Rename necromancy to school of Life & Death and that would probably be better for the ability to group healing magic and effects together with the necrotic ones , and provide space to explore interesting interactions between the two.
i've often visualized healing word as evocation (or conjuring) positive energies to magically reject harm at a distance. it could be divine replacement flesh or time-reversed something or other, but just not anything so mundane as quick regeneration. i don't really get the necromancy vibe except that it has to do with pos/neg forces and manipulating the swirl of that within a vessel... in which case maybe we can just rename that school to something less taboo and more general like 'dynamics' or 'vitae' and then we can still talk about how some badguys are committingnecromancy with that school.
cure wounds i've often visualized as a transmutation (although a case could be made for enchantment, tricking the body) guided by touch as the wounds knit closed. this is my go-to for non-divine healing classes. i would love it if the caster could choose to maintain touch and continue the healing (maybe spending hit dice but definitely not further spell slots) over another round or two. nothing you would want to do in combat lest the healer become vulnerable as they focus more intently on that second (or third) round. and anyway it's no more ridiculous than stopping for a short rest after every single combat or else finding very convenient healing potions around the next corner (a sure sign the dm is second guessing the deadliness of their next encounter after seeing how much hp you have left).
illusion would be great for a spell that provided some small healing (per Rob76 above) but mostly was there to provide some temp hp. thinking back to wheel of time books, refreshing the horses and whatnot.
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Associating them with necromancy gives that school a neat duality, and it took me an embarrassingly long time to notice they're not necromancy. Though, transmutation is probably the most logically compelling argument. In general, the schools are all pretty vague and a lot of spells feel more counterintuitively categorized than healing in evocation. I'm not sure I have a strong opinion.
Personally, I never thought it would belong in anything like Necromancy, since while it does vaguely revolve around manipulating life energy and the soul, Necromancy spells are usually decaying things or creating undead, making it seem more like Necromancy manipulates life to cause things to decay rather than any other use. I think it belongs in Abjuration, since it's usually the type of magic that revolves around restoration and protection.
I also realized no one's mentioned that the resurrection spells are necromancy, and it does feel like they ought to be the same school as healing. Granted that bringing back the dead does relate to death in a way that healing does not because you're probably dealing with, like, souls and stuff, but they are both ways of undoing physical harm.
Eh, I’d say literally calling a soul back to a body is rather different from closing a bad cut. Which possibly highlights why healing isn’t Necromancy; Necromancy is more to do with the insubstantials related to life force, as opposed to the tangible mechanics of repairing damaged tissue.
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There's a good argument that HP are mostly illusion, anyway. :)
Rename necromancy to school of Life & Death and that would probably be better for the ability to group healing magic and effects together with the necrotic ones , and provide space to explore interesting interactions between the two.
i've often visualized healing word as evocation (or conjuring) positive energies to magically reject harm at a distance. it could be divine replacement flesh or time-reversed something or other, but just not anything so mundane as quick regeneration. i don't really get the necromancy vibe except that it has to do with pos/neg forces and manipulating the swirl of that within a vessel... in which case maybe we can just rename that school to something less taboo and more general like 'dynamics' or 'vitae' and then we can still talk about how some badguys are committing necromancy with that school.
cure wounds i've often visualized as a transmutation (although a case could be made for enchantment, tricking the body) guided by touch as the wounds knit closed. this is my go-to for non-divine healing classes. i would love it if the caster could choose to maintain touch and continue the healing (maybe spending hit dice but definitely not further spell slots) over another round or two. nothing you would want to do in combat lest the healer become vulnerable as they focus more intently on that second (or third) round. and anyway it's no more ridiculous than stopping for a short rest after every single combat or else finding very convenient healing potions around the next corner (a sure sign the dm is second guessing the deadliness of their next encounter after seeing how much hp you have left).
illusion would be great for a spell that provided some small healing (per Rob76 above) but mostly was there to provide some temp hp. thinking back to wheel of time books, refreshing the horses and whatnot.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
Associating them with necromancy gives that school a neat duality, and it took me an embarrassingly long time to notice they're not necromancy. Though, transmutation is probably the most logically compelling argument. In general, the schools are all pretty vague and a lot of spells feel more counterintuitively categorized than healing in evocation. I'm not sure I have a strong opinion.
Medium humanoid (human), lawful neutral
Personally, I never thought it would belong in anything like Necromancy, since while it does vaguely revolve around manipulating life energy and the soul, Necromancy spells are usually decaying things or creating undead, making it seem more like Necromancy manipulates life to cause things to decay rather than any other use. I think it belongs in Abjuration, since it's usually the type of magic that revolves around restoration and protection.
As Lamoon01 has pointed out, in D&D, the school of necromancy has to do with life and death. Protecting against death can take the form of the Clone spell.
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I also realized no one's mentioned that the resurrection spells are necromancy, and it does feel like they ought to be the same school as healing. Granted that bringing back the dead does relate to death in a way that healing does not because you're probably dealing with, like, souls and stuff, but they are both ways of undoing physical harm.
Medium humanoid (human), lawful neutral
Eh, I’d say literally calling a soul back to a body is rather different from closing a bad cut. Which possibly highlights why healing isn’t Necromancy; Necromancy is more to do with the insubstantials related to life force, as opposed to the tangible mechanics of repairing damaged tissue.