Death's Embrace & Channel Negative Energy


Rules Questions


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When you channel energy, you choose a creature type (living, undead, or evil outsider with a feat), and whether or not you're channeling for damage or healing. Because of that, I have a question about the wording of Death's Embrace from the Death Cleric domain.

It states:

Death's Embrace (Ex): At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy.

So if I'm reading this correctly: if I have a Cleric that can channel negative energy, choose living creature type, and choose to channel for damage, and don't exclude my cleric from the channel, my Cleric would heal the same amount of damage dealt by the channel negative energy.

Is that correct?

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

This is a rules question, as PFS has no specific rules about how your domain powers work. Flagged for moving.

Sovereign Court

This is correct, yes. In effect, a cleric can then heal themselves when they channel negative energy to damage living creatures AND when they channel to heal undead.

Also, this question fits better in the general rules forum as it is not specifically related to PFS.


Ah, sorry. Out of habit as this is for a PFS character. I was tied between the two forum sections.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Acedio wrote:

This is correct, yes. In effect, a cleric can then heal themselves when they channel negative energy to damage living creatures AND when they channel to heal undead.

Also, this question fits better in the general rules forum as it is not specifically related to PFS.

I would disagree. Nothing in the ability indicates that you would be affected by two versions of channel energy.

Negative channeling either:

  • Harms living creatures, or
  • Heals undead creatures

The ability either moves you from the first category to the second, or changes the effect on you when you are in the first. There's no language to indicate that you both reverse the effect on living creatures and are targeted as an undead creature (and thus healed).

Probably should be the latter (when negative energy is channeled to heal, you heal).

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Majuba wrote:
There's no language to indicate that you both reverse the effect on living creatures and are targeted as an undead creature (and thus healed).
Death's Embrace wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.

The first line states that you heal instead of taking damage. You can only do something "instead of" another thing if the second thing would have happened, so that first line applies in circumstances when you would normally have taken damage - when negative energy is channeled to harm living creatures, you're healed instead of being harmed.

The second line then explicitly states that you're also healed when negative energy is channeled to heal undead.


This doesn't change your type for the channel ability. If you channel to affect living creatures, you're still affected, unless you happen to be undead. When you channel negative and affect living creatures, normally it would harm you unless you exclude yourself from the channel, as most negatively-channelling living clerics do. With this, it would heal you instead.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Jiggy wrote:
Death's Embrace wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.

That's what I get for not looking up the full text of the ability.

I still disagree - it appears the second sentence explains the context of the first. It still doesn't say anything like "Also, if ..."

The various targeting and effects of channeled energy (as witnessed by the endless variant channeling threads) are confusing enough to require that second line. As for "instead", you heal when undead are targeted, instead of being harmed when living creatures are.

That does make it a lot more questionable though.

To be clear, here is what is proposed:

  • Positive to Heal Living: normally healed, still healed
  • Positive to Harm Undead: normally no effect, still no effect
  • Negative to Harm Living: normally harmed, now healed {???}
  • Negative to Heal Undead: normally no effect, now healed

So instead of being healed once, harmed once, ignored twice, it would be healed three times, ignored once. That seems odd and too much.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Majuba wrote:
Jiggy wrote:
Death's Embrace wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.
I still disagree - it appears the second sentence explains the context of the first.

That can't be the case, because of what "instead" means.

The second sentence says that you heal when NE is channeled to affect undead. Normally, such a situation would not harm you; therefore, the first sentence's "instead of taking damage" can't be talking about that event. It has to be talking about an event where you would be taking damage if you didn't have this ability. NE channeled to heal undead is not such an event.

There is no way to read those two lines as referring to the same type of event.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Normal: The channeling of negative energy can damage you.

Death's Embrace: The channeling of negative energy heals you instead. If the channeled energy targets undead, you heal.

Perfectly reasonable (and more likely IMO) explanation. You don't have to be harmed by that explicit use of channeled negative energy in order to be healed instead, you simply have to be "healed instead of harmed" by channeled negative energy. You could also say that Undead are "healed instead of harmed" by it.

