Well I feel like there are 2 instances in the basic rules that support my claim.
Damage Rolls, "With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, but never negative damage."
Temporary hit points, "Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury."
The first instance blatantly states that you can deal 0 damage. This satisfies the conditions for the crusher/slasher/piercer feat as they all state:
Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals [type] damage...
No where does that number of damage require you to actually move someone's hit points total. So for this purpose you've rolled your d20 and hit, you rolled your damage as 1 and you've applied your modifier of -1, you dealt 0 bludgeoning damage and move the target 5 feet. In essence this is no different form the shove or grapple action, where you hit with a special attack action to achieve an effect.
The second instance gives you a buffer to your Hit Points, as the description states "Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury." When you have 10 temporary hit points and I deal 7 bludgeoning damage to you, I've done 0 effective bludgeoning damage to your total hit points. In this case I've done nothing to give you lasting injury, only remove (part of) a spell effect. But because the type is bludgeoning and I hit you, the crusher feat would still kick in.
One last hint is in how resistance and damage reduction is handled. I roll for an attack, hit, roll 1 on the damage die, the raging barbarian has resistance, the damage gets reduced to 0.5 and then rounded down to 0. Another instance is where I roll for an attack, hit, roll 3 on the damage die, the paladin has heavy armor mastery, the damage gets decreased by -3, the paladin takes 0 damage.
Damage mitigation doesn't equal a missed attack, so in my opinion feats apply when you deal 0 [type] damage. Now to turn it around, can you find any rules that say you can't deal 0 damage for the purpose of feats?
So a baby clobbers you in the face. Did you get hit? Yes. Did you take damage? No. It's not about if 0 damage is no damage. It's about whether you got hit with bludgeoning damage, which you did.
I tend to disagree (although I don't believe this is a clear cut situation at all). You got hit, but if the amount of bludgeoning damage is zero, that hit did not "deal bludgeoning damage".
If a beneficial effect triggered on movement, and a player said "I move zero feet", would you allow the beneficial effect to occur?
So a baby clobbers you in the face. Did you get hit? Yes. Did you take damage? No. It's not about if 0 damage is no damage. It's about whether you got hit with bludgeoning damage, which you did.
I tend to disagree (although I don't believe this is a clear cut situation at all). You got hit, but if the amount of bludgeoning damage is zero, that hit did not "deal bludgeoning damage".
If a beneficial effect triggered on movement, and a player said "I move zero feet", would you allow the beneficial effect to occur?
Well yes. If a grappled creature with a movement of 0 and no benefit to movement speed casts misty step, I'd allow the movement of 30 feet to happen. Again there's language supporting this, can you show me language that prevents this?
That's not the same. Misty step causes (something akin to) movement, it doesn't activate when you move. It also isn't linked to your movement speed, so whether you are grappled obviously makes no difference.
This is more like getting up from prone. It takes half your movement. If you have zero movement, it could be that it takes zero movement (half of zero) to rise. Instead, zero movement is counted as no movement, so you can't use half your movement as you don't have any to use.
The line you quote from the rules about dealing 0 damage, while usable to support your position, I would take as being more of an explanatory note to say that, while modifiers can stop damage being dealt, they cannot cause negative damage (which would technically have increased the HP of the target if allowed).
To think of this another way: If you punch someone, and it is so weak that they don't even feel it, is that going to push them back 5ft? No, they are going to stand there and laugh at you.
To think of this another way: If you punch someone, and it is so weak that they don't even feel it, is that going to push them back 5ft? No, they are going to stand there and laugh at you.
To think of this as yet another way: If you trip someone, do they fall even if you don't inflict any injury? Yes they are going to tumble without taking damage. If you push someone do you actually harm them, or just move them?
But pushing and tripping is already handled by the Shove action, which doesn't do any damage of any type. You are aiming to move them or knock them to the ground, not do damage to them, so it is handled differently by the game mechanics.
This is a regular attack, intended to cause damage. If you do an unarmed strike (punch/kick/head butt), or you hit someone with a club/staff, and that attack is weak enough not to cause any damage, how is it strong enough to move someone 5ft away from you? It makes no sense.
This is a regular attack, intended to cause damage. If you do an unarmed strike (punch/kick/head butt), or you hit someone with a club/staff, and that attack is weak enough not to cause any damage, how is it strong enough to move someone 5ft away from you? It makes no sense.
