Damage of two types but immunity to one

[OakwoodDM]

So, is that 10 fire and cold damage fire damage? Yes. It cannot be dealt to you, because all fire damage is prevented.

Equally, if you look at it from a different angle:

Is that 10 fire and cold damage cold damage? Yes. Are you immune to cold damage? No. Take full damage.

Personally, I like the analogy given earlier. If you drink water, nothing bad happens to you. This is because water does not harm you. If you drink poison, it kills you.
If you drink water mixed with poison, that doesn't make you suddenly unaffected by the poison, just because the water's harmless.

Fire/Cold damage is different from both Fire damage and Cold damage, and so immunity to just one has no effect.

(And that's the answer I'd give to the specific situation mentioned by the OP. The creature's immune to poison. The attack toes Poison/Acid damage. Therefore the creature takes full damage.)

 

[Ryujin]

Is fire and cold damage fire damage? Yes, but it's also cold damage. If you're immune to fire, the cold still gets you. This seems to be a fairly simple concept to me, that isn't contradicted by the passage that DracoSuave posted. That passage refers to an attack with one damage type, but additional effects.

 

[Verision]

I don't know what the actual rules are, but I use a pretty basic house rule for this situation and it came up because one of my players has immunity to necrotic (intelligent item from one of the WotC campaigns).

My rule goes like this:
Any duel damage type is half and half. If something does X Necrotic and Poison damage, then I treat it as if it is X/2 Necrotic damage and X/2 Poison.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic, then they take X/2 Poison damage.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic and has vulnerability 10 poison, then they take X/2+10 poison damage.

-If the target had resist 10 necrotic and resist 5 poison, then they take X/2-10 necrotic and X/2-5 poison.

etc.

Personally, I think 4e is a little overcomplicated sometimes and I like to make rules as simple as possible. That way they are easier to remember during a game, and there is less chance that we will have to "pause" an encounter to go look up a rule.

 

[abyssaldeath]

I don't know what the actual rules are, but I use a pretty basic house rule for this situation and it came up because one of my players has immunity to necrotic (intelligent item from one of the WotC campaigns).

My rule goes like this:
Any duel damage type is half and half. If something does X Necrotic and Poison damage, then I treat it as if it is X/2 Necrotic damage and X/2 Poison.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic, then they take X/2 Poison damage.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic and has vulnerability 10 poison, then they take X/2+10 poison damage.

-If the target had resist 10 necrotic and resist 5 poison, then they take X/2-10 necrotic and X/2-5 poison.

etc.

Personally, I think 4e is a little overcomplicated sometimes and I like to make rules as simple as possible. That way they are easier to remember during a game, and there is less chance that we will have to "pause" an encounter to go look up a rule.

No offense, but how is your house rule less complicated than "unless you have resistance or immunity to both, you take full damage"?

 

[Ryujin]

I don't know what the actual rules are, but I use a pretty basic house rule for this situation and it came up because one of my players has immunity to necrotic (intelligent item from one of the WotC campaigns).

My rule goes like this:
Any duel damage type is half and half. If something does X Necrotic and Poison damage, then I treat it as if it is X/2 Necrotic damage and X/2 Poison.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic, then they take X/2 Poison damage.

-If the target is immune to Necrotic and has vulnerability 10 poison, then they take X/2+10 poison damage.

-If the target had resist 10 necrotic and resist 5 poison, then they take X/2-10 necrotic and X/2-5 poison.

etc.

Personally, I think 4e is a little overcomplicated sometimes and I like to make rules as simple as possible. That way they are easier to remember during a game, and there is less chance that we will have to "pause" an encounter to go look up a rule.

This sounds remarkably like the original method for dealing with multiple types of damage, which was removed by errata fairly early on. It was simplified because this method is quite cumbersome, thereby slowing play a great deal.

 

[Solvarn]

Immune: If you are immune to a damage type (such as cold or fire), you don't take **that type of damage**...Immunity to one part of a power does not make you immune to other parts of the power. For example, if you are immune to thunder, a power can deal no thunder damage to you, but the power could push you.

Cold damage and cold/fire damage are two different things. They are two different things in regards to resistance, I don't see any reason why based upon the above passage it would be inferred that they would be treated differently. You wouldn't take the cold damage but you would take the fire damage, so in this case full damage.

If the rule worked as you say it does, the words **that type of damage** quoted above would be replaced with **any damage from the attack**.

Especially given "Immunity to one part of a power does not make you immune to other parts of the power" clause in the aforementioned rule quote I don't see any reason without specific wording to the contrary declaring a separate clause that you would treat immunity differently than resistance for any specific reason, creating a subset of the damage mitigation rules.

