I always thought the damage was strangely undefined. but one of the examples I'n um I read ( forget where) suggests it's a death effect.
Vampiric Touch isn't a death effect. . . nor is it negative energy or energy drain. Death ward has no effect on it.
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From the PRD
Vampiric touch
School necromancy; Level sorcerer/wizard 3
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S
Range touch
Target living creature touched
Duration instantaneous/1 hour; see text
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance yes
You must succeed on a melee touch attack. Your touch deals 1d6 points of damage per two caster levels (maximum 10d6). You gain temporary hit points equal to the damage you deal. You can't gain more than the subject's current hit points + the subject's Constitution score (which is enough to kill the subject). The temporary hit points disappear 1 hour later.
So, even if the school says necromancy, and a name like Vampiric Touch, the damage type is currently (per RAW) untyped.
Text from Death Ward:
The subject gains a +4 morale bonus on saves against all death spells and magical death effects. The subject is granted a save to negate such effects even if one is not normally allowed. The subject is immune to energy drain and any negative energy effects, including channeled negative energy.
This spell does not remove negative levels that the subject has already gained, but it does remove the penalties from negative levels for the duration of its effect.
Death ward does not protect against other sorts of attacks, even if those attacks might be lethal.
So, per current RAW, Vampiric touch is neither a death spell (for example Death Knell is a death spell and has a descriptor of "death"), nor a negative energy spell (like inflict x wounds spells).
So, per current RAW, Death Ward does nothing vs Vampiric Touch.
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Vampiric Touch isn't a death effect. . . nor is it negative energy or energy drain. Death ward has no effect on it.it's the "negative energy" point that makes me wonder.
It protects against harm and inflict, but Vampiric Touch is like a undefined type. Would there be no way to protect yourself from a vampiric touch?
Have a high touch AC or Spell Resistance?
Spell turning or Spell Immunity would also grant you some protection.
It isn´t ´like´ untyped damage, that´s exactly what it is.
There´s NOTHING about Vamp. Touch that remotely suggests Death Ward protects against it.
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Actually, there is something that suggests that Vampiric Touch is affected by Death Ward, although it might simply be the result of poor editing.
In Ultimate Magic, under the description for the Thanatopic Spell (Metamagic) feat, it gives the example of applying the Thanatopic Spell feat to Vampiric Touch, allowing it to affect someone protected by Death Ward. - Ultimate Magic p.157
The example is pretty clear, so either the Vampiric Touch spell from the Core Rulebook, or the Thanatopic Spell feat from Ultimate Magic could use some errata to clarify this.
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Actually, there is something that suggests that Vampiric Touch is affected by Death Ward, although it might simply be the result of poor editing.
In Ultimate Magic, under the description for the Thanatopic Spell (Metamagic) feat, it gives the example of applying the Thanatopic Spell feat to Vampiric Touch, allowing it to affect someone protected by Death Ward. - Ultimate Magic p.157
The example is pretty clear, so either the Vampiric Touch spell from the Core Rulebook, or the Thanatopic Spell feat from Ultimate Magic could use some errata to clarify this.
It is possible that they are going to errata it. I hear that they also added the "poison" descriptor to stinking cloud (thus changing how it affects things with poison immunity and save bonuses).
Hm... Unless Paizo verifies that this is an intended change that will be included in next Core Rules Errata (like Stinking Cloud becoming Poison), I don´t know if I would rely on Ultimate Magic to adjudicate other things... It has WAY too much Errata issues itself. I can see why it would make sense to Errata Vampire Touch (to consistently explain WHY it doesn´t work vs. non-living targets), but from what we have I wouldn´t say it´s anything but untyped damage, ineligible for Death Ward... Feel free to house-rule however you wish, of course.
How would a living caster gain hit points from a negative energy effect then? Furthermore, if it was a negative energy effect, how would it work against undead?
It's better to see it as stealing vitality than anything else.
It is Necromancy. All forms of necromantic power that has dealt damage has always been negative energy. For this to lack the descriptor is a clearly, and terrible edited, oversight. RAI it is a negative energy effect.
No. Disrupt undead does positive energy damage, and horrid wilting does untyped damage. Bone shatter does untyped damage, as does blight, blood boil, wail of the banshee, finger of death, and canopic conversion. Those are just the sorcerer/wizard spells. Other class spell lists may have others.
Necromancy does more than negative energy damage.
Speaking of necromancy, this thread died 4 years ago.
Otherwise this spell is extremely powerful, consistently healing characters while damaging with no defense from it at all? Insanity. This makes Magus' unstoppable.
You mean defenses aside from having a high touch AC or spell resistance? The damage is hardly great, as it only scales at half the normal rate.
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Otherwise this spell is extremely powerful, consistently healing characters while damaging with no defense from it at all? Insanity. This makes Magus' unstoppable.
Let's make it a bit more realistic:
"It give a magus with spell recall (several archetypes trade it away) that is willing to burn 3 (or 2 at level 11) arcana points to recall vampire tough a decent hp buffer for a couple of battles. Tehn he is out of arcana points."If that is your definition of unstoppable stop laying the 2 encounters adventuring day and your problem is solved.
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Otherwise this spell is extremely powerful, consistently healing characters while damaging with no defense from it at all? Insanity. This makes Magus' unstoppable.Let's make it a bit more realistic:
"It give a magus with spell recall (several archetypes trade it away) that is willing to burn 3 (or 2 at level 11) arcana points to recall vampire tough a decent hp buffer for a couple of battles. Then he is out of arcana points."
If that is your definition of unstoppable stop laying the 2 encounters adventuring day and your problem is solved.You do realize there's the Wand arcana Magus right? Vampiric Touch Wand.
There is also the fact you can prepare the spell more than once and use higher level slots to prepare lower level spells, also.
3 level spell cast at 5th level, for 2d6 of damage/healing, at the cost of not casting any other spell with spell combat as your hand isn't free. Please, do that while fighting my magus. I promise you I will not cast vampiric touch against you if you do that.
I assure that I will memorize greater invisibility, dimension door and several other spells before using a higher level slot for vampiric touch.
After a battle you can use a pearl of power to recover the spell slot, if you like, but you are devoting a ton of resources to a decent but not overpowered tactic.
Vampiric touch is a nice spell, but you gain 1d6 hp every 2 caster levels. At 10th level it is an average of 17.5 hp. A good sword stroke, nothing more.
The damage may not seem great, but Magus class tends to easily get critical hits in thanks to weapons like the Rhoka sword.
Make it a scimitar or rapier, no reason to spend a feat to get a exotic weapons that do an average of 1 extra HP of damage (unless you want to spend most of your time enlarged).
BTW:
a) "Spellstrike (Su): At 2nd level, whenever a magus casts a spell with a range of “touch” from the magus spell list, he can deliver the spell through any weapon he is wielding as part of a melee attack."
b) "Wand Wielder (Su): The magus can activate a wand or staff in place of casting a spell when using spell combat."
c) FAQ "The spell you cast when using spell combat has to be a magus spell you know, and it must be a magus spell prepared with one of your magus spell slots.
Wand wielder don't allow you to use a wand with spellstrike so you get a critical only with a natural 20.