Monster Damage Resistances and Immunities: Full Reference Chart

Damage resistances and immunities are among the most mechanically significant properties in the Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual — the difference between a fighter's sword arm and a useless wet noodle often comes down to whether a creature has "resistance to nonmagical bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage" printed in its stat block. This reference covers how resistances and immunities are defined, how the math works at the table, which monster types carry these properties most reliably, and how Dungeon Masters can use that knowledge to build encounters with real teeth.

Definition and scope

The D&D 5th Edition rules distinguish three tiers of damage modification, each defined in the Player's Handbook and restated in the Monster Manual (Wizards of the Coast, Monster Manual 5th ed., pp. 8–9):

1. Resistance — the creature takes half damage from the specified damage type.
2. Immunity — the creature takes zero damage from the specified damage type.
3. Vulnerability — the creature takes double damage from the specified damage type.

These three properties operate on specific damage types, not on attack forms. The 13 damage types recognized in 5th Edition are: acid, cold, fire, force, lightning, necrotic, piercing, poison, psychic, radiant, slashing, thunder, and bludgeoning. A werewolf resistant to "nonmagical bludgeoning" is not resistant to a magic weapon's bludgeoning damage — the qualifier matters as much as the type.

Scope is narrow and deliberate. A creature verified in the Monster Manual as immune to poison damage is immune to the damage, not necessarily the poisoned condition. Those are tracked separately in the stat block under "Condition Immunities." Conflating the two is one of the most common rulings errors at the table.

How it works

The math is applied after all other modifiers. A rogue who rolls 24 piercing damage against a skeleton — which has immunity to poison and vulnerability to bludgeoning, but no piercing modification — deals the full 24. Roll that same 24 against a werewolf with resistance to nonmagical piercing, and the creature takes 12.

When resistance and vulnerability apply simultaneously (a rare but rules-legal scenario with homebrew or certain spells), the 5th Edition Dungeon Master's Guide (p. 197) specifies they cancel each other out, resulting in normal damage. No stacking of multiple resistances to the same type occurs — two separate sources of fire resistance still reduce fire damage by half, not by three-quarters.

The most operationally important subset for Dungeon Masters is the "nonmagical physical" resistance cluster: many monster stat blocks read "bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks." This single line covers lycanthropes (werewolves, wererats, werebears), shadows, and dozens of fiends. At tier 2 play (roughly character levels 5–10, per the challenge rating system), parties without access to magical weapons can find these resistances functionally crippling.

Common scenarios

Undead: Skeletal undead such as skeletons carry vulnerability to bludgeoning and immunity to poison and exhaustion. Zombies are tougher — no bludgeoning vulnerability, poison immunity, and the infamous Undead Fortitude trait. Full breakdown of undead resistances is available in the undead monsters guide.

Fiends — Demons vs. Devils: This is where the contrast between monster families matters most. Demons (chaotic evil fiends) generally carry immunity to poison and resistance to cold, fire, and lightning. Devils (lawful evil fiends), by contrast, typically trade cold resistance for cold immunity and add poison immunity. Both families share resistance to nonmagical physical damage. The practical difference: a cold-based spell like Cone of Cold is half-effective against a demon, but outright halved and absorbed differently against a pit fiend with cold immunity. See the fiends, demons, and devils guide for type-by-type breakdowns.

Constructs: Golems represent the most aggressive immunity clusters in the game. The iron golem carries immunity to fire, poison, and psychic damage, plus immunity to nonmagical physical attacks that aren't adamantine. Four immunities in a single stat block. The constructs guide details how golem-type magic immunity interacts with spell effects beyond damage.

Elementals: Fire elementals are immune to fire and to nonmagical physical damage — but vulnerable to nothing. Water-based elementals tend toward cold resistance or immunity. Earth elementals carry nonmagical physical resistance but no elemental damage immunity by default.

Decision boundaries

When building an encounter or adjudicating a damage roll, 3 thresholds determine whether a resistance matters enough to shape tactics:

1. Single damage type vs. party composition — if 3 of 4 players deal primarily fire damage (a pyromaniac party, statistically unlikely but not fictional), fire immunity on an enemy is essentially a TPK-shaping mechanic. DMs building for encounter balance should cross-reference party damage profiles against monster immunity clusters before finalizing encounter design.

2. Nonmagical physical resistance vs. party level — below level 5, the majority of martial characters have no reliable access to magic weapons. A creature with nonmagical physical resistance effectively has 20–30% more functional hit points against those characters. The conceptual overview at how-recreation-works-conceptual-overview frames how mechanical asymmetries like this shape play experience at different tiers.

3. Condition immunity vs. control spells — poison immunity in a stat block blocks the poisoned condition from poison-damage effects, but Hold Person targets the paralyzed condition and bypasses poison immunity entirely. Knowing where damage immunity ends and condition immunity begins is the line between a failed action and a fight-defining spell.

Monster traits and special abilities sometimes layer additional conditional resistances on top of stat block immunities — the lich's Rejuvenation trait, for instance, doesn't affect damage at all but dramatically changes the consequence of dealing it.