Breath of Life and Nonlethal damage in general (and kineticist burn in particular)


Rules Questions


What happens to nonlethal damage after character death? Nonlethal damage zeroed - or stays?

For example, 200 hp character has 100 nonlethal damage and dies at -30 hp. Breath of Life gives him 32 hp, so he is at +2 hp. How many nonlethal damage he has?
A) zero, because he died = became an object, and objects can not have nonlethal damage.
B) 68 (100 nonlethal minus 32 healed by BoL), so at +2 hp and 68 nonlethal damage he is stll unconscious.

What if that 100 nonlethal damage was from kineticist burn?
C) look A)
D) 100 - because kineticist burn can be removed only by rest


Fedor Checherov wrote:

What happens to nonlethal damage after character death? Nonlethal damage zeroed - or stays?

For example, 200 hp character has 100 nonlethal damage and dies at -30 hp. Breath of Life gives him 32 hp, so he is at +2 hp. How many nonlethal damage he has?
A) zero, because he died = became an object, and objects can not have nonlethal damage.
B) 68 (100 nonlethal minus 32 healed by BoL), so at +2 hp and 68 nonlethal damage he is stll unconscious.

What if that 100 nonlethal damage was from kineticist burn?
C) look A)
D) 100 - because kineticist burn can be removed only by rest


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I agree with MrCharisma. B & D.

_
glass.


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Concur with both of the above.


A dead creature is still a creature. Its body may sometimes be treated as an object, but the dead creature is still a creature. A demonstration of this is the breath of life spell itself. It targets a "creature touched". If the dead creature weren't still a creature, then that spell wouldn't work.


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Melkiador wrote:
A dead creature is still a creature. Its body may sometimes be treated as an object, but the dead creature is still a creature. A demonstration of this is the breath of life spell itself. It targets a "creature touched". If the dead creature weren't still a creature, then that spell wouldn't work.

Death is merely a condition of life.


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"Death is just the beginning of undeath."
-Thread Necromancers' Guild


Warped Savant wrote:

"Death is just the beginning of undeath."

-Thread Necromancers' Guild

You called?


Thread Necromancers' Guild wrote:
Warped Savant wrote:

"Death is just the beginning of undeath."

-Thread Necromancers' Guild
You called?

I figured I should add some XP to my resume before applying to join your guild. :)

You know how it is... show you that I know what I'm talking about so that you don't have to take a leap of faith in my application.
(After all, I know what kind of effect good faith has on you.)


Melkiador wrote:
A dead creature is still a creature. Its body may sometimes be treated as an object, but the dead creature is still a creature. A demonstration of this is the breath of life spell itself. It targets a "creature touched". If the dead creature weren't still a creature, then that spell wouldn't work.

It wouldn't, except that it explicitly says it does. So it does.

_
glass.


For the text to change the target, then the target would need to tell you to "see text", like the Telekinesis spell does.

Moreover, the text of Breath of Life never actually specifies that the spell's target is modified. In fact it just solidifies the fact that a dead creature is still a creature.

Quote:
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.


Melkiador wrote:
For the text to change the target, then the target would need to tell you to "see text", like the Telekinesis spell does.

It should say that, but all that does is alert you that you need to check the main text for full details of the targets. Whether the target line warns you or not, you do need to check the text in this case.

Melkiador wrote:

Moreover, the text of Breath of Life never actually specifies that the spell's target is modified. In fact it just solidifies the fact that a dead creature is still a creature.

Quote:
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.

None of that says the target is currently a creature. It allows you to target an object that was a creature at the moment it died, and heal it as if it still was that creature.

Unless you think all this text is superfluous and normal healing spells can also bring back the dead? After all, they also target "creature touched".

_
glass.


So... a different question.

Is there support for the idea that a person retains accumulated nonlethal damage while he's dead? I can't find anything. Conditions do unless the condition or revival method says otherwise; but nonlethal damage is not a condition.


glass wrote:


Quote:
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.

