House rule: cure spells are swift actions

[Dalebert]

We were having a discussion about how it's almost never the smart thing to do to waste actions healing someone in the middle of combat. You're usually better off preventing damage or helping to kill off something that's hurting them. Then suddenly the DM declared this house rule on the basis that he wanted it to be a more viable choice. This does NOT apply to magic items. It's only when using a prepared spell. I haven't asked yet, but I think he will almost certainly apply it to the witch's healing hex as well since hexes are generally easier to use than spells.

Each Wednesday we alternate between his game where I'm a player and my game where he's a player. I immediately decided to apply the same house rule to my game. Did we make a horrible mistake? Anyone think this is game-breaking? Is healing in combat supposed to be a crappy choice?

[jedipotter]

I'd say it's game breaking.

You want to give out heals a a swift ''free'' action. It takes away the balance of ''if you heal you give up an action''. So you'd want a heal and a full normal action. Seems like a bit much.

[Adverb]

I've been considering this myself!

Let us know how it works out?

[jiriku]

The problem with healing isn't really that it costs too much, but that it does too little. This rule doesn't make healing competitive; it just shifts the action cost to a type of action that you generally can't use to attack or cast a battlefield control spell. Sure, people will heal more, but only because sometimes they've got nothing else useful to do with their swift action.

A better approach might be to make healing spells good at what they do. for example, you might double the dice rolled by all spells that heal damage or grant temporary hit points, and allow vigor and cure minor wounds to do a flat 1d8 instead of 1 point. That would make healing much more relevant, and would greatly increase the number of situations in which healing an ally was a "competitive" decision.

[Jormengand]

Well...

Given that you're still using up the spell slot, and cure spells don't do nearly as much healing as damage spells usually do damage (compare flame strike to mass cure light wounds - at level 9, the latter needs to hit about twice as many things to do the same amount, and it just gets worse as it goes), it doesn't seem like a terrible suggestion.

Swift action Heal may be a bit much, but for the Cure X wounds spells it doesn't seem too bad an idea.

[Pex]

My group uses a house rule of all healing outside of combat is maximized. It speeds up recovery allowing the party to continue on more easily.

Pathfinder already allows for non-standard action healing. Quick Channel Feat allows you to Channel Energy as a move action. Battle Oracles and Life Oracles can cast swift action healing spells a couple of times a day. Life Oracles can also heal while moving or himself as a move action with another revelation that doesn't even use spell slots.

What you're proposing is quite powerful but might be better off as a house rule feat with Quick Channel and Quicken Spell being prerequisites to allow swift Cure spells without increasing the spell slot.

[Thiyr]

Honestly, I think swift action cure spells is going to be fine. The problems with healing I feel are probably best summed up here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=12203165&postcount=9), and swift cure is only gonna really hit one of those three issues. Admittedly, one of the bigger issues, but still enough that it's not gonna unbalance anything. The worst of it is going to be realizing that it probably should carry over to the inflict spells (Aka: the Undead Cure), which might lead to some shenanigans. Perhaps swift action to cast on self, like the PF Paladin's lay on hands?

Regardless, it's a perfectly fine addition. though if they have to be prepared cures (That is, not the cleric's spont-cast cure, not favored soul cure, etc) then it's probably still not gonna effect anything.

[JusticeZero]

Why on earth does anyone think that it is actually IMPORTANT that people be throwing healing spells during combat? Because clearly, the military could be so much more effective if it quit worrying about things like armor or camouflage and instead sent surgeons out into every firefight to remove bullets from the soldiers while they fight. Seriously, why do people think this is important to give special pleading to? Why don't you instead say that doing damage needs to be emphasized and that attacking should be made a swift action on top of your regular actions? Or casting spells! Wizards are supposed to cast fireballs, so why not let them cast them for free as a swift action just so they can explode things more?

[Slipperychicken]

To make healing more relevant, perhaps healing spells could heal amounts comparable to damage spