Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Damionte 12-08-06, 12:30 PM	Hey gang, The Eldritch Disciple Prestige class from complete mage is like a Mystic Theurg combining the Warlocke & Cleric. It gives you access to Healing Blast essence invocation. Healing blasts let's you trade one of your turn undead uses to change your eldritch blast into a positive energy healing blast. Which does your normal eldritch blast damage to heal friendly target's or hurt undead. Is it too much of a stretch to allow this character to coup-de-grace a willing target with the heal effect? Especially if you're using it out of combat to get the party back up to strength? For those unfamiliar with the 3.5 coup de-grace, it's no longer an auto kill. It's an auto confirmed crit.
Arturius1 12-08-06, 12:37 PM	Coup de grace works because you're attacking a vital point on your target who's helpless. Regardless of what part of the body it's aimed, healing works the same. To answer your question: yes, it's too much of a stretch.
Damionte 12-08-06, 12:43 PM	Healing doesn't work the same regardless of where it hits. It's a variable effect just like damage. With the exception of the heal/harm spell, and some of the Psionic healing spells. You can crit with Cause Serious wounds. Because it's a damage spell you can also coup de grace with it. So why not coup/crit with healing spells. They're supposed to be the exact opposite contemporary spell.
Thomas_Covenant 12-08-06, 12:52 PM	RAW, no, you can't Coup de Grace with this kind of effect, multiple reasons. Balance and logic, no, I wouldn't allow Coup de Grace for healing.
Arturius1 12-08-06, 12:53 PM	Because you can't crit with a healing spell.
Damionte 12-08-06, 01:17 PM	To bring RAW into it I believe that yes you can. Healing Spells are weapon like spells. Just as harm spells are. The ability to crit a particular target is not determined by the effect you hit them with. It's determined by thier ability to be critted. My inability to score a critticle hit on a jelly with my short sword does not mean my short sword can not score critical hits. It means my short sword can't score a critical hit on a jelly.
Arturius1 12-08-06, 01:23 PM	Then I should amend my thought that you cannot crit living creatures with a healing spell since there's no attack roll made.
Damionte 12-08-06, 01:26 PM	That's just it though. No where in any of the rules does it state you can not. It lays out what types of spells you can crit with. Individual creatures have rules for who can or can not be critted. No where though does it state that you can't crit with cures. Thier normal target though (undead) just can't be critted with anything. Not just heal spells. I can't crit them with anything else either. Heal spells don't have thier own seperate rules written disqualifyng them from being weapon like.
Arturius1 12-08-06, 01:30 PM	You're asking about coup de gracing a willing ally with a heal spell, right? Well since your ally is alive (most likely) then there's no attack roll to make. No attack roll, no chance of crit.
Damionte 12-08-06, 01:39 PM	That's not exactly the case though. The attack roll is still there, it's an automatic success though. In the case of coup-de-grace it's an automatic success and an automatic crit.
Thomas_Covenant 12-08-06, 01:48 PM	Err...hrm...ok, back up a bit. RAW, you can Crit with a Cure XXX wounds/Inflict XXX wounds spell, under certain conditions. Most spells with attack rolls can crit, that wasn't the issue of the OP, I thought. Coup de Grace is a very restricted action, RAW, and Curing/healing effects would almost never apply.
Damionte 12-08-06, 01:49 PM	Hmmm come to think of it, doing this in combat would not be a very good idea. It woud take two rounds. You'd need to be well out of harms way. Edit to respond to other post. The OP scenario and cure spells are related events. Why would cure NOT apply to coup de grace?
Loki5654 12-08-06, 01:50 PM	Coup de Grace automatically scores a critical hit. From the SRD: Critical Hits When you make an attack roll and get a natural 20 (the d20 shows 20), you hit regardless of your target’s Armor Class, and you have scored a threat. The hit might be a critical hit (or "crit"). To find out if it’s a critical hit, you immediately make a critical roll—another attack roll with all the same modifiers as the attack roll you just made. If the critical roll also results in a hit against the target’s AC, your original hit is a critical hit. (The critical roll just needs to hit to give you a crit. It doesn’t need to come up 20 again.) If the critical roll is a miss, then your hit is just a regular hit. A critical hit means that you roll your damage more than once, with all your usual bonuses, and add the rolls together. Unless otherwise specified, the threat range for a critical hit on an attack roll is 20, and the multiplier is ×2. Healing is not damage. Therefore you cannot crit with a healing spell. Therefore you cannot Coup de Grace with a healing spell. 'Nuff said.
