Same thing then... you magically take "that" damage, you don't take "magical" damage. I'm not seeing the step that translates nonmagical damage to magical damage, or typed damage to untyped damage.
When a creature within 10 feet of you takes damage, you can use your reaction to magically take that damage, instead of that creature taking it. This feature doesn’t transfer any other effects that might accompany the damage, and this damage can’t be reduced in any way.
"It's magic, lol" is exactly correct if you're explaining to someone why Warding Bond changes the type to typeless, as it says it does
There is nothing about "typeless damage" in Warding Bond. You can make inferences, but it doesn't "say" anything like that
This spell wards a willing creature you touch and creates a mystic connection between you and the target until the spell ends. While the target is within 60 feet of you, it gains a +1 bonus to AC and saving throws, and it has resistance to all damage. Also, each time it takes damage, you take the same amount of damage.
The spell ends if you drop to 0 hit points or if you and the target become separated by more than 60 feet. It also ends if the spell is cast again on either of the connected creatures. You can also dismiss the spell as an action.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
"It's magic, lol" is exactly correct if you're explaining to someone why Warding Bond changes the type to typeless, as it says it does
There is nothing about "typeless damage" in Warding Bond. You can make inferences, but it doesn't "say" anything like that
This spell wards a willing creature you touch and creates a mystic connection between you and the target until the spell ends. While the target is within 60 feet of you, it gains a +1 bonus to AC and saving throws, and it has resistance to all damage. Also, each time it takes damage, you take the same amount of damage.
The spell ends if you drop to 0 hit points or if you and the target become separated by more than 60 feet. It also ends if the spell is cast again on either of the connected creatures. You can also dismiss the spell as an action.
It doesn't say it has a type. So, it doesn't.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Why would the damage you take no longer be the same type of damage that was inflicted to the original target?
"Different attacks, damaging spells, and other harmful effects deal different types of damage."
"Damage types have no rules of their own, but other rules, such as damage resistance, rely on the types."
You can Deal different Types of Damage. Damage Taken rules don't at all say they rely on the types.
The Take Damage step happens after resistances, immunities, and etc have all been dealt with already. It is the final portion of getting damaged where you actually drop the HP numbers. See:
"Whenever a creature takes damage, that damage is subtracted from its hit points."
Damage is subtracted. Thus it is just a number (at this point, as it is "taken").
So the assumption would be that fire damage remains fire damage, unless there is something to dell me that fire damage is no longer fire damage. Changing damage type of even more extreme, stripping the type entirely from the damage, is something nearly unheard of in D&D, so why would you think this would happen without something to tell you explicitly that it happens?
You're going to have to come at this argument with a lot more firepower than that.
You can't subtract 5 fire from your HP. That is nonsensical parsing.
You can take 5 fire damage though, which is the obvious route normal english would end up with
Explain then how you subtract 5 fire from your character sheet. Go ahead. Explain that.
Damage Type don't have their own rules. And rules only do what they say they do. At no point does the book say damage taken has a type. Only damage dealt has a type.
Damage is damage, and damage has a type, dealt vs taken is only a shift of perspective from the attacker to the attacked. Its two sides of the same coin
No, it isn't. It is a different STEP in the damage process. Hit/Affect--->Damage Dealt--->+/- Damage effects--->Damage resist/immunity--->Damage Taken
Eh, honestly that is semantics call it whatever you want. The important part is the stage of the damage mechanics the damage is getting swapped at.
It happens as damage is taken.
THAT is at the very end of the damage process.
After damage is dealt. After immunity applied, after +/- modifiers applied. After resistance applied. the very last step is for that damage to be taken. (Ie the HP going down)
THAT is the step where the Palli power kicks in. All the way at the stage where HP is going down by a number value.
That number value cannot be reduced in any way, per the ability itself.
