Do multiple breaths of life stack to revive a creature?

[Will Pratt]

If a creature were to be dead and is affected by two separate Breaths of life and their combined total were to bring the creature back to life but neither of the individual spells were to bring back the dead creature would the creature be resurrected?

Ex.If a PC were to have a Con of 20 and be at negative 50 HP and affected by a breath of life but only healed for 15 points of damage he would then be at 35HP which isn't enough to succeed in resurrecting him. However this party's cleric has a quickened breath of life that he decides to expend as well to heal the dead PC and hopefully bring him back to life. This quickened breath of life heals for 16 points of damage causing the PC to be at negative 19HP.

Neither of these single breaths of life are enough to resurrect the dead PC but the two of them together are just enough to bring the PC back from the dead. Would it work? The wording that states the creature is healed even if it doesn't work leads me to believe that it would in fact stack.

From PRD wrote:

This spell cures 5d8 points of damage + 1 point per caster level (maximum +25).

Unlike other spells that heal damage, breath of life can bring recently slain creatures back to life. If cast upon a creature that has died within 1 round, apply the healing from this spell to the creature. If the healed creature's hit point total is at a negative amount less than its Constitution score, it comes back to life and stabilizes at its new hit point total. If the creature's hit point total is at a negative amount equal to or greater than its Constitution score, the creature remains dead. Creatures brought back to life through breath of life gain a temporary negative level that lasts for 1 day.

Creatures slain by death effects cannot be saved by breath of life.

Like cure spells, breath of life deals damage to undead creatures rather than curing them, and cannot bring them back to life.

[Bloodlust]

"If cast upon a creature that has died within 1 round"

By that wording, as long as you're in combat rounds and the round has not expired, you can have five people all line up one after the other and do it on their initiative.

[Claxon]

The description in the PRD makes it sound like

1) Breathe of Life is cast on dead PC moving him from -50 to -35 hp. This is not enough to bring him back to life, he is still dead.
2) Before one round has passed another Breathe of Life is cast and move s the dead PC from -35 to -19. The PC is alive, stable, and at -19 hp.

The spell specifically says apply the healing to the creature, and if its new hp amount is less than its con then it is alive. Seems to be exactly how it works.

[Jiggy]

Ooooh, interesting idea: an almost-successful breath of life followed by a bear's endurance...?

[Blueluck]

Jiggy wrote:

Ooooh, interesting idea: an almost-successful breath of life followed by a bear's endurance...?

That's a great idea! Since Bear's Endurance is a second level spell, it's easy to quicken.

[Matthew Downie]

Assuming your GM allows you to cast Bear's Endurance on someone who is currently dead...

[Troubleshooter]

I've always wondered whether spell effects ended when their targets no longer qualify as a target. If somebody with lots of Target: Creature effects dies (and becomes an object), are their spells removed even if they resurrect before the durations would expire? Similarly, what if a person is affected by flesh to stone, receives the benefits of lots of Target: Object spells, then has the enchantment broken?

I've never seen any text about changing states after casting. I'd imagine that most groups probably run breath of life such that the creature retains all its effects like it never died.

[coyote6]

Matthew Downie wrote:

Assuming your GM allows you to cast Bear's Endurance on someone who is currently dead...

Bear's endurance says "Target creature touched", and breath of life says "Target creature touched". So if you can't cast bear's endurance on the someone, the same circumstance would seem to indicate you can't cast breath of life on the person either.

I hadn't thought of that before.

[Troubleshooter]

Interesting. So does a creature's body really become an object? Or is it a creature and an object? Perhaps that. I think that's how Undead work for effects requiring Fortitude saves.

Admittedly, I suspect I'm trying to justify an interpretation that allows a creature to retain its effects when receiving breath of life (erasing them can be a let-down and a hassle) while ensuring that people can't receive Target: Object spells while a corpse then come back to life to enjoy benefits they probably shouldn't have.

[fretgod99]

coyote6 wrote:

Matthew Downie wrote:

Assuming your GM allows you to cast Bear's Endurance on someone who is currently dead...

Bear's endurance says "Target creature touched", and breath of life says "Target creature touched". So if you can't cast bear's endurance on the someone, the same circumstance would seem to indicate you can't cast breath of life on the person either.

I hadn't thought of that before.

Only difference is Breath of Life specifically says it can be cast on someone who is dead. I don't think I'd allow spells to function if cast on a dead person. Dying, probably. Dead, no. Just seems ... wrong.

[Sitri]

OP: Sounds good.

For the bear's endurance, I would think that you would need to cast that first. BoL is an instantaneous spell, meaning you would not have time for a swift action before the CON check came into play.