Thomas_Covenant 12-08-06, 01:53 PM	Healing is not damage. Therefore you cannot crit with a healing spell.Cure XXX wounds can certainly Crit a creature that takes damage from positive energy, AND is vulnerable to crits. (Kir-lanan, Faerun comes to mind, there's at least a couple others...)
Damionte 12-08-06, 02:04 PM	Healing is damage. it just has a opposite effect on creatures based on the energy type. Living creatures are made up of positive energy. When you pour positive energy into them it repairs damage rather than causes it. When you pour positive energy into a negative energy creature it hourts them rather than hela them. The spell is the same though. The only difference between heal and harm spells is that heals are positive energy and harms are negative. Spell is the same though.
Damionte 12-08-06, 02:13 PM	Thinking this all the way through, you could not crit with a cure light wounds simply by touching your friend with just a standard action. You would actually have to roll the dice and get a 20. You'd also possibly miss on a natural 1. Hitting a willing target is an auto hit but not an auto crit. Only with a coup-de-grace would it be an auto crit. Granted it takes a standard action to cast, and a full round to do the coup-De, both of which provoke attacks of opportunity if you were silly enough to do it in melee combat. But rules as written both are allowable.
Loki5654 12-08-06, 02:15 PM	Healing is damage. Nope. Damage: A decrease in hit points, an ability score, or other aspects of a character caused by an injury, illness, or magical effect. Healing=Healing, Damage=Damage, Healing=/=Damage. In the case of undead, yes Cure X Wounds spells damage them, but since Undead are immune to criticals they are immune to Coup de Grace.
Damionte 12-08-06, 02:21 PM	In the case of undead, yes Cure X Wounds spells damage them, but since Undead are immune to criticals they are immune to Coup de Grace. Yes but we're not talking about undead. Undead are imune to critical attacks. Mortal beings though are not and that's what we're talking abou there. You can crit a human with a negative energy spell. My point is that there is nothing written that restricts you from being able to crit a mortal with a positive energy spell. The thing that keeps us form critting is the way we normally do it machanics wise. When we forgoe our attack roll for willing target's out of habit, yes we take out our chance to miss, but we also take out our chance to crit.
RavenDrake 12-08-06, 02:26 PM	To avoid bogging this discussion down in Healing veruses damage, I refer you to this: Coup de Grace As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target. Regardless of whether you count healing as damage or reverse damage or not, You can only perform a coup de grace with a Melee weapon, a bow, or a crossbow. So, in short, no. Neither can you coup de grace with any spell, spell-like ability, supernatural ability, natural ray attack, or anything else that's not a melee weapon, bow, or crossbow.
Loki5654 12-08-06, 02:31 PM	We're not talking about undead though. Undead are imune to critical attacks. Mortal beings though are not and that's what we're talking abou there. Granted. You can crit a human with a negative energy spell. My point is that there is nothing written that restricts you from being able to crit a mortal with a positive energy spell. Yes there is. I've already pointed it out to you. When you crit, you double the damage. Healing is not damage, therefore you cannot crit with a healing spell. The thing that keeps us form critting is the way we normally do it machanics wise. When we forgoe our attack roll for willing target's out of habit, yes we take out our chance to miss, but we also take out our chance to crit. No. Because a healing spell (in the case of mortals) results in a HP gain. Damage is defined as an HP loss. A crit doubles the HP loss (i.e. rolled twice) but does not affect any HP gains. That's what the RAW says. Feel free to house rule.
Damionte 12-08-06, 02:38 PM	I'm still rolling damage dice. These just happen to repair your damage instead of causing more. That's the crux of the theory. I hate to cut this off early, but I have to jam for a bit. I'll be back this evening. Go ahead and respond I'll pick it up again later.
Loki5654 12-08-06, 02:57 PM	I'm still rolling damage dice. These just happen to repair your damage instead of causing more. No, you are rolling dice. There are no "damage dice" or "attack dice" or "armor dice", there are just dice. In the case of a healing spell, the dice tell you the amount of healing done (as in an increase in the targets HP). Since damage= a decrease in the targets HP, a healing spell does not do damage. Since it does not do damage, you can't double the damage with a critical. Since you cannot critical, you cannot Coup de Grace. How can I make the RAW any clearer for you? That's the crux of the theory. A theory I believe I have disproven. It would help if you could show some RAW quotes to back up your argument. Right now, it just sounds to me like all you are saying is "I think it should be like this." Which is fine for a house rule, but the RAW disagrees with your basic premise. I hate to cut this off early, but I have to jam for a bit. I'll be back this evening. Go ahead and respond I'll pick it up again later. See you soon. Edit: I apologize if my tone came across as condescending in any way. I didn't intend for that to happen. I've decided against editing the entry, instead I am adding this apology.
