[Edit: Some text removed that only confused the issue]
The situation:
An evil cleric channels negative energy to hurt the party. However, one PC has negative energy affinity (in this case, from Curse of Black Blood, but it could be from any source). What happens?
Does the PC in question get healed by the negative energy damage? Or is she not a valid target in the first place because she doesn't count as a living target for purposes of the channel? If she is not a valid target, does the cleric know that?
If the cleric does know, does he find out before or after settling on the action (i.e. if he channels just to hit that one PC, does he waste his action, or does he realize it won't work and get the option of taking a different action)?
The same goes for an anti-paladin using Touch of Corruption, which we now know is a negative energy effect. If an anti-paladin uses ToC on the PC with negative energy affinity, does it work and heal her, fizzle and give the anti-paladin a chance at taking a different action, or fizzle and waste the anti-paladin's turn?
How about positive energy channeling to heal your party when you think some of the enemies are undead (they are disguised as undead for whatever reason--most likely, for my purposes, because of the Juju Oracle Mystery, but it would apply equally to someone using Undead Form or whatever)? Let's say you have Selective Channel--do you know you need to use it on those enemies instinctively?
Uhh what rulings? The core book makes it clear you do one or the other. Unless something I'm not aware of changed.
Uhh what rulings? The core book makes it clear you do one or the other. Unless something I'm not aware of changed.
Maybe I should edit that line out because you're missing the point of the question. The problem comes because the devs recently said that negative energy damage always heals undead no matter what, rather than just when the ability specifies it does. For example, the touch of a wraith automatically heals undead without needed any additional rules touch beyond designating that damage as negative energy.
But really, in the end, that's not relevant to any question but the first, so yeah, I'm removing it.
Oh I see I think your concerned about a clarification that doesn't really change anything.
First one thing to take in is the idea of general rule and specific rule.
Specific over rides general.
So I was to understand that channel specifically says you can harm or heal but not do both. (For clarification I'm going by memory)
So that ruling doesn't change anything because the specifics of channel take precedent.
Secondly paladin lay on hands and anti paladin harm touch have never been selective. Any more than cause light wounds.
|
The evil cleric doesn't automatically "know" at any point, until after noticing the effect didn't hurt that party member. The cleric doesn't know who to selectively channel out - she has to "guess", unless she's seen before that a previous channel didn't affect that person.
The channel doesn't heal that party member, because the cleric was channeling to harm, not to heal. That's regardless of positive or negative. This is important for most of your question, I believe - same with positive channeling with undead in the way. You're channeling to heal, not to harm, so they're unaffected.
The description of a Black Blooded Oracle, it says she is treated as if she was undead. (positive deals damage and negative heals)
The description of channel energy, an evil cleric can choose to either damage living creature or heal undead.
So Avatar-1 is correct, the character would be unaffected.
Also the evil cleric wouldn't know until he tries it, or if someone heals her/ she heals herself with negative energy and he happens to notice.
|
I have to disagree here, in that the description of Channel Energy states that one either channels to affect living or undead. The effect of that (harming or healing) depends on which of those two you are choosing to affect when you channel, and upon what type of energy the cleric channels.
So, in summary, the character channels, and decides to effect living or undead. The result of the channel depends then on whether the channeler has selected positive or negative energy for their character. Whatever they might think would happen is immaterial to what does happen, which is based on those two choices -the type of energy channeled, and what of two options was selected to be affected, namely living or undead. All effects are determined from those two choices. So it could be quite possible for a cleric to accidentally affect an unintended target....
4 choices:
or[/b] to heal living creatures. An evil cleric (or one who worships an evil deity) channels negative energy and can choose to deal damage to living creatures or to heal undead creatures. A neutral cleric who worships a neutral deity (or one who is not devoted to a particular deity) must choose whether she channels positive or negative energy. Once this choice is made, it cannot be reversed. This decision also determines whether the cleric casts spontaneous cure or inflict spells (see spontaneous casting).
So:
fist choice (permanent): positive or negative channelingsecond choice (every time the ability is used): channel to heal or to harm.
Positive channel to heal = heal living creatures
Positive channel to harm = damage undead
Negative channel to heal = heal undead
Negative channel to harm = damage living creatures
Maybe I should edit that line out because you're missing the point of the question. The problem comes because the devs recently said that negative energy damage always heals undead no matter what, rather than just when the ability specifies it does. For example, the touch of a wraith automatically heals undead without needed any additional rules touch beyond designating that damage as negative energy.Uhh what rulings? The core book makes it clear you do one or the other. Unless something I'm not aware of changed.
I think this is key here. mpl, do you have a link to the discussion of which you're speaking?