None of that says the target is currently a creature. It allows you to target an object that was a creature at the moment it died, and heal it as if it still was that creature.

Unless you think all this text is superfluous and normal healing spells can also bring back the dead? After all, they also target "creature touched".

I don't read it that way. Breath of Life does not make any statements that "for purposes of this spell, dead [objects] can be counted as creatures". It simply refers to dead creatures. Hence, dead creatures are still creatures (while also being objects). Being an object or a creature is not a binary requirement.

Other healing spells cannot bring a dead creature back to life, because those spells have no such provision allowing for it. They could theoretically heal the injuries on a dead creature, but that becomes moot, because the creature is still dead at that point. king of the reverse of a death effect can kill a creature without actualy removing its hit points.

Sandslice wrote:

So... a different question.

Is there support for the idea that a person retains accumulated nonlethal damage while he's dead? I can't find anything. Conditions do unless the condition or revival method says otherwise; but nonlethal damage is not a condition.

There is also no direct rules that state a dead creature retains accumulated lethal damage. Breath of life indirectly implies this. Both lethal and nonlethal damage are forms of HP damage. What works for one works for the other (unless we have a specific rule telling us otherwise).


Sandslice wrote:

So... a different question.

Is there support for the idea that a person retains accumulated nonlethal damage while he's dead? I can't find anything. Conditions do unless the condition or revival method says otherwise; but nonlethal damage is not a condition.

Nothing says it should not. Nonlethal damage is damage. Just like lethal damage. It stays just like lethal damage would. I see no wording that says otherwise.

Dark Archive

But burn is it's own thing, unaffected by being dead or alive


Name Violation wrote:
But burn is it's own thing, unaffected by being dead or alive

I wasn't thinking of burn with my question, since I regard that as a condition specific to kineticist mechanics. (:


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Sometimes dead creatures count as a creature, sometimes an object.
It's weird that people try to insist that a dead creature is purely an object and acts exactly like an object at all times.

Breath of Life says "If cast upon a creature that has died within 1 round..." If you going to to to say that you remove all non-lethal damage from a dead creature because it's now an object and objects can't have non-lethal damage then you'd have to argue that Breath of Life would have to say "If cast upon an object that had been a creature that died within 1 round...." because if a dead creature isn't a creature and is purely an object then Breath of Life can't target a creature that has died in the last round as the dead creature isn't a creature, it's an object.

Alternatively, Raise Dead:
Target dead creature touched

Notice that a dead creature is still listed as a creature?

Liberty's Edge

This thread has me wondering, could a murderer use cure spells to disguise the cause of death.


ShadowcatX wrote:
This thread has me wondering, could a murderer use cure spells to disguise the cause of death.

No, but "Sculpt Corpse" could.

Reasoning:
Cure Light Wounds says "When laying your hand upon a living creature, you channel positive energy that cures 1d8 points of damage + 1 point per caster level (maximum +5)."

But someone could try to argue that Heal would work....


Quote:
Dead characters cannot benefit from normal or magical healing, but they can be restored to life via magic.

This is the text that keeps you from healing dead creatures. The language is old and specific to PCs, but basically you generally can’t heal dead creatures at all, even if you aren’t trying to bring them back to life.

Liberty's Edge

Melkiador wrote:
Quote:
Dead characters cannot benefit from normal or magical healing, but they can be restored to life via magic.
This is the text that keeps you from healing dead creatures. The language is old and specific to PCs, but basically you generally can’t heal dead creatures at all, even if you aren’t trying to bring them back to life.

NPCs is Non-Player Characters, so it is not specific to PCs.


Melkiador wrote:
Quote:
Dead characters cannot benefit from normal or magical healing, but they can be restored to life via magic.
This is the text that keeps you from healing dead creatures. The language is old and specific to PCs, but basically you generally can’t heal dead creatures at all, even if you aren’t trying to bring them back to life.

For anyone trying to find where it says this, it's under "Conditions >> Dead"

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