TOPIC: DR vs Monster Ranged attacks question

I am trying to get right when player's Ranged DR applies to a monster's non-melee attack and when it does not. I was told this past run but didn't write it down before re-focusing on the adventure.

My Elf has 7 Ranged DR (4 Kvothe, 2 Shaed, 1 Saga). A monster hits me with a non-melee, non-Eldritch attack and I want to quickly know whether or not Ranged DR applies. Is the rule "It applies after the save?" "If you had to roll a saving throw then it doesn't apply?" "Other? The Magical Damage Resolution Flow Chart on Page 70 of the TD Player's Handbook implies the former but only talks about spells or magical damage, and I don't want to interrupt the combat to ask if the attack was a spell/magical.

Thank you very much.

Surprised you didn't get an answer on this.

Supposedly, there are three forms of "attacks". Melee, missile, spell. The latter two fall under ranged. Anything not a melee attack would, therefore, be a ranged attack.

Where it gets messy is when it's not clear whether a monster is attacking or doing something else that should be an attack but ... TD vagueness. How often do we get hit with breath weapon attacks? Are they missile? How often does a fire elemental just flame on? Are they a spell?

Since the player controls hit point loss, ultimately, as a practical matter, you decide what is relevant. Given that it is a waste of time to go through whether a bunch of tokens matter for something or not, I understand the quandary as we could cheat as much as we wanted on managing HP but don't want to as it undermines the challenge.

Hello, ranged DR applies to non-melee damage unless the effect explicitly bypasses DR or is resolved as direct damage after a save that doesn’t allow DR. The tricky part is that not all non-melee attacks are treated the same in the flow.