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Lil headcanon for Undertale
I remember I said before that I consider physical damage and magical damage two different things. I also think that while in an Encounter only your Soul is there to take the damage, and you're not physically there to dodge the magic. You can move your soul around, true, but you do it from outside the battle box or even the buttons. I think your body would be stuck in place during the turn of the enemy.
Physical damage on the other hand, it can be dealt out of combat too, outside the rules of an Encounter. I remember this book in Snowdin saying that monsters receive bullet pattern birthday cards for their birthday, implying they can summon magic only during an Encounter.
Physical damage can be dealt both inside and outside of combat, as Frisk shows when they attack. I believe that since monsters are made of magic both physical and magical attacks lower their HP, while humans are made of physical matter and their Soul doesn't get damaged if their body is. On the other side, magic attacks can sometimes influence the body, especially when you die. There's an interaction with Toriel in the Ruins, where she's worried about you because she sees you injured if you get hit by a monster even if you're at full HP, while if you don't get hit at all during all the Ruins she notices you're unscathed. That proves that while you got physical damage by magic attacks, eating food or saving heals your Soul but not your body.
The fact that the two things are different can also explain what I like to call the "dodging dilemma". As we know, Sans can dodge us. It's known, and no one discusses it. But if we talk to Undyne during her hangout, she tells us that Asgore can also dodge, because the first time the two fought Undyne couldn't land a single hit. But Asgore doesn't dodge us during his battle. Everyone chalks it up to him being regretful and not wanting to take our Soul, until another thing comes to mind. Wouldn't he have taught Undyne how to dodge, if he knew how to do? And wouldn't Undyne have used that ability against us, if that was the case?
This would make sense if you considered the fact physical and magical attacks are different. I think every monster knows how to dodge basic attack patterns, even if it could be difficult to dodge more complicated ones. And monsters are taught how to fight only magically and not physically. And for some reason, only Sans knows how to dodge physical attacks. And it all clicks together like this. Who knows, maybe Asgore knows how to also dodge physical attacks, but let's remember something else: when he was on the Surface, apparently humans could and did use magic too. Maybe he wasn't expecting Frisk to fight physically inside an Encounter because he thought they could also use magic, and all the monsters didn't warn him because they didn't know better. His skills would be rusty at best when he realized the situation, and he probably lost that ability anyway during the years of reclusion Underground, this without counting the regret factor. The only question left is, how does Sans know how to dodge physical attacks then? I... Will let you try to come up with answers, because I have no idea :)
But seriously, tell me what you think about this, possible weak points of this headcanon and maybe conjure up a solution for the last question, if you want to.
... I lied, it wasn't a little headcanon at all