Hyper Healer

[Nettlekid]

Recently, because of various anime and webcomics I've been reading, I've decided that healers are cool. The act of either charging in, hand glowing with radiant power to revive the bloody wreck of your teammate back from near-death, or bursting forth with explosive light and your whole team shining with renewed vigor is just such a cool image that I want to build a character focused on it. I know that Healbots are generally obsolete, and the best way to "heal" damage is to prevent it from occurring in the first place, but even so I want to try to make a healer who's worth it.

I could imagine that Cleric, Archivist, Favored Soul, and Healer all make classic medics. Cleric gets DMM easiest, Archivist gets the variety of Druid spells, Favored Soul gets more spells/day and versatility, and Healer gets...well, not all that much. So Cleric is probably the best way to go. How best to maximize healing output, how to heal many people at once, how to be a steady supply of healing all through the day (beyond spells/day limit), how to cure afflictions and status problems beyond HP damage, and how to keep yourself healthy are all issues I want to deal with. I want to build a character that, while the rest of the team gets smashed up, bloody, near death, in the midst of a difficult battle, and then it's my turn and now it's as though the battle's just beginning. How should I do it?

[Magnera]

Revenance along with Revivify (http://dndtools.eu/spells/miniatures-handbook--75/revivify--1958/) make them selves very useful when resurrecting your friends.

Perhaps DMM cleric using Persist/Reach/Chain Spell on Delay Death (http://dndtools.eu/spells/races-of-destiny--81/delay-death--3048/) and Lesser Vigor (http://dndtools.eu/spells/complete-divine--56/vigor-lesser--667/)? These two make it very difficult to die normally. Although, disintegrate still sucks.

[questionmark693]

Taking a feat from Complete Divine called....something....about healing XP It lets you cast healing spells at a higher level. I'll look it up when I get home tonight. Also, PrC'ing into Radiant Servant of Pelor can be super nice, iirc it grants the healing domain as a bonus domain, and also raises your caster level for healing (and light) spells.

EDIT:Try to find a way to get 'Last Breath' added to your spell list....sounds really nice for your image you're after :) it's a druid spell thouhg, so that might be difficult...good luck!

[Valwyn]

I actually like healers. I once saved the wizard and the paladin from being wolf food at least twice each in the same encounter. :smallbiggrin: (Using a few house rules on healing spells, but still.)

Radiant Servant of Pelor metamagics your Cure spells for free as long as you prepare them in your domain slot.

Combat Medic (Heroes of Battle) can take 10 when using the Heal skill, gets added effects on his healing spells (I like Sanctuary at level 1, combine it with Close Wounds to force the fighter to make a Will save to be able to hit your friend), and eventually learn how to cast Heal spontaneously. As a bonus, CM gets high reflexes, which clerics usually don't get.

A few divine feats also improve healing, or give fast healing for a short while. Sacred Healing, I think.

Amulet of Retributive Healing lets you basically Twin a healing spell. Blessed Bandages let you stabilize someone without a check. A wand of Lesser Vigor is better for healing when the fight is over than a wand of Cure Light Wounds.

There's a reserve feat called Touch of Healing, which lets you heal X amount with a touch, up to 50% of the target's full HP. Mitigate Suffering lets you reduce ability damage for a while. Panacea is a useful spell to keep in reserve.

Ray of Resurgence is also handy, even if it's not an actual healing spell.

There are two ACFs that are useful for a healing cleric: Pool of Healing, from Complete Champion and Divine Restoration. Ask your DM if PoH can be used with Caduceus Bracers.

Here's a handbook (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=7p4t0p81abbr65d3nsqqqdnh87&topic=1304.0;prev_next=prev#new).

There might be more stuff I'm forgetting. Hope this helps. :smalltongue:

[Guizonde]

Taking a feat from Complete Divine called....something....about healing XP It lets you cast healing spells at a higher level. I'll look it up when I get home tonight. Also, PrC'ing into Radiant Servant of Pelor can be super nice, iirc it grants the healing domain as a bonus domain, and also raises your caster level for healing (and light) spells.

