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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannyalcatraz" data-source="post: 3037352" data-attributes="member: 19675">I agree.  I always have, but you seem to misunderstand my position even still.I didn't say they did- my position is that on a successful hit, they deliver their energy damage.However "a successful hit" is required for any kind of melee or ranged attack, even melee touch attacks.There is no rule stating that weapons with a special ability that triggers on "a successful hit" do so ONLY when doing a regular melee attack.No rule is being broken- rather, one is being enforced to its logical end.Actually, heirarchy does matter- specific rules trump general rules.Trips and other special attacks modify the damage a weapon deals.  Magical enchantments are not weapons & they are not covered by ANY of the special attack rules.The general rule is that a weapon deals damage when it scores a successful hit.  The specific rule is that a trip attack prevents a weapon from doing damage normally.There is no rule that says trip attacks modify magical damage in any way.Again the text: The second sentence of this entry reads "THE FIRE does not harm the wielder"- not "THE FLAMING WEAPON." This matters. The designers have already made a distinction between the weapon and the power granted by the magic. "A flaming weapon" is nothing more than a description of a weapon wrapped in a shroud of magical fire.  That fire is the manifestation of the magical enchantment upon the weapon, but it is not dependent upon the weapon's doing damage.Consider a martial artist PC with a touch attack spell (say, Shocking Grasp) cast upon his hands.  That spell will trigger whenever that martial artist makes a successful attack, be it unarmed melee strike or a mere touch attack.  Even if his unarmed strike does no damage, the spell will discharge and have its effect.  It is no less an "extra damage" effect than the weapon's magical enhancement, but is not affected by the underlying failure of his unarmed attack to do damage.  The underlying attack's damage is resolved in parallel to the magical damage.Another hint that weapon damage and enchantment damage are resolved in parallel is what happens when the enchanted weapon crits.  With a regular attack, a crit gets multiplied by the weapon's particular multiplier...but the enchantment damage is untouched.  For those enchantments that are affected by crits, the damage isn't multiplied by the weapon's multiplier.  Instead, additional dice of damage of a larger type are delivered, and they are added to the base enchantment damage. The flaming ability, not the weapon, is doing the fire damage.  It has its own rules.  It isn't dependent upon underlying weapon damage.</blockquote>

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