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Harm heals undead by virtue of the Negative trait. It serves as the undead equivalent of the healing trait.Effects with this trait heal undead creatures with negative energy, deal negative damage to living creatures, or manipulate negative energy.
That's not true. Harm heals the undead because it explicitly says it does in the spell's text. There are absolutely spells out there with the negative trait (chill touch, for example) that do not heal the undead. That "or" in the trait description is important.
Nope
So an undead monk can use "Wholeness of Body" to kill itself faster?
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So an undead monk can use "Wholeness of Body" to kill itself faster?
Nope. Wholeness of body is positive healing, which doesn't work on Undead, but is not Positive damage, and won't kill them, either. It's the opposite application of the same reason that something like Vampiric Touch won't heal undead.
Damage is damage. Healing is healing. The one does NOT become the other, which is why things like Harm and Heal need to spell out that they can do both of those things, depending on target.
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So an undead monk can use "Wholeness of Body" to kill itself faster?Nope. Wholeness of body is positive healing, which doesn't work on Undead, but is not Positive damage, and won't kill them, either. It's the opposite application of the same reason that something like Vampiric Touch won't heal undead.
Damage is damage. Healing is healing. The one does NOT become the other, which is why things like Harm and Heal need to spell out that they can do both of those things, depending on target.
This.
PF1 had negative & positive energy and their healing/damaging effects depended on whether you were living, undead, or whatever (with many exceptions, etc., etc.).In PF2, the effects are spelled out specifically in the abilities. And that's it. There's no need to extrapolate. Awkwardly, spells like Heal & Harm have different effects depending on the subject/target so the net results resemble PF1 norms; but again, PF2 delineates these effects as parts of the spells, not as attributes of negative or positive energy themselves.
And IMO this has led to some awkward phrasing with some forms of Negative Healing which read like Dhampir get healed by Harm and unaffected by Heal (since that "like an undead" is missing"). This may be so they function in living-PC parties which might like to unleash AoE Heals.
Keeping a mixed party of quick and dead topped off in Blood Lords is going to be a whole issue, I can tell.
And IMO this has led to some awkward phrasing with some forms of Negative Healing which read like Dhampir get healed by Harm and unaffected by Heal (since that "like an undead" is missing"). This may be so they function in living-PC parties which might like to unleash AoE Heals.
It isn't missing at all. It's right there in the dhampir writeup. Some people just dismiss that as irrelevant because it isn't also in the standalone definition of Negative Healing.
Still, whether your table reads this like a deliberate effort to make AoE Heal be safe or as an attempt to lawyer past expressed design intent is a matter of variation worth establishing before playing a dhampir. Effects that don't do double duty are perfectly clear, though.
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So an undead monk can use "Wholeness of Body" to kill itself faster?
Yes you can read the undead trait like that.
It needs interpretation. It probably shouldn't be read like that. But Paizo left that open in the rules.
And IMO this has led to some awkward phrasing with some forms of Negative Healing which read like Dhampir get healed by Harm and unaffected by Heal (since that "like an undead" is missing"). This may be so they function in living-PC parties which might like to unleash AoE Heals.It isn't missing at all. It's right there in the dhampir writeup. Some people just dismiss that as irrelevant because it isn't also in the standalone definition of Negative Healing.
Still, whether your table reads this like a deliberate effort to make AoE Heal be safe or as an attempt to lawyer past expressed design intent is a matter of variation worth establishing before playing a dhampir. Effects that don't do double duty are perfectly clear, though.
It is the descpritive text that a lot of people like to deride as flavour text for Dhampir - dhampirs respond to positive and negative energy as if they were undead. I'm not one of them I am happy to accept flavour text for what it is: part of the rules description.
Where it is missing is with Undead Eidolon which are Undead and living and have negative Healing.
Then there are all the effects that specifically undead or target living creatures. To get them to work well you need to bend the targetting rules a bit. A lot of interpretation is recommended.
Healing Undead
...
The heal spell can’t heal undead, but harm and soothe can.
...Undead Trait
Once living, these creatures were infused after death with negative energy and soul-corrupting evil magic. When reduced to 0 Hit Points, an undead creature is destroyed. Undead creatures are damaged by positive energy, are healed by negative energy, and don't benefit from healing effects.Soothe target: Targets 1 willing living creature
Soothe traits: emotion, enchantment, healing, mentalDid I miss something? Is the healing undead sidebar just wrong, or is soothe written incorrectly?
Also what are you supposed to do about stuff like diseases and curses whose removal spells have the healing trait and therefore don't work on undead? From my reading undead PC's don't have anything that says they can benefit from healing effects.
Here's how I see it. The Soothe spell has neither the positive or negative trait within the spell. Instead, it is mental or emotion effect that is healing the creature. This is definitely a gray area, but I argue that since it is not positive or negative, it can heal both undead and living creatures. But of course, ask your GM if he will allow this.