The alternate racial trait for Aasimar, "Deathless Spirit" says, among other things:
They gain resistance 5 against negative energy damage.
The Shadow Entry says:
A shadow's touch deals 1d6 points of Strength damage to a living creature. This is a negative energy effect.
Is the shadow's strength damage negative energy damage? If not, to what end is it identified as "a negative energy effect"?
The alternate racial trait for Aasimar, "Deathless Spirit" says, among other things:
They gain resistance 5 against negative energy damage.The Shadow Entry says:
A shadow's touch deals 1d6 points of Strength damage to a living creature. This is a negative energy effect.Is the shadow's strength damage negative energy damage? If not, to what end is it identified as "a negative energy effect"?
I would personally rule that the resistance only applies to negative energy that does damage directly to a character's health. The fact it is identified as "negative energy" means that a creature like a Dhampir, who reverses the negative/positive aspects of positive and negative energy, would either be unaffected (or even better) by it.
I'd likely go with your ruling too, as it seems too powerful otherwise, but I'm wondering if there is something more definite.
I'd likely go with your ruling too, as it seems too powerful otherwise, but I'm wondering if there is something more definite.
I'm curious as well and am currently trying to find anything concrete. If I find it, I'll be sure to post it. Perhaps someone else will beat me to it.
EDIT: The only thing I can find is the description of resistance in general -
A creature with resistance to energy has the ability (usually extraordinary) to ignore some damage of a certain type per attack, but it does not have total immunity.
Each resistance ability is defined by what energy type it resists and how many points of damage are resisted. It doesn't matter whether the damage has a mundane or magical source.
When resistance completely negates the damage from an energy attack, the attack does not disrupt a spell. This resistance does not stack with the resistance that a spell might provide.
This seems to indicate that there IS a possibility that the trait would stop nearly all of the STR damage, since resistance only states that it must be damage, which is what STR damage technically is. So... I suppose it's quite possible.
The best I can offer you as evidence
Damage
Damage reduces a target's current hit points.Ability Damage is called out separately at the bottom of the section, suggesting it is distinct.
This topic seems to come up every so often, but usually in reference to abilities that flatly add to "damage".
Basically my argument is this
-"Damage" is defined as above
-every place where they intend a SQ to affect "Ability Damage"(and/or "Drain"), it is specifically noted as such
-ergo, every reference to simply "Damage" only entails HP effects
I never would have thought to look up the game's definition for damage. Given the quoted material, I believe it's a solid stance to say that Deathless Spirit does not apply to ability damage.
Seems pretty conclusive to me, then. Thanks for the assists!