The only reason immunity is mentioned at all is to specify that effects still take place. An immobilizing cold power hitting something immune to cold still freezes them in place, they just take no damage.

 

[CovertOps]

If you have vulnerable 10 radiant and immunity to cold, and you get hit for 15 points of cold and radiant damage, you'll take 25 points altogether.

I think you missed my point Jester. I was trying to show how absurd the opposite position was through example.

Their claim: If you have (for example) immunity to fire, vulnerability 10 to radiant, and take 10 points of fire/radiant damage, then their position is that you take no damage because you are immune to fire.

Sans the specific text on resistances I'm not clear why they think immunity is any better than resistance. Immunity is nothing more than infinite resistance. Why would you need resistance to all damage types, but only immunity to one? The intent is pretty clear even if the wording isn't.

 

[Mesh Hong]

The only reason immunity is mentioned at all is to specify that effects still take place. An immobilizing cold power hitting something immune to cold still freezes them in place, they just take no damage.

Does it though?

If a character is immune to fear and gets hit by the following attack:

Scarey Face - (minor, at will) - fear
Range 5; attack +X vs. Will; on hit target is immobilised until the end of scarey creatures next turn

Surely the PC immune to fear will not be immobilised.

 

[mneme]

I'm fairly sure this is a straw man argument.

There are a variety of logical fallicies involved in this argument, but no--no, it isn't.

What it really comes down to is how you want to read the phrase "the power's other effects". You can treat damage of type fire and cold as either one effect or two. If you treat it as one then of course immunity protects you from all the damage. If you treat it as two then it does not. Treating it as two effects makes it work quite nicely when it comes to resistances.

...except that that's wrong. The rules are really clear on what's one effect and what's two -- and "25 fire and cold damage" is one thing, one set of damage, and one effect--just one with two keywords.

Immunity is -supposed- to be powerful (though not as powerful as it was when the game was first released).

Lets turn the argument around for a moment:

Baleful Gaze of the Basilisk

You cast a toxic glance at your foe, leaving it paralyzed with fear.
Daily

Arcane, Fear, Implement, Poison
Standard Action Ranged 10
Target: One creature
Attack: Charisma vs. Fortitude
Hit: The target is stunned and takes ongoing 10 poison damage (save ends both).
Miss: Ongoing 10 poison damage (save ends).
Dragon Magic: When the target saves against the ongoing poison damage, you slide the target a number of squares equal to your Strength modifier.
First published in Player's Handbook 2.

Immunity to poison and immuity to fear both grant immunity to a power's "other effects" (unlike straight damage types).

So, what happens when you use the Baleful Gaze of the Basilisk against a target that's immune to fear?

What about against one that's immune to poison?

My answers, of course, is that the target that's immune to fear taks the ongoing poison, but not the slide or the stun.

A target that's immune to poison is immune to all the effects of the power, as while they're fear effects, they're -also- poison effects and the target is immune to those.

Now, a real GM would probably (correctly) interpret the intent of the power that the slide is a poison effect (mabye) and that the stun is a fear effect. But lets just look at RAW interpretation, not rule-by-intent here. (a similar example is Prismatic Spray--it's easy to figure out which of the three effects are -intended- to be tied to each keyword--but one cannot do so (for the stun effect) without flavor-based interpretation)

Similarly, you're hit with 25 ongoing poison and fear damage. Would Plaguefire body help you?

Plaguefire Body

You feel your bones burning with an inner fire, and those around you see the faint outline of your skeleton glowing through your skin.
Encounter

Arcane
Free Action Personal
Effect: End one poison, disease, charm, or fear effect that currently affects you.
First published in Forgotten Realms Player's Guide.

Basically, it seems like the anti-immunity people in the thread are trying to treat immunity as resistance(infinity). But there's no support for that in the rules text, and you can't get there without more or less making up a rule (either immuity=infinite resistance or the [worse] "damage with multiple types is multiple effects" misrule).

 

[mneme]

If a character is immune to fear and gets hit by the following attack:

Scarey Face - (minor, at will) - fear
Range 5; attack +X vs. Will; on hit target is immobilised until the end of scarey creatures next turn

Surely the PC immune to fear will not be immobilised.

That's correct, but that's because fear (along with poison, charm, illusion, and sleep) grants immunity to nondamaging effects (as does immune:gaze -- but immune:gaze is unique in that it works like original 4e immunities and blocks out the entire power rather than parts of it). So immune:fear will stop nondamaging effect, but immune:cold won't because immune:cold is just immunity to that damage type.

CovertOps: I'd like to see textev there--that's the entire argument summarized in one sentence, both sides -- "immunity is infinite resistance" vs "no, it isn't, they never say that"