And so it is already too late to apply the Palli's resistances and etc because we're already past that point in the damage process.
you (incorrectly) assume the damage type disappears at some point, but where in the rules does it say that? If I take fire damage, am i not burned? If cold, am I not frozen? if necrotic, am I not withered? the damage you take still has a type, because the description of the damage taken is specific to the damage dealt. I don't get burned by thunder damage. If you remove typing, then all damage becomes simple numbers, which are meaningless to narrative and description. That doesn't track in a game built around narrative and description.
This reply has absolutely nothing to do with what it seemingly is replying to.
Anyway. Damage Taken, is just a number. When your character Takes damage you just subtract a number from their current HP. That's it. That is all you do. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, no one scribbles in super tiny font -5 fire damage in their HP box. There isn't even a way to do that here on dndbeyond character sheets. Explain exactly the process you take for subtracting 5 fire damage that is in any way different from subtracting 5 from your HP.
You don't. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, you subtract 5. You know it, we all know it. There is no way to subtract 5 fire.
AFTER all the resistances and immunity and such have already been applied, that is when damage is taken. "Take damage" means subtracting a number from your HP.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Is this ANOTHER "disprove my assumption about the rules" threads?
Apparently the damage you take is at least in one place in the rules referred to as typed. It also is referred to in a way that doesn't indicate it is special in any way. Again, absent ANY text from the books stating otherwise, most readers would have the assumption that the damage you take is of the same type that was dealt.
Injury. Injury poison can be applied to weapons, ammunition, trap components, and other objects that deal piercing or slashing damage and remains potent until delivered through a wound or washed off. A creature that takes piercing or slashing damage from an object coated with the poison is exposed to its effects. [emphasis added]
Why would the damage you take no longer be the same type of damage that was inflicted to the original target?
"Different attacks, damaging spells, and other harmful effects deal different types of damage."
"Damage types have no rules of their own, but other rules, such as damage resistance, rely on the types."
You can Deal different Types of Damage. Damage Taken rules don't at all say they rely on the types.
The Take Damage step happens after resistances, immunities, and etc have all been dealt with already. It is the final portion of getting damaged where you actually drop the HP numbers. See:
"Whenever a creature takes damage, that damage is subtracted from its hit points."
Damage is subtracted. Thus it is just a number (at this point, as it is "taken").
So the assumption would be that fire damage remains fire damage, unless there is something to dell me that fire damage is no longer fire damage. Changing damage type of even more extreme, stripping the type entirely from the damage, is something nearly unheard of in D&D, so why would you think this would happen without something to tell you explicitly that it happens?
You're going to have to come at this argument with a lot more firepower than that.
You can't subtract 5 fire from your HP. That is nonsensical parsing.
You can take 5 fire damage though, which is the obvious route normal english would end up with
Explain then how you subtract 5 fire from your character sheet. Go ahead. Explain that.
Damage Type don't have their own rules. And rules only do what they say they do. At no point does the book say damage taken has a type. Only damage dealt has a type.
Damage is damage, and damage has a type, dealt vs taken is only a shift of perspective from the attacker to the attacked. Its two sides of the same coin
No, it isn't. It is a different STEP in the damage process. Hit/Affect--->Damage Dealt--->+/- Damage effects--->Damage resist/immunity--->Damage Taken
Eh, honestly that is semantics call it whatever you want. The important part is the stage of the damage mechanics the damage is getting swapped at.
It happens as damage is taken.
THAT is at the very end of the damage process.
After damage is dealt. After immunity applied, after +/- modifiers applied. After resistance applied. the very last step is for that damage to be taken. (Ie the HP going down)
THAT is the step where the Palli power kicks in. All the way at the stage where HP is going down by a number value.
That number value cannot be reduced in any way, per the ability itself.