Nathreet 12-08-06, 03:55 PM	Basically a Coup De Grace heal to the guy's neck won't heal him more. Wounds are messy. Wounds don't have "weak points". Now if somebody just had his throat slit (CdG or sneak attack) I suppose you could aim the heal directly at the slit for critically healing. I think a DM should allow that, but it is a houserule. Ruleswise the answer is no, anyway. There's nothing about that in the healing spells and it is unreasonable to assume it (and it is unreasonable to assume that it has anything to do with damage when you are using it to heal not damage).
Pangeon 12-08-06, 04:40 PM	A touch spell that deals damage can score a critical hit just as a weapon can. A touch spell threatens a critical hit on a natural roll of 20 and deals double damage on a successful critical hit. Damage reduces a target’s current hit points. (Bolding mine.) Healing is not damage, as it does not reduce the target's hit points. Therefore you cannot critical (and thus coup de grace,) with a healing spell, much in the same way one cannot coup de grace with an Awaken spell.
Damionte 12-08-06, 11:33 PM	Edit: I apologize if my tone came across as condescending in any way. I didn't intend for that to happen. I've decided against editing the entry, instead I am adding this apology. No problem. I understand how we can get on these forums. We get in the habit of responding to folks who won't bend or respond rudely and we slip. No offense taken. Back to the point. :) Based on the books definition of healing vs damage I can let it go for now. Though I'm probably oging to introduce it in my games from now on with this viewpoint. That healing and damage are not two seperate entities. It's the same spell rather it has a positive or negative effect on the target and thus should do the same thing going both ways. I will re-introduce the concept of healing as negative damage, and damage as negative healing. In other words they're one and the same. This will make the heal & harm spells equal in all respects. They'll probably go for it. We're not much for making major changes to the game, but in this case I don't believe we are. In fact I feel this is well within the relam of flavor as intended, that was simply shot down by another example of Wizards inability to think ahead or edit the books properly. :) Thanks for your input all. Would have taken me a while to come up with both sides of the argument by myself. - Damionte
Nyat 12-09-06, 12:49 AM	So poking somebody in the eye with positive energy heals them better? Thats...odd.
runestar 12-09-06, 01:57 AM	You can't heal more hp with a coup-de-grad healing spell any more than a rogue cannot heal more hp by sneak attacking with a wand of cure light wounds.;) What actually happens is that the extra damage from the crit is dealt in the form of positive energy damage. It does not become extra curative hp. So if you crit'ed with a heal spell, what actually happens is that you end up dealing X positive energy damage, where X is the amount of hp healed, for a net bonus of 0 damage/hp healed.:)
RavenDrake 12-09-06, 02:37 AM	You can't heal more hp with a coup-de-grad healing spell any more than a rogue cannot heal more hp by sneak attacking with a wand of cure light wounds.;) What actually happens is that the extra damage from the crit is dealt in the form of positive energy damage. It does not become extra curative hp. So if you crit'ed with a heal spell, what actually happens is that you end up dealing X positive energy damage, where X is the amount of hp healed, for a net bonus of 0 damage/hp healed.:) The only problem with that is that positive energy does not deal damage to living creatures. It can HARM them(Aww, thank's Glimmerskin, you saved my *EXPLODES*"), but it does not deal damage. I do agree that it shouldn't apply extra healing with a crit or sneak attack, but it's simpler to say that healing effects don't get the benefit of such attributes.
Deep Blue 9000 12-09-06, 02:42 AM	You can't coup de grace with a ranged touch attack.
