I have a question regarding the spell Life Transference. I have a level 6 Fallen Aasimar grave cleric in my campaign and she uses Life Transference as a big heal when someone is down. With the Fallen having a natural resistance to necrotic damage, how should I tally the total healed? How about with the target creature unconscious?
Spell: You sacrifice some of your health to mend another creature’s injuries. You take 4d8 necrotic damage, and one creature of your choice that you can see within range regains a number of hit points equal to twice the necrotic damage you take.
With Circle of Mortality, would she instantly take the 32 points of necrotic damage? Then halved from resistance to 16? Would the target be healed for 64 or 32?
I think that because of the words " ... hit points equal to twice the necrotic damage you take. ", you apply first the resistance, then the net necrotic damage, and lastly you double for the healing.
DnDSwede is right. If it said "equal to the damage dealt" it would not take into account any weaknesses or resistances. But it is the damage "taken" so it would apply. That means the target will be healed for 32, not 64, hit points.
I'm not sure that's how the rule books use the words "take" and "dealt". Just as an example, a fireball says "A target takes 8d6 fire damage on a failed save" and that is clearly before any resistances are applied. So she did take 32 damage, she just resisted half of it and only lost 16hp - thus the healing stays at 64. By the same token, if she cast this spell when she only had 7hp left herself, she would still be taking 32 damage (and healing 64) even though she only actually lost 7hp and then collapsed. Maybe that is not what they intended, but a spell that didn't want that damage to be resistable could have easily said the damage cannot be reduced, or that the hp is transferred directly.
The meaning of "take" depends on the context. "You take 4d8 necrotic damage" is describing the damage of the spell, before it's modified by any abilities; "twice the necrotic damage you take" is talking about the damage you actually took. This is similar to monster abilities like a vampire's bite: "The target's hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the necrotic damage taken."
That tweet doesn't answer the actual question, just that the damage is halved not whether the healing is also halved. Also the wording of the Vampire ability is not identical to this spell. It lists the damage, then in a later sentence refers to the necrotic damage "taken". In contrast, Life Transference has a single sentence that says "You take 4d8 necrotic damage ... equal to twice the necrotic damage you take." That's the same two words, "you take", in the same sentence, without a changing of tense, and no more than an "and" in way of conjunction or preposition. It's all splitting hairs, I know, but how this hair splits has a significant impact for the utility of this spell. I've had a search and can't find a sage advice which rules on this specifically.
I do understand where you are all coming from, but it seems an unnecessarily mean reading of the rules in this case. The universe is not broken by allowing Grave Clerics and Necromancers to cast this spell with less damage taken; but the other interpretation, on the other hand, completely ruins this spell (worse than Cure Wounds) for those two - the very people who should be masters of powers of life and death.
While I agree that it would not break the game, I do think that the intent is for the spell to heal double the amount of net damage you've taken. I base this on this answer by mr Crawford:
In this answer, it is clear that the intent is that the net damage is used for calculating the healing. After all, a caster with 1 HP can "take" 4d8 damage, though it would result in only 1 damage after all calculations, since they don't have more HP resulting in 2 hp of healing. If the spell uses the base damage dealt (whatever you rolled on the 4d8) then the answer should be yes to the question asked in the linked SA.
I get that this is a bit odd since the whole "master of life and death" thing, but think about it; though this spell is a necromancy spell, it is hardly a spell an evil necromancer would use. It's all about self sacrifice to help another person. A lich/necromancer would not do that. Not even the Grave domain cleric is about self sacrifice. Note that they don't get this spell as a domain spell either.
As necromancers go, there are a lot of spells that are on the necromancer spell list that don´t quite fit the bill of evil-raise-dead-y masterminds. Things like spare the dying, revivify or astral projection or clone. It has more to do that they use life essence or "soul" flavored power, which puts it in the necromancer spell list.
I do understand that this might be a bit odd for characters such as an Aasimar cleric, which have permanent resistance to necrotic damage, if they want to use this spell. Perhaps as a DM I would allow a character to make it "typeless" damage dealt to the character, without the possibility of applying any weaknesses/resistances if I have a resistant character that wants to use this spell. But this is such a niche situation I think the spell is fine the way it is, counting resistances and vulnerabilities before calculating the damage it heals.
