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I would love to see positive/negative energy crap gone. A big plus from me to 4th edition for ridding of that and introducing radiant and necrotic damage types instead and turning healing into healing.
I'd love to see it more inline with the other energy types. Sort of alike a large divide between Divine and Arcane magic, Divine taps more into the 5th element, while Arcane maipulates the four classic elements (or their D&D equivalents). Clerics would be more defined and different as they channel the holy/spiritual energies of life and death more effectively, Druids access both those a bit and a greater understanding of the natural worlds elemental forces, while Wizards (and Arcanists) focus mostly on the less spiritual Elemental forces, but have a slight understanding or other forces as well.
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I think some intent can be inferred by looking at the selective channeling feat and burst effect rules.
Selective Channeling
You can choose whom to affect when you channel energy.Prerequisite: Cha 13, channel energy class feature.
Benefit: When you channel energy, you can choose a number of targets in the area up to your Charisma modifier. These targets are not affected by your channeled energy.
Normal: All targets in a 30-foot burst are affected when you channel energy. You can only choose whether or not you are affected.
Then also the FAQ from here
Just like using a Target: creature spell, you must be able to see or touch a creature to affect it (or, in the case of this feat, select it to be unaffected).
Which states basically that you must be able to target a creature to exclude it, which reaffirms that everyone is affected by default. Now keep in mind that effects of the burst may vary based on your choices.
Also consider that channel energy is a burst
Channeling energy causes a burst...
looking at how burst spells work might help (yes, I know it's not a spell, but bear with me):
A burst spell affects whatever it catches in its area, including creatures that you can't see.
So let's say you were a positive cleric with a Human, a dhampir, and a zombie withing your range. Now you choose to do a harm undead burst, what happens? All 3 of them are affected since they are within range and you didn't exclude them. Now since you chose "harm undead", what happens to each of them when the burst hits them?
Human: no effect, because it is a living creature.
Dhampir: damaged, because as NEI states: "The creature is alive, but reacts to positive and negative energy as if it were undead — positive energy harms it, negative energy heals it."
Zombie: damaged, because it is undead (obviously)
Basically, what I am saying is as a burst effect, it hits everything. It is not a targeted ability, you just choose what the effect of the burst is which determines what effect is caused to each creature in the burst.
Recap:
harm undead: harms dhampir
heal living: no effect on dhampir
heal undead: heals dhampir
harm living: no effect on dhampir
I think some clarifications to the text could be useful in a later edition, but the existing rules seem pretty clear to me on the matter.
Hope that helps, I'm going to sleep!
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You're missing the part about the dhampir being alive. You have to pick whether you are targeting living or undead when you channel. A dhampir is not undead. Nobody has said that a burst doesn't affect all valid targets in the area.
Example :
Cleric channels positive to heal living in a 30 ft burst. Inside that burst is 1 human necromancer, 4 allies, and 5 skeletons. The cleric heals himself, his 4 allies, and the necromancer, because all are living creatures. The skeletons are not harmed, because he channeled to affect living, not undead.
Same cleric channels positive to harm undead in a 30 ft burst. Inside that burst is the same group. Only the 5 skeletons are affected, and they all take damage. None of the other creatures are undead, so they are not affected by the positive energy. Not healed, not harmed, nothing.
The cleric has no choice, he has to pick living or undead as the target of his channel. The channel only affects targets that fall into one of those two categories. The dhampir is alive, he's affected by targeting living. He just reacts to whatever energy is channeled the opposite of a normal human.
The cleric has no choice, he has to pick living or undead as the target of his channel.
The main point I was making though was that the cleric chooses who will be affected by the burst, not who gets hit by the burst (except himself or limited targets with selective channeling).
When he chooses undead/living, everything not excluded in range gets hit with the burst, it just has no effect when it hits invalid creatures.
So a dhampir in range gets hit by the channel, and the effect it has on him is modified by NEI.
DreDub,
he can't get hit by the channel if he's not a valid target. That's like saying that if you had a burst effect 'slay elf' that a human is hit by it when it goes off in his face. He's not. He's an invalid target, so the spell doesn't interact with him at all.
Here's a different one. If a cleric had the 'elemental channel' feature, he can't say it hits every human within 30 feet and doesn't work on them. It doesn't hit any target that's not valid to hit.
If your premise were true, then any class feature that adds to a channel would affect everyone in 30 feet, not just the valid targets. You can't use a channel against an invalid target (your channel of positive energy vs living targets doesn't affect elementals, golems, or undead).
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You know, we could just get rid of the annoying emo dhampir and the whole issue would be solved...
Just a thought.
DreDub,
he can't get hit by the channel if he's not a valid target. That's like saying that if you had a burst effect 'slay elf' that a human is hit by it when it goes off in his face. He's not. He's an invalid target, so the spell doesn't interact with him at all.Here's a different one. If a cleric had the 'elemental channel' feature, he can't say it hits every human within 30 feet and doesn't work on them. It doesn't hit any target that's not valid to hit.
If your premise were true, then any class feature that adds to a channel would affect everyone in 30 feet, not just the valid targets. You can't use a channel against an invalid target (your channel of positive energy vs living targets doesn't affect elementals, golems, or undead).
I see what DreDub's saying, and I'm not sure whether or not I agree. But let me attempt to restate it:
1) Cleric chooses form of the channel and activates it.
2) Every creature within the range of the channel is within the burst.
3) Every creature within the burst is checked to see whether they are a valid target.
4) Every creature that is a valid target takes the appropriate affect based on their type and abilities and so on.
Given this, a dhampir would be a valid target for a "heal living" channel in step 3 (because he's living), and then would be hurt by it per step 4. The same dhampir would ignore a "heal undead" channel, because step 3 excludes him before step 4 is checked.
The counter argument seems to be:
1) Cleric chooses form of the channel and activates it.
2) Every creature within range that is of the appropriate type takes the appropriate affect based on their type and abilities and so on.
It's conflating more of the logic into a single step, which changes the outcome.
...
I see what DreDub's saying, and I'm not sure whether or not I agree. But let me attempt to restate it:1) Cleric chooses form of the channel and activates it.
2) Every creature within the range of the channel is within the burst.
3) Every creature within the burst is checked to see whether they are a valid target.
4) Every creature that is a valid target takes the appropriate affect based on their type and abilities and so on.
Yes, precisely.
Given this, a dhampir would be a valid target for a "heal living" channel in step 3 (because he's living), and then would be hurt by it per step 4. The same dhampir would ignore a "heal undead" channel, because step 3 excludes him before step 4 is checked.
In Step 3, since it is a positive energy burst, you would treat a dhampir as undead and it would not be affected. In a heal undead, when it checks him he would be a valid target.
I think the crux of the issue stems from the misconception that this ability is targeted only at certain creatures, when instead it is an AoE effect which only affects certain creatures, based on the choice you make when you use it.
DreDub,
he can't get hit by the channel if he's not a valid target. That's like saying that if you had a burst effect 'slay elf' that a human is hit by it when it goes off in his face. He's not. He's an invalid target, so the spell doesn't interact with him at all.
Ah, but the human boy would be hit, since he is in AoE effect. Now, what is the effect of this on him? Nothing, because he is not an elf.
Here's a different one. If a cleric had the 'elemental channel' feature, he can't say it hits every human within 30 feet and doesn't work on them. It doesn't hit any target that's not valid to hit.
It still "hits" everything in range, it just has no effect unless you are that particular type of elemental.
If your premise were true, then any class feature that adds to a channel would affect everyone in 30 feet, not just the valid targets. You can't use a channel against an invalid target (your channel of positive energy vs living targets doesn't affect elementals, golems, or undead).
Not sure which class features you are referring to, I am at work and they block all the fun sites, so I can't look up much. Is this something that adds on to the damage? Or that lets you select other creature types?
Basically, when I say that things are hit by the AoE channel burst, I do not mean that being hit automatically means it heals or does damage.
DreDub, I think your misconception is that you are saying it's not targeting specific types of creatures. However, the plain reading of the Channel Energy uses the words 'creatures targeted'.
You are ignoring the fact that the channel ability is a burst that specifically target's certain creatures by type (living vs undead).
This energy can be used to cause or heal damage, depending on the type of energy channeled and the creatures targeted
So yes, it's an area of effect, that specifically targets a specific type of creature when it's used. If you are not that type of creature, you are not a valid target of the channel, and are not affected by it.
Bobson's five steps follow the rules as written, and do not require treating the Dhampir as Undead for targeting (which nothing in the rules says he should be). The only rule is that they react to negative and positive energy like undead. Not to targeted spells like undead.
You know, we could just get rid of the annoying emo dhampir and the whole issue would be solved...
Just a thought.
Unless you ban the NEA, it makes no difference if it's a dhampir, or some necromantically fueled half-living/half-dead monster. This same issue will pop up. That's why I labeled the thread NEA & Channel, not 'sparkly dhampir issues'.
That's why I labeled the thread NEA & Channel, not 'sparkly dhampir issues'.
Nice one! And I am suitably corrected.
Argument over -- mdt wins this one, hands-down.
DreDub, I think your misconception is that you are saying it's not targeting specific types of creatures. However, the plain reading of the Channel Energy uses the words 'creatures targeted'.
You are ignoring the fact that the channel ability is a burst that specifically target's certain creatures by type (living vs undead).
This energy can be used to cause or heal damage, depending on the type of energy channeled and the creatures targeted
I am not ignoring that, but it seems like a blurb telling you what to expect from the ability. It defines no rules, actions, or options. I think it could use a touchup.
When you read further down you get to the actual mechanics of Channel:
Channeling energy causes a burst that affects all creatures of one type (either undead or living) in a 30-foot radius centered on the cleric. The amount of damage dealt or healed is equal to 1d6 points of damage plus 1d6 points of damage for every two cleric levels beyond 1st (2d6 at 3rd, 3d6 at 5th, and so on)...
Note that the word target is never mentioned, which makes sense since this is an AoE effect.
ie. a harm undead channel energy burst doesn't divert itself around a human, it just passes through harmlessly.
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The UMR needs to be clarified, as I totally see how it's unclear. I'm starting a discussion with Jason and Stephen about this. IMO, the ability needs to say something like "The creature is alive, but is treated as undead for all effects that affect undead differently than living creatures, such as cure spells and channeled energy."
Cleric channels positive energy to heal the living? Living are affected. Undead are unaffected, and so are creatures with NEA because they're treated as undead.
Cleric channels positive to harm undead? Living are unaffected. Undead are affected, and so are creatures with NEA because they're treated as undead.
Cleric channels negative energy to harm the living? Living are affected. Undead are unaffected, and so are creatures with NEA because they're treated as undead.
Cleric channels negative energy to heal undead? Living are unaffected. Undead are affected, and so are creatures with NEA because they're treated as undead.
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Sean's reading is how I read it. When I channel I don't Choose heal or harm. Then the energy chooses who is affected. If my cleric uses positive energy and I choose harm... undead and NEA are injured because it is positive energy harming, I don't target a specific type of monster when i channel, just the effect (harm or heal) I want, the energy does the rest.
Thanks Sean.
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The UMR needs to be clarified, as I totally see how it's unclear. I'm starting a discussion with Jason and Stephen about this. IMO, the ability needs to say something like "The creature is alive, but is treated as undead for all effects that affect undead differently than living creatures, such as cure spells and channeled energy."
The 'Light to Dark' abilities of the Tzitzmitl (sp?) from Bestiary 3 and the Wayang (especially the Wayang) from the Dragon Empires Gazetteer also could be clearer in this respect.