EDIT:Try to find a way to get 'Last Breath' added to your spell list....sounds really nice for your image you're after :) it's a druid spell thouhg, so that might be difficult...good luck!

here is the quick list on the RSoP (http://dndtools.eu/classes/radiant-servant-of-pelor/)

if you want to build this guy, you need to go at it with the sun domain and the healing domain high on your short list of domains. these guys are beacons of light walking around. i'm trying to get my cleric of pelor to go into that, because just like you i'm the kind of guy who doesn't want a gamebreaker, but a true blue healing specialist (... toasting undead is just bonus). the sun domain will grant you empowered turning (or something) that helps vs undead and becomes brutal when going radiant, and the healing domain allows you to cast heal spells as if 1 caster level higher. and to the detractors, the sun domain is there to prevent getting damaged (ok, from undead, evil and light sensitive, but it's something :smalltongue:)

hope this helps :smallsmile:

[thethird]

I personally like Radiant Servant of the Sovereign Host. Under the adaptation of radiant servant of pelor it says that other gods are acceptable, and the Sovereign Host is both neutral good and offers the sun domain.

In my opinion what works best is:

Human; Cloistered Cleric 5 / Sovereign Speaker 9 / Radiant Servant of pelor 2 / Combat Medic 4

Other than the feats necessary for prerequisites:

wordly focus, extra turning, dodge (or substitutes) and combat casting. You will greatly benefit from maximize spell, divine metamagic maximize spell (to burn turn attempts), mastery of day and night and imbued healing (to give more effects to your cure spells).

This means that whenever you cast a cure spell (which is from the healing domain) it is both maximized and empowered and it also carries two minor buffs.

For damage you have several options be it from the cleric list or from the truck load of domains at your disposition, and you can maximize them using divine metamagic.

[Corundum Dragon]

From Bunko's Bargain Basement Reopened Unicorn Horn (CC 133, 190gp) Turn a Heal spell into a Mass Heal with a 30' cone area of effect for 190 GP.
Sovereign glue it to a Wand of Cure Light Wounds (DMG 246, 750gp), or Wand of Lesser Vigor (SC 229 for spell, 750gp)
The next part of the idea comes from the staff of maccrocross filled with these wands instead of magic missile.
The Rods and Staff of Macross (a staff that holds 6 rods and can be used to trigger all of them simultaneously, and a set of 6 rods that does the same with wands, combined with 36 20th level magic missile wands)
I was originally thinking of filling one with wands of grease, color spray, and other disabling spells, and another with spells like Eagle’s Splendor, Fox’s Cunning, Resistance, Shield, etc.

[Nettlekid]

Hmm...

The flavor and imagery is cool, but Persisting Mass Lesser Vigor (or any other of the Mass Vigor line) is too small for the level it would be used at. It's just a few points a round. Great in the downtime, but not too effective in battle and never jaw-dropping. You'd get the same effect without DMM with the 10th level of Celestial Mystic. Reach(or Occular)-Chain-Persisting Delay Death is a neat idea, though pretty heavy on feats.

Radiant Servant of Pelor doesn't strike me as great. The uses of the free Empower and Maximize are too limited, from only the domain slots, especially when I could Maximize all Cures with Mastery of Day and Night. All you miss out on are the Empowers, and since at the level that Empower makes a big difference you're likely to be using Heal anyway, no huge loss. Last Breath and Revivify are neat, but both with significant drawbacks. Revivify has that material component that I'd always have to buy lots of, and Last Breath (CD version) loses a level, while the SC version puts you in a new body, which could be troublesome.

Combat Medic is more what I'm looking for, in that you would just show up and *poof* Everyone gets healthier with bonuses on the side. It's a bit weak in and of itself, but it could do. I like that Pool of Healing, since I've always thought Lay on Hands was cool. Is there any way to Chain Touch of Healing? Maybe by clever use of something like War Weaver, or Affinity Field?

[Hadrian_Emrys]

The vigor suggestion is there to handle all of the nicks and cuts you aren't purging with in-combat heal nukes. No sane person would treat them as spike heals. :smalltongue:

[Silva Stormrage]

Its quite arguable that the spell soul of light http://dndtools.eu/spells/dragon-magic--62/soul-of-light--1089/ makes mass lesser vigor heal a lot more.

[Akal Saris]

My sig has a guide to the Healer class if you want to play a class that's good at healing. That is, as long as you follow the SpC's advice and give the class the great healing spells from that book :P

Nice find on the unicorn horn component in Bunko's, Corundum Dragon! That's a pretty nifty trick.

[Psyren]

It's technically 3rd party, but Vitalist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/classes/vitalist) is probably the best way to make a focused healer in 3.x. You create a mental network out of your party members that enables you to heal all their wounds from range, and even transfer hit points they gain from self-healing or other methods to injured members via said network.

You can also pre-heal via temporary hit-points, cure various status effects, and of course raise the dead - and do it all without requiring a specific deity or alignment.

[killem2]

I'm so proud of the playground, and entire thread about healing and not one person bagged on it.


Warms my heart :smallbiggrin:.
GO HEALERS!