Hmm. I'll concede the point on that tweet, but I still don't agree that the spell description actually says that. It is ambiguous, and if that is what they wanted to say then they could have done it much better. Also I will continue to play with my interpretation in both situations. If someone wants to sacrifice their last 3 hp and knock themselves out to give another player a big hp boost then great, what a story moment (I do punish going unconscious with a lasting penalty until the next rest though, so it's more of a cost). Also I do disagree on your characterisation of a Necromancer as basically a Lich - I think life transference could be the exact thing for a soul projecting, astral plane trotting, non-evil Necromancer.
Hmm. I'll concede the point on that tweet, but I still don't agree that the spell description actually says that. It is ambiguous, and if that is what they wanted to say then they could have done it much better. Also I will continue to play with my interpretation in both situations. If someone wants to sacrifice their last 3 hp and knock themselves out to give another player a big hp boost then great, what a story moment (I do punish going unconscious with a lasting penalty until the next rest though, so it's more of a cost).
I get what you're saying and I don't think it hurts the game that much. I like your idea as well, and story wise it's really cool moment. Also, it's such a rare occasion that it's less game-breaking. If a player were to actively pursue a loophole that's a different thing altogether.
I agree on the phrasing that it is somewhat unclear. Often when effects such as this arise they are split in seperate sentences for clarity, like the vampire´s bite:
Hit: 7 (1d6 + 4) piercing damage plus 10 (3d6) necrotic damage. The target's hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the necrotic damage taken, and the vampire regains hit points equal to that amount.
Also I do disagree on your characterisation of a Necromancer as basically a Lich - I think life transference could be the exact thing for a soul projecting, astral plane trotting, non-evil Necromancer.
Though it's true that necromancer does not always mean an evil character, but it does fit the trope. In my settings necromancy is rarely inherently evil so I agree with you. I merely mentioned it because I feel that many people view the necromancy = evil as standard.
To me the combination of fallen aasimar and life transference seems like a min/max type build. I might be wrong on this. I would worry that significantly increasing the life cleric effectiveness with this spell would make for in overly powerful combination that makes balancing this PC with the rest of the group harder.
If it was not a min max move and something that felt cool for the group then I would accept the better version of the spell (especially if the PC is the main healer). If I felt the player was trying to hard to gain an advantage then I would lean on my initial ruling.
To me the combination of fallen aasimar and life transference seems like a min/max type build. I might be wrong on this. I would worry that significantly increasing the life cleric effectiveness with this spell would make for in overly powerful combination that makes balancing this PC with the rest of the group harder.
If it was not a min max move and something that felt cool for the group then I would accept the better version of the spell (especially if the PC is the main healer). If I felt the player was trying to hard to gain an advantage then I would lean on my initial ruling.
I get this and I'd probably rule the same. You could say that the very essence of the aasimar is actively blocking being drained. Therefore even when the aasimar wants to be drained (ie use the life transference spell) his body blocks some functionality. It's kind of the same with saving throws if you ask me; you may choose to fail some throws (for instance keep standing in the red dragon's flaming breath in order to block a party member from harm) but not others (like willingly ingesting a poison).
If you feel like it is a min-max attempt on the player's part which you don't agree with, it's up to you to determine how you interpret the spell. And as said above, it works both ways so whatever works for you and your group :)
This reply is super late, but its the kind of thing that people search for so here's my bit:
From the rules I would argue that you don't even get to take the 32 damage (max roll from 4d8) since you aren't rolling to heal someone. You are rolling to damage yourself then you just heal for double the damage you took. The result would be /roll 4d8 = 18 damage(average), take 9 damage (resistance) heal for 18.
To me it definitely seems like an attempt at optimization which I think is fine and I like the flavour of bringing allies back from the brink of death. If its just a matter of balancing the characters so that one doesn't outshine the others you could ask your players "Would you like your cleric friend to be able to restore 64hp to you if you ever fall in combat?" but if there was another character that intended to play a dedicated healer it could be a problem.
I'd let the Aasimar Cleric (or Divine Soul Sorc) take half and still get the full amount. Just as a house rule, even though it's probably not RAI/RAW.
