I am playing a vengeance paladin lvl 4 and the undead in our campaign will only target me. We have been running a dungeon and there was a room with a ton of ghouls, and they ALL zeroed in on my character because of his holy symbol and would only attack me and no one else (mind you one more came in every turn for the next 4 turns). While i was down making death saves, the DM said they would still chew on me which was played as biting attacks and I was perma-dead in no time. Then they went after the magic user the same way and had the same result. DM upon killing half the party very quickly into the dungeon was 'kind' and we got revivified us both, but then three rooms later there was a large flying flaming skull that would ONLY attack me once again. Even when the rest of the party had it tied to the ground and was mercilessly attacking it, it would still use all of its ranged multi attacks on me (i was grappled by something else 25 ft away). I have been looking in the monster manual and I have yet to find anything about the undead only attacking clerics and paladins first, then magic users, then the rest of the party. She didn't handle the skeletons this way for some reason or I would have died yet again in a different room as well, as there was 8 of them. What is the point of being a paladin and having an advantage against the undead when you are nonstop overwhelmed by them? I have never heard anyone that has played a paladin mention this. I would think this is something that would be mentioned habitually.... Is there something off about the situation I am in or is this normal?

Nothing about undead makes them target any specific individual so this is just your DM either being new or a dick. They have the "DM vs players" mindset and are giving tactics to creatures that are usually mindless or at least not tactical. I would recommend having a word with your DM. 

There is some homebrew going on with the campaign which can be a little frustrating at times. I can understand that a more powerful Undead would be a little smarter and try and go for the bigger threat, and as a DM I would think that occasionally challenging individual characters or the whole team to think outside the box would lead to better game play and character development (though I am not a DM so take that with a grain of salt), but this is just plain over kill. This DM claims that the paladins are hard for a DM to run because of their tenants, but that too has me scratching my head.

Has this person DM'd before? Let them know that you're not having fun being the sole focus of monster attacks, even when seemingly there are much better targets. Maybe they don't realize they're doing it this badly - it could be a learning experience to help shape their DMing. 

I had a similar learning experience as a DM (with a Paladin as well, no doubt). I didn't even realize I was doing it, but I was only ever forcing the Paladin to make Wis saving throws, instead of the Cleric, Sorcerer, or Warlock. When he was mind-controlled during a boss fight, he kinda angrily grumbled about always being targeted by those moves and it made me realize what I was doing. I made sure to bring the fun (read: pain) to other characters as well after that.

thanks for the input you all! I'll try talking to them again. I'm trying to be patient because they are new and so are we, and I think Cyb3rm1nd made a good point in that they have a DM vs Player mentality. The DM has never been a player and after thinking on it for a bit I can see why they encourage DM's to be players first. It would give them a chance to be in the players shoes and be more mindful of the encounters and how they approach them.

Even as a new DM I never singled out a character. Not without a real reason.

Your a paladin. So what? What if you were just a fighter and was wearing stolen armor, or were simply religious and carried a symbol of your religion.

What if I was a rogue who carried a musical instrument as a cover? I knew how to play it because of my background and used it to look like a simple entertainer or even a bard?

Not every magic user looks like Gandalf either. Some could even use bladed weapons. Not all clerics look like Catholic priests. Or even act like them either.

The undead only target characters if they are under the direction of some intelligence.

I tried talking to her to what sounds like no avail. She said that all the lore and blogs she reads, the undead single out to cleric, paladin, then magic users. She said we can revisit after this campaign. I told her I have a barbarian made to switch out because I'm not going to continue being singled out and it takes away from me playing my strengths and not having fun. She told me I should have been smiting but 8 ghouls against me and I can only smite 3 times before I'm out of slots or they paralyze me. She said we can talk about switching out to my barbarian. I'm thinking I will likely quit playing. Which sucks because they are the only person I have found to dm and I don't want to loose a friend over a game.

She's reading the wrong things or making shit up, then. She should be limited to real D&D 5e official material, and as somebody who owns everything official except the Dragonlance one (pre-ordered digital... soon.... SOON) nowhere, at all, suggests regular undead would target clerics or mages. Most undead literally don't have real minds - they have no ability to understand what clerics or mages are let alone be smart enough to target them. Now if you had an enemy that was intelligent then sure, but regular undead? Nope.

Challenge her. Ask her to cite which official 5e book states to do this. In fact, tell her to check the Dungeon Master's Guide , in the Introduction, where it says the following, and I'll highlight something she's not understanding:

The D&D rules help you and the other players have a good time, but the rules aren’t in charge. You’re the DM, and you are in charge of the game. That said, your goal isn’t to slaughter the adventurers but to create a campaign world that revolves around their actions and decisions, and to keep your players coming back for more! 

Quote from hoosierdaddy407 >>

I tried talking to her to what sounds like no avail. She said that all the lore and blogs she reads, the undead single out to cleric, paladin, then magic users. She said we can revisit after this campaign. I told her I have a barbarian made to switch out because I'm not going to continue being singled out and it takes away from me playing my strengths and not having fun. She told me I should have been smiting but 8 ghouls against me and I can only smite 3 times before I'm out of slots or they paralyze me. She said we can talk about switching out to my barbarian. I'm thinking I will likely quit playing. Which sucks because they are the only person I have found to dm and I don't want to loose a friend over a game.