And so it is already too late to apply the Palli's resistances and etc because we're already past that point in the damage process.
you (incorrectly) assume the damage type disappears at some point, but where in the rules does it say that? If I take fire damage, am i not burned? If cold, am I not frozen? if necrotic, am I not withered? the damage you take still has a type, because the description of the damage taken is specific to the damage dealt. I don't get burned by thunder damage. If you remove typing, then all damage becomes simple numbers, which are meaningless to narrative and description. That doesn't track in a game built around narrative and description.
This reply has absolutely nothing to do with what it seemingly is replying to.
Anyway. Damage Taken, is just a number. When your character Takes damage you just subtract a number from their current HP. That's it. That is all you do. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, no one scribbles in super tiny font -5 fire damage in their HP box. There isn't even a way to do that here on dndbeyond character sheets. Explain exactly the process you take for subtracting 5 fire damage that is in any way different from subtracting 5 from your HP.
You don't. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, you subtract 5. You know it, we all know it. There is no way to subtract 5 fire.
AFTER all the resistances and immunity and such have already been applied, that is when damage is taken. "Take damage" means subtracting a number from your HP.
Rav, 1) see every spell in the game, they all say take (thanks Wolf for pointing that out). 2) a PC is not a character sheet. Don’t confuse a bookkeeping abstraction with what happens to the PC. If a PC gets hit by a fireball, they don’t lose 28, they get burned, from fire damage that they took. This game is not a computer program…Character sheets, damage processes, dice rolls, movement speeds are a means to the end of describing a character in an imaginary world. They are not an end to themselves. The writers know this, and they expect us to know that too
If you have a magic item that adds +3 damage to all your spells while you're holding it, and you cast Fireball, is Fireball dealing 3 typeless damage or an additional 3 fire damage? Is a +3 longsword dealing 3 typeless damage as well? How about Sneak Attack?
It's well accepted that simple mathematical operations on damage preserves the type. Damage types are a lot like units of measure in a sense.
Anyway. Damage Taken, is just a number. When your character Takes damage you just subtract a number from their current HP. That's it. That is all you do. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, no one scribbles in super tiny font -5 fire damage in their HP box. There isn't even a way to do that here on dndbeyond character sheets. Explain exactly the process you take for subtracting 5 fire damage that is in any way different from subtracting 5 from your HP.
You don't. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, you subtract 5. You know it, we all know it. There is no way to subtract 5 fire.
HP (and the number subtracted from it) is typeless. Damage taken is not. WotC very well could add a new class feature tomorrow that says "whenever you take 5 or more fire damage, you gain advantage on attack rolls until the end of your next turn." Your character carries the proof of the damage's type in whatever injuries show up on their body. The corpse of someone that dies of acid damage is not the same as the corpse of someone that dies of bludgeoning damage.
EDIT: There's already some proof of this in-game. See the oil flask: "On a hit, the target is covered in oil. If the target takes any fire damage before the oil dries (after 1 minute), the target takes an additional 5 fire damage from the burning oil."
The rules do tell you how to subtract 5 fire damage: strip the unit of measure and subtract the quantity from your HP. You still got burnt though.
Is this ANOTHER "disprove my assumption about the rules" threads?
The mods seem to have no problem with threads becoming about one poster's opinions, and not the actual subject of the thread, so probably.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
My 2cp on Immunity: it ignores the attack, damage type or condition that is applicable.
In your instance, OP, I would agree that the Paladin in question would take the damage from the Aura of the Guardian as has probably been stated, because this is a sacrificial move on the characters part. IMHO, they forgo their own protections to save another by figuratively, and in some cases literally, putting themselves in harms way.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Is this ANOTHER "disprove my assumption about the rules" threads?
The mods seem to have no problem with threads becoming about one poster's opinions, and not the actual subject of the thread, so probably.
Well, at least this one is straightforward to disprove (see above), unless someone is actually arguing that spells literally tell you how much damage you take without telling you how much they deal (and ignore resistance and immunity altogether).
As to the OP question, I don't know exactly what RAW might be, but I'd certainly probably just choose to rule the way that InquisitiveCoder describes in post #8.