Aasimar Divine Soul (Scourge) using Empowered Healing takes an avg 10 damage and heals an average of 40 (when calculating the spell with empowered healing rerolls). With low AC and d6, they can't really use it more than 2-3 times before needing to spend some extra slots to heal themselves.
Aasimar Life Cleric (Protector) takes 4 dmg, then heals 41. With armor + d8, they can probably get away with using this as long as they have slots.
Mechanically, that's top-tier healing for sure. But it's still a situational ability. Most of the time, you're still better off casting something like a fireball, twinned haste, or spirit guardians. So you won't use this that many times in a day. Basically, you'll probably only use it when someone drops to 0. When it goes off, the only benefit will be the target can take 2-3 hits before going down again (instead of 1-2).
I don't think it outshines what other sorc or cleric builds can do (e.g., forge cleric + warforged). It's also a niche that really helps the group stay up and having fun. I usually don't have anyone stepping up to be healers in games, so I don't think I'd have the problem of them "outshining" someone at their role. Let's also consider all the things they could be doing as a munchkin instead (e.g., divination wizards / PAM + GWM builds).
So, looking at the combination of Grave Cleric, Fallen Aasimar, and Life Transference...
-> Grave Cleric's Circle of Mortality would not apply. By the text of Life Transference, you're not rolling to heal a creature that's at 0 hitpoints, you're rolling for damage to yourself. Circle of Mortality specifies the act of healing a creature at 0 hitpoints. Pretty straightforward there. Now this is a spot where, for story development reasons, the DM could choose to do other things, but as just a simple use of the combination, it's a no-go.
-> Based on the wording of Life Transference, either the Aasimar's Celestial Resistance would reduce both the damage and the healing, or it would reduce neither. The nercotic damage the caster takes, and the healing the target receives, are both in the same sentence, and as such are being described as a single statement. This would mean that the intention behind the spell is that you determine the final outcome as a single step. If an effect like Celestial Resistance were meant to only apply to the self-damage to the caster, and not also to the healing, then the spell would describe the damage and healing separately. I personally disagree with that intention, but that's neither here nor there -- it's how the spell is written.
-> The text of the spell Life Transference is in need of a rewrite to make determinations like this easier to distinguish. This is a statement I find myself making with alarming frequency about a wide variety of spells. Many of them seem to be written intentionally ambiguous, which is a problem when there are so many overlapping and interlocking mechanisms in DnD for something to get interpreted in ways that cause problems (like this one).
Hey there I have a Life Transference question. If you are a cleric and take Otherworldly Form (which you can choose to be immune to radiant and necrotic or fire and poison damage) if you choose radiant and necrotic immunity and cast Life Transference would you take the necrotic damage or not?
Life Transference has been changed since the rest of this thread (I assume). It included the line "which can’t be reduced in any way", so you take full damage from it regardless of resistance or immunity.
I think one thing to consider when discussing the whole matter Is the misconception that a Necromancer is evil in 5E, in 5E that may not be the case. A Necromancer who raises the dead to use his undead army to enslave a nation is evil. However a Necromancer who uses the animate dead spell to raise the victims of an evil dictator to take revenge and over throw them can be classed as good. A Necromancer may actually NEVER raise the dead, they may use the Necromancer spell " speak with the dead" to speak to a victim to discover who murdered them.
A cleric can use his skills for good or evil, so can a necromancer its all down to perception and how you play the character. I think the old thinking of " a necromancer is evil and a Cleric is good" is a player mistake and not a character wat of thinking
Basically Necromancy is the practice of magic involving communication with the dead.
Life Transference has been changed since the rest of this thread (I assume). It included the line "which can’t be reduced in any way", so you take full damage from it regardless of resistance or immunity.
I would be interested in knowing where the amendment to the spell is ad I can not see any reference that the spell now says "which can not be reduced by any means" in either Xanathars or any other source where the spell is printed. I would be interested as playing a Necromancer Mage who is not intently evil and have had many IC discussions about if " raising the dead " is evil and what remains after the souls has departed the body 😳
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Hello All!