When I brought up the 'four possible interpretations' thing in the Tzitzmitl thread it degenerated into passive-aggressive sniping (and encouragement of same) about the reading comprehension skills of 'some people' who 'didn't get it,' instead of something useful, so it's nice that it's been brought up again, and is being taken a bit more seriously this time.
I agree with those saying that returning Channel Energy to how it was in Beta, always affecting both undead *and* the living with each use, would get rid of this 'four possible effects when I channel' issue.
Thanks Sean,
I'm fine with a clarification, either way, as long as it's clarified. :)
I agree with those saying that returning Channel Energy to how it was in Beta, always affecting both undead *and* the living with each use, would get rid of this 'four possible effects when I channel' issue.
I agree that it would make this easier, as well as making more sense. But it's a major balance issue to let it have both effects at once. And I can't think of a good way to handle that. It trivializes undead fights, unless the enemy has a negative energy channeler, in which case it makes them really hard.
I agree that it would make this easier, as well as making more sense. But it's a major balance issue to let it have both effects at once. And I can't think of a good way to handle that. It trivializes undead fights, unless the enemy has a negative energy channeler, in which case it makes them really hard.
I would imagine that in an undead heavy campaign, it would get very boring for the cleric if he just had to get in range of everything and spam channel.
Happy to see this clarified, it was definitely kind of murky and took me a while and a lot or rereading to make up my own mind on the matter.
I prefer SKR's vision much better, it makes more sense.
Just to clarify, this change means that spells such as disrupt undead will damage a dhampir, hide from undead will make you invisible to him, and sleep won't put him to sleep because it doesn't target undead?
Just to clarify, this change means that spells such as disrupt undead will damage a dhampir, hide from undead will make you invisible to him, and sleep won't put him to sleep because it doesn't target undead?
That would appear to be the case. Dhampir's now
- show up as undead to detect undead
- are damaged by disrupt undead
- treat people with hid from undead as invisible
- are damaged by positive energy channels that are set out to damage and unaffected by healing waves of positive energy, healed by healing waves of negative energy and ignore waves of negative energy sent out to injure living
Negative Energy Affinity (Ex) The creature is alive, but is treated as undead for all effects that affect undead differently than living creatures, such as cure spells and channeled energy. Format: negative energy affinity; Location: Defensive Abilities.
So, from the undead subtype, here are things that affect them differently than living creatures.
- Immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, morale effects, patterns, and phantasms).
- Immunity to bleed, death effects, disease, paralysis, poison, sleep effects, and stunning.
- Not subject to nonlethal damage, ability drain, or energy drain. Immune to damage to its physical ability scores (Constitution, Dexterity, and Strength), as well as to exhaustion and fatigue effects.
- Negative energy (such as an inflict spell) can heal undead creatures. The fast healing special quality works regardless of the creature's Intelligence score.
- Immunity to any effect that requires a Fortitude save (unless the effect also works on objects or is harmless).
- Not at risk of death from massive damage, but is immediately destroyed when reduced to 0 hit points.
- Not affected by raise dead and reincarnate spells or abilities. Resurrection and true resurrection can affect undead creatures. These spells turn undead creatures back into the living creatures they were before becoming undead.
All of the above are affects that effect undead differently than living creatures. Mind-Affecting spells affect undead differently (in that they don't work on them). Nonlethal damage is an effect that works on living, but not undead, so Dhampir's are immune to it. Bleed, death effects, poison, sleep, etc all don't work on Dhampir's. They ignore fort save effects unless it also affects objects or is harmless. Can't be raised from the dead (but can be resurrected). And they die if they hit 0 hp, as that's different from living creatures.
MDT are you being serious or indirectly asking for more clarification? I don't think the intent was to give the race dhamphir the undead traits such as immunity to mind-affecting effects.
I do think that all affects... needs to be changed though.
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NEA doesn't give you all the undead traits; that would be a pointless ability (we'd just change the monster's type to undead if we wanted it to work that way).
Basically, if an effect specifically says, "this works this way on living creatures, and this other way on undead," then treat the NEA creature as if it were undead, otherwise, treat it as living.