Mystyc 12-09-06, 02:56 AM	Regardless of whether you count healing as damage or reverse damage or not, You can only perform a coup de grace with a Melee weapon, a bow, or a crossbow. So, in short, no. Game, set, match. How did no one notice that the discussion was over a dozen posts ago?
runestar 12-09-06, 03:26 AM	The only problem with that is that positive energy does not deal damage to living creatures. You might want to look up the Ravid in the MM then...:P
Loki5654 12-09-06, 04:33 AM	No problem. I understand how we can get on these forums. We get in the habit of responding to folks who won't bend or respond rudely and we slip. No offense taken. Back to the point. :) Based on the books definition of healing vs damage I can let it go for now. Though I'm probably oging to introduce it in my games from now on with this viewpoint. That healing and damage are not two seperate entities. It's the same spell rather it has a positive or negative effect on the target and thus should do the same thing going both ways. I will re-introduce the concept of healing as negative damage, and damage as negative healing. In other words they're one and the same. This will make the heal & harm spells equal in all respects. They'll probably go for it. We're not much for making major changes to the game, but in this case I don't believe we are. In fact I feel this is well within the relam of flavor as intended, that was simply shot down by another example of Wizards inability to think ahead or edit the books properly. :) Thanks for your input all. Would have taken me a while to come up with both sides of the argument by myself. - Damionte Its a perfectly acceptable house rule. Let us know how it works out.
Damionte 12-09-06, 05:33 AM	For the ranged touch can't coup folks, I left it up to you as individuals to know that the hidious blow invocation turns it into a melee attack. Which you can coup with. It didn't need to be restated. ------------ The party is still talking this one over. We want to make sure it doesn't casue any unforseen bumps before we put it in. For instance one loophole I came up with regarded rogue clerics. Currently within the RAW a rogue cleric can sneak attack an undead using a cure light wounds spell. Just as they can sneak attack a mortal using a cause light wounds. (For those who dopn't know what I'm talking about right now browse through the spell sections of complete adventurer.) Not all of the votes are in but at the moment it looks as if positive energy "crits" are in. But sneak attacks are out. Since sneak attack and critting are already seperate entities in the rules we're using that as a baseline to make sure they stay that way even if we implement this crit with heals thing. They're in unanimous agreement so far that critting with healing makes perfect sense and no one can figure out why we never did it before. Probably because the idea of critting with spells is still fairly new to the group. Play tests so far have been positive. In general I see this making the cleric a more enjoyable class for us. In this particular group no one want's to be the cleric. No one want's to be heal boy. Our clerics rarely get to cast much else besides cure & vigors. Since a single cleric doesn't pack enough healing for our groups standard 5-6 man parties unless he puts everything into healing. Using this system our clerics can heal more when out of combat and thus have more spells to use for other things. (They also hate that I'm constantly eating into the party fund to buy cure wands.)
Damionte 12-09-06, 05:43 AM	Oh and one more thing. (A little off topic btut) Speaking of inconsistancies and arbitrary rules. The coup-de-grace discription is a prime example of the book editors being on crack. It's as if someone wrote that rule on a sticky note and it got tossed into the book at the last second. They describe coup to work with melee weapons. Then seemingly as an afterthought toss in bows and crossbows as well. Seems to me that at the time the sticky was written they hadn't came up with the idea of weapon like spells. Or even Monks. Then later when they decided to add in a few more things they didn't go back and proofread to make sure everything that would be effected by said change was updated to reflect the new idea. Like the scedule was too compressed and they just rushed it out the door. One more month of clean up development for the PHB would have cleared up 80% of the rules arguments we have on these boards. They left a little bit too much up to the concept of rule-zero. Granted I'm preaching to the choir. You guys already know what I mean.
runestar 12-09-06, 05:51 AM	Game, set, match. How did no one notice that the discussion was over a dozen posts ago? I will concede that I overlooked that, though it is really secondary to the main question. The OP was basically asking if critting with a cure spell would let you heal more hp - the answer should be no. That you can't actually crit with it conveniently resolves this one specific issue, but not the wider picture. Shall we attempt it from another angle for the sake of the other critable curative spells out there?:)
Pangeon 12-09-06, 11:22 AM	While you're at it, go ahead and make CLW a Necromancy spell. ILW is Necro, but CLW is Conjuration (healing)? Makes no sense to me. Make 'em the same school.
Mystyc 12-09-06, 11:39 AM	For the ranged touch can't coup folks, I left it up to you as individuals to know that the hidious blow invocation turns it into a melee attack. Which you can coup with. It didn't need to be restated. Er, if you're using hideous blow, then you're not critting with the blast anymore. You're critting with the weapon it's being channeled through. In that case, the weapon damage will be multiplied, and the blast "damage" (like all extra dice) is not.