And so it is already too late to apply the Palli's resistances and etc because we're already past that point in the damage process.
If we were past the point of damage reduction by the time it got to the paladin, the feature would not need to specify that the damage cannot be reduced.
I don't question the intention of the feature. I feel that the wording is meant to say that if the paladin takes the damage from someone else, then they shouldn't be able to do that and then still get out of the damage. This was just the conversational seed that sparked the question whether or not damage immunity is considered damage reduction or whether Xanathar's guide four-step process for damage modification places immunity separate from, and prior to, damage reduction.
It doesn't describe resistance differently, but it does go through the damage process steps in the introduction, which includes where immunity falls in the steps:
(first) any relevant damage immunity, (second) any addition or subtraction to the damage, (third) one relevant damage resistance, and (fourth) one relevant damage vulnerability.
As a side note, I wish D&D Beyond included the introduction and subheadings in the TOCs for the books. Right now its in a separate button and not listed in "Contents" and a lot of the books actually provide relevant game information and rules in those sections.
Same thing then... you magically take "that" damage, you don't take "magical" damage. I'm not seeing the step that translates nonmagical damage to magical damage, or typed damage to untyped damage.
When a creature within 10 feet of you takes damage, you can use your reaction to magically take that damage, instead of that creature taking it. This feature doesn’t transfer any other effects that might accompany the damage, and this damage can’t be reduced in any way.
That’s like saying that if you magically lift a pizza with mage hand across a room, it becomes a magic pizza. The magic brought “that damage” to your hp (or, your hp to that damage?), but the damage was not created or transformed by the magic.
And also, that SAC quote is not RAW, and a good rule of thumb is that the longer and more elaborate an SAC entry is, the more likely they’re trying to invent a new rule rather than interpret existing rule language. Entirely unsupported, and not actually as simple and helpful as the author believed.
and also, that SAC doesn’t say what you’re saying it says.
That’s like saying that if you magically lift a pizza with mage hand across a room, it becomes a magic pizza. The magic brought “that damage” to your hp (or, your hp to that damage?), but the damage was not created or transformed by the magic.
Catapult deals magic damage, despite flinging a mundane object at you. I gave you the rules on determining when damage is magic. "Does its description say it’s magical?" -- yes, so the damage it deals is magical. Your pizza analogy fails because if the hand dropped a hot pizza on you, you'd take damage from the pizza, not the hand. In this case, you're taking damage from the aura, and the aura is magical.
And also, that SAC quote is not RAW,
We've been over this. There is no meaningful way in which the SAC and the PHB are different levels of RAW. Both are published by WOTC and declare themselves to be official.
and a good rule of thumb is that the longer and more elaborate an SAC entry is, the more likely they’re trying to invent a new rule rather than interpret existing rule language.
You're not wrong, but rules that only exist in the SAC are still rules, as we've discussed in the past. For example, the widely accepted rule that a melee weapon attack is any attack which is both a melee attack and a weapon attack is only in the SAC - if you treat the SAC as not RAW, "melee weapon attack" could be any attack with a melee weapon, i.e. a thrown dagger could be a melee weapon attack, just as an improvised stab with a dart could be a ranged weapon attack. The rule we're currently discussing - "what counts as magical" - is absolutely only in the SAC, but without it, we have no basis for knowing what's magical and what isn't. It's not particularly productive to take the only rule in the game covering the issue and declare it not a rule. Remarkably, this one doesn't even contradict the PHB anywhere, so I don't see a reason to exclude it. Naturally, whenever you get mutually exclusive rules - like the ones for picking an ability modifier for an attack - the DM has no choice but to pick which rule to obey and which to exclude.
That’s like saying that if you magically lift a pizza with mage hand across a room, it becomes a magic pizza. The magic brought “that damage” to your hp (or, your hp to that damage?), but the damage was not created or transformed by the magic.