By that logic the shove action in and of itself doesn't make sense. Your attack hit, you dealt bludgeoning damage, the damage value was 0. Nothing in the wording of the feat requires an amount that is more then 0, it just states "...when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage..." I've rolled the dice, I rolled higher to hit then the required AC so I deal bludgeoning damage. The amount is determined by die and modifiers. If that number is 0 I still fill the requirement.
Firstly, the shove attack makes a lot of sense. You are specifically trying to push someone back or over, not trying to damage them. It's a very different thing to do.
For the rest, it comes down to your definition of "deals damage". It doesn't say "an attack which hits with a damage type of bludgeoning".
To me, "deals damage" means the same as "causes damage". If you hit with an unarmed strike with a strength modifier of -1, it doesn't cause, or deal, any damage. Therefore it is a perfectly valid interpretation to say that it doesn't deal any bludgeoning damage and doesn't trigger the Crusher feat.
What about concentration? If an attack hits a concentrating wizard, but the attack "deals zero damage" (because of modifiers, or resistances/immunities), do they have to make a concentration check?
Well I feel like there are 2 instances in the basic rules that support my claim.
Damage Rolls, "With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, but never negative damage."
Temporary hit points, "Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury."
The first instance blatantly states that you can deal 0 damage.
You use this to show that you can deal zero damage. However, it also clearly states that you cannot deal negative damage. It doesn't say that negatives would result in zero damage, so we end up with a situation where damage reduced to exactly zero is still "dealing damage" but those reduced below zero are not (as it is not possible to deal negative damage). This doesn't make much sense.
When I joined this thread with a simple extension to the OPs question, I was fairly on the fence about it. The more I read, and the more I consider all the various angles, the more I am convinced that zero damage is no damage.
Skimming trough the compendium on WoTC you can see the following on page 13:
Can damage be reduced to 0 by resistance or another form of damage reduction? There is no damage minimum in the rules, so it is possible to deal 0 damage with an attack, a spell, or another effect.
This makes it clear that you can in fact deal 0 damage.
Aside from this there's other sources that explain as below, referencing the DM guide.
...Note that many features that are reactive to attacks use different wording. A feature that triggers "when you are hit/when you hit" and a feature that triggers "when you are damaged/when you deal damage" are not quite the same thing. The "hit" kind of feature would trigger on a hit even if the damage is 0, whereas the "damage" kind would trigger only if the damage was 1 or greater. Therefore, be careful of the wording when evaluating such a feature.
Since Crusher tells you "..when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage.." it triggers of a hit roll not a damage roll Another example of this is Hunter's mark which triggers "...whenever you hit it with a weapon attack..." not when damage is applied.
An example where it wouldn't apply is Hellish rebuke, which specifically triggers of "..the creature that damaged you...", not hit you, but damaged you. - https://twitter.com/jeremyecrawford/status/784550483507744769 Other examples of not applying are keeping up concentration and keeping up rage, these trigger of taking damage specifically.
In this case though, the crusher, piercer and slasher feats are more aligned with hunter's mark then with concentration and rage. To break it down,
Once per turn... check
...when you hit a creature... check
...with an attack ... check
...that deals [type] damage... check
...you can [effect]... check
In the reverse order: In order to move someone 5 feet, my fists deal bludgeoning damage, which I apply trough an attack on a creature I hit, once per turn. The feat doesn't trigger off damage, it triggers off hits. The only reason the word "damage" is in there is to describe the damage type. Otherwise the feat would have been written as "when you damage a creature" instead of "when you hit a creature"
To me, your quote from the DMG supports the opposite position. The trigger for this is not just an attack which hits, it is an attack which hits which deals bludgeoning damage. This makes half of the condition for the trigger match the second part, and by the rules in that quote would require the damage to be greater than or equal to 1.
This would be different, IMHO, if it said "hit with an attack with a damage type of bludgeoning". This would not have a "deals damage" trigger.
For the SA quote, this looks more like clarifying that there is not a minimum of 1 damage caused by an attack, rather than being specifically applicable to this situation. It also doesn't answer the case of negative damage, which is specifically not allowed per the PHB and is not "zero damage".
Plus, as much as I enjoy rules lawyering, look at simple English. If you read a description which said "I hit him with a punch which dealt damage", you would assume some damage was caused. If you asked how much damage and he said "zero" or "none", you would not consider his initial statements to be truthful, as dealing/causing/inflicting zero damage means the same as not dealing any damage.
Only if you say that "deal zero [type] damage" is not the same as "deal no [type] damage" or "does not deal any [type] damage". I would say those 3 statements are equivalent, and therefore your third condition is not met.
