Crystal of life drinking ??

[shaga]

Ok this crustal is on Magic item compendium, page 64-65 and my DM and me have an argument about its function.
1 It says it heals you each time you hit a living creature. Is a demon, devil or other outsider living creature?
2 It says it heals you each time you hit, until it has healed xx points of damage. What if you are max hp when you hit a living creature? can you be healed when you are not damaged?
3 What kind of damage does the crystal heal? It says damage but hit point damage? ability damage? (I think my DM is trolling me on this one but I asked anyway)

My answers:
1 Everything not undead or construct is considered living. Maybe a more strict rule, everything that can be sneak attacked but I think there are plants that are living and don't get sneak attacked.
2 It says it heals you each time you hit but its full only "When the crystal has healed a total of 10 points of damage..." key words here are 10 points of damage, if you are maxed, it doesn't heal damage, so it doest count.
3 I refuse to answer this question on the grounds that is trolling from my DM...

Thanks for your answers in advance.

PS: Rate this magic item for me please. How useful would it be for a two weapon style rogue or fighter?

[Flickerdart]

1) Outsiders are living creatures.
2) You don't get healed if you have maximum HP already.
3) It only heals hit point damage.

Due to the very low cap on damage healed, the crystal is extremely underwhelming.

[KillianHawkeye]

Anything with a Constitution score is a living creature.

[shaga]

Due to the very low cap on damage healed, the crystal is extremely underwhelming.

Original I misunderstood your post... Sorry but English is not may native language.
I agree that maybe 10hp is not high enough but the lesser crystal does 3hp each hit until it heals 30hp. For only 1500gp, you don't believe 30hp per day while not stopping for actual healing is not at list an average magic item?

[Togath]

for 2000gp, a feat, or a level in crusader you can get infinite use heal-by-attacking abilties(either once per encounter, or once every few rounds)

[Flickerdart]

Original I misunderstood your post... Sorry but English is not may native language.
I agree that maybe 10hp is not high enough but the lesser crystal does 3hp each hit until it heals 30hp. For only 1500gp, you don't believe 30hp per day while not stopping for actual healing is not at list an average magic item?
For 1500gp, you can buy two Wands of Lesser Vigor. Each charge from these wands is 11 HP. Thus, the wands heal a total of 11*50*2=1100 HP. In order for the crystal to heal more than the wands, you will have to take part in 36.7 adventuring days. Since by CR guidelines such a day will have 4 CR-appropriate encounters, and you need 13.3 such encounters to level, you will gain 11 levels before the crystal is a better deal than the wands. Since the lesser crystal must be attached to a magic weapon, the soonest you can buy it is level 4. That means that the crystal only becomes better at level 15, at which point 30 HP hasn't been a relevant amount for about 7 levels.
If activating wands is a problem, you can get two healing belts for the same cost (MIC). Each belt heals 2d8 thrice a day, for a total of 54 HP on average, almost twice your crystal.

[shaga]

for 2000gp, a feat, or a level in crusader you can get infinite use heal-by-attacking abilties(either once per encounter, or once every few rounds)

Isn't crusader on Tome of battle? Unfortunately Tome of battle is banned from this campaign. What costs 2000gp or a feat and gives infinite use heal by attacking?

[Lonely Tylenol]

Isn't crusader on Tome of battle? Unfortunately Tome of battle is banned from this campaign. What costs 2000gp or a feat and gives infinite use heal by attacking?

Martial Study or a Devoted Spirit Amulet, both also from Tome of Battle.

Flickerdart: I think the point of the Crystals of Life-Drinking are that they don't require actions or UMD checks (for those uninitiated to divine magic in any way). They are useful for all the same reasons Crusader's Strike (and other analogues) are useful--just less so.

That said, it does scale poorly by level (by virtue of not scaling at all). They are a lot better in E6, though.

[shaga]

For 1500gp, you can buy two Wands of Lesser Vigor. Each charge from these wands is 11 HP.

If activating wands is a problem, you can get two healing belts for the same cost (MIC). Each belt heals 2d8 thrice a day, for a total of 54 HP on average, almost twice your crystal.

The wands are nice and the wizard/cleric in our group is already using them but I am rogue/fighter and I don't wont to stop for heal, plus I don't have skills for use magic device.

The healing belt is another excellent magic item, I am thinking of having one anyway but the average is 27hp (2d8x3=48max~6min, average 27).
We are at level four and I already have a magic weapon. I was thinking either to get a second magic weapon or a lesser gem for the 3hp.

[Ernir]

for 2000gp, a feat, or a level in crusader you can get infinite use heal-by-attacking abilties(either once per encounter, or once every few rounds)
You mean a Devoted Spirit Amulet for Crusader's Strike? That's 3000GP.

For 1500gp, you can buy two Wands of Lesser Vigor. Each charge from these wands is 11 HP. Thus, the wands heal a total of 11*50*2=1100 HP. In order for the crystal to heal more than the wands, you will have to take part in 36.7 adventuring days. Since by CR guidelines such a day will have 4 CR-appropriate encounters, and you need 13.3 such encounters to level, you will gain 11 levels before the crystal is a better deal than the wands. Since the lesser crystal must be attached to a magic weapon, the soonest you can buy it is level 4. That means that the crystal only becomes better at level 15, at which point 30 HP hasn't been a relevant amount for about 7 levels.
The crystals aren't good for their total healing amount, as you have so aptly demonstrated here. They are good for action-free healing at precisely the time when healing is most welcome (in the middle of combat). That lesser healing crystal has kept my characters at positive HP in situations where Lesser Vigor wands wouldn't have been able to.

Yeah, fine, in-combat healing is crap when someone like the Cleric has to spend precious actions on it that could be better spent on making the enemy more dead. But the Life Drinking crystals aren't sucking up your actions, "just" your GP. And their only slot competition is... other crystals.

[Togath]

Good point about the lack of slot competition, that actually makes them somewhat decent, as there usually wont be a reason not to have a augment crystal it just adds to other soruce sof healing.