D&D 5E Living vs dead vs undead

[Li Shenron]

Does 5e ruleset define living, dead and undead as mutually exclusive?

This is a bit of theoretical curiosity since I don't have any trouble at hand to manage, but I am sure it can have some practical consequences.

Narratively speaking, it's normally not a problem to say that an undead is neither living nor dead. But as soon as you have an ability, spell, magic item or whatever, which affects a 'living' creature or a 'dead' creature differently, without specifying how it works on undead, you might need a consistent rule to apply.

Additionally, when an undead creature is 'killed' in combat, does it become 'dead'? Does it remain 'undead'? Both?

 

[AtomicPope]

Does 5e ruleset define living, dead and undead as mutually exclusive?

Undead is a creature type.
Living and dead are defined on page 196-198 of the Player's Handbook. Monsters die instantly when they reach 0 hit points (page 198).

Narratively speaking, it's normally not a problem to say that an undead is neither living nor dead. But as soon as you have an ability, spell, magic item or whatever, which affects a 'living' creature or a 'dead' creature differently, without specifying how it works on undead, you might need a consistent rule to apply.

Additionally, when an undead creature is 'killed' in combat, does it become 'dead'? Does it remain 'undead'? Both?

In previous editions, creatures that were never living didn't "die" but instead they were "destroyed." In this edition, creatures "die" whether or not they were ever alive.

 

[Lyxen]

5e is really not prescriptive about all this. Even the "fact" that monsters (therefore including undead monsters) "die" at 0 hp is not a rule, just the way "most DMs" deal with it: "Most DMs have a monster die the instant it drops to 0 hit points, rather than having it fall unconscious and make death saving throws."

Also, the "undead" monster type is just a general tag for the effect of some spells and powers, it's not like it was in 3e, a kind of "template" for having a number of inherent powers and characteristics.

This is the 5e way, the perspective is that there is no need of rules, just local rulings for specific monsters, leaving the DM free to do whatever he feels is good for a particular situation in the adventure. You are therefore free to have undead brought to 0 hp being totally destroyed, temporarily deactivated, free to be raised again or animated again - or not, etc... You don't need a general rule, just think how a specific monster would behave. And you can have undeads, living deads, unlivings, animated deads, etc. and to surprise your players each time with a new situation that will amaze them (and that will require clever "in the game world" thinking rather than metagaming).

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

Experiment at the school of Applied Necromancy: "today students, you'll be provided with one fresh corpse each. You'll have yo cast Animate Objects on it, then Animate Dead, then kill it and cast the same spells again on its remains. Note the results each time and deduce whether a corpse is an object, an undead corpse is still an object and whether one can be reanimated again". In gam world thinking is fun but player knowledge is usually much lower than character knowledge depending on topic.

 

[Dausuul]

Undead is a creature type.
Living and dead are defined on page 196-198 of the Player's Handbook.

"Dead" is sort of defined on those pages (at least, in the sense that it explains a common way to achieve the state of being dead). "Living" is not defined there at all that I can see.

To the OP--as far as game mechanics go, I regard "death" as "transitioning to the state of being dead." If you destroy an undead creature, that counts; it wasn't dead, and now it is*. I say "living" refers to any creature which is not a construct or an undead.

Are there any particular spells or items you have in mind which specify one effect for living targets and another for dead ones?

*However, there is a quirk around this: Suppose Joe Fighter dies on Tuesday, gets zombified, and then the zombie is slain on Wednesday. What is the status of the resulting corpse? Is it the corpse of an undead creature which died on Wednesday, or the corpse of a humanoid which died on Tuesday? I'm inclined to say "humanoid/Tuesday," but you could argue either way. If you care about Jeremy Crawford's opinion, he seems to take the "undead/Wednesday" interpretation.

 

[Voadam]

In the MM on page 7 under Type it defines undead as "Undead are once-living creatures brought to a horrifying state of undeath through the practice of necromantic magic or some unholy curse. Undead include walking corpses, such as vampires and zombies, as well as bodiless spirits, such as ghosts and specters."

Once-living sounds incompatible with being considered living. Creatures includes both living and undead creatures.

 

[aco175]

Living and dead are defined on page 196-198 of the Player's Handbook. Monsters die instantly when they reach 0 hit points (page 198).

This is why I should read the new editions instead of just skim them. I sometimes have a monster cleric cast mass cures and have several of the killed monsters rise like they are PCs. I'll likely still have this behave the same. I would never track the death saves, but just roll a d6 or whatever and have some of the closest rise. Although by the time the PCs run into monsters that can do this, the monsters that get back up are like 4e minions with one hit to kill them again.

 

[Dausuul]

This is why I should read the new editions instead of just skim them. I sometimes have a monster cleric cast mass cures and have several of the killed monsters rise like they are PCs. I'll likely still have this behave the same. I would never track the death saves, but just roll a d6 or whatever and have some of the closest rise. Although by the time the PCs run into monsters that can do this, the monsters that get back up are like 4e minions with one hit to kill them again.

What you're doing is perfectly consistent with the rules. Having monsters die instantly at 0 is not a rule; it's just called out as something "most DMs" do. Clearly you are not most DMs.

 

[Vince_Snetterton]

Someone may have already pointed it out, but the three states are definitely treated differently in 5e.
Also, dead aka corpses are now considered "objects" which leads to a lot of restrictions on spells that can be cast on a corpse.

Revivify cast on an inert "Undead" does not bring the target back to "living", but brings back an Undead. Revivify cast per the spell on a "Dead" target brings back a "living" creature.

Bottom line, if I as an DM have my evil Necromancer NPC cast "Animate Dead" on an NPC that has failed his death saves, well, that char is EXTREMELY unlikely to be coming back to the game. Same goes for a char killed by a Shadow, or a few other nasties.

 

[Li Shenron]

This is why I should read the new editions instead of just skim them. I sometimes have a monster cleric cast mass cures and have several of the killed monsters rise like they are PCs. I'll likely still have this behave the same. I would never track the death saves, but just roll a d6 or whatever and have some of the closest rise. Although by the time the PCs run into monsters that can do this, the monsters that get back up are like 4e minions with one hit to kill them again.

You are not doing anything wrong