 

 I’m guessing this is a new DM? I mean new to DMing, not just new to you. 
You could try telling them that 1. Any lore pre-2014 is not official. Any blogs they read are also not official. And 2. Even then, it doesn’t matter, the DM is under no obligation to abide by what they read on the internet. Particularly if what they read is making the game not fun for their table.

Yes they are new. I have looked at the monster manual on the undead and there was nothing about them singling out the clerics and paladins, then once they are dead magic users and ignoring everyone else. The others are having fun for now. If I keep playing and I switch to a barbarian (which to me is not a very exciting character). The weak magic user will become the new punching bag for the undead. The DM did tell me she removed all the undead from the campaign I had a feeling this is how it would play out. She said she would send me all the lore but I can't find ityself which raises questions on my end.

It of course depends how "realistic" (yeah, yeah, I know, we don't like that word) you campaign should be, but making the intelligent enemies target the squishy cloth-wearing fireball throwing characters and ignoring the huge guy in a tin-can is totally understandable tactics. How much hard battles your party wants is something you should talk about with the DM (as others have already mentioned).

As for you paladin and the skeletons. There is no such rule in the monster manual/phb, but no one is banning your DM to make a world, where the undead "feel" the opposed god's champion and target them fanatically. If you find this annoying, this is something you should talk about with the DM. 

Similarly no-one is banning your DM to make her skeletons more intelligent then their default variant (in that case see the first paragraph above).

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

Even as a new DM I never singled out a character. Not without a real reason.

Your a paladin. So what? What if you were just a fighter and was wearing stolen armor, or were simply religious and carried a symbol of your religion.

What if I was a rogue who carried a musical instrument as a cover? I knew how to play it because of my background and used it to look like a simple entertainer or even a bard?

Not every magic user looks like Gandalf either. Some could even use bladed weapons. Not all clerics look like Catholic priests. Or even act like them either.

 

The undead only target characters if they are under the direction of some intelligence.

 Or if the undead is itself intelligent enough to understand which characters are a bigger threat to it.  But ghouls are pretty feral and mostly just try to attack the nearest living body they can reach so they can eat it.

As stated I had already talked with her on it. I can understand making them more apt to attack me and I mentioned this when I talked with her, but them ignoring anyone else and only attacking me no matter what is very much overkill. She thought it was fair because it effects the druid next but from where I'm sitting that's just moving on to the next punching bag and the next one won't last as long. From where I'm sitting I'm not being unreasonable but it comes cross that she feels that I am. I just dont get why something so simple is such a big deal.

New GMs (and an unpleasant number of old GMs, sadly) can be prone to interpreting any attempts at feedback that are anything other than heaping praise about how they're the most awesome and creative GM of all time as some sort of personal attack.

If your GM is incapable of going with any tactic beyond "dogpile on a single player" and won't listen to feedback, it may be time to consider how much you actually want to stick with that campaign. 

Intelligent undead might choose to target paladins, but only if they were certain you were in fact a paladin or had already seen you devastate them in combat (and even then they could just as easily be too scared to confront you directly). From what you’re saying, it sounds like your DM is just being a jerk. If she won’t listen to reason, you may need to find another campaign to play in.

Yeah we shall see. If I have to switch character to have fun and that doesn't register it's over the top. I don't think anything else will. I'll look around and see if there is another group. Of course..... I could always be a dm and run things differently.....

Intelligent creatures should be played as such, with the DM deciding their actions (and targets), not what's written in the monster books. There's certainly a case for, "how did they know I was a _insert class_?" but otherwise, if it's a baddie you've faced before, they might know. After a round or two of you healing allies, they know you're the threat. The one with little to no armor is easier to hit, therefore, you're singled out.

Mindless undead should not be played as such. 

There's a difference and a creatures intelligence should be a huge driver in how they act

Now, if the DM is consistent, keep this interaction on the back burner. In future games, if you're playing a rogue and another player is playing the paladin, undead should attack the paladin, even if you - as the rogue - are clearly doing the most damage/being the biggest problem. If the undead switch to ONLY you, now YOU are being targeted because you're playing well, being clever, etc., and this is clearly a problem.

If anything, undead will want to avoid divine beings as holy symbols can denote someone who is able to turn or destroy them

Quote from Jacked_Goblin >>

Now, if the DM is consistent, keep this interaction on the back burner. In future games, if you're playing a rogue and another player is playing the paladin, undead should attack the paladin, even if you - as the rogue - are clearly doing the most damage/being the biggest problem. If the undead switch to ONLY you, now YOU are being targeted because you're playing well, being clever, etc., and this is clearly a problem.

 It's actually a problem either way, just for different reasons.  For the latter, the problem is obvious, but for the former it means that the GM is basically punishing anyone who plays the "wrong" class.