Is there a standard or widely accepted ruling on how an AMF interacts with sources of Force damage that don't qualify for being magical outside of being Force damage?
Force. Force is pure magical energy focused into a damaging form.
So if you have an ability that qualifies as non-magical that deals Force damage, like the Horizon Walker L3 ability Planar Warrior or the L3 Psi Warrior ability Psionic Strike, does the fact that Force damage is intrinsically magical "propagate" its magical nature, causing the AMF to stop the effect? In other words, when checking to see if a damage effect's description says it's magical, if it says it deals Force damage, then does that mean it's magical because Force's description says it's magical?
I believe there is a widely accepted, "standard" ruling on this: AMF will work on a cleric's spells but not on Divine Intervention. By extension, force damage employed by a PC shouldn't enjoy the deity exception unless we're talking about a cleric using Divine Intervention to cause the Force damage.
I did provide an example - Psi Warriors - where there's no indication a deity is involved, but I welcome all opinions in this thread, including anyone wanting to argue that the answer is different for clerics than for everyone else. I don't think we have a cleric domain yet with Divine Strikes that deal Force damage, but all Divine Strike text has the same basic format, so we can certainly theorycraft about it.
On the one hand, it seems perfectly reasonable that non-magical sources of force damage shouldn't have an issue with force damage inside AMF. On the other hand, it says it plain as day right there in the description. It's also not completely outrageous that an 8th level spell might completely nullify force damage within its own area of effect.
Since we're splitting hairs anyway, if a ghost were to move incorporeally into the floor inside the radius of AMF, wouldn't it still take force damage from ending their turn inside the floor since the floor would be granting total cover from the spell?
On the one hand, it seems perfectly reasonable that non-magical sources of force damage shouldn't have an issue with force damage inside AMF. On the other hand, it says it plain as day right there in the description. It's also not completely outrageous that an 8th level spell might completely nullify force damage within its own area of effect.
Since we're splitting hairs anyway, if a ghost were to move incorporeally into the floor inside the radius of AMF, wouldn't it still take force damage from ending their turn inside the floor since the floor would be granting total cover from the spell?
I would think so, since AMF is an AOE, and total cover blocks AOEs. But to the point of my post, a DM might rule that because Incorporeal Movement can deal Force damage, an AMF turns off Incorporeal Movement - that is, dealing Force damage means it's magical, so it's suppressed by the AMF. The AMF does block the ghost's Etherealness and under at least some DMs will also block Ethereal Sight, since the AMF explicitly blocks planar travel (presumably including planar travel for the not-photons the ghost would be using to see into the other plane), so that seems reasonably consistent to me.
Taking the SAC entry at face value, all effects that deal force damage are magical, because force damage is inherently magical. That said, I'm sure the RAI was not to exclude an entire damage type from an AMF, but until they revise that entry, the RAI stands, and the RAW can be read to exclude force damage in an AMF
Texas, on your question, i'd argue the AMF stops at the surface of the floor due to total cover rules, so if a Ghost phased into the wall, the damage they took from the interior of the wall would still happen, as the part of the ghost technically receiving the damage is not in the AMF
Incorporeal movement is definitely supernatural, but nothing about the feature meets the Sage Advice Compendium's guidelines for determining if something is magical. Is it intraplanar travel? Sort of, but not exactly?
Incorporeal movement is definitely supernatural, but nothing about the feature meets the Sage Advice Compendium's guidelines for determining if something is magical. Is it intraplanar travel? Sort of, but not exactly?
Etherealness is definitely interplanar travel. Ethereal Sight is questionable, but I would rule it would qualify as interplanar travel - effectively, I would interpret the ghost's corneas as having portals to the ethereal plane laid over them. Incorporeal movement isn't interplanar travel - the ghost has a separate mechanic, Etherealness, for traveling via the Ethereal Plane.
In theory, yes, force damage is magical. That's how the Player's Handbook defines it, and most examples of it are clearly magical in nature.
In practice, the definition is hard to take at face value because force and radiant are the game's dumping grounds for things that don't fit neatly into other damage types, and have been retroactively applied to a bunch of unrelated things with little regard for consistency. 5e lumps all of these into "force":
Creations of magical force (the kind used for Wall of Force and Forcecage) that you can attack with (e.g. Spiritual Weapon, Magic Missile) Previously these were treated roughly the same as magical weapons, except they could attack targets in the Ethereal Plane since they exist simultaneously in that plane.
Energy beams like Eldritch Blast and Disintegrate, both of which used to deal typeless damage, didn't extend into the Ethereal Plane, and obviously killed you in different ways.
Teleportation mishaps (also used to be typeless damage).
Critical Role's Graviturgy magic (but not the Player's Handbook Reverse Gravity) and the Psi Warrior's psionically-propelled attacks. These seem to be conflating D&D force with the real world physics definition of it.