"Undead are immune to X, Y, Z" is not the same as "this works this way on living creatures, and this other way on undead."
So a dhampir is still affected by charm person because that spell doesn't say "it affects humanoids like X, but affects undead like Y."
Unfortunately, we don't have the option of rewording every single effect in all books in the game to clarify corner cases of how they interact with NEA. GMs will have to use common sense on how to parse the two core elements of NEA, which are, in order:
* The creature is alive (and therefore, unless otherwise specified, is affected as if it were a living creature), but
* If an effect specifies that it does one thing to living creatures and a different thing to undead creatures, the creature with NEA is affected as if it were undead.
As posted in the Blog Sean, the wording says 'all affects' not 'all affects where the affect explicitly has a differentiator between live and undead'. All affects is all affects.
I'm not trying to be a jerk about this, but I honestly don't see where this wording makes anything clearer, even with your comments. There's nothing else in the system that I know of that explicitly affects undead differently than living within the power itself. Everything that affects undead and living differently comes from the undead traits. Even channel energy comes from there, the only thing in Channel is 'what type of channel am I performing, affect living or undead'. That's not saying something affects living different than the other, it's what am I targeting.
So a dhampir is still affected by charm person because that spell doesn't say "it affects humanoids like X, but affects undead like Y."
That raises the question of something like command undead and halt undead... which don't affect everyone [except undead by virtue of a pre-existing immunity], but which, rather, explicity [affect only undead]. I'm guessing your intent is that dhampirs, as humanoids, would be unaffected -- but the explanation given, while clearing up one case, makes that "common sense" interpretation look a lot worse.
NEA is intended as a very specific effect, so that calls for more specific rules language, not a more general statement. For clarity, we'd say something like "If you are targeted by or caught within the area of a negative energy effect that heals undead, you are healed as if you were undead. If targeted by or caught within a positive energy effect that harms or applies a negative status condition (e.g., turning) to undead, you are likewise affected. If targeted by or caught within the area of a positive or negative energy effect that neither heals nor harms undead, you are affected as would a normal humanoid. Spells and other effects that are not explicity positive or negative energy-based (e.g., halt undead) fall outside the scope of this ability."
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Perhaps;
"You are healed by negative energy and harmed by positive energy as if undead. You may be excluded from channeled energy via Selective Channeling, but are otherwise healed or harmed, even if the channeling cleric had not intended to heal or harm undead with that use of channel energy."
Have I mentioned how much I prefer the Beta version of Channel Energy? Oy.
[tangent]
And then there's the funkitude of Alignment Channel, where I can take Alignment Channel (Good) and be able to use positive energy to *kill angels,* or negative energy to *heal angels.* (Not that anyone would do that. When do you, A) adventure with angels as a bad guy, or B) fight angels as a good-guy anyway? Is it worth a feat to you to be able to heal angels with negative energy or harm angels with positive energy? If so, what sort of game are you in, and is Alignment Channel (Good) still going to see more use than Mounted Giant Space Hamster Proficiency?)
Alignment Channel (Evil) is the only choice to take, whether you are a good cleric of Iomedae and have demon enemies you want to smite with your channeled positive energy or an evil cleric of Asmodeus and have devil allies you want to heal with your negative energy.
[/tangent]
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For some reason, the other thread isn't allowing me to post this, but I figured it would be pertinent here, too.
A few interesting notes A creature with NEA can not be braught back to life. DeathKnell may or may not work on them and it's also argueable if their bodies can be used in Animate dead or similar spells (you can not reanimate undead bodies). Briliant Energy Weapons? LifeDrinker?
Hallow Could potentually have a hanging affect.
See the thread on today's blog for more discussion on this. TLDR: revision in progress.
Beckett,
As near as I can tell, the language I proposed above (which admittedly was off the top of my head, and could probably be tightened still further) would handle all of the examples you posted. By referencing "positive energy" and "negative energy" as key terms that must specifically appear in the effect description, we can drastically narrow down the number of cases that might apply. Then all we need to do is spell out, for the remaining cases, what does what.