Catapult deals magic damage, despite flinging a mundane object at you. I gave you the rules on determining when damage is magic. "Does its description say it’s magical?" -- yes, so the damage it deals is magical. Your pizza analogy fails because if the hand dropped a hot pizza on you, you'd take damage from the pizza, not the hand. In this case, you're taking damage from the aura, and the aura is magical.
No, Chicken_Champ is spot on. The aura isn't damaging you, you're taking damage that was meant for someone else. The aura is just how the damage gets to you, just like the mage hand example.
Catapult doesn't simply fling a mundane object; if that were the case it'd just say something along the lines of "make a ranged weapon attack with the object." The spell causes the object to move in a way that's inconsistent with the laws of physics (straight line, then immediately drops to the ground on impact or at maximum range) and deals damage that can't be avoided by armor and is comparable to a trebuchet. It's clearly got more in common with Magic Stone than a ranged weapon.
A specific spell wording still beats a general (if not common) rule of immunity.
The spell says you take damage that can't be reduced in any way.
Resistance or immunity are more general rules than this specific spell since they apply to more than one thing (immunity to fire, weapons, cold, poison and so on).
Same thing for warding bond, doesn't matter how immune you are to anything, if they take damage you do too. Specific beats general.
Rav, 1) see every spell in the game, they all say take (thanks Wolf for pointing that out). 2) a PC is not a character sheet. Don’t confuse a bookkeeping abstraction with what happens to the PC. If a PC gets hit by a fireball, they don’t lose 28, they get burned, from fire damage that they took. This game is not a computer program…Character sheets, damage processes, dice rolls, movement speeds are a means to the end of describing a character in an imaginary world. They are not an end to themselves. The writers know this, and they expect us to know that too.
People have questions like this thread because of an imprecise understanding of how the rules work. You may not be clued in on how the mechanics function and interact with one another, that is ok, not everyone is expected to. It is a lot to keep clinking around in your head and 'close enough' is often more efficient than actually following the rules closely and with precision. I'll never fault someone for not having precision in the rules while they running a game.
But we're not running a game right now, we're actually discussing the rules themselves. Yes, the mechanics are all just tools to support the narrative. But we can discuss those mechanics with precision, especially here, on the Rules and Game Mechanics forum. Scolding me that the narrative is king is the weirdest take you put forward... here.
That said, the PHB describes what "Take damage" means. It means "subtract HP". As always, you're welcome to deviate from what the PHB says if that suits your game's narrative. But that isn't especially a helpful way to take the conversation when discussing the mechanics specifically.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Same thing then... you magically take "that" damage, you don't take "magical" damage. I'm not seeing the step that translates nonmagical damage to magical damage, or typed damage to untyped damage.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
There is nothing about "typeless damage" in Warding Bond. You can make inferences, but it doesn't "say" anything like that
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
It doesn't say it has a type. So, it doesn't.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Explain then how you subtract 5 fire from your character sheet. Go ahead. Explain that.
No, it isn't. It is a different STEP in the damage process. Hit/Affect--->Damage Dealt--->+/- Damage effects--->Damage resist/immunity--->Damage Taken
This reply has absolutely nothing to do with what it seemingly is replying to.
Anyway. Damage Taken, is just a number. When your character Takes damage you just subtract a number from their current HP. That's it. That is all you do. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, no one scribbles in super tiny font -5 fire damage in their HP box. There isn't even a way to do that here on dndbeyond character sheets. Explain exactly the process you take for subtracting 5 fire damage that is in any way different from subtracting 5 from your HP.
You don't. You don't subtract 5 fire damage, you subtract 5. You know it, we all know it. There is no way to subtract 5 fire.
AFTER all the resistances and immunity and such have already been applied, that is when damage is taken. "Take damage" means subtracting a number from your HP.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Is this ANOTHER "disprove my assumption about the rules" threads?