[Stalarious]

Now the breath of life in the Discription of what it does may state that you touch a dead creature and you can heal them however Does the actual statistics state that ergo the "target" part state one dead creature or target creature touched?

Reason I ask is although it maybe in the fluffy discription does not mean that the logic of bears endurance would not work. Because there are alot of spells that the "Fluff" discription is more constraining then how the players use them and are never called out on because they dont follow the fluff.

Part of the fun of spells is finding new and interesting ways to use/ combo them. I for one say rock on for thinking about the combo.

[Matthew Downie]

If Bear's Endurance works, other spells should to. So you could save a character on -100HP by having one character cast Heal on them and the other cast Breath of Life.
Actually, I'd be OK with that.

[Matthew Downie]

Here's a thought: cast Gentle Repose. It 'extends the time limit on raising that creature from the dead' by one day per level. As long as you do it in the first round, you can then cast Breath of Life as many times as it takes(?)

[Stalarious]

This area all depends on wording if the spells dont conflict then your right alot of combos for this actually will work to great effect but its all in wording.

I know that sounds a little condtridictory to my original post. But there are some spells I would say obviusly SHOULD not work on a dead body. For me cat's grace is one sorry your dead you have no dex so I personally dont see it working i would say fizzle.

However your corpse still has its CON thats how you determine when you die so bears endurance would work to preserve the persons body ot even bringing them back. this is of course MHO.

[Robert A Matthews]

The dead condition prevents you from healing damage at all(except breath of life). The bear's endurance thing seems like it shouldn't work but a case could be made that it isn't actually healing them. I wouldn't allow it to work and I'm sure most GMs wouldn't. Breath of life is a very specific exception to the dead rules. I see no reason why 2 breath of life spells cast in the same round wouldn't work.

[Drachasor]

Troubleshooter wrote:

I've always wondered whether spell effects ended when their targets no longer qualify as a target. If somebody with lots of Target: Creature effects dies (and becomes an object), are their spells removed even if they resurrect before the durations would expire? Similarly, what if a person is affected by flesh to stone, receives the benefits of lots of Target: Object spells, then has the enchantment broken?

I've never seen any text about changing states after casting. I'd imagine that most groups probably run breath of life such that the creature retains all its effects like it never died.

Hmm, the dead condition doesn't state that you become an object. "Raise Dead" targets a "dead creature", and since everything in the game is an object or a creature, this seems to indicate the dead are still considered creatures. Dead creatures are just creatures that don't benefit from natural or magical healing and decay over time. So it would seem. Oddly they don't seem to automatically be helpless or even unconscious if you take enough damage to go from positive health to dead in one attack.

Overtime you'll decay to a point where you don't really exist anymore though, I suppose. That's up to DM arbitration.

This is an oddity that they've kept from 3.X.

[Drachasor]

Robert A Matthews wrote:

The dead condition prevents you from healing damage at all(except breath of life). The bear's endurance thing seems like it shouldn't work but a case could be made that it isn't actually healing them. I wouldn't allow it to work and I'm sure most GMs wouldn't. Breath of life is a very specific exception to the dead rules. I see no reason why 2 breath of life spells cast in the same round wouldn't work.

By RAW, Healing is well-defined both for magical and natural healing. Hit Points from Temporary Hit Points or from Constitution gain is neither.

Honestly, the rules for dead should say something like "When you are dead you are no longer a creature, but an object. Your body no longer has any ability scores, but retains any properties inherent to the dead matter that composes it."

Raise Dead would still work since it targets a "dead creature" which would be a special kind of object. Breath of Life would need "dead" added to it.

Though, an oddity with breath of life is that your body wouldn't have negative hit points. As an object, if you treat dead bodies as objects, it would have the hit points of that object. Otherwise you'd have to consider the dead body already destroyed and hence anything that killed something would also destroy the body. So as written, Breath of Life only works if you assume Dead Bodies are not objects, but merely creatures suffering a very debilitating condition (which given D&D spells, this is not unreasonable).

[LazarX]

Multiple castings of the spell CAN stack, but they'd all have to be done in that same single round after death. You get one round after the subject dies. Period. Casting the spell does not extend the deadline if the damage you cure isn't enough to bring you above the death threashold.

[Sitri]

For a second I thought that the Heal trick would work because it is missing the "living" clause found in the cure line, but Robert is right, the dead condition still prevents that spell from working.

For the Bear's Endurance False life bit, do you accept the 3.5 FAQ that a dead body is an object? That seems to be what the answer hinges on. Since breath of life has a target listed as "creature touched" and not "creature or body touched" I would be inclined to say it works.

