Is damage and loss of life the same thing?

Life loss and Damage are not the same thing. Damage causes life loss, but other non-damage effects [card=Profane Command]can cause life loss as well. Life loss is unaffected by anything that prevents or redirects damage. Damage can be dealt to creatures, planeswalkers, and players.

What counts as damage in MTG?

Damage is impairment or destruction that a creature, planeswalker, or player may suffer from a certain source. Damage dealt to a Planeswalker causes that many loyalty counters to be removed from it. Damage dealt to a player causes them to lose that much life.

Does paying life count as loss of life MTG?

If a player pays life, the payment is subtracted from their life total; in other words, the player loses that much life. (Players can always pay 0 life.)

Do abilities count as combat damage?

There are also abilities like the one granted to creatures you control by Arm with Aether that do not care if the damage being dealt is combat damage or not. This ability will trigger whenever the creature with the ability deals damage.

What qualifies as combat damage?

To count as combat damage (such as for Fog or Curiosity), the damage must be dealt as a result of combat, not just during the combat phase. This is specifically damage dealt by attacking and blocking creatures during the turn-based action at the beginning of a combat damage step (see below for more details).

Is infect a replacement effect?

There is a ruling on Infect: Damage dealt to a player from a creature with infect does not deal damage as well as poison counters. Damage is assigned as a number and can be prevented as normal, but when it is dealt to a player it turns into poison counters instead of reducing their life total.

How much damage is infect?

702.90a Infect is a static ability. 702.90b Damage dealt to a player by a source with infect doesn’t cause that player to lose life. Rather, it causes that source’s controller to give the player that many poison counters.