Edit: FAQ'ing FYI.


The problem with that interpretation is that if you hold that the first sentence of the ability does not alter what happens when you channel negative energy to affect living creatures, then when you channel negative energy to affect living creatures, you still take damage unless you exclude yourself from the channel. That would directly contradict the wording of the feature. I'm not opposed to alternate interpretations of the rules, but you have to draw the line when your interpretation directly contradicts the text.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Majuba wrote:

Normal: The channeling of negative energy can damage you.

Death's Embrace: The channeling of negative energy heals you instead. If the channeled energy targets undead, you heal.

Perfectly reasonable (and more likely IMO) explanation. You don't have to be harmed by that explicit use of channeled negative energy in order to be healed instead, you simply have to be "healed instead of harmed" by channeled negative energy. You could also say that Undead are "healed instead of harmed" by it.

If your interpretation were correct (that the only effect of Death's Embrace is that NE channeled to heal undead will heal you as well), then that means that in any situation in which NE would harm you, it still does. That's not what "instead" means.

That means that an ability which explicitly says it makes something happen "instead of taking damage" never actually makes you take any less damage than someone without the ability.

Doing X instead of Y means that Y doesn't happen. That's just basic english. You are suggesting that an intelligent game designer intended to in no way cause you to take any less damage but chose to communicate that intent by saying that you would do something else instead of taking damage.

I don't know how to make this any clearer than it already is.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Paladin of Baha-who? wrote:
The problem with that interpretation is that if you hold that the first sentence of the ability does not alter what happens when you channel negative energy to affect living creatures, then when you channel negative energy to affect living creatures, you still take damage unless you exclude yourself from the channel. That would directly contradict the wording of the feature.

Not at all. In general principal creatures are only healed or harmed by a type of energy. If you are healed by negative energy, you are not harmed by it. When someone channels negative to heal, it affects you. Simple really.

Jiggy: You're highly over-interpreting here. I am not suggesting you are still harmed by negative targeting living, and thus I am not suggesting that a designer wrote horribly misleading text.

I am suggesting this is a very simple ability. Channeled negative energy is either directed to heal (normally targeting undead), or directed to harm (normally targeting living). Death's Embrace changes which type targets you (the kind that heals instead of the kind that harms).

It would be miraculously simple to make the language clearer, if it was intended to heal you both ways (something that is typically very clear in situations like this). "At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy that targets the living. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area."

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

EDIT: You know what, nevermind.

Sovereign Court

2 people marked this as a favorite.

Sorry, Majuba, the text is actually very clear about what this ability does.

1.

PRD wrote:
You heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy.

If you take damage from channeled negative energy, you heal from it instead. This is very clear cut. Damage => Healing.

Majuba wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy that targets the living.

This is already implicitly true simply because undead creatures cannot be damaged at all by negative energy. You cannot take damage from a negative channel unless you are living. Therefore this phrasing is redundant and does not add anything to the ability. So, no, this phrasing doesn't make it any more clear, it just increases the word count and doesn't add anything. Incidentally, this isn't even the correct wording for the ability because it be more accurate to say "you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy that harms."

2.

PRD wrote:
If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.

If someone channels to heal undead, you also heal from it. I think we're all in agreement here. If you are already undead, then this of course has no additional benefit. This DOES NOT say anything about being considered as an undead creature for the purposes of negative energy channeling. All it does is allow you, as a living creature, to be healed by negative energy channeled to heal.

This ability does NOT do

Majuba wrote:
Death's Embrace changes which type targets you (the kind that heals instead of the kind that harms).

because it says nothing about changing the effects of positive energy.

What it does do is that if you are a living creature, you get healed by any kind of channeled negative energy (healing or harming), and are still healed by healing channeled positive energy.