[fretgod99]

Honestly, I don't think it even rests on that. Do you honestly think the intent of Bear's Endurance was to allow it to be cast after a person has died to beef up their constitution score? If they die with it in place already, whatever. But I don't see how it should function after the fact. Doesn't pass the smell test for me.

[Sitri]

fretgod99 wrote:

Honestly, I don't think it even rests on that. Do you honestly think the intent of Bear's Endurance was to allow it to be cast after a person has died to beef up their constitution score? If they die with it in place already, whatever. But I don't see how it should function after the fact. Doesn't pass the smell test for me.

Well I don't think it was the intent, but if cast just before BoL and it made the difference in life or death I would probably accept it (barring some statement from Piazo that confirms the old 3.5 faq). I even thought earlier when someone posted about the dex boost on a dead body that I didn't see a problem with that either; of course no actual benefits are incurred until something else happens to get the creature up and running again.

I am definitely not saying just cast bears endurance and if that gets them in range of what would have been stable they live. The status effect of death is not negated unless called for.

[Drachasor]

Sitri wrote:

For a second I thought that the Heal trick would work because it is missing the "living" clause found in the cure line, but Robert is right, the dead condition still prevents that spell from working.

For the Bear's Endurance False life bit, do you accept the 3.5 FAQ that a dead body is an object? That seems to be what the answer hinges on. Since breath of life has a target listed as "creature touched" and not "creature or body touched" I would be inclined to say it works.

Pathfinder is not 3.5 and frankly the 3.5 FAQ is not technically errata. So on both counts you can't apply it as part of the rules.

But like you said, if Bear's Endurance doesn't work, then technically Breath of Life wouldn't work either. The description doesn't say you can cast it on a dead body either. It says "if you cast it..." -- it just happens that's impossible if dead bodies are objects. It wouldn't be the first poorly worded thing either. There's that feat (I forget it's name), that as a standard action (with no attack) increases your reach by 5' until the end of your current turn (so no reach AoOs).

Hmm, kind of like how Disintegrate can't destroy trees.

Honestly, I think it would be kind of neat if Bear's Endurance, False Life, and the like could be used to rescue someone recently dead. At the moment though this just makes a huge mess, since they wouldn't be limited by any sort of time. You could use them a week later, for instance (by RAW).

The real point is, the Dead condition is horribly worded. Breath of Life is an example of it tripping up the writers.

Addendum: Well, to be perfectly clear, Bear's Endurance and False Life can restore someone dead to positive hit points. However, by the rules they are technically still dead (since they don't remove the dead Condition, unlike Breath of Life).

Of course, allowing such spells to work on dead bodies (e.g. they are not objects), means it is impossible to destroy a dead body. It's already at negative hit points, but it isn't destroyed. Since it isn't an object with hit points of an object, you can't actually destroy it (unless you use a spell like Disintegrate). So, like I said, all kinds of weirdness.

[fretgod99]

^ Which is why it's much easier to avoid that mess and simply go with "no". Only Breath of Life works like that on a dead body because that's clearly the intent of the spell.

[Drachasor]

fretgod99 wrote:

^ Which is why it's much easier to avoid that mess and simply go with "no". Only Breath of Life works like that on a dead body because that's clearly the intent of the spell.

Honestly? I'd let my players boost it with False Life and other non-healing spells if that's all they had on them and they needed the boost.

[Jiggy]

Having a search-fu fart: can someone point me to where the "dead = object" rule is?

[Drachasor]

Jiggy wrote:

Having a search-fu fart: can someone point me to where the "dead = object" rule is?

There's no such rule.

If it isn't an object, then arguably you can't destroy a dead body. You just do more and more hit point damage. This just drives the HP further into the negatives.

If it is an object, then technically Breath of Life can't target a dead person, since it targets a creature.

There was a 3.5 FAQ that, in answering another question, assumed dead bodies were objects.

[Reecy]

But it really depends on when the Dead Condition takes effect...

Is it at the beginning of his next turn or is as soon as his HP hits negative enough to kill him.

[Cerberus Seven]

Reecy wrote:

But it really depends on when the Dead Condition takes effect...

Is it at the beginning of his next turn or is as soon as his HP hits negative enough to kill him.

'Dead' happens immediately when at low enough hit points, low enough CON, or hit with a death effect. No ambiguity, RAW matches RAI. Breath of Life simply works on the recently dead. For purposes of Breath of Life, it should be precisely one round in the initiative count after whatever fatal effect occurred that the spell is no longer effective.

[Drachasor]

Cerberus Seven wrote:

Reecy wrote:

But it really depends on when the Dead Condition takes effect...