I have a question regarding the spell Life Transference. I have a level 6 Fallen Aasimar grave cleric in my campaign and she uses Life Transference as a big heal when someone is down. With the Fallen having a natural resistance to necrotic damage, how should I tally the total healed? How about with the target creature unconscious?
Spell: You sacrifice some of your health to mend another creature’s injuries. You take 4d8 necrotic damage, and one creature of your choice that you can see within range regains a number of hit points equal to twice the necrotic damage you take.
With Circle of Mortality, would she instantly take the 32 points of necrotic damage? Then halved from resistance to 16? Would the target be healed for 64 or 32?
I think shes dealt 32 hit points of damage but only takes 16 hit points of damage so I vote 32 points of healing.
I think that because of the words " ... hit points equal to twice the necrotic damage you take. ", you apply first the resistance, then the net necrotic damage, and lastly you double for the healing.
DnDSwede is right. If it said "equal to the damage dealt" it would not take into account any weaknesses or resistances. But it is the damage "taken" so it would apply. That means the target will be healed for 32, not 64, hit points.
Subclass: Dwarven Defender - Dragonborn Paragon
Feats: Artificer Apprentice
Monsters: Sheep - Spellbreaker Warforged Titan
Magic Items: Whipier - Ring of Secret Storage - Collar of the Guardian
Monster template: Skeletal Creature
I'm not sure that's how the rule books use the words "take" and "dealt". Just as an example, a fireball says "A target takes 8d6 fire damage on a failed save" and that is clearly before any resistances are applied. So she did take 32 damage, she just resisted half of it and only lost 16hp - thus the healing stays at 64. By the same token, if she cast this spell when she only had 7hp left herself, she would still be taking 32 damage (and healing 64) even though she only actually lost 7hp and then collapsed. Maybe that is not what they intended, but a spell that didn't want that damage to be resistable could have easily said the damage cannot be reduced, or that the hp is transferred directly.
The meaning of "take" depends on the context. "You take 4d8 necrotic damage" is describing the damage of the spell, before it's modified by any abilities; "twice the necrotic damage you take" is talking about the damage you actually took. This is similar to monster abilities like a vampire's bite: "The target's hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the necrotic damage taken."
The official ruling is that Life Transference doesn't bypass resistance.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
That tweet doesn't answer the actual question, just that the damage is halved not whether the healing is also halved. Also the wording of the Vampire ability is not identical to this spell. It lists the damage, then in a later sentence refers to the necrotic damage "taken". In contrast, Life Transference has a single sentence that says "You take 4d8 necrotic damage ... equal to twice the necrotic damage you take." That's the same two words, "you take", in the same sentence, without a changing of tense, and no more than an "and" in way of conjunction or preposition. It's all splitting hairs, I know, but how this hair splits has a significant impact for the utility of this spell. I've had a search and can't find a sage advice which rules on this specifically.
I do understand where you are all coming from, but it seems an unnecessarily mean reading of the rules in this case. The universe is not broken by allowing Grave Clerics and Necromancers to cast this spell with less damage taken; but the other interpretation, on the other hand, completely ruins this spell (worse than Cure Wounds) for those two - the very people who should be masters of powers of life and death.
While I agree that it would not break the game, I do think that the intent is for the spell to heal double the amount of net damage you've taken. I base this on this answer by mr Crawford:
Sage advice
In this answer, it is clear that the intent is that the net damage is used for calculating the healing. After all, a caster with 1 HP can "take" 4d8 damage, though it would result in only 1 damage after all calculations, since they don't have more HP resulting in 2 hp of healing. If the spell uses the base damage dealt (whatever you rolled on the 4d8) then the answer should be yes to the question asked in the linked SA.
I get that this is a bit odd since the whole "master of life and death" thing, but think about it; though this spell is a necromancy spell, it is hardly a spell an evil necromancer would use. It's all about self sacrifice to help another person. A lich/necromancer would not do that. Not even the Grave domain cleric is about self sacrifice. Note that they don't get this spell as a domain spell either.
As necromancers go, there are a lot of spells that are on the necromancer spell list that don´t quite fit the bill of evil-raise-dead-y masterminds. Things like spare the dying, revivify or astral projection or clone. It has more to do that they use life essence or "soul" flavored power, which puts it in the necromancer spell list.
