Life Transference - Xanathers

[Harzel]

Actually, I believe that is already built into the spell and D&D 5e design as hit points are not tracked into negative scores. You take hits after 0 you lose a death save, You take critical hits after 0 you lose two death saves, you take a single hit after 0 that would be more than your maximum hit points you instantly die, but you don't track negative hit points. Since the spell says they heal twice the damage you take and you don't take negative damage then its capped by the max damage a character can take up to 0.

Someone can correct me but I looked at PHB p.197 "Dropping to 0 Hit points"

The reason that I made the comment is because the phrase "damage taken" is ambiguous. While I agree that in this context it should be interpreted as being capped by the number of HP that the receiver of the damage has, there are instances where "damage taken" or "takes damage" is used differently. For instance, if one of my monsters hits a PC and rolls 30 for damage, I will say to the player, "<name of PC> takes 30 points of slashing damage." I don't ask first how many HP the PC has. In fact, there is another such example in the very section you cited.

For example, a cleric with a maximum of 12 hit points currently has 6 hit points. If she takes 18 damage from an attack, she is reduced to 0 hit points, but 12 damage remains. Because the remaining damage equals her hit point maximum, the cleric dies.

(emphasis added)

 

[JacktheRabbit]

Yes, with the note that NPCs with PC-class-like features need not (and in the MM, etc., generally do not) have the same HP as an equivalently leveled PC would. In the MM, etc., NPCs generally have higher HD/HP than would a PC with the same class-level features.

Right. Based on other NPC style examples my 5th level Carter examples would have way more hit points than a PC would and would have a minor magic item or precast a spell on themself to give them vulnerability to nevermind so the damage taken is doubled which is then doubled again as healing to boss. Idea being they take about 40 and crush and bid gets s nice 80hp surge.

 

[Ancalagon]

Incidentally, a life cleric using this spell is *really good*. At level 6 the cleric heals some of the damage he took, and the target also heals 5 more than what was rolled.