Healing and Undead

[DireSickFish]

Do healing spells hurt undead in this edition? And does negative energy heal undead in this edition?

[hymer]

So far, the spells I've seen that heal (except Goodberry, which has other problems) have a clause that makes them not work on undead and constructs. Inflict Wounds deals Necrotic damage and has no healing effect on anyone, but many or most undead can be slain with that damage type.
I'm not entirely sure 'negative energy' is a game term in 5th.

All that said, the Death domain in the DMG may have something to show us on this matter, but we'll have to wait.

[Daishain]

What he said.

Which is really too bad, I rather liked healing spells having a dual purpose.

[DireSickFish]

So undead aren't immune to "Necrotic" damage then? Damn I was hoping to use poison and necrotic traps in my dungeon to give the players fits but let my undead go where they pleased.

[Ralanr]

What he said.

Which is really too bad, I rather liked healing spells having a dual purpose.


On the bright side, you can now hurt people with the power of the sun!

Which I guess you could do before...did not think this through.

[Chaosvii7]

So undead aren't immune to "Necrotic" damage then? Damn I was hoping to use poison and necrotic traps in my dungeon to give the players fits but let my undead go where they pleased.

Most all of them do have immunity, if not resistance to them. There isn't standardized monster traits by creature type, but undead are more uniform in that a lot of them are built on the same chassis. Anyways, it's already been mentioned; Healing only heals, and doesn't affect undead.

[Fwiffo86]

Could introduce something like I am...

If using random monsters... have the dungeon be permeated with the energies behind animating the dead. Thus when a random monster is rolled, it animates the nearest dead body.

Additionally, any time a character is damaged by one of your necrotic traps, have those hit points "transferred" to nearby undead.

[hymer]

Most all of them do have immunity, if not resistance to them.

Could you clarify that? I'm assuming it's an estimate, but I don't really know what the estimate is.
Off the top of my head I can think of seven undead stat blocks that I'm certain have neither resistance nor immunity to necrotic damage. And I know Yorrin counted (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?379165-MM-Resistances-Immunities-Vulnerabilities-and-Damage) 11 immunes and 11 resistants to necrotic. Not all of those are undead.

[Scirocco]

Zombies and Skeletons do not have resistance/immunity to necrotic damage and the Chill Touch cantrip specifically grants disadvantage to an undead creature attacking the caster 'til their next turn.

Wights are immune however, IIRC.