I do understand that this might be a bit odd for characters such as an Aasimar cleric, which have permanent resistance to necrotic damage, if they want to use this spell. Perhaps as a DM I would allow a character to make it "typeless" damage dealt to the character, without the possibility of applying any weaknesses/resistances if I have a resistant character that wants to use this spell. But this is such a niche situation I think the spell is fine the way it is, counting resistances and vulnerabilities before calculating the damage it heals.
Subclass: Dwarven Defender - Dragonborn Paragon
Feats: Artificer Apprentice
Monsters: Sheep - Spellbreaker Warforged Titan
Magic Items: Whipier - Ring of Secret Storage - Collar of the Guardian
Monster template: Skeletal Creature
Hmm. I'll concede the point on that tweet, but I still don't agree that the spell description actually says that. It is ambiguous, and if that is what they wanted to say then they could have done it much better. Also I will continue to play with my interpretation in both situations. If someone wants to sacrifice their last 3 hp and knock themselves out to give another player a big hp boost then great, what a story moment (I do punish going unconscious with a lasting penalty until the next rest though, so it's more of a cost). Also I do disagree on your characterisation of a Necromancer as basically a Lich - I think life transference could be the exact thing for a soul projecting, astral plane trotting, non-evil Necromancer.
I get what you're saying and I don't think it hurts the game that much. I like your idea as well, and story wise it's really cool moment. Also, it's such a rare occasion that it's less game-breaking. If a player were to actively pursue a loophole that's a different thing altogether.
I agree on the phrasing that it is somewhat unclear. Often when effects such as this arise they are split in seperate sentences for clarity, like the vampire´s bite:
Hit: 7 (1d6 + 4) piercing damage plus 10 (3d6) necrotic damage. The target's hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the necrotic damage taken, and the vampire regains hit points equal to that amount.
Though it's true that necromancer does not always mean an evil character, but it does fit the trope. In my settings necromancy is rarely inherently evil so I agree with you. I merely mentioned it because I feel that many people view the necromancy = evil as standard.
Subclass: Dwarven Defender - Dragonborn Paragon
Feats: Artificer Apprentice
Monsters: Sheep - Spellbreaker Warforged Titan
Magic Items: Whipier - Ring of Secret Storage - Collar of the Guardian
Monster template: Skeletal Creature
To me the combination of fallen aasimar and life transference seems like a min/max type build. I might be wrong on this. I would worry that significantly increasing the life cleric effectiveness with this spell would make for in overly powerful combination that makes balancing this PC with the rest of the group harder.
If it was not a min max move and something that felt cool for the group then I would accept the better version of the spell (especially if the PC is the main healer). If I felt the player was trying to hard to gain an advantage then I would lean on my initial ruling.
I get this and I'd probably rule the same. You could say that the very essence of the aasimar is actively blocking being drained. Therefore even when the aasimar wants to be drained (ie use the life transference spell) his body blocks some functionality. It's kind of the same with saving throws if you ask me; you may choose to fail some throws (for instance keep standing in the red dragon's flaming breath in order to block a party member from harm) but not others (like willingly ingesting a poison).
If you feel like it is a min-max attempt on the player's part which you don't agree with, it's up to you to determine how you interpret the spell. And as said above, it works both ways so whatever works for you and your group :)
Subclass: Dwarven Defender - Dragonborn Paragon
Feats: Artificer Apprentice
Monsters: Sheep - Spellbreaker Warforged Titan
Magic Items: Whipier - Ring of Secret Storage - Collar of the Guardian
Monster template: Skeletal Creature
This reply is super late, but its the kind of thing that people search for so here's my bit:
From the rules I would argue that you don't even get to take the 32 damage (max roll from 4d8) since you aren't rolling to heal someone. You are rolling to damage yourself then you just heal for double the damage you took. The result would be /roll 4d8 = 18 damage(average), take 9 damage (resistance) heal for 18.
To me it definitely seems like an attempt at optimization which I think is fine and I like the flavour of bringing allies back from the brink of death. If its just a matter of balancing the characters so that one doesn't outshine the others you could ask your players "Would you like your cleric friend to be able to restore 64hp to you if you ever fall in combat?" but if there was another character that intended to play a dedicated healer it could be a problem.