Is it at the beginning of his next turn or is as soon as his HP hits negative enough to kill him.

'Dead' happens immediately when at low enough hit points, low enough CON, or hit with a death effect. No ambiguity, RAW matches RAI. Breath of Life simply works on the recently dead. For purposes of Breath of Life, it should be precisely one round in the initiative count after whatever fatal effect occurred that the spell is no longer effective.

Most times I wouldn't imagine it is practical. Probably better to let the bastard die and loot the body. The next guy to join the party probably follows WBL guidelines anyway...

[LazarX]

Will we now see inclusions from Paizo in "Murphy's Rules" along the lines of these?.. quoted from two separate games.

"Dead Characters can perform no actions on their turn."

"Dead Characters can perform no actions of any kind."

[Avatar-1]

Raise Dead's target is "dead creature".

Breath of Life gets around listing "dead creature" as the target because it specifically mentions it in the spell description.

Bear's Endurance doesn't do either of these. Target is "creature".

Without listing "live creature", it's pretty clear that's not the intent of every spell with a target of touch that it's okay to cast it on them if they're dead as well.

Are there any other precedents where a spell specifically has "creature", is intended for dead creatures as well, and doesn't list it in the spell description or anywhere else?

[Eridan]

PRD Dead wrote:

Dead: The character's hit points are reduced to a negative amount equal to his Constitution score, his Constitution drops to 0, or he is killed outright by a spell or effect. The character's soul leaves his body.

...
A dead body decays normally unless magically preserved, ..

A creature changes to a pile of meat (object) as soon as her soul leaves the body.

[Tamago]

I think the real question to ask on the Breath of Life/Bear's Endurance debate is, "which is more fun?"

Is it more fun to allow the spells to work together? Or is it more fun to say that one or the other is incompatible with the given situation?

Personally, I think it's a really cool, clever, and fun way to keep someone in the game, letting their character *just* squeak by while getting brought back to life.

If you think it would be more fun in your game to have a stronger fear of death by having a very narrow interpretation of the rules, then that's OK too!

[Cerberus Seven]

Tamago wrote:

I think the real question to ask on the Breath of Life/Bear's Endurance debate is, "which is more fun?"

Is it more fun to allow the spells to work together? Or is it more fun to say that one or the other is incompatible with the given situation?

Personally, I think it's a really cool, clever, and fun way to keep someone in the game, letting their character *just* squeak by while getting brought back to life.

If you think it would be more fun in your game to have a stronger fear of death by having a very narrow interpretation of the rules, then that's OK too!

Fun in not allowed in the rules forum. Get him, angry mob! /sarcasm

In all seriousness, though, good on you for bringing the focus back to what's most important in a game: the fun factor. Casting Bear's Endurance on a corpse may be a bit iffy according to the rules, but the enjoyment resulting from it sure isn't. "Hey, remember that one time you made that corpse EXTRA healthy? Never seen a severed head look so hale!"

[Drachasor]

Avatar-1 wrote:

Raise Dead's target is "dead creature".

Breath of Life gets around listing "dead creature" as the target because it specifically mentions it in the spell description.

Bear's Endurance doesn't do either of these. Target is "creature".

Without listing "live creature", it's pretty clear that's not the intent of every spell with a target of touch that it's okay to cast it on them if they're dead as well.

Are there any other precedents where a spell specifically has "creature", is intended for dead creatures as well, and doesn't list it in the spell description or anywhere else?

Technically, the description of Breath of Life does not say you can cast it on a dead creature. It just says what happens *if* you do. That's a very distinct difference.

Frankly, if you count the dead as OBJECTS, then they don't even HAVE negative hit points for Breath of Life to heal. They have the hit points of a cadaver (likely no hardness) and healing spells shouldn't affect them. The spell is really messed up if you think about it. It implies, for one, that you can't destroy a corpse for some period of time after someone dies (for at least a round, and possibly more if someone makes a more powerful spell). You can just reduce it further into negative hit points. Weird. Or do you somehow keep track of object hit points too? When do those kick in after death? It just raises further questions!

And I don't see how it is clear that you can't cast spells that target creatures on people with the dead condition.

Anyhow, I with the group that says it is more fun to allow such things, though remember that bringing someone to positive hit points after death does not remove the "dead" condition. You need magic like Breath of Life for that. I'd probably have the dead remain creatures for a minute or ten minutes or something. I am hopeful I could handwave the object/creature oddity as it will hopefully not ever be an issue.

Hmm, or perhaps the more sensible option is to just allow Breath of Life to bring someone back from the dead if they died within the previous round, with a total number of hit points equal to *Healing Rolled - Con or something*.