Damage of two types but immunity to one

[mneme]

If the character were being damaged by an attack that does fire and cold damage, and they were immune to cold damage, they would take the fire damage.

Recently errata'd rules made it clear that characters making attacks with one keyword and using a weapon with another keyword had to choose one keyword to apply to powers. I think the only way a character can achieve two keywords now is that:

a) they take the Energy Admixture (covers one power)
b) the power itself has multiple keywords

Multiple keywords are easy, actualy; they're just not germane to the topic. There's no contention about what happens if you get hit with an attack that does separate damage of different types -- the attack benefits from multiple vulnerabilities (and can't benefit from any given one once; 3 radiant + 3 radaint is 6 radiant, but 3 radiant + 3 fire and cold stays separate unless it hits a resist(all) 5, in which case 1 damage (your choice? frankly, I'm not sure [ ooh, that's a fun one. You hit an undead which has resist(all) 10, vulnerable radiant (5), and regenerate (turned off if it takes radiant damage with 3 radiant damage and 10 fire damage [one damage source]. Have they taken radiant damage or not?]) slips through, but each damage chunk is separately resisted/checked on immunity.

That said, it's not that hard for damage chunks to have multiple types. Admixture does it, lots of power does it, and hell, plenty of features do it (Radiant One, perhaps? Radiant and Necrotic on everything you have CA against!). I'm not really sure what RAI is (and would slightly lean towards "the damage should slip through"), but it's not a big deal, and if Wizards has intended to have immunities not zero out damage with multiple types, they haven't done that yet. "it's also fire damage" isn't an other effect -- it's the -same- effect. The one you're immune to.

 

[keterys]

if Wizards has intended to have immunities not zero out damage with multiple types, they haven't done that yet.

The PHB errata is more than likely them doing just that, as already noted upthread.

 

[Hazard_53188]

Recently errata'd rules made it clear that characters making attacks with one keyword and using a weapon with another keyword had to choose one keyword to apply to powers. I think the only way a character can achieve two keywords now is that:

a) they take the Energy Admixture (covers one power)
b) the power itself has multiple keywords

In case it helps with the discussion, the specific case that made me wonder how this works was a character attacking using a Mordant weapon with this power activated against a creature with poison immunity. "Power (At-Will • Acid, Poison): Free Action. All damage dealt by this weapon is acid damage and poison damage. Another free action returns the damage to normal.
".

The attack power itself had no damage type.

 

[Zieche]

"it's also fire damage" isn't an other effect -- it's the -same- effect. The one you're immune to.

IMHO:

AND implies two seperate things combined. And it is completely reasonable to take damage from one even when immune to the other.

Example:
You can drink water, you can't drink poison. So you can't drink water and poison in the same cup. Well... maybe once.

 

[CovertOps]

Resistance or immunity to one keyword of a power does not protect a target from the power’s other effects. Also, resistance doesn’t reduce damage unless the target has resistance to each type of damage from the attack, and then only the weakest of the resistances applies. For example, a character who has resist 10 lightning and resist 5 thunder who takes 15 lightning and thunder damage takes 10 damage because the resistance value to the combined damage types is limited by the lesser of the two resistances.

Yes, SK. So immunity stops all the damage matching the type (even if it has other types), but resistance (not immunity) only works if you have all the types and then the lowest resistance applies.

Nowhere do they say that immunity stops working if you don't have immunity to all the types.

I'm fairly sure this is a straw man argument. You're trying to prove your point via the negative when 4e is an exception based system. You take damage unless the rules tell you you don't take damage. 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.

The reason I believe you are wrong is that it lumps both immunity and resistance together "Resistance or immunity..." and treats them exactly the same. Since the issue of resistance has come up many times they specifically address how to handle that situation, but the lack of additional text about immunity does not prove that immunity cold prevents all damage from a cold/fire power. Just that the issue has not come up. If I was a betting person I'd put my 2 coppers on a FAQ or errata saying that you need immunity to all damage types of a power to be immune to the damage, otherwise it makes immunities VERY powerful.

The whole point of multiple damage types is to get around resistances/immunities, not to have immunity cold (for example) grant you immunity to any other damage type "bundled" with it.

 

[CovertOps]

The whole point of multiple damage types is to get around resistances/immunities, not to have immunity cold (for example) grant you immunity to any other damage type "bundled" with it.

I got to thinking about this some more...what if you have immunity cold and vulnerability radiant and get hit with a power that does cold/radiant damage? How is that supposed to work where you're suddenly immune to a damage type to which you have a vulnerability.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

My own thoughts on the "no other effect" in the immunities section is for powers like this (for all powers, assume target has no immunity/resistance to the other key words):

Psychic, Fear

Target takes 2d6 psychic damage and runs away like a little girl (save ends).

My thinking is that the entry intends that if a target had Immunity: fear, that it would take the damage but wouldn't need to run away.


Likewise, a power like this:

Lightning, Poision
Target takes 10 lightning damage and 10 poison damage.

Immunity to Lighting would prevent its damage, but not the poison damage.


However, for a power like this:
Fire, Cold
Target takes 40 fire and cold damage, and ongoing 5 fire damage

Immunity to fire would prevent to ongoing 5, but would in no way reduce the 40 fire & cold damage.

 

[Markn]

My own thoughts on the "no other effect" in the immunities section is for powers like this (for all powers, assume target has no immunity/resistance to the other key words):

Psychic, Fear

Target takes 2d6 psychic damage and runs away like a little girl (save ends).

My thinking is that the entry intends that if a target had Immunity: fear, that it would take the damage but wouldn't need to run away.


Likewise, a power like this:

Lightning, Poision
Target takes 10 lightning damage and 10 poison damage.

Immunity to Lighting would prevent its damage, but not the poison damage.


However, for a power like this:
Fire, Cold
Target takes 40 fire and cold damage, and ongoing 5 fire damage

Immunity to fire would prevent to ongoing 5, but would in no way reduce the 40 fire & cold damage.

This!

 

[the Jester]

I got to thinking about this some more...what if you have immunity cold and vulnerability radiant and get hit with a power that does cold/radiant damage? How is that supposed to work where you're suddenly immune to a damage type to which you have a vulnerability.

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.

 

[DracoSuave]

First:

If you take 10 fire and cold damage, and you have immunity to fire, that fire and cold damage isn't 'another effect'. It's fire damage, and you're immune to it.

Resistance is not the same thing as immunity. They are not the same words. They do not do the same things.

They never have.

From the PHB3:

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.

[the parts about non-damaging immunities clipped for brevity and irrelevance]

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

Resistance on the other hand has a rule where if you are resistant to a damage type, and you are hit with a power with multiple damage types, you must have resistance to all those damage types. However, that ONLY applies to damage types. Resistance to melee and ranged attacks, resistance to all damage, resistance to arcane damage, resistance to weapon damage, all those things work fully against such powers because that rule ONLY applies to resistance to damage types.

That means: Resistance to fire, cold, thunder, lightning, radiant, necrotic, poison, or psychic. Nothing else. Immunity is not resistance to a damage type. Resistance to untyped damage is not resistance to a damage type.