"attack doesn't penetrate the defenses" question

[omega_red]

What does this message exactly mean? Went to water cave with my lvl27 wizard and tried to kill the dragon. Neither Burning Hands (P:39) nor Fireball (P:16) could harm her.

The attack doesn't penetrate the defenses of Shyssiryxius, the female great water dragon!
She should be pretty vulnerable to fire or I'm mistaken? Do I just need to beef Fireball's efectiveness up?

[Silfir]

Um, why should a water dragon inside a water cave be especially vulnerable to fire?

I don't think the problem is effectivity (yours is Xtreme), so I'd wager a guess that Shyssiryxius is immune to fire.

[omega_red]

Well, immune monsters give messages like "foo resists the searing flames". Or well, maybe the defenses in question is indeed water in the cave ;)
Too bad I don't have Acid Ball (and the one from Library got destroyed there :/)

[Laukku]

Maybe it has something to do with PV. Trying Burning Hands on some ants gave the same message once.

[reich]

I think the message means the monster didn't take damage thanks to its PV. With a level 1 elementalist this often happens when you try to scorch a giant bat.

[Grey]

Water has nothing to do with it - I've scorched her before. PV is likely the answer, though I've never heard of that happening with ball spells. Acid ball easily takes down greater molochs for instance.

[Elone]

But then again greater molochs are weak, and easily fall in melee.

[Grey]

Greater Molochs have minimum 100 PV - acid ball does not cause a great deal more than that, if more than that at all. Emperor moloch has 200 PV and he's known to fall to acid ball too. I just don't think PV affects the spell.

[Silfir]

Could it be that DV is the deciding factor? I'm currently having trouble wrapping my head around the idea that a huge bat could have enough PV to not take damage from Burning Hands...

[gut]

Burning hands does yield pathetic damage at exp. level 1, but
quickly improves as your exp. level rises. I remember not being
able to damage bandits with BH, but I've not noticed it with bats.

[Grey]

Repeated use to get its effectivity up also makes it quite powerful (at least in comparison with most other spells where effectivity does very little).