D&D 5E Guardian of Faith vs Resistance/Vulnerability - How much does it actually "deal"

[Stalker0]

Normally Guardian of Faith deals 20 radiant damage to a person getting in the area. Once 60 damage has been dealt, the guardian is expended.

So the question comes with resistance and vulnerability.

If I deal 20 radiant damage to a person...but it drops to 10 damage because of vulnerability...did the guardian deal 20 or 10 damage for its limit?

Of course the same question for vulnerability, if the damage was doubled to 40...is that 40 from the limit or just 20?

 

[Satyrn]

I'd say it counts as dealing 20.

pardon me while I indulge in silly analogies to illustrate my reasoning. Imagine, if you will, that the spell is a big corporation and the victim is one of it's employees.

in the resistance scenario, it's like the corp is paying the employee's wages for the week. The corp pays out 20 bucks, and then the government swoops in to take its shareleaving the worker with only half his check.

Now, in the vulnerability scenario, it's still like the corp is paying the employee's wages. But here, the employee lives in a socialist paradise, and because 20 bucks a week is not enough to live on, the government tops up his pay.

In both cases, the corp is paying out a measly 20 bucks.

 

[jaelis]

IMO a straight reading is that it counts the hp actually dealt. Since that is what the spell says.

Wouldn't be crazy to play it differently, but would be kind of a bummer to use up all the damage on invulnerable targets.

 

[Harzel]

It seems like the question would arise even just with the saving throw for normal creatures. If the creature makes its save, does that count as 10 hp dealt or 20?

I think I'd go with counting the damage actually taken. If it were supposed to count 20 per pop no matter what, it could have just said the guardian disappears after dealing damage three times. But it could be read either way.

 

[Lucas Blackstone]

To me damage dealt means damage dealt. So if something was immune to radiant damage the guardian wouldn't disappear in 3 attacks since it dealt zero damage with those 3 attacks.

It uses the same wording as Vampiric Touch ( damage dealt ). If you used Vampiric Touch on something immune to necrotic damage, rolled 12 damage on those 3d6, which after the immunity would be dealing zero damage, I can't see how you would heal 6 necrotic since the enemy's hit points were reduced by zero.

 

[gyor]

Seems like a question for sage advise.

 

[jayoungr]

If it says "damage dealt to the creature," I would count it as the amount of damage the creature actually takes. So in the case of resistance, I'd count the attack as dealing 10 damage, rather than 20.