Rule · 500.6
Retaliation
Thorns, Riposte, Retort, and Subrogated Insurance all say the same thing in different words: the enemy that damaged you loses Vitality. They are one mechanic, and it is not damage. The boss Reflect rune reads like them but is not one of them — it answers with real damage.
This rule is part of the Comprehensive Rules, where every cross-reference resolves in one page.
- 500.6aRetaliation is a Vitality cost, not a damage instance. It skips the whole pipeline in 500.1 — Armor, the incoming-damage cap, Insurance, Shield, damage-ignore charges, and ally redirects never touch it. The rules every Vitality cost shares are in 500.8.
- 500.6bBecause it is not a damage instance, it starts no damage reactions. Retaliation never answers retaliation, and it fires no on-damage-taken trigger on the unit paying it.
- 500.6cIt is still Vitality lost, so anything keyed to losing Vitality rather than to a damage instance does respond. The runes that reset on Vitality damage — Adrenaline, Momentum, and Bolster — lose their accumulated bonus, and Vitality-threshold rune effects re-evaluate.
- 500.6dA defy-death rune still saves the unit paying it. Retaliation that empties Vitality kills through the ordinary death route, with deathrattles, Macabre, and kill credit intact.
- 500.6eRetaliation is refused against a unit that is not a legal combat target: a dead unit, an Entrapped unit, or a Dormant one.
- 500.6fThe retaliating unit is credited with the Vitality it took. Against a normal unit that Vitality also feeds its own Feast; against a boss it scores as damage dealt but feeds no Feast.
- 500.6gRetaliation into a boss can cross a Phasebreak threshold, but it never advances the boss's Stagger meter. Stagger counts direct damage only.
- 500.6hA unit never retaliates against itself or against an ally. Both Thorns and Riposte check sides before they fire.
See also Insurance Shield Feast Relentless