Damionte 12-09-06, 12:33 PM	Er, if you're using hideous blow, then you're not critting with the blast anymore. You're critting with the weapon it's being channeled through. In that case, the weapon damage will be multiplied, and the blast "damage" (like all extra dice) is not. No it turns it into a melee touch spell spell effect, which you can then crit with. Even if we were not doing a coup though you can crit with an eldritch blast. Rays, even rays that are ranged touch are considered weapon like and can crit. Eldritch blast is also a ray effect. Besides in our games we've long ago ruled the coup-de-grace rules as written didn't make any sense. We allow coups with anything that does damage. Reember that the bigger issue here was rather you could crit with healing spells, not "just" rather you can coup with them. The two are tied together.
Mystyc 12-09-06, 12:51 PM	No it turns it into a melee touch spell spell effect, which you can then crit with. It lets you deliver with a "melee attack," and lets you deal your weapon damage. Touch is no longer part of the equation. Complete Arcane, 134. Reember that the bigger issue here was rather you could crit with healing spells, not "just" rather you can coup with them. The two are tied together. By all means, continue to argue about that. I have no better answer to that debate than any of you. I am only talking about the CDG, RAW.
Nyat 12-09-06, 01:27 PM	Seems to me that at the time the sticky was written they hadn't came up with the idea of weapon like spells. Or even Monks. Monks are melee weapons :P For the record I don't think it would be especially unbalanced to allow "healing crits", it just doesn't follow the RAW and honestly makes no sense. You crit when trying to hurt somebody by landing your blow on a vital area such as the throat or eyes. Why on earth would poking somebody's throat with positive energy heal them any more than if you poked them in the chest. Its not like people have an organ in their neck that amplifies healing magic...at least not that I am aware of.
Oliver D'Argent 12-09-06, 01:55 PM	RavenDrake gave the answer bake on post #19. Regardless of whether you count healing as damage or reverse damage or not, You can only perform a coup de grace with a Melee weapon, a bow, or a crossbow. So, in short, no. Neither can you coup de grace with any spell, spell-like ability, supernatural ability, natural ray attack, or anything else that's not a melee weapon, bow, or crossbow. Hideous Blow does not turn an Eldritch Blast into a melee attack, it allows the Warlock to make a single weapon attack and add his Eldritch Blast if it hits. It is still a use of a spell-like ability, though, and so, cannot be used to make a coup de grace.
Damionte 12-09-06, 04:46 PM	Why on earth would poking somebody's throat with positive energy heal them any more than if you poked them in the chest. Because the damage is on thier throat, and not thier chest. :) If it didn't matter where you were pouring the positive energy in, then all healing damage would be constant, like it is with fast healing or HEAL. When you crit with a cure spell against a negative energy creature or as the more common scenario you crit with a inflict spell against a positive energy creature it's because you got the energy into the right spot. Why is it illogical for it to work the same in both directions.
Sphere 12-09-06, 05:19 PM	Coup de Grace As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target. You automatically hit and score a critical hit. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die. A rogue also gets her extra sneak attack damage against a helpless opponent when delivering a coup de grace. Kill them with healing? You can with a Coup-de-grace. That is why people don't do it.
Oliver D'Argent 12-09-06, 06:19 PM	Since it has been established that you cannot coup de grace with a spell, all that remains is to deal with the issue of spells and critical hits. On page 140 of the PHB it states, "A spell attack that requires no attack roll, such as lightning Bolt, cannot score a critical hit." Since healing spells do not require attack rolls when used on willing targets, they cannot get critical hits when used that way. When you use such spells against Undead, you have to make a touch attack and, so, would nomally be able to crit if not for the fact that Undead are immune to critical hits.
Sphere 12-09-06, 06:57 PM	Since it has been established that you cannot coup de grace with a spell, all that remains is to deal with the issue of spells and critical hits. On page 140 of the PHB it states, "A spell attack that requires no attack roll, such as lightning Bolt, cannot score a critical hit." Since healing spells do not require attack rolls when used on willing targets, they cannot get critical hits when used that way. When you use such spells against Undead, you have to make a touch attack and, so, would nomally be able to crit if not for the fact that Undead are immune to critical hits. You can deliver a spell with a coup de grace: If you charge your hand with an inflict light wounds, you can deliver a coup de grace with an unarmed strike and spend the charge at the same time. However if you do this the spell damage is not multiplied.
