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Archives of Nethys

Archives of Nethys

Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Starfinder RPG

Rules Index | GM Screen | Player's Guide
Chapter 8: Playing the Game

Immunity, Weakness, and Resistance

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
Damage and effects can be negated, deal less damage, or deal more damage due to the recipient’s immunity, weakness, or resistance.

Immunity

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
When you have immunity to a specific type of damage, you ignore all damage of that type. If you have immunity to a specific condition or type of effect, you can't be affected by that condition or any effect of that type. You can still be targeted by an ability that includes an effect or condition you are immune to; you just don't apply that particular effect or condition.

If you have immunity to effects with a certain trait (such as death effects, poison, or disease), you are unaffected by effects with that trait. Often, an effect both has a trait and deals that type of damage (such as a lightning bolt spell). In these cases, the immunity applies to the effect corresponding to the trait, not just the damage. However, some complex effects might have parts that affect you even if you're immune to one of the effect's traits; for instance, a spell that deals both fire and acid damage can still deal acid damage to you even if you're immune to fire.

Immunity to Critical Hits

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
Immunity to critical hits works a little differently. When a creature immune to critical hits is critically hit by a Strike or other attack that deals damage, it takes normal damage instead of double damage. This does not make it immune to any other critical success effects of the actions, such as a critical specialization effect or the extra damage of the deadly trait. However, in some cases the GM might determine the added effects don’t apply.

Immunity to Nonlethal

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
Another exception is immunity to the nonlethal trait. If you’re immune to nonlethal, you’re immune to all damage from attacks and effects with the nonlethal trait, no matter what other type the damage has. For instance, a typical construct has immunity to nonlethal attacks. No matter how hard you hit it with your fist, you’re not going to damage it. However, you can take a penalty to remove the nonlethal trait from your fist (page 282), and some abilities give you unarmed attacks without the nonlethal trait.

Temporary Immunity

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
Some effects grant you immunity to the same effect for a set amount of time. If an effect grants you temporary immunity, repeated applications of that effect don't affect you for as long as the temporary immunity lasts. Unless the effect says it applies only to a certain creature's ability, it doesn't matter who created the effect. For example, the blindness spell says, “The target is temporarily immune to blindness for 1 minute.” If anyone casts blindness on that creature again before 1 minute passes, the spell has no effect.

Temporary immunity doesn't prevent or end ongoing effects of the source of the temporary immunity. For instance, if an ability makes you frightened and you then gain temporary immunity to the ability, you don't immediately lose the frightened condition due to the immunity you just gained—you simply don't become frightened if you're targeted by the ability again before the immunity ends.

Weakness

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
If you have a weakness to a certain type of damage or damage from a certain source, that type of damage is extra effective against you. Whenever you would take that type of damage, increase the damage you take by the value of the weakness. For instance, if you are dealt 2d6 fire damage and have weakness 5 to fire, you take 2d6+5 fire damage.

If you have a weakness to something that doesn't normally deal damage, such as water, you take damage equal to the weakness value when touched or affected by it. If more than one weakness would apply to the same instance of damage, use only the highest applicable weakness value. This usually only happens when a creature is weak to both a type of damage and a material or trait, such as a cold iron axe cutting a monster that has weakness to cold iron and slashing.

Resistance

Source Player Core pg. 408 2.0
If you have resistance to a type of damage, each time you take that type of damage, reduce the amount of damage you take by the listed number (to a minimum of 0 damage).

Resistance can specify combinations of damage types or other traits. For instance, you might encounter a monster that's resistant to non-magical bludgeoning damage, meaning it would take less damage from bludgeoning attacks that weren't magical, but would take normal damage from your +1 mace (since it's magical) or a nonmagical spear (since it deals piercing damage). A resistance also might have an exception. For example, resistance 10 to physical damage (except silver) would reduce any physical damage by 10 unless that damage was dealt by a silver weapon.

If you have more than one type of resistance that would apply to the same instance of damage, use only the highest applicable resistance value, as described in weakness.

It's possible to have resistance to all damage. When an effect deals damage of multiple types and you have resistance to all damage, apply the resistance to each type of damage separately. If an attack would deal 7 slashing damage and 4 fire damage, resistance 5 to all damage would reduce the slashing damage to 2 and negate the fire damage entirely.