A baby hit me in the face. Did it hurt? No. Did I take damage? No. But I still got hit.
If it makes it easier you could switch it around.
- Once per turn, when you hit a creature with a melee attack
- Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage
The key parts are that you hit a creature. The second part is the type of attack. Bludgeoning damage gets displayed this way in weapons and spells too and is used as a discriptor, not as the actual end result.
The meaning being ranged/melee weapon/spell attacks with the damage type of [type]
Only in your specific reading of the condition. It doesn't say "Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack with a damage type of bludgeoning" or "which may deal bludgeoning damage", it specifically says "which deals bludgeoning damage".
Player: I hit the creature
DM: Great, did you deal damage?
Player: Yes
DM: How much?
Player: Zero
DM: So you didn't deal any damage, then. Why did you say you did?
Only in your specific reading of the condition. It doesn't say "Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack with a damage type of bludgeoning" or "which may deal bludgeoning damage", it specifically says "which deals bludgeoning damage".
Yes, it specifically states "which deals bludgeoning damage". Exactly as every other instance where the damage type is declared. A couple of examples below, where I've highlighted the Trigger and damage type declarations for your convenience.
Magic stone: "...On a hit, the target takes bludgeoning damage..."
Catapult: "...When the object strikes something, the object and what it strikes each take 3d8bludgeoning damage."
Dust devil: "...On a failed save, the creature takes 1d8bludgeoning damage..."
Unarmed strike: "...On a hit, an unarmed strike deals bludgeoning damage..."
You can go trough the entire spell list for spells that do damage type bludgeoning and you'll be hard pressed to find an instance where the damage isn't declared as bludgeoning damage. The only I could find in a short time is shillelagh, which only applies on weapons that deal already deal bludgeoning damage.
The above examples all declare damage type with the same wording used in the crusher/slasher/piercer feat and I can't find any precedent that confirms your claim that the wording would be different. Every example I've seen so far confirms that "deals bludgeoning damage" is a damage type deceleration rather then a trigger condition. So the damage feats boil down to:
Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals piercing damage,...
I=limit B=condition U=damage type
Can you show me a single example where the damage type declaration is worded differently then -(deals/takes) [type] damage- ? Because without precedent there's no base for the claim that it's a trigger.
Yes, it specifies the damage type. However, it also specifies that the attack must deal that damage. Not that it is capable of doing so, not that it's the damage type of the weapon, but that it actually does deal the damage.
I don't think this is going to come up very often, really. Few people will take it use features or abilities like this without being relatively good at them. Crusher and other damage type related feats are unlikely to be taken by any but a martial character, and they will very rarely have a negative damage modifier.
Just out of interest, what if the condition for something was purely "hit with an attack which deals damage", without a damage type specified? Would you allow that to trigger on zero (or less than zero) damage?
"Can you show me a single example where the damage type declaration is worded differently then -(deals/takes) [type] damage- ?"
Can you show me a single ruling which says that "deals [type] damage" doesn't mean that the attack must actually cause (i.e. deal) some damage to allow it to trigger? You keep pointing to things worded the same and saying that it would be interpreted as the weapon's damage type, but I think it's just as viable to interpret it as requiring some damage of that type to be inflicted.
All the rules available indicate that 0 damage is an amount of damage.
We are not arguing logic, we are arguing rules. Find 1 rule that says 0 damage is no damage.
From the DMG, quoted above:
'Note that many features that are reactive to attacks use different wording. A feature that triggers "when you are hit/when you hit" and a feature that triggers "when you are damaged/when you deal damage" are not quite the same thing. The "hit" kind of feature would trigger on a hit even if the damage is 0, whereas the "damage" kind would trigger only if the damage was 1 or greater'
The type we are considering here contains both parts in in: it is triggered on a hit which deals damage. According to this, if it triggers on "deals damage" (which it does, in part, by my reading), that damage must be "1 or greater".
To be fair to everyone, this is all probably down to "notoriously bad wording". I completely accept that it is possible to interpret it the way you have. However, it is also very much viable to interpret it the way I am saying. This is why I asked the question, and it is also why there have been others who don't agree.
It all comes down, IMHO, to the definition of "deals damage". I would say that dealing zero damage is not actually dealing damage, as it is silly that it would. You haven't dealt any damage if the amount of damage is zero. The only rules I have read which indicate that zero damage would be dealing damage can just as easily be read as a clarification that you cannot cause negative damage (give HP back to the target). They also clash with the DMG quote above, so I'll take the one which makes sense in plain English (if it ever comes up, which I doubt it will).