[Silva Stormrage]

I'm so proud of the playground, and entire thread about healing and not one person bagged on it.


Warms my heart :smallbiggrin:.
GO HEALERS!

Really? I always thought healers were fairly popular if understood to be weaker than normal. I have seen people bagging on saying that healing is REQUIRED but not just bagging on healing in general.

Usually that kind of treatment is reserved for monks :smalltongue:

[Slipperychicken]

Reach Spell has already been mentioned, but it could be useful for when you absolutely need to stabilize/heal someone, but aren't in reach. Also, I like the idea of shooting blue healing lasers at people.

[tyckspoon]

Reach Spell has already been mentioned, but it could be useful for when you absolutely need to stabilize/heal someone, but aren't in reach. Also, I like the idea of shooting blue healing lasers at people.

You'll probably be better off using healing spells that already have range instead of spending a feat and 2 spell levels on Reach Spell - things like Close Wounds, Darts of Life, and Light of Venya should be in your repertoire anyway as healing spells that do things that basic Cure X Wounds can't, and that can't be spontaneously cast by most characters (Light of Venya is actually described as basically healing lasers, will heal significantly more than a Reach Cure Light would, and can be precast to put healing on tap up to 10 min/CL before you actually expect to be in a fight. It's pretty nifty, although the 1st and 2nd level versions of it kind of suck.. somewhat ironically, that's mostly because they don't have the healing option, so they're left as sub-par blasting/illumination spells.)

[Cerlis]

Really? I always thought healers were fairly popular if understood to be weaker than normal. I have seen people bagging on saying that healing is REQUIRED but not just bagging on healing in general.

Usually that kind of treatment is reserved for monks :smalltongue:

everytime i've seen it people said "The party doesnt need a healer. just be a divine class and use wands after combat" or something along those lines.

[Slipperychicken]

everytime i've seen it people said "The party doesnt need a healer. just be a divine class and use wands after combat" or something along those lines.

That's more or less how it goes. It's a necessary role, but using vanilla cure X in combat is usually inefficient, but sometimes worth it (like if it'll be enough to get someone back up in time to sway the battle). As a result, most of your healing needs to happen outside the fight.

Depending on the game, it can be more useful. Lower optimization needs more healing, since it usually isn't rocket tag.

[thethird]

Radiant Servant of Pelor doesn't strike me as great. The uses of the free Empower and Maximize are too limited, from only the domain slots, especially when I could Maximize all Cures with Mastery of Day and Night. All you miss out on are the Empowers, and since at the level that Empower makes a big difference you're likely to be using Heal anyway, no huge loss. Last Breath and Revivify are neat, but both with significant drawbacks. Revivify has that material component that I'd always have to buy lots of, and Last Breath (CD version) loses a level, while the SC version puts you in a new body, which could be troublesome.

Unless radiant servant is errated it says that you need to cast spells from the healing domain, not necessarily from your domain slots. Alternatively you can choose to cast spells from the healing domain spontaneously so there is that. Also the sovereign speaker gives you 3 extra domain slots (that's something).


Combat Medic is more what I'm looking for, in that you would just show up and *poof* Everyone gets healthier with bonuses on the side. It's a bit weak in and of itself, but it could do. I like that Pool of Healing, since I've always thought Lay on Hands was cool. Is there any way to Chain Touch of Healing? Maybe by clever use of something like War Weaver, or Affinity Field?

There is always the Favored soul trickster, but I doubt it is what you want.

Human Favored Soul 4/War Weaver 5/Spellguard of Silverymoon 4/Geomancer 6

You need dragon's blood pool to be an arcane spell caster. But since your favored soul spells heal (due to PHB II ACF) the personal ones become touch spells (due to Spellguard) and then due to war weaver become ranged and valid targets for the tapestry. You end being able to buff the whole party with cleric spells (normally personal) while healing it.

[Fouredged Sword]

A bard warweaver with hymn of healing is an interesting option. Cure light wounds will heal up to 28+1d8 damage to everyone in the party as a standard action. Use versatile spellcaster with heighten spell to qualify early enough to be useful.

[killem2]

Anyway I am happy to see a healer thread. Sure, healing isn't the greatest thing but all d&d things should be supported if someone wants to play it :)

[Nettlekid]

Is there anything like an Ultimate Magus for Divine classes? One thing I want is to be able to "nova" with healing spells frequently, or use higher slots for metamagic healing spells, and that runs the risk of running out of slots too quickly in the day. To counteract this, I want to somehow progress something like Favored Soul, with its many spell slots, with another class like Apostle of Peace which has its own casting. That would give me many, many slots.

