'I heal him with my sneak attack!'

[pantoffelheld]

heyo,
I found this topic, and a vague and useless thought crept into my mind. Lord_Silvanos states:

You can sneak attack with spells that require an attack roll and deal damage or energy drain.

The damage is of the same type as that of the spell, except for ability damaging and energy draining spells that deal negative energy damage instead.

Now, let's presume there is a caster who can sneak attack. His best buddy, who just appears to be a skeleton he animated himself, is taking serious damage and is for whatever reason flat-footed. The caster doesn't hesitate and casts harm on his friend. however, he is aiming for the most vital part of the undead. So does this caster gets his sneak attack damage added, thus healing the undead more? Or am I completely missing something here?

Same can be said about clerics who can sneak attack. A cure spell requires a touch attack, right? so it is a weapon-like spell, thus sneak attack can be applied to the damage. the sneak attack damage is of the same as that of the spell, so you'll get cheap extra HP!

Or am I utterly mistaken?

[Emperor Tippy]

Undead are immune to sneak attacks.

[NEO|Phyte]

In both cases, the Sneak Attack would still be damaging the target (assuming a sneak attack is possible, see Tippy's post). It may not make sense, but them's the rules.

[Indon]

At the very least, undead are immune to sneak attack, so no go there.

As for positive energy 'sneak heals', I remember reading a thread on this but sadly do not remember its' conclusion. I'm pretty sure the answer is 'no, but you could deal positive energy damage if you feel like betraying someone'.

Edit: By which I mean that the person would forego the saving throw, thinking it a heal spell, and BAM! Positive energy laser to the kidneys.

[MeklorIlavator]

He could cast gravestrike. It allows one to sneakattack undead.

But as the others say, it would onl hurt him.

[Neek]

Then the attack would go through. If you can create the condition to sneak attack undead, and you charge up a Cure Moderate Wounds, and you sneak attack the undead, then you add your sneak attack bonus to the Cure Moderate Wounds damage roll.

It'd be pretty funny to have a Thief/Cleric who does nothing but backstab/heal his own party. I'm not sure if that'd work, but I think it could...

[kpenguin]

I'm pretty sure the answer is 'no, but you could deal positive energy damage if you feel like betraying someone'.

Edit: By which I mean that the person would forego the saving throw, thinking it a heal spell, and BAM! Positive energy laser to the kidneys.

Uh... I don't think so. Positive energy only heals living creatures unless there's a huge amount (i.e. from the positive energy plane). Same thing for negative energy and undead.

[pantoffelheld]

so uh, you heal and deal damage with the same kind of energy in one spell? that seems even less logic than healing extra because you 'aim for vital area's'. It means a spell can do 1d8 healing and 1d6 damage at the same time :S magic is strange...

on the other hand, I'm getting idea's for a home-brew spell. roll 2d20. the first number is the damage you get, the second is the amount you heal. that could lead to some awkward situations when someone heals the mayor

[Neek]

Well, if the target's unwilling to be healed, then wouldn't it require the caster to make a touch attack?

Such as, "Girls are ew. They have cooties," said the half-orc. And the cleric was a girl.

It'd be a pretty funny roleplaying moment, if that.

[kpenguin]

I think that should work. After-all, positive energy only heals living and negative energy only heals undead. A sneak attack with a weaponlike spell deals same type of damage as the spell, so it should heal if on the appropriate target.

On a similar note, can healing spells crit?

[ClericofPhwarrr]

While the sneak attack idea wouldn't work, spell-storing darts/shuriken with cure spells stored are great as healing syringes that anyone can carry. And they do let you stab someone to heal them. Plus, it's cheap ranged healing.

[Penguinsushi]

In addition to the problem mentioned, my take (as a gm) on this - or any other instance where the developers didn't completely think through their wordings from the munchkin perspective - is generally something like this:

"I don't care if the rules could *seem* to allow it, it's against the spirit of the thing, so NO."

i.e., I don't believe sneak attack was ever meant to heal, therefore, sorry - no go.

~PS

[goat]

Sneak attack! UMD Check! Wand of heal medium wounds! Successful DC 30 Heal check!

"Congratulations, you just performed keyhole surgery on your severely damaged compatriot, successfully sealing off their punctured lung. Your colleague seems much better."

Edit - "Your colleague, unaware of your actions (thus allowing the sneak attack) is now of the belief that thier god loves them so much, they have brought them back from the brink. They charge into a crowd of enemies full of religious ferver. They die."

[Indon]

Ooh, you could also take Wandstrike for use with healing wands.

"Be HEALED!" *whack* "Ow, what'd you do that for!"

[LotharBot]

My wife adds the following thoughts:

Can you crit a party member with a healing spell to heal twice as many HP?

If they're helpless, is it an automatic crit?

Can you CdG, so they have to make a fort save or be fully healed?

(Personally... I'd say no, you can't do any of those, or use sneak attack to heal. Even if you're using negative energy to heal.)

[Matthew]

I think this was addressed in a Rules of the Game Article. I'll have to go digging for it, but basically, Positive Energy is Energy. It Heals via the Cure Light Wounds Spell, but that Spell doesn't work with Sneak Attack for the purposes of Healing. However, when the Spell is cast as a Positive Energy Attack it does work with Sneak Attack.

[Edit]
Rules of the Game - All About Sneak Attacks (Part Four)

[Winged One]

I remember starting a thread like this when I played a character who was going for Divine Trickster(although the DM ruled that instead of spontanious trickery at DT5, I'd just get my trickery spells on my regular cleric spell list, even though the campaign died during a combat encounter). The concensus was that I could Sneak Attack with Inflict, and also Suprise for the Dead with Cure when I got DT1, but that if I tried with the energy type that healed the target, I'd still get damage of that type.