Yes, it specifies the damage type. However, it also specifies that the attack must deal that damage. Not that it is capable of doing so, not that it's the damage type of the weapon, but that it actually does deal the damage.
Except it doesn't specify that the attack deals damage. The wording would be "when you damage a creature" rather then "when you hit a creature" like literally every other example I gave you.
I don't think this is going to come up very often, really. Few people will take it use features or abilities like this without being relatively good at them. Crusher and other damage type related feats are unlikely to be taken by any but a martial character, and they will very rarely have a negative damage modifier.
That's a pretty moot point. Things like resistances and debuffs like ray of enfeeblement exist. So it doesn't matter how good you are at a thing, there could always be a situation where it happens, so it deserves a proper answer.
Just out of interest, what if the condition for something was purely "hit with an attack which deals damage", without a damage type specified? Would you allow that to trigger on zero (or less than zero) damage?
There is no such description. The closest you can get is "when you damage a creature" or "when you hit with a melee attack", You've provided 0 examples that declare both a requirement to hit and damage be 1 or over.
Can you show me a single ruling which says that "deals [type] damage" doesn't mean that the attack must actually cause (i.e. deal) some damage to allow it to trigger?
You keep pointing to things worded the same and saying that it would be interpreted as the weapon's damage type, but I think it's just as viable to interpret it as requiring some damage of that type to be inflicted.
I indeed take my time to point to examples where the english is used before. You keep saying "you think" and when I ask for examples you just uno reverse the question by asking me for examples in return. You're discussing in bad faith here. Provide examples for your arguments with included source.
Well I feel like there are 2 instances in the basic rules that support my claim.
The first instance blatantly states that you can deal 0 damage. This satisfies the conditions for the crusher/slasher/piercer feat as they all state:
No where does that number of damage require you to actually move someone's hit points total. So for this purpose you've rolled your d20 and hit, you rolled your damage as 1 and you've applied your modifier of -1, you dealt 0 bludgeoning damage and move the target 5 feet. In essence this is no different form the shove or grapple action, where you hit with a special attack action to achieve an effect.
The second instance gives you a buffer to your Hit Points, as the description states "Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury." When you have 10 temporary hit points and I deal 7 bludgeoning damage to you, I've done 0 effective bludgeoning damage to your total hit points. In this case I've done nothing to give you lasting injury, only remove (part of) a spell effect. But because the type is bludgeoning and I hit you, the crusher feat would still kick in.
One last hint is in how resistance and damage reduction is handled. I roll for an attack, hit, roll 1 on the damage die, the raging barbarian has resistance, the damage gets reduced to 0.5 and then rounded down to 0.
Another instance is where I roll for an attack, hit, roll 3 on the damage die, the paladin has heavy armor mastery, the damage gets decreased by -3, the paladin takes 0 damage.
Damage mitigation doesn't equal a missed attack, so in my opinion feats apply when you deal 0 [type] damage.
Now to turn it around, can you find any rules that say you can't deal 0 damage for the purpose of feats?
I tend to disagree (although I don't believe this is a clear cut situation at all). You got hit, but if the amount of bludgeoning damage is zero, that hit did not "deal bludgeoning damage".
If a beneficial effect triggered on movement, and a player said "I move zero feet", would you allow the beneficial effect to occur?
Well yes. If a grappled creature with a movement of 0 and no benefit to movement speed casts misty step, I'd allow the movement of 30 feet to happen.
Again there's language supporting this, can you show me language that prevents this?
That's not the same. Misty step causes (something akin to) movement, it doesn't activate when you move. It also isn't linked to your movement speed, so whether you are grappled obviously makes no difference.
This is more like getting up from prone. It takes half your movement. If you have zero movement, it could be that it takes zero movement (half of zero) to rise. Instead, zero movement is counted as no movement, so you can't use half your movement as you don't have any to use.
The line you quote from the rules about dealing 0 damage, while usable to support your position, I would take as being more of an explanatory note to say that, while modifiers can stop damage being dealt, they cannot cause negative damage (which would technically have increased the HP of the target if allowed).
To think of this another way: If you punch someone, and it is so weak that they don't even feel it, is that going to push them back 5ft? No, they are going to stand there and laugh at you.
To think of this as yet another way: If you trip someone, do they fall even if you don't inflict any injury? Yes they are going to tumble without taking damage.
If you push someone do you actually harm them, or just move them?
