DnD is a game with many mechanics and rules, and for new players, it can be hard to memorize or take all of them in in the beginning. Resistance, for example, is a fairly important concept in Dungeons and Dragons.
One of the many things that new players are wondering about is resistance. So, what is resistance, and how does it work in Dungeons and Dragons?
Resistance makes creatures take less damage from certain sources. For example, if a creature has resistance to physical damage, it will take half damage from sources of physical damage. Resistance can originate from various features and traits. If damage is an uneven number before you include the resistance to that damage, you round the number down. For example, 17 damage would end up as 8.
There are a lot of different ways you can gain resistance to different damage types in Dungeons and Dragons. Let’s explore this topic further. Read more to find out everything you need to know about resistance in DnD!
How Does Resistance Work In DnD?
As I mentioned earlier, resistance means that you take less damage from a damage type than you would if you would not have resistance to that damage type. The Player’s Handbook explains it well (page 197):
“If a creature or an object has resistance to a damage type, damage of that type is halved against it.”
I also mentioned that you round down when calculating damage that you have resistance to. This is only necessary when the damage that you’re receiving is an odd number, of course.
It’s fairly straightforward. However, there are some things regarding resistance in DnD that are unclear. For example, do two instances of resistance to the same damage type stack?
The answer to that question is no. You can’t have more than one source of resistance for the same resistance type. However, you can have more than one source of resistance for different types.
While multiple instances of the same resistance do not stack, other types of damage mitigation do stack. That means that you can take even less damage from damage with resistance plus a skill or ability.
For example, if a Tiefling rogue gets hit by a fireball while it has evasion active, plus the racial bonus it gets from the racial trait Hellish Resistance, those two instances of damage mitigation would stack.
You might be dismayed now, to find out that your Barbarian that doesn’t have any spells can’t deal damage to creatures with physical resistance, but you would be mistaken in thinking that.
Remember, weapons can have magical properties, and that will make the attacks deal magical damage. Barbarians, for example, can then deal a bunch of magic damage instead of physical.
There’s something called vulnerability in DnD as well, which is pretty much the opposite of resistance, in that it makes you take more damage from a source you’re vulnerable to. In fact, you take double damage from such sources.
How Can You Get Resistance in DnD?
I mentioned earlier how different resistance can be gained from different sources. This includes racial features, feats, spells, and more. Naturally, some resistance abilities are harder to come by and others are easy.
Let’s go through some more specific ways of getting resistance in DnD. Here are the ways of gaining resistance. I’ll limit the list to resistances from the Player’s Handbook, but there are certainly more of them in for example Xanathar’s Guide to Everything and Volo’s Guide to Monsters.
| Name | Source | Resistance |
| Hellish Resistance | Racial Feature (Tiefling) | Fire |
| Dwarven Resilience | Racial Feature (Dwarf) | Poison |
| Aura of Purity | Spell (Cleric and Paladin) | Poison |
| Stout Resilience | Racial Feature (Stout Halfling) | Poison |
| Protection from Poison | Spell (Cleric, Druid, Paladin, and Ranger) | Poison |
| Thought Shield | Spell (Warlock) | Psychic |
| Rage | Barbarian (Ability) | Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing |
| Inured to Death | School of Necromancy Warlock (Ability) | Necrotic |
| Aura of Life | Spell (Cleric and Paladin) | Necrotic |
| Fire Shield | Spell (Wizard) | Cold |
| Avatar of Battle | Ability (War Domain Cleric) | Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing (Non-magical) |
| Stone Skin | Spell (Druid, Ranger, Sorcerer, and Wizard) | Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing (Non-magical) |
| Wind Walk | Spell (Druid) | Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing (Non-magical) |
| Blade Ward | Cantrip (Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard) | Bludgeoning, Piercing and Slashing (Weapons) |
| Dungeon Delver | Feat | Traps |
| Gaseous Form | Spell (Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard) | Non-magical Damage |
| Aura of Warding | Spell (Oath of the Ancients Paladin) | Spells |
| Spell Resistance | Feature (Abjuration School Wizard) | Spells |
| Wild Magic Surge | Feature (Sorcerer) | Damage (All) |
| Warding Bond | Spell (Cleric) | Damage (All) |
There are some other miscellaneous resistance abilities as well, for example, Draconic Ancestry and Fiendish Resilience. As I mentioned earlier, there are more available in other books and I strongly recommend getting them.
What’s the Difference Between Resistance and Immunity?
Immunity is another status in Dungeons and Dragons that is somewhat similar to resistance. Immunity is a more uncommon condition than resistance because it grants complete protection from a certain type of damage.
For example, Mind Blank is a spell that grants immunity to Psychic damage for 24 hours, which means that you can’t take damage from Psychic damage. Fairly logical, right?