How much do elemental resistances and vulnerabilities influence damage?

There are many enemies with resistances or vulnerabilities to specific elements like fire, lightning, cold or spirit. I'm wondering how important matching my elemental damage to those resistances or vulnerabilities is.

What are the exact damage multipliers if you attack with an element that the enemy is resistant to, or that they are vulnerable to?

1 Answer

Resistances are a flat reduction, after armor is taken into account. So if you have 20% fire resistance, you take 20% less damage from a packet of fire damage. It works the same way for a vulnerability.

I'm playing on Hard, and matching offensive elements to enemies is definitely useful, but not so useful that I would carry around multiple sets of weapons. You can usually just power though that.

If you are having trouble with a fight, going back with the appropriate elemental resistance potion equipped, however, could definitely turn the tide.

Some of the higher-tier dragon fights might be worth speccing against. Dragons have a ton of health, and the longer the fight goes, the greater the chance that something could go poorly for you.