[Jasdoif]

My wife adds the following thoughts:

Can you crit a party member with a healing spell to heal twice as many HP?

If they're helpless, is it an automatic crit?

Can you CdG, so they have to make a fort save or be fully healed?

(Personally... I'd say no, you can't do any of those, or use sneak attack to heal. Even if you're using negative energy to heal.)

In Complete Arcane, where it covers the weaponlike spell stuff, it says "spells that require attack rolls but do not deal actual damage cannot score critical hits." I think that covers it: If your healing spell doesn't damage your party member, you can't score a critical hit.


As for the original sneak attack question...it says it deals extra damage of the same type (with the exception of energy drain or ability damage). If there's no damage, there's no type for the extra damage. At best, you don't get any sneak attack; at worst, you've dealt typeless damage to your skeletal buddy.


The exception raises an interesting thought, though. Touch of idiocy deals ability damage to mental scores, which undead aren't immune to. Thought it won't work on our skeleton since the spell is mind-affecting, you could deal negative energy sneak attack to an "intelligent" undead party member with this. "Hey, hold still so I can heal you! Don't away about the headache, it'll go away in at most a week!"

[SurlySeraph]

Coup de grace for full healing... my DM generally lets us do pretty much anything we can argue for, so I'm trying this next game with cure superficial wounds. This is one of the biggest flaws I've ever seen; being able to replicate a level 6 spell using a level 0 spell under RAW is even worse than Pun-Pun.

[martyboy74]

Coup de grace for full healing... my DM generally lets us do pretty much anything we can argue for, so I'm trying this next game with cure superficial wounds. This is one of the biggest flaws I've ever seen; being able to replicate a level 6 spell using a level 0 spell under RAW is even worse than Pun-Pun.

What? No it's not! Pun-pun doesn't even have to look for rules loopholes! He makes rules loopholes!

[Matthew]

Coup de grace for full healing... my DM generally lets us do pretty much anything we can argue for, so I'm trying this next game with cure superficial wounds. This is one of the biggest flaws I've ever seen; being able to replicate a level 6 spell using a level 0 spell under RAW is even worse than Pun-Pun.

It's not actually a rules loophole. Coup de grace cannot be done with Touch Spells or Ray Attacks, though the FAQ suggests Touch Attacks as a reasonable House Rule, your DM could quite reasonably disallow such a use.

[Nifft]

Tomb-Tainted Soul + Inflict + Sneak Attack

"Close your eyes... I'm going to cure you. In the back. Hard."

Cheers, -- N

[fusama]

A ruling I've seen on the positive energy vs cure spell thing is that cure spell != positive energy. Cure spells are powered by positive energy, like ray of enfeeblement is powered by negative energy, neither are simply the raw energy (all negative energy spells don't deal str damage, for example). Furthermore, while positive energy, properly used and prepared (as in a cure spell) does good things to you, raw, untamed positive energy is bad and will hurt you.

As far as sneak attacking with spells goes, I'm a fan of Vampiric Touch. Since you gain temp hp equal to the damage dealt, all the extra d6's from the sneak attack get added to the temp hp gained.

[Tor the Fallen]

Exposure to raw positive energy heals you so much, you explode.

[Curmudgeon]

If you want to be picky about requiring damage for a sneak attack to deliver a Cure Light Wounds spell, try for an unarmed strike. 1d3 of nonlethal damage plus 1d8+1 positive energy "damage" + Nd6 sneak attack "damage", which is of the same type as the spell.

[Fax Celestis]

The exception raises an interesting thought, though. Touch of idiocy deals ability damage to mental scores, which undead aren't immune to. Thought it won't work on our skeleton since the spell is mind-affecting, you could deal negative energy sneak attack to an "intelligent" undead party member with this. "Hey, hold still so I can heal you! Don't away about the headache, it'll go away in at most a week!"

Touch of Idiocy is a penalty, not damage, and is therefore not Sneak-attackable.

[Matthew]

If you want to be picky about requiring damage for a sneak attack to deliver a Cure Light Wounds spell, try for an unarmed strike. 1d3 of nonlethal damage plus 1d8+1 positive energy "damage" + Nd6 sneak attack "damage", which is of the same type as the spell.

The sum total of that would be:

1D3 Non Lethal Damage + 1D8+1 Cured Hit Points + ND6 Sneak Attack Positive Energy Damage

[Green Bean]

Coup de grace for full healing... my DM generally lets us do pretty much anything we can argue for, so I'm trying this next game with cure superficial wounds. This is one of the biggest flaws I've ever seen; being able to replicate a level 6 spell using a level 0 spell under RAW is even worse than Pun-Pun.

That would be funny, actually, because the 'Fort-or-die' effect isn't damaged based.

Rogue: Alright, if this works, it'll cure more damage than normal. Oh, by the way, there's a one in twenty chance that this'll kill you instantly. Cheers!

[Quietus]

My wife adds the following thoughts:

Can you crit a party member with a healing spell to heal twice as many HP?

If they're helpless, is it an automatic crit?

Can you CdG, so they have to make a fort save or be fully healed?

(Personally... I'd say no, you can't do any of those, or use sneak attack to heal. Even if you're using negative energy to heal.)

Your wife is clearly made of equal parts Win and Awesome.

[PinkysBrain]

I'd tend to agree with the argument that positive energy can heal doesn't mean it's application always will heal.

That said, there are a couple of classes which explicitly say they get healing by converting certain forms of damage. If you were to sneak attack a Frostrager with a cold spell for instance your sneak attack damage would be converted to healing.