This ability provides no additional benefit to undead death domain clerics because they cannot be damaged by channeled negative energy, and are already healed by negative energy channeled to heal.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Acedio wrote:
This ability does NOT do
Majuba wrote:
Death's Embrace changes which type targets you (the kind that heals instead of the kind that harms).

because it says nothing about changing the effects of positive energy.

What it does do is that if you are a living creature, you get healed by any kind of channeled negative energy (healing or harming), and are still healed by healing channeled positive energy.

This ability provides no additional benefit to undead death domain clerics because they cannot be damaged by channeled negative energy, and are already healed by negative energy channeled to heal.

1. I never said it did anything to positive energy. Nor did I say it changes what the cleric's type is considered (undead vs. Living). I said it changes what type *of negative energy* affects the cleric, the kind that heals instead of the kind that harms. They are two different things, strange as it is.

2. The fact that an ability meant to make a cleric more like an undead treats them so *radically* different is reason enough to doubt that logic. That a Death cleric could he healed by both positive and negative (instead of 'swapping') is reasonable. Having them treated *better* than undead by negative energy is just silly. Channeled energy (positive or negative) either heals or harms, it *never* does both.

Sovereign Court

Majuba wrote:
Channeled energy (positive or negative) either heals or harms, it *never* does both.

Except in the case that you have this ability, as it clearly and explicitly says it does.

PRD wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.

These two statements are entirely independent. As you astutely point out, there is no way for a channel to be declared to heal and harm at the same time, the channeler must choose on or the other. If the negative channel is designated to HARM, then a cleric of the death domain is instead healed by it IF they take damage per the first clause. If the negative energy channel is designated to HEAL, then a cleric of the death domain is also healed by it, per the second clause. These scenarios cannot and do not overlap, because they are contingent on the declared purpose of the channel, which is mutually exclusive.

Therefore, channeled negative energy, whether channeled to heal or harm, still heals a living cleric of the death domain.

The "silliness" of the ability is a different topic, and is not what is being asked about. This is how the ability reads. If it is a better ability for a living death domain cleric than an undead one, then perhaps this is not a great domain for an undead cleric. An undead cleric of the murder subdomain would then be a strong alternative.

Edited: Ninja edited for elaboration of argument. Sorry.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Acedio wrote:
Majuba wrote:
Channeled energy (positive or negative) either heals or harms, it *never* does both.

Except in the case that you have this ability, as it clearly and explicitly says it does.

You see it as clear. I see it as vague at worst, clearly *not* at best. FAQ anyone?

Cardio wrote:
PRD wrote:
At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy. If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal hit points just like undead in the area.
In the case that you are a cleric of the death domain of at least 8th level, you are healed by negative energy channeled to harm as well as negative energy channeled to heal.

Can we agree that read my way, this ability means you are being healed by negative energy instead of being harmed by it? Healed by CNE (channeled negative energy) to heal, and not harmed by CNE to harm.

Edit: silliness is a great warning sign for misinterpretation.

Sovereign Court

Majuba wrote:


Can we agree that read my way, this ability means you are being healed by negative energy instead of being harmed by it? Healed by CNE (channeled negative energy) to heal, and not harmed by CNE to harm.

No, because if you are damaged by a harming negative energy channel, the first clause of the ability applies and you are instead healed by it.

Edit: The ability imparted by the first clause is contingent entirely on taking damage from negative energy, which requires it by definition to be a channel to harm. Therefore, you heal from negative energy channeled to harm.

The entire argument here is that your way of reading it is incorrect.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

The entire argument here is obtuse and ridiculous. If your entire argument is that it cannot be read any other way, then you will be incapable of recognizing any other point of view..

The first sentence is not contingent on it being CNE to harm, *unless* you assume it means you are directly transmuting damage into healing. It doesn't say that. It *could* mean that, but it is not explicit. The second sentence then explains what the first one means.

This is perfectly consistent with the text, and does not contradict or require reading into it. Your interpretation is also not contradictory, but you are reading an explicit ability that is not there. Also missing is any language to indicate that there are two separate abilities being described.

