its melee weapon attack that deals "damage + fire damage" and I have resist 5 all and resist 5 weapon, I should take the same amount of damage if I only have resist 5 all; only the "all" should matter. And resist 5 fire should be no different.




No, those are all different kinds of resistance and stack if they apply to the same attack.

The only thing that does NOT stack is the -same- resist.

Resist fire does not stack with resist fire.  Resist all does not stack with resist all.  Resist kobold does not stack with resist kobold.  However, resist fire, resist all, and resist kobold DO stack.



> I can (now) see two ways to be consistent here: either the "resist 5 all" applies twice (to the damage and the fire damage),




No, because it's one incident of damage.  As a check for this, ask:  If you have a feat that says 'When you are damaged' would it trigger once, or twice?

As an example, there's a swordmage power that adds fire damage to attacks.  Not makes them fire damage, just adds your strength modifier in additional fire damage.  That's not an extra smack of damage, that's not going to trigger things twice.  It's -just additional damage.-  It just happens to have a type, and interacts with resistance, immunity, and vulnerability.  That's all it does.



> or you combine all the types together (so all the damage from the giant's attack is fire (and melee and weapon)) and apply the resistance once. (Wait, weren't fire giants rewritten in MV? What did they do for their damage expressions?)




No, you don't.  If a resistance applies, it applies.  If a vunerability applies, it applies.  The only resistances that don't stack are the same resistance.



> But this pick-and-choose thing, where you're encouraged to have multiple resistances that normally wouldn't stack... and then you have to say "well, the _precise_ type won't stack"




Which is what actually happens.



> (so now I want resist 5 fire & ice, and also resist 5 fire) just seems fraught with contradictions.




Uh... what?  No.  That's not at all what you need.

If you're hit with 5 fire and cold damage, you'd need resist 5 fire, and resist 5 cold to resist 5 points of it.  If you have some 'resist 5 fire and cold' quality, that's actually resist 5 fire, and resist 5 cold.  It's two distinct resistances.


It's almost like there's a fundamental misunderstanding on what 'fire and cold damage' is here.


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## Istar (Sep 20, 2011)

I thought this was a simple all you guru's would have a simple clear answer for.

We have a saying in our country "Yeah Right" !!!!


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## NewJeffCT (Sep 21, 2011)

Istar said:


> I thought this was a simple all you guru's would have a simple clear answer for.
> 
> We have a saying in our country "Yeah Right" !!!!




They're only 72 posts into the thread - you need at least 150-200 to get a really clear answer on anything.


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