I'd let the Aasimar Cleric (or Divine Soul Sorc) take half and still get the full amount. Just as a house rule, even though it's probably not RAI/RAW.
Aasimar Divine Soul (Scourge) using Empowered Healing takes an avg 10 damage and heals an average of 40 (when calculating the spell with empowered healing rerolls). With low AC and d6, they can't really use it more than 2-3 times before needing to spend some extra slots to heal themselves.
Aasimar Life Cleric (Protector) takes 4 dmg, then heals 41. With armor + d8, they can probably get away with using this as long as they have slots.
Mechanically, that's top-tier healing for sure. But it's still a situational ability. Most of the time, you're still better off casting something like a fireball, twinned haste, or spirit guardians. So you won't use this that many times in a day. Basically, you'll probably only use it when someone drops to 0. When it goes off, the only benefit will be the target can take 2-3 hits before going down again (instead of 1-2).
I don't think it outshines what other sorc or cleric builds can do (e.g., forge cleric + warforged). It's also a niche that really helps the group stay up and having fun. I usually don't have anyone stepping up to be healers in games, so I don't think I'd have the problem of them "outshining" someone at their role. Let's also consider all the things they could be doing as a munchkin instead (e.g., divination wizards / PAM + GWM builds).
So, looking at the combination of Grave Cleric, Fallen Aasimar, and Life Transference...
-> Grave Cleric's Circle of Mortality would not apply. By the text of Life Transference, you're not rolling to heal a creature that's at 0 hitpoints, you're rolling for damage to yourself. Circle of Mortality specifies the act of healing a creature at 0 hitpoints. Pretty straightforward there. Now this is a spot where, for story development reasons, the DM could choose to do other things, but as just a simple use of the combination, it's a no-go.
-> Based on the wording of Life Transference, either the Aasimar's Celestial Resistance would reduce both the damage and the healing, or it would reduce neither. The nercotic damage the caster takes, and the healing the target receives, are both in the same sentence, and as such are being described as a single statement. This would mean that the intention behind the spell is that you determine the final outcome as a single step. If an effect like Celestial Resistance were meant to only apply to the self-damage to the caster, and not also to the healing, then the spell would describe the damage and healing separately. I personally disagree with that intention, but that's neither here nor there -- it's how the spell is written.
-> The text of the spell Life Transference is in need of a rewrite to make determinations like this easier to distinguish. This is a statement I find myself making with alarming frequency about a wide variety of spells. Many of them seem to be written intentionally ambiguous, which is a problem when there are so many overlapping and interlocking mechanisms in DnD for something to get interpreted in ways that cause problems (like this one).
Hey there I have a Life Transference question. If you are a cleric and take Otherworldly Form (which you can choose to be immune to radiant and necrotic or fire and poison damage) if you choose radiant and necrotic immunity and cast Life Transference would you take the necrotic damage or not?
you would take no damage, and heal no damage. The spell would be useless to you while using the Otherworldly form in this way
Life Transference has been changed since the rest of this thread (I assume). It included the line "which can’t be reduced in any way", so you take full damage from it regardless of resistance or immunity.
I think one thing to consider when discussing the whole matter Is the misconception that a Necromancer is evil in 5E, in 5E that may not be the case. A Necromancer who raises the dead to use his undead army to enslave a nation is evil. However a Necromancer who uses the animate dead spell to raise the victims of an evil dictator to take revenge and over throw them can be classed as good. A Necromancer may actually NEVER raise the dead, they may use the Necromancer spell " speak with the dead" to speak to a victim to discover who murdered them.
A cleric can use his skills for good or evil, so can a necromancer its all down to perception and how you play the character. I think the old thinking of " a necromancer is evil and a Cleric is good" is a player mistake and not a character wat of thinking
Basically Necromancy is the practice of magic involving communication with the dead.
I would be interested in knowing where the amendment to the spell is ad I can not see any reference that the spell now says "which can not be reduced by any means" in either Xanathars or any other source where the spell is printed. I would be interested as playing a Necromancer Mage who is not intently evil and have had many IC discussions about if " raising the dead " is evil and what remains after the souls has departed the body 😳