Nonweapon Damage Types. Which ones and how many?

[Hassassin]

The problem with "untyped" damage is that it is, by its very nature, superior to typed damage. Creatures and players have the ability to resist or be immune to typed damage, where untyped damage is far more difficult to avoid.

So given the choice, untyped is far superior simply because it works outside the structure.

Creatures can also have weaknesses to certain typed damages. Untyped damage is consistent, while typed depends on the target. If weaknesses and resistances are approximately balanced, neither is superior.

 

[MortalPlague]

Creatures can also have weaknesses to certain typed damages. Untyped damage is consistent, while typed depends on the target. If weaknesses and resistances are approximately balanced, neither is superior.

True, but in practice, resistance pops up about ten times more than vulnerability. The only consistent damage vulnerability I can recall seeing is undead having fun with radiant damage.

 

[Hassassin]

True, but in practice, resistance pops up about ten times more than vulnerability. The only consistent damage vulnerability I can recall seeing is undead having fun with radiant damage.

But we are discussing a new edition here. That should change.

 

[steeldragons]

Energy:
Fire/heat
Ice/Cold
Lightning/Electricity
Thunder/Sonic
Force/Shockwave
Psychic/Mental

The "Radiant/Holy" and "Necrotic/Unholy" are secondary distinctions/considerations, I think, individual to certain creatures/special abilities...maybe, if the designers include or want to incorporate such elements into a "general" part of the game, accepted cosmology, etc...if so, they would go under "Energy" types.

Not sure if "Natural Attacks" count as "Non-weapon Damage" for the purposes of the OP, but in case...

Physical:
Bludgeoning/Blunt (fists, tails, various appendages)
Slashing/Slicing (claws mostly, other things like mantis/ankheg forelegs, etc.)
Piercing (certain claws, teeth, certain horns/antlers, stingers)
Toxic (poisons, venoms, acids, chemicals)
Blood loss (whether "passive", a.k.a. "bleeding out", or "active" via stirges, vamps, etc.)

Then there's "Ability Damage" that's kind of its own thing as it could effect mental or physical traits.

"Falling" doesn't really strike me as a valid "damage type" since the damage is from the landing, not the fall. Yes, obviously, the damage must be calculated by the height of the fall, but the Damage type would be different for different falls.

If you land on a flat stone surface -bludgeoning. If you land on a field of spikes -piercing, first, and, most likely, bludgeoning also... possibly with a sprinkle of Toxic (poisoned spear tips) on top.

And "Non-lethal" could/should be taken into account, I believe someone has mentioned the option/idea of this being a "condition", so to speak (gods, I do NOT want "conditions" per se back in the back!). An "add-on" to the base Damage type (cold, slashing, whatever it is).

That would be something like:
Ongoing
Non-lethal
...not sure what else might be a "mitigating factor" to other damage types.
"Focused" maybe?...eg. I cast a spell that does "Focused Lightning Damage." I "focus" it onto the creature's legs...?
"Critical"...?

 

[Minigiant]

True, but in practice, resistance pops up about ten times more than vulnerability. The only consistent damage vulnerability I can recall seeing is undead having fun with radiant damage.

I hope this changes. Part of the reason I want a small list if energy damage types is to make spreading them around easier. I'd love to see vulnerablity expanded so PCs can use if more often. Any damage type that doesn't have a lot of common vulnerable creatures shouldn't be included.

Fire-plant creatures, trolls (stop regen), some undead, cold outsiders, white and silver dragons, flesh golems
Cold- plant creatures, fire outsiders, red and gold dragons, salamanders, flesh golems
Electric- magical aquatic creatures, iron golem (slows), Onix*
Acid- trolls (stop regen), Intelligence check fail
Sonic- Rolled another 1


Also want alchemical throwing grenades to be core so PCs can deal energy damage whenever they have the spare time and cash.

 

[Hassassin]

Fire-plant creatures, trolls (stop regen), some undead, cold outsiders, red and gold dragons
Cold- plant creatures, fire outsiders, white and silver dragons, salamanders

Swap the dragon colors around, and I very much agree.

Acid: trolls
Sonic: just leave it out

 

[TwinBahamut]

Toxic is a nice catch-all - good call.

That said, I'd still want to differentiate between poison and the others as they by tradition have been cured/healed/fixed in different ways.

Lingering poison effects can be cured in different ways without worrying too much about the actual damage type, in my opinion. This works as long as the separation between poisoning as a condition and poisoning as a form of HP damage is maintained. Actually, if you avoid using the same word "poison" for two totally different things (a damage type and a condition type), it helps keep things clearer.

This nicely handles psionic damage as well.

It certainly does for a lot of definitions of psionic damage. I'm not 100% certain it covers the idea of a purely mental attack, but I suppose that is drawing a very fine line anyways.

You missed one type, however: ability damage, as its own category. I'm prepared to assume this will find its way into 5e in some form, so we might as well keep it in mind.

I really hope we can avoid the return of the mathematical nightmare known as ability damage... A more robust and detailed condition system would work so much better than forcing players to rebuild all the math on their character sheet every time a certain kind of attack hits, and then again when the damage is healed.

If they do implement ability damage, all I can do is hope it is more elegant than it was in 3E.

Could do, but how would hacking mechanically differentiate from bludgeoning? Three types is probably enough.

I suppose it would be the most reliable of the four weapon damage types. It is the weapon type which has all the limitations and benefits inherent to weapon-based attacks, but doesn't have as many situational strengths and weaknesses as others. Such as it can hurt a skeleton without penalty (unlike slashing or piercing), but doesn't get the bonus bludgeoning does. That impression might come from playing too much Demon's Souls, where "Hacking" damage is described as "Normal" damage, though.

 

[Falling Icicle]

If acid is not an energy type, then surely cold cannot be either?

Cold is the absence of heat, and it makes sense that such spells could work by invoking some kind of magical energy that drains the heat out of things. You can rationalize cold being a type of energy that way. Acid, on the other hand, is a physical substance.

 

[Lanefan]

Lingering poison effects can be cured in different ways without worrying too much about the actual damage type, in my opinion. This works as long as the separation between poisoning as a condition and poisoning as a form of HP damage is maintained. Actually, if you avoid using the same word "poison" for two totally different things (a damage type and a condition type), it helps keep things clearer.

I very rarely if ever have poison cause h.p. damage (though the delivery mechanism very well might!); but I believe the game-as-written does have some poisons doing straight h.p. damage these days, so better factor it in.

I really hope we can avoid the return of the mathematical nightmare known as ability damage... A more robust and detailed condition system would work so much better than forcing players to rebuild all the math on their character sheet every time a certain kind of attack hits, and then again when the damage is healed.

It depends how many other things hang off of ability bonuses, along with how the bonuses work. 3e was a female dog in such regards as a) lots of things were based on ability bonuses, and b) the bonus changed for every 2 ability points. If the bonus structure is more like 1e (i.e. a large gap in the middle of the curve where there is neither bonus nor penalty) and not too many other things are directly tied to that bonus, ability damage isn't much of a problem.

Lanefan

 

[Starfox]

If the DM chooses to run the "different kinds of damage" option, I can see a full range of damage types like people here suggest. But in the minimum-comlexity game, things should be much easier than that. Exactly how this is done is up to the skill of the game designer. If I took a shot at it, I might do something like this:

Physical (weapons, basically martial per 4E)

Energy (Fire, cold etc, basically Arcane per 4E)

Mystical (Force, alignment, positive, negative. What divine ought to have done)

Form here you can add sub-types in different rules modules, separating energy types like fire and cold and physical types like blunt and piercing.