It's true that one cannot eliminate 100% of all possible corner-cases, but a halfway-proficient technical writer, willing to spend a modicum of effort on it, can easily reduce them by an order of magnitude or more.
EDIT: Then again, when the developer drops in to let us know he isn't reading the suggestions made ("TLDR"), I guess it's a moot discussion.
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Have I mentioned how much I prefer the Beta version of Channel Energy? Oy.
Oh Hell Yes!!!
[tangent]
And then there's the funkitude of Alignment Channel, where I can take Alignment Channel (Good) and be able to use positive energy to *kill angels,* or negative energy to *heal angels.* (Not that anyone would do that. When do you, A) adventure with angels as a bad guy, or B) fight angels as a good-guy anyway? Is it worth a feat to you to be able to heal angels with negative energy or harm angels with positive energy? If so, what sort of game are you in, and is Alignment Channel (Good) still going to see more use than Mounted Giant Space Hamster Proficiency?)Alignment Channel (Evil) is the only choice to take, whether you are a good cleric of Iomedae and have demon enemies you want to smite with your channeled positive energy or an evil cleric of Asmodeus and have devil allies you want to heal with your negative energy.
[/tangent]
Preach on, brother. :)
In Sean's defense, I took his TLDR to mean, "for those of you who don't want to read the long stuff above, the summary is..." not "I'm not reading your posts."
EDIT: Then again, when the developer drops in to let us know he isn't reading the suggestions made ("TLDR"), I guess it's a moot discussion.
Actually, that TLDR was me letting people here know that they could skip all the discussion in the other thread because the net result of that discussion is "yes, this needs to change, and will be changed." I wasn't dismissing what was discussed here.
A few interesting notes A creature with NEA can not be braught back to life. DeathKnell may or may not work on them and it's also argueable if their bodies can be used in Animate dead or similar spells (you can not reanimate undead bodies). Briliant Energy Weapons? LifeDrinker?
"A creature who has been turned into an undead creature or killed by a death effect can't be raised by this spell. Constructs, elementals, outsiders, and undead creatures can't be raised."
They can be brough back with raise dead. Raise dead specifically targets dead creature. When the creature is dead it keeps it's type (which is Humanoid (dhampir) in case of dhampir) but all racial traits are inert unless specifically described as working while dead (like dragonlance draconians' various death throws, tarrasque regeneration, etc.). Negative Energy Affinity does not state that it works while dead so when you cast raise dead on a dead dhampir he is dead Humanoid and not Undead.
Personally, I'd rewrite it as follows:
Negative Energy Affinity (Ex) The creature is alive, but is treated as undead for all positive and negative energy effects that affect undead differently than living creatures, such as cure spells and channeled energy. Format: negative energy affinity; Location: Defensive Abilities.
Only a slight change, but it keeps what I see as the original intent without opening the can of worms of "every spell which treats undead differently".
Edit: Of course, per skimming the other thread, it was deliberately not tied to positive/negative energy, but I really think it makes more sense and is more manageable this way.
Perhaps it would be simpler to say that for all healing and damaging effects, NEA creatures are treated as undead? That might limit wonkiness.
Plus, Positive and Negative Energy are not spell descriptors - they are contained in the description, and are therefore less easily categorized. Some would argue that all Necromancy spells are inherently Negative Energy effects, and while that's a stretch, it's certainly not wrong, it's just not right either.
Just a thought.
RPG Superstar 2015 Top 32, RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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The way I see it, Pos/Neg energy effects have two "checkpoints" before determining their final effect:
1) Are you being affected at all? (This doesn't matter for cure/inflict spells, but matters for channel energy or for effects which can only target one type or the other.)
2) In what way are you affected? (Which type heals you and which type harms you?)
If you want NEA to affect #2 but not #1, then I recommend the following:
If you want NEA creatures to be treated like undead for #1 AND #2, then I recommend the following:
How do those sound?