Weird weapon attacks like the Steel Defender's force-powered rend and the Horizon Walker's Planar Warrior feature, which deal pure force damage despite smacking you with a chunk of steel. Weird how magic weapons don't deal force damage too while every other vaguely magical attack does.
The biggest tell for me that force damage doesn't have any real narrative meaning is that after all these years there's basically only two monster types that resist it (one of which originally only absorbed Magic Missiles), and when I tried to introduce a more in-depth injury system into my games I couldn't come up with a list of injuries for force damage that made sense for all of them.
So despite the forum this question is posted in, I think the most practical thing to do is to consider each instance of force damage individually. A blanket ruling is very likely to have holes in it, or have new ones introduced in the future.
Is there a standard or widely accepted ruling on how an AMF interacts with sources of Force damage that don't qualify for being magical outside of being Force damage?
Antimagic Field:
How to tell if an effect is magical:
Force damage:
So if you have an ability that qualifies as non-magical that deals Force damage, like the Horizon Walker L3 ability Planar Warrior or the L3 Psi Warrior ability Psionic Strike, does the fact that Force damage is intrinsically magical "propagate" its magical nature, causing the AMF to stop the effect? In other words, when checking to see if a damage effect's description says it's magical, if it says it deals Force damage, then does that mean it's magical because Force's description says it's magical?
I don't think so.
Perhaps force damage was created by a deity.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I believe there is a widely accepted, "standard" ruling on this: AMF will work on a cleric's spells but not on Divine Intervention. By extension, force damage employed by a PC shouldn't enjoy the deity exception unless we're talking about a cleric using Divine Intervention to cause the Force damage.
I did provide an example - Psi Warriors - where there's no indication a deity is involved, but I welcome all opinions in this thread, including anyone wanting to argue that the answer is different for clerics than for everyone else. I don't think we have a cleric domain yet with Divine Strikes that deal Force damage, but all Divine Strike text has the same basic format, so we can certainly theorycraft about it.
On the one hand, it seems perfectly reasonable that non-magical sources of force damage shouldn't have an issue with force damage inside AMF. On the other hand, it says it plain as day right there in the description. It's also not completely outrageous that an 8th level spell might completely nullify force damage within its own area of effect.
Since we're splitting hairs anyway, if a ghost were to move incorporeally into the floor inside the radius of AMF, wouldn't it still take force damage from ending their turn inside the floor since the floor would be granting total cover from the spell?
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I would think so, since AMF is an AOE, and total cover blocks AOEs. But to the point of my post, a DM might rule that because Incorporeal Movement can deal Force damage, an AMF turns off Incorporeal Movement - that is, dealing Force damage means it's magical, so it's suppressed by the AMF. The AMF does block the ghost's Etherealness and under at least some DMs will also block Ethereal Sight, since the AMF explicitly blocks planar travel (presumably including planar travel for the not-photons the ghost would be using to see into the other plane), so that seems reasonably consistent to me.
Taking the SAC entry at face value, all effects that deal force damage are magical, because force damage is inherently magical. That said, I'm sure the RAI was not to exclude an entire damage type from an AMF, but until they revise that entry, the RAI stands, and the RAW can be read to exclude force damage in an AMF
Texas, on your question, i'd argue the AMF stops at the surface of the floor due to total cover rules, so if a Ghost phased into the wall, the damage they took from the interior of the wall would still happen, as the part of the ghost technically receiving the damage is not in the AMF
Incorporeal movement is definitely supernatural, but nothing about the feature meets the Sage Advice Compendium's guidelines for determining if something is magical. Is it intraplanar travel? Sort of, but not exactly?
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Etherealness is definitely interplanar travel. Ethereal Sight is questionable, but I would rule it would qualify as interplanar travel - effectively, I would interpret the ghost's corneas as having portals to the ethereal plane laid over them. Incorporeal movement isn't interplanar travel - the ghost has a separate mechanic, Etherealness, for traveling via the Ethereal Plane.
In theory, yes, force damage is magical. That's how the Player's Handbook defines it, and most examples of it are clearly magical in nature.
In practice, the definition is hard to take at face value because force and radiant are the game's dumping grounds for things that don't fit neatly into other damage types, and have been retroactively applied to a bunch of unrelated things with little regard for consistency. 5e lumps all of these into "force":
The biggest tell for me that force damage doesn't have any real narrative meaning is that after all these years there's basically only two monster types that resist it (one of which originally only absorbed Magic Missiles), and when I tried to introduce a more in-depth injury system into my games I couldn't come up with a list of injuries for force damage that made sense for all of them.
So despite the forum this question is posted in, I think the most practical thing to do is to consider each instance of force damage individually. A blanket ruling is very likely to have holes in it, or have new ones introduced in the future.
The Forum Infestation (TM)