FAQ it or not, I.m done arguing with a wall.

Sovereign Court

The second sentence does NOT explain what the first one means because you cannot take damage from a channel that heals undead. Your interpretation is not "perfectly consistent with the text" for that very reason. Your interpretation assumes that the first clause is fluff, which does not make any sense because it describes a completely different situation than what follows.

Edit: I suppose the two other people who were arguing against your point were also walls, too?

Liberty's Edge

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There are two separate thoughts or situations described in this ability. If we examine them individually the RAI and RAW are pretty clear.

"...you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy."

How can any character take damage from channeled negative energy?
1. A character must be living.
2. The character must be targeted by a cleric channeling negative energy to do damage.

Therefore, a living cleric of 8th level or higher, with the Death Domain, when targeted to take damage from negative energy will heal instead. That is EXACTLY what the first sentence states.

"If the channeled negative energy targets undead, you heal damage just like undead in the area."

How can undead be target by negative energy?
1. They must be undead.
2. The undead must be targeted by a cleric channeling negative energy to heal undead.
NOTE: Theoretically, you could target undead with NE to harm them, but it wouldn't do any good. Undead can never take damage from CNE. Therefore, the only way you can reasonably target undead with NE is for the express purpose of healing them.

Death's Embrace causes the living cleric of 8th level or higher with the Death Domain to heal damage just like the undead. Quite simply, Death's Embrace allows them to heal with both applications of channeled NE. Pretty straightforward.

I don't see the confusion with this ability. Yes, it can be powerful in very odd situation. It allows an evil cleric to heal himself two different ways; by channeling NE to harm living OR by channeling NE to heal undead. If, for some odd reason, a cleric channeling positive energy to heal living and chose NOT to exclude the cleric with the Death's Embrace ability, that cleric would heal, too. However, the only way to really "break" this ability would be to have two clerics over 8th level in the party with the Death Domain, one of whom channels PE and one who channels NE. Then, the two of them could heal each other with both PE and NE, and heal their party members with PE.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Just to throw another wrench in there... In the description of Inflict Light Wounds, it states that (emphasis mine)

Inflict Light Wounds wrote:
When laying your hand upon a creature, you channel negative energy that deals 1d8 points of damage + 1 point per caster level (maximum +5).

If we assume that the second sentence of Death's Embrace is intended to qualify the first, the Cleric still takes damage from Inflict Light Wounds.

If we assume that they are independent statements, the Cleric should be healed by Inflict Light Wounds.

Personally, I think the idea that a Cleric would be healed by another Cleric using Channel Negative Energy but harmed by Inflict Light Wounds to be a bit silly. That leads me to interpret Death's Embrace as two independent statements.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

That's a very nice wrench ZZT, I think I'll just leave it lying right where it landed.


I am playing an 8th level Negative Channeling Cleric with the Death Domain and my PFS group has had several discussions about the 1st sentence in the Deaths Embrace description. [/Death's Embrace (Ex): At 8th level, you heal damage instead of taking damage from channeled negative energy.] Does this mean any Negative Channel by myself or opposing cleric would heal my PC or is it further explanation on the second sentence. Everyone has some very good points and I am wondering if anyone has heard an official ruling from Paizo on this subject. If not may I request an official response?

Liberty's Edge

Raise Thread.

This came up last week.

When I first read the rules for Death's Embrace it seemed obvious that it meant that the character heals damage from negative channels that can heal and the character takes no damage from negative channels that can harm. That seems like a reasonable domain power for the level.

But the wording can also be interpreted as meaning that the character is healed by channels meant to harm including their own channels. That seems out of line with similar powers from other domains.

In PFS a reasonably tankish 8th level cleric optimized for channeling can generally avoid taking more damage than their channels can heal in any given round. This seems all kinds of broken to me and it gets worse if you have more than one negative channeling cleric in the same party.

In a home game I would house rule this to the way I initially thought the rule read. As a PFS gm, I have raised the thread and hit the FAQ button.

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