redraven 12-09-06, 09:24 PM	When you crit with a cure spell against a negative energy creature or as the more common scenario you crit with a inflict spell against a positive energy creature it's because you got the energy into the right spot. Why is it illogical for it to work the same in both directions. It is illogical precisely because the curative magic automatically goes "into the right spot." Ignoring for a moment that "damage" in D&D is an abstract concept and thus there are no particular wound locations, let's say your character has a chest wound. If I cast Cure Light Wounds and touch you in the leg, your chest is healed. There is nothing to suggest that touching the actual wound "heals more" because all of the healing goes to the same place regardless of where the CLW is placed: exactly to where the wounds are. It is not as if the effectiveness of CLW is diminished because it has to travel from, say, your leg to your chest. Beyond the above, I suppose I will be the first person to mention that I dislike this ruling for balance reasons. You are essentially allowing all the Cleric's healing spells to get Empowered (it's actually better than Empowered) for free when they are not in combat. Indeed, under your ruling, there would be no reason to not use the Coup-de-Grace action with healing spells at every available opportunity. I understand that your players have a large party and healing spells may take up a huge chunk of the party cleric's spells, but this is the wrong way to go about solving the problem. It should not fall to the party Cleric to spend all their time and spells healing wounds if they would rather be doing something else. I would recommend that everyone in the party use their individual funds to purchase Wands of CLW, which will usually provide more than enough healing for extended adventuring at a cost of only 750 gp per Wand. Fifty charges from a CLW Wand means 50d8 + 50 points of healing, or 275 points of healing on average. Alternatively, have the Cleric craft or purchase a Staff with only CLW loaded will allow them to use their (presumably) higher CL to increase the amount of healing by 200 points per Staff at the same cost. Or, they can simply rest more often and allow natural healing to take care of the damage, with Heal checks increasing this amount of free healing considerably.
Oliver D'Argent 12-09-06, 09:37 PM	You can deliver a spell with a coup de grace: If you charge your hand with an inflict light wounds, you can deliver a coup de grace with an unarmed strike and spend the charge at the same time. However if you do this the spell damage is not multiplied. So it still doesn't help the OP, who is trying to find a legal way to "coup de grace" an ally with a healing spell to double the effect.
Nezkrul 12-09-06, 10:37 PM	just to clear up some confusion, coup de grace is a full round action, so you can't coup de grace with a hideous blow (standard action). You can however, coup de grace with an inflict spell if you hold the charge till next round OR if it is a quickened inflict spell and you hold the charge until your standard/full round action. You have to deliver the charge as an unarmed strike though, but if you do, the fortitude save (10 + damage dealt) takes into account ALL the damage dealt by the action, which includes the spell damage. for the guy that would like to house rule heals being able to crit: keep in mind that that also means your heals can miss (natural 1) when you aren't able to coup de grace, since you need to actually make an attack roll in order to roll a 20. Also, your target has to be "helpless" for a CDG but if you change it to work on "willing" targets for heal spells, the enemies get to use this agains the players as well :D
Damionte 12-10-06, 08:37 AM	(Note: We played tonight and put this in as an experiment for the session. It worked great. We honestly had no balance issues by implementing it. The key to it is that criting with a spell still requires rolling a natural 20. Natural 20's are pretty rare. We had no heals land a natural 20 the entire session. And the combat was too dangerous to risk the double attacks of oportunity as well as the two rounds required to try to do a friendly coup-de-grace in combat. Out of combat healing I didn't usually use the coup to heal with. Lesser Vigor gave a more consistant amount of HP recovery than a crited cure light at our current level. No one was hurt bad enough to require a coup-ed cure moderate. Only once did I get to use it during an encounter. We had a 3 round reprieve between waves of Gnolls. During that time I dropped a coup-ed cure light on our fighter/rogue. He got 11HP's back. Which is equal to my max roll for a non crit cure light.) This played out as I expected it too. If you're interested in the concept, play test it. I believe you'll find it helpful without breaking the game.
Mystyc 12-10-06, 11:08 AM	If you're interested in the concept, play test it. I believe you'll find it helpful without breaking the game. And by helpful, you mean irrelevant? It sounds like the rule never actually came into play in a meaningful way. (Which also makes me question how your balance assessment is valid, but hey...)
Larz_Fang 12-12-06, 02:40 AM	Positive energy can kill living creatures. Look the epic spell Greater Ruin. It deals almost always over 100 points of damage as positive energy.
Qube 12-12-06, 09:28 AM	but if you coup the grace: the target still needs to make a fortitude save DC 10 + damage delt (meaning DC 10) or die. and remember that you can fumble on saves ...
Damned slayer 12-12-06, 12:49 PM	if its a coup the grace the target would have to make a fort save against 15+damge dealt or die (wich is not really what you like) and since you told healing is damage... so with a cure light wounds at lvl5 the DC would be 29 for a 5th level party wich is death I think :)