Uhh what rulings? The core book makes it clear you do one or the other. Unless something I'm not aware of changed.
Maybe I should edit that line out because you're missing the point of the question. The problem comes because the devs recently said that negative energy damage always heals undead no matter what, rather than just when the ability specifies it does. For example, the touch of a wraith automatically heals undead without needed any additional rules touch beyond designating that damage as negative energy.
But really, in the end, that's not relevant to any question but the first, so yeah, I'm removing it.
I've asked about this before, and had multiple developers state that you channel for what you want to do, and then negative energy affinity decides how the person is affected based on what you are trying to do. Either it works as intended, or it fails because you weren't trying to affect them in the only way they can be affected.
So, you are channeling positive energy to heal? You will only heal with it. You will NOT heal the negative energy guy because he's not healed by positive energy, but you won't hurt him either because you aren't trying to harm him, nor will you affect the zombie who's attacking you in any way.
On the other hand, if you channel positive energy to HARM undead, then you are going to blast your negative energy affinity friend too, unless you have selective channeling.
On the flip side, if you are channeling negative energy to HARM... then you negative affinity friend is UNAFFECTED because he can't be harmed by negative energy only healed, but he's not healed because you aren't trying to heal him.
Basically, what it boils down to is negative energy affinity just means you need to be careful not to hurt your friend when you are trying to blast undead and that when you heal all your other friends with a blast of postive energy, he's unaffected.. you don't kill him while healing the rest of the party.
Now, you said the devs recently changed this, can you provide a link to the source of where they said this? Because if so, I'm cool with it, but it contradicts what they've told me many times in the past.
EDIT: Also, wraiths don't channel energy like a cleric, they have a touch attack. Rules for cleric channeling and rules for a wraith's touch attack don't have anything to do with each other. So, I could see easily where a wraith could attack the dhampir and be like "OMG WTF DID I JUST HEAL YOU?" being completely different than the cleric doing so.
Basically, what it boils down to is negative energy affinity just means you need to be careful not to hurt your friend when you are trying to blast undead and that when you heal all your other friends with a blast of postive energy, he's unaffected.. you don't kill him while healing the rest of the party.
Now, you said the devs recently changed this, can you provide a link to the source of where they said this? Because if so, I'm cool with it, but it contradicts what they've told me many times in the past.
The devs didn't change that, and they claim they didn't change anything.
Anyway, here's the post that bothered me with the relevant bit being:
"Therefore, a dhampir paladin hurts himself if he uses LOH on himself."
Lay on Hands sure looks to me like a "you choose to heal or harm" ability, but apparently, it's not, because the undead paladin can try and heal himself but end up hurting himself in the process.
I do think the original comments there confused the issue, though, and I shouldn't have mentioned it.
See, I was also asking about the general rules on targeting and fizzling, though. If I cast, say, Charm Person on what turns out to be undead, and it fails, do I know why?
Imagine, if you will, your spells and abilities are like buttons in a video game. When I press X, but I have an illegal target, which of the following happens:
1) The game makes a buzzer sound, possibly with explanatory text ("I can't use that ability right now" or "improper target" or whatever) and nothing happens, so I can just hit another button quickly (i.e. the ability cannot be used at all, and I can take a different action, as I effectively never used the ability in the first place)
2) The ability's animation plays, but it fails and I get a little explanation as to why ("invalid target" or "I need to use that on something else!") (i.e. my turn is wasted, but I know why and won't waste another one)
3) The ability's animation plays, and fails, but I have absolutely no idea why (i.e. my turn is wasted, but I don't know why and am likely to waste at least one more turn trying it again).
|
|
I think it is 3) if you are using a area effect. If you are using a targeted effect if can be 2) or 3), with me leaning toward 3). In any instance I would allow a Perception or Spellcraft or appropriate Knowledge check to realize what is the problem.
Base for my opinion:
Succeeding on a Saving Throw: A creature that successfully saves against a spell that has no obvious physical effects feels a hostile force or a tingle, but cannot deduce the exact nature of the attack. Likewise, if a creature's saving throw succeeds against a targeted spell, you sense that the spell has failed. You do not sense when creatures succeed on saves against effect and area spells.
A invalid target is different from a target that has made a saving throw, but this mechanic is a decent base for adjudicating the situation.
SKR post is all about the text of the paladin ability. Instead of saying that you choose to heal or harm, the paladin ability say that it can heal a living creature and it can harm an undead, without speaking of a choice on how you use it.
SKR pointed out that, as written, the paladin ability don't channel positive energy, so it don't work as a cleric channel ability.
it was an oversight when making Pathfinder, but, for now, those are the rules.