netherspite
commented
6 years ago 
Monday Sep 14, 2015 at 16:48 GMT
Those partial resists are caused by a mechanic called level based resistance, where mobs do not actually have the specific resistance, but are able to partially(or fully for nonbinary spells) resist the spell. For infos about that mechanic read: https://dwarfpriest.wordpress.com/2008/01/07/spell-hit-spell-penetration-and-resistances/#more-176
Some combatlog values(from 1.12) show smite partial resists aswell: http://forums.elitistjerks.com/topic/9411-spell-hit-spell-crit-and-mages/?p=264535
Thus I think this is working as intended.
Sunday Sep 13, 2015 at 15:03 GMT
Originally opened as https://github.com/ccshiro/cc-buglist/issues/1778
This report has been marked as invalid, and with good reason. I'll be leaving the original report further down in the post.
See Barroth's link to EJ: Empirical evidence shows that mobs that are higher level than yourself have an innate chance of partially resisting spell damage that is impossible to counter.
See also Wowwiki's article on Magical Resistance: Level-based resistance (not to be confused with level-based miss) can play a factor in total resists. For every level that a mob has over the player, there is 8 resist (believed; the exact number may be higher) added. For boss fights, this means there is 15-24 resistance added. This extra resistance means there will be partial resists on non-binary spells from the added resistance. However, this resistance has been shown to not apply to binary spells at all. This level based resistance cannot be reduced by any means, not even Spell Penetration.
Original report:
How it should work Partial resists only exist as a result of resistances, while full resists may be a result of resistances or chance to be missed. However, holy resistance does not exist as a stat, and only few mobs have some form of protection against holy spells.
PvE on Corecraft Level 3 priest casting Smite vs level 4 mob: Full hits, partial resists, full resists. Level 4 priest casting Smite vs level 4 mob: Full hits, no partial resists, full resists.
This was the case for 20+ mobs, and the partial resists show that the higher level mob has holy resistance, which it shouldn't have. It's likely built into mobs through "all resistances" or chance to be missed.
PvP on Corecraft Between players there seems to be no issue, even with level difference, Mark of the Wild and "resist all" enchants. A holy spell was never partially resisted (only hit or full resist), but other schools were.
In short Higher level mobs should only have an increased chance to fully resist holy spells, which is caused by not being capped on spell hit. A mob should not be able to partially resist holy spells, which would be caused by having holy resistance.
Discussions on the subject http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Magic_schools_(WoW)#Holy http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Resistance?oldid=1561363 http://www.excalibur-nw.com/forum/tracker/issue-2323-holy-damage-being-partially-resisted-mobs-having-holy-resistance/ http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/676034-Holy-Resistance
Last edited: 2015-09-14 22:30 (10:30 PM) CEST