Also, would Dweomerkeeper be worth it for the Su True Resurrection, or Su True Creation to make diamonds for spells like Revivify?

[questionmark693]

As far as I'm aware, the only classes like Ultimate Magus are Ultimate magus, Arcane Hierophant, and Mysitc Theurge, but none of those do both divine classes. You could ask your DM for a divine version of Ultimate Magus though, or maybe Bard/Cleric a Mystic Theurge....not optimal, but gives you two classes with healing spells getting advanced.

[Psyren]

Is there anything like an Ultimate Magus for Divine classes? One thing I want is to be able to "nova" with healing spells frequently, or use higher slots for metamagic healing spells, and that runs the risk of running out of slots too quickly in the day. To counteract this, I want to somehow progress something like Favored Soul, with its many spell slots, with another class like Apostle of Peace which has its own casting. That would give me many, many slots.

One way you could do this would be Ardent/Apostle of Peace/Psychic Theurge. With the Life mantle, your psionic side would be a decent healer as well, and both classes are Wis based so you'd have a ton of ammunition to heal with. And being psionic, Vow of Poverty wouldn't be nearly as much of a problem - you'd get access to things like flight and teleportation that you might otherwise have trouble getting without items.

[Nettlekid]

As always, Psyren, you have a clever answer involving Psionics. There's really nothing they can't do. And you're right, the Wis synergy and the well-known versatility of PP as opposed to spell slots is a big plus. And that's not even using Ardent tricks like the Dominant Ideal Synchronicity thing.

A build I decided could work, although now that Ardent thing is really tempting me, is Cleric 5/Skypledged 10/Hierophant1/RSoP 3/Contemplative 1. You get three domains (plus Knowledge if you go Cloistered Cleric), you get the extreme versatility in the form of the Divine Skypool which even allows you to draw Druid spells, Hierophant gives you Divine Reach so you can Chain Heals and other touch buffs, RSoP gives you Empower to your healing (which can be coupled with Maximize from Mastery of Sun and Moon) and Contemplative 1 is a nice way to round things off.

Feat-wise, I think Extra Turning, Maximize Spell, Master of Sun and Moon, and Chain Spell are good to start with. What other feats would be useful?

[Zombulian]

One way you could do this would be Ardent/Apostle of Peace/Psychic Theurge. With the Life mantle, your psionic side would be a decent healer as well, and both classes are Wis based so you'd have a ton of ammunition to heal with. And being psionic, Vow of Poverty wouldn't be nearly as much of a problem - you'd get access to things like flight and teleportation that you might otherwise have trouble getting without items.

I support this post. Although not all games would allow Apostle of Peace I think, being as BoED gets banned a lot. Could easily replace that with CC or something though I guess.

I'm also a fan of the Healer class, and they work fairly well with the whole idea of running in hands-a-glowin on your unicorn or coatl companion. With a couple more unicorns bound to you from sanctified spells.

[Valwyn]

Is there anything like an Ultimate Magus for Divine classes? One thing I want is to be able to "nova" with healing spells frequently, or use higher slots for metamagic healing spells, and that runs the risk of running out of slots too quickly in the day.

It might not be what you were looking for, but Cleric 3/Warlock 1 qualifies for Eldritch Disciple from Complete Mage. At first level you can choose Healing Blast and then get a bunch of invocations to change the shape/reach of your blast, like Eldritch Spear (get a range of 250 ft), Eldritch Chain (hit additional targets), or Eldritch Cone. You need to be either Chaotic or Evil to enter the class, and you burn a use of Turn Undead to activate Healing Blast, but it could come in handy. Then again, it's only 1d6 healing unless you want to get more levels of Warlock, but it might be interesting to be able to heal people from the other side of the room.

[Socratov]

you might want to try to sneak in a (divine)bard lvl or 3 (maybe prestige) and take some extra music so you can pick healing hymn doubling your healing from spells for a bardic music use.

[Psyren]

You need to be either Chaotic or Evil to enter the class, and you burn a use of Turn Undead to activate Healing Blast, but it could come in handy.

Note that you can't be evil and still use Healing Blast. That leaves CN and CG as alignment options.

[kiryoku]

if your groups of similar alinement one level of Hierophant in the dungenon masters guide gives you all healing spells maxed for just losing one level of the number of castings without losing your caster level. for an example say a healing spell did 3D8 it would do flat 24 for those of your alinement. for just one level into it. though it does require 15 ranks of knowledge religion and any metamagic and 7th level casting to get in it.

Edit: its on page 188.

[Vertharrad]

There is errata(or just look in the special black book version) that said Heirophant needed ranks was Knowledge(nature or religion) 15rnks.