But pushing and tripping is already handled by the Shove action, which doesn't do any damage of any type. You are aiming to move them or knock them to the ground, not do damage to them, so it is handled differently by the game mechanics.
This is a regular attack, intended to cause damage. If you do an unarmed strike (punch/kick/head butt), or you hit someone with a club/staff, and that attack is weak enough not to cause any damage, how is it strong enough to move someone 5ft away from you? It makes no sense.
By that logic the shove action in and of itself doesn't make sense. Your attack hit, you dealt bludgeoning damage, the damage value was 0.
Nothing in the wording of the feat requires an amount that is more then 0, it just states "...when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage..."
I've rolled the dice, I rolled higher to hit then the required AC so I deal bludgeoning damage. The amount is determined by die and modifiers. If that number is 0 I still fill the requirement.
Firstly, the shove attack makes a lot of sense. You are specifically trying to push someone back or over, not trying to damage them. It's a very different thing to do.
For the rest, it comes down to your definition of "deals damage". It doesn't say "an attack which hits with a damage type of bludgeoning".
To me, "deals damage" means the same as "causes damage". If you hit with an unarmed strike with a strength modifier of -1, it doesn't cause, or deal, any damage. Therefore it is a perfectly valid interpretation to say that it doesn't deal any bludgeoning damage and doesn't trigger the Crusher feat.
What about concentration? If an attack hits a concentrating wizard, but the attack "deals zero damage" (because of modifiers, or resistances/immunities), do they have to make a concentration check?
You use this to show that you can deal zero damage. However, it also clearly states that you cannot deal negative damage. It doesn't say that negatives would result in zero damage, so we end up with a situation where damage reduced to exactly zero is still "dealing damage" but those reduced below zero are not (as it is not possible to deal negative damage). This doesn't make much sense.
When I joined this thread with a simple extension to the OPs question, I was fairly on the fence about it. The more I read, and the more I consider all the various angles, the more I am convinced that zero damage is no damage.
Skimming trough the compendium on WoTC you can see the following on page 13:
This makes it clear that you can in fact deal 0 damage.
Aside from this there's other sources that explain as below, referencing the DM guide.
Since Crusher tells you "..when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage.." it triggers of a hit roll not a damage roll
Another example of this is Hunter's mark which triggers "...whenever you hit it with a weapon attack..." not when damage is applied.
An example where it wouldn't apply is Hellish rebuke, which specifically triggers of "..the creature that damaged you...", not hit you, but damaged you.
- https://twitter.com/jeremyecrawford/status/784550483507744769
Other examples of not applying are keeping up concentration and keeping up rage, these trigger of taking damage specifically.
In this case though, the crusher, piercer and slasher feats are more aligned with hunter's mark then with concentration and rage. To break it down,
In the reverse order: In order to move someone 5 feet, my fists deal bludgeoning damage, which I apply trough an attack on a creature I hit, once per turn.
The feat doesn't trigger off damage, it triggers off hits. The only reason the word "damage" is in there is to describe the damage type.
Otherwise the feat would have been written as "when you damage a creature" instead of "when you hit a creature"
To me, your quote from the DMG supports the opposite position. The trigger for this is not just an attack which hits, it is an attack which hits which deals bludgeoning damage. This makes half of the condition for the trigger match the second part, and by the rules in that quote would require the damage to be greater than or equal to 1.
This would be different, IMHO, if it said "hit with an attack with a damage type of bludgeoning". This would not have a "deals damage" trigger.
For the SA quote, this looks more like clarifying that there is not a minimum of 1 damage caused by an attack, rather than being specifically applicable to this situation. It also doesn't answer the case of negative damage, which is specifically not allowed per the PHB and is not "zero damage".
Plus, as much as I enjoy rules lawyering, look at simple English. If you read a description which said "I hit him with a punch which dealt damage", you would assume some damage was caused. If you asked how much damage and he said "zero" or "none", you would not consider his initial statements to be truthful, as dealing/causing/inflicting zero damage means the same as not dealing any damage.
Only if you say that "deal zero [type] damage" is not the same as "deal no [type] damage" or "does not deal any [type] damage". I would say those 3 statements are equivalent, and therefore your third condition is not met.
A baby hit me in the face. Did it hurt? No. Did I take damage? No. But I still got hit.
If it makes it easier you could switch it around.
- Once per turn, when you hit a creature with a melee attack
- Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals bludgeoning damage
The key parts are that you hit a creature. The second part is the type of attack. Bludgeoning damage gets displayed this way in weapons and spells too and is used as a discriptor, not as the actual end result.