Apparently the damage you take is at least in one place in the rules referred to as typed. It also is referred to in a way that doesn't indicate it is special in any way. Again, absent ANY text from the books stating otherwise, most readers would have the assumption that the damage you take is of the same type that was dealt.
Injury. Injury poison can be applied to weapons, ammunition, trap components, and other objects that deal piercing or slashing damage and remains potent until delivered through a wound or washed off. A creature that takes piercing or slashing damage from an object coated with the poison is exposed to its effects. [emphasis added]
Wait a second. Isn't just about every spell that does damage phrased as "the creature takes XdY (type) damage on a hit" or "... on a failed save"?
Edit: Yep, the first 5 that I checked were written that way:
Rav, 1) see every spell in the game, they all say take (thanks Wolf for pointing that out). 2) a PC is not a character sheet. Don’t confuse a bookkeeping abstraction with what happens to the PC. If a PC gets hit by a fireball, they don’t lose 28, they get burned, from fire damage that they took. This game is not a computer program…Character sheets, damage processes, dice rolls, movement speeds are a means to the end of describing a character in an imaginary world. They are not an end to themselves. The writers know this, and they expect us to know that too
If you have a magic item that adds +3 damage to all your spells while you're holding it, and you cast Fireball, is Fireball dealing 3 typeless damage or an additional 3 fire damage? Is a +3 longsword dealing 3 typeless damage as well? How about Sneak Attack?
It's well accepted that simple mathematical operations on damage preserves the type. Damage types are a lot like units of measure in a sense.
HP (and the number subtracted from it) is typeless. Damage taken is not. WotC very well could add a new class feature tomorrow that says "whenever you take 5 or more fire damage, you gain advantage on attack rolls until the end of your next turn." Your character carries the proof of the damage's type in whatever injuries show up on their body. The corpse of someone that dies of acid damage is not the same as the corpse of someone that dies of bludgeoning damage.
EDIT: There's already some proof of this in-game. See the oil flask: "On a hit, the target is covered in oil. If the target takes any fire damage before the oil dries (after 1 minute), the target takes an additional 5 fire damage from the burning oil."
The rules do tell you how to subtract 5 fire damage: strip the unit of measure and subtract the quantity from your HP. You still got burnt though.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
The mods seem to have no problem with threads becoming about one poster's opinions, and not the actual subject of the thread, so probably.
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
My 2cp on Immunity: it ignores the attack, damage type or condition that is applicable.
In your instance, OP, I would agree that the Paladin in question would take the damage from the Aura of the Guardian as has probably been stated, because this is a sacrificial move on the characters part. IMHO, they forgo their own protections to save another by figuratively, and in some cases literally, putting themselves in harms way.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Well, at least this one is straightforward to disprove (see above), unless someone is actually arguing that spells literally tell you how much damage you take without telling you how much they deal (and ignore resistance and immunity altogether).
As to the OP question, I don't know exactly what RAW might be, but I'd certainly probably just choose to rule the way that InquisitiveCoder describes in post #8.
If we were past the point of damage reduction by the time it got to the paladin, the feature would not need to specify that the damage cannot be reduced.
I don't question the intention of the feature. I feel that the wording is meant to say that if the paladin takes the damage from someone else, then they shouldn't be able to do that and then still get out of the damage. This was just the conversational seed that sparked the question whether or not damage immunity is considered damage reduction or whether Xanathar's guide four-step process for damage modification places immunity separate from, and prior to, damage reduction.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Xanathars describes damage resistance differently? Where?
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
It doesn't describe resistance differently, but it does go through the damage process steps in the introduction, which includes where immunity falls in the steps:
(first) any relevant damage immunity, (second) any addition or subtraction to the damage, (third) one relevant damage resistance, and (fourth) one relevant damage vulnerability.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/xgte/introduction#ResistanceandVulnerability
As a side note, I wish D&D Beyond included the introduction and subheadings in the TOCs for the books. Right now its in a separate button and not listed in "Contents" and a lot of the books actually provide relevant game information and rules in those sections.