The meaning being ranged/melee weapon/spell attacks with the damage type of [type]
"The second part is the type of attack."
Only in your specific reading of the condition. It doesn't say "Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack with a damage type of bludgeoning" or "which may deal bludgeoning damage", it specifically says "which deals bludgeoning damage".
Player: I hit the creature
DM: Great, did you deal damage?
Player: Yes
DM: How much?
Player: Zero
DM: So you didn't deal any damage, then. Why did you say you did?
Yes, it specifically states "which deals bludgeoning damage". Exactly as every other instance where the damage type is declared. A couple of examples below, where I've highlighted the Trigger and damage type declarations for your convenience.
You can go trough the entire spell list for spells that do damage type bludgeoning and you'll be hard pressed to find an instance where the damage isn't declared as bludgeoning damage. The only I could find in a short time is shillelagh, which only applies on weapons that deal already deal bludgeoning damage.
The above examples all declare damage type with the same wording used in the crusher/slasher/piercer feat and I can't find any precedent that confirms your claim that the wording would be different. Every example I've seen so far confirms that "deals bludgeoning damage" is a damage type deceleration rather then a trigger condition. So the damage feats boil down to:
Can you show me a single example where the damage type declaration is worded differently then -(deals/takes) [type] damage- ? Because without precedent there's no base for the claim that it's a trigger.
Yes, it specifies the damage type. However, it also specifies that the attack must deal that damage. Not that it is capable of doing so, not that it's the damage type of the weapon, but that it actually does deal the damage.
I don't think this is going to come up very often, really. Few people will take it use features or abilities like this without being relatively good at them. Crusher and other damage type related feats are unlikely to be taken by any but a martial character, and they will very rarely have a negative damage modifier.
Just out of interest, what if the condition for something was purely "hit with an attack which deals damage", without a damage type specified? Would you allow that to trigger on zero (or less than zero) damage?
"Can you show me a single example where the damage type declaration is worded differently then -(deals/takes) [type] damage- ?"
Can you show me a single ruling which says that "deals [type] damage" doesn't mean that the attack must actually cause (i.e. deal) some damage to allow it to trigger? You keep pointing to things worded the same and saying that it would be interpreted as the weapon's damage type, but I think it's just as viable to interpret it as requiring some damage of that type to be inflicted.
All the rules available indicate that 0 damage is an amount of damage.
We are not arguing logic, we are arguing rules. Find 1 rule that says 0 damage is no damage.
From the DMG, quoted above:
'Note that many features that are reactive to attacks use different wording. A feature that triggers "when you are hit/when you hit" and a feature that triggers "when you are damaged/when you deal damage" are not quite the same thing. The "hit" kind of feature would trigger on a hit even if the damage is 0, whereas the "damage" kind would trigger only if the damage was 1 or greater'
The type we are considering here contains both parts in in: it is triggered on a hit which deals damage. According to this, if it triggers on "deals damage" (which it does, in part, by my reading), that damage must be "1 or greater".
To be fair to everyone, this is all probably down to "notoriously bad wording". I completely accept that it is possible to interpret it the way you have. However, it is also very much viable to interpret it the way I am saying. This is why I asked the question, and it is also why there have been others who don't agree.
It all comes down, IMHO, to the definition of "deals damage". I would say that dealing zero damage is not actually dealing damage, as it is silly that it would. You haven't dealt any damage if the amount of damage is zero. The only rules I have read which indicate that zero damage would be dealing damage can just as easily be read as a clarification that you cannot cause negative damage (give HP back to the target). They also clash with the DMG quote above, so I'll take the one which makes sense in plain English (if it ever comes up, which I doubt it will).
Except it doesn't specify that the attack deals damage. The wording would be "when you damage a creature" rather then "when you hit a creature" like literally every other example I gave you.
That's a pretty moot point. Things like resistances and debuffs like ray of enfeeblement exist. So it doesn't matter how good you are at a thing, there could always be a situation where it happens, so it deserves a proper answer.
There is no such description. The closest you can get is "when you damage a creature" or "when you hit with a melee attack", You've provided 0 examples that declare both a requirement to hit and damage be 1 or over.
These all declare on hit, not on weapon damage.
I indeed take my time to point to examples where the english is used before. You keep saying "you think" and when I ask for examples you just uno reverse the question by asking me for examples in return. You're discussing in bad faith here. Provide examples for your arguments with included source.