The damage is magical for the same reason a magic weapon overcomes the damage resistance from Stoneskin. If you take the damage magically - that is, magic is how the damage was delivered - the damage itself counts as magic.
That’s like saying that if you magically lift a pizza with mage hand across a room, it becomes a magic pizza. The magic brought “that damage” to your hp (or, your hp to that damage?), but the damage was not created or transformed by the magic.
And also, that SAC quote is not RAW, and a good rule of thumb is that the longer and more elaborate an SAC entry is, the more likely they’re trying to invent a new rule rather than interpret existing rule language. Entirely unsupported, and not actually as simple and helpful as the author believed.
and also, that SAC doesn’t say what you’re saying it says.
So, several moles really, take your pick.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Catapult deals magic damage, despite flinging a mundane object at you. I gave you the rules on determining when damage is magic. "Does its description say it’s magical?" -- yes, so the damage it deals is magical. Your pizza analogy fails because if the hand dropped a hot pizza on you, you'd take damage from the pizza, not the hand. In this case, you're taking damage from the aura, and the aura is magical.
We've been over this. There is no meaningful way in which the SAC and the PHB are different levels of RAW. Both are published by WOTC and declare themselves to be official.
You're not wrong, but rules that only exist in the SAC are still rules, as we've discussed in the past. For example, the widely accepted rule that a melee weapon attack is any attack which is both a melee attack and a weapon attack is only in the SAC - if you treat the SAC as not RAW, "melee weapon attack" could be any attack with a melee weapon, i.e. a thrown dagger could be a melee weapon attack, just as an improvised stab with a dart could be a ranged weapon attack. The rule we're currently discussing - "what counts as magical" - is absolutely only in the SAC, but without it, we have no basis for knowing what's magical and what isn't. It's not particularly productive to take the only rule in the game covering the issue and declare it not a rule. Remarkably, this one doesn't even contradict the PHB anywhere, so I don't see a reason to exclude it. Naturally, whenever you get mutually exclusive rules - like the ones for picking an ability modifier for an attack - the DM has no choice but to pick which rule to obey and which to exclude.
No, Chicken_Champ is spot on. The aura isn't damaging you, you're taking damage that was meant for someone else. The aura is just how the damage gets to you, just like the mage hand example.
Catapult doesn't simply fling a mundane object; if that were the case it'd just say something along the lines of "make a ranged weapon attack with the object." The spell causes the object to move in a way that's inconsistent with the laws of physics (straight line, then immediately drops to the ground on impact or at maximum range) and deals damage that can't be avoided by armor and is comparable to a trebuchet. It's clearly got more in common with Magic Stone than a ranged weapon.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
Remember the rule specific beats general.
A specific spell wording still beats a general (if not common) rule of immunity.
The spell says you take damage that can't be reduced in any way.
Resistance or immunity are more general rules than this specific spell since they apply to more than one thing (immunity to fire, weapons, cold, poison and so on).
Same thing for warding bond, doesn't matter how immune you are to anything, if they take damage you do too. Specific beats general.
People have questions like this thread because of an imprecise understanding of how the rules work. You may not be clued in on how the mechanics function and interact with one another, that is ok, not everyone is expected to. It is a lot to keep clinking around in your head and 'close enough' is often more efficient than actually following the rules closely and with precision. I'll never fault someone for not having precision in the rules while they running a game.
But we're not running a game right now, we're actually discussing the rules themselves. Yes, the mechanics are all just tools to support the narrative. But we can discuss those mechanics with precision, especially here, on the Rules and Game Mechanics forum. Scolding me that the narrative is king is the weirdest take you put forward... here.
That said, the PHB describes what "Take damage" means. It means "subtract HP". As always, you're welcome to deviate from what the PHB says if that suits your game's narrative. But that isn't especially a helpful way to take the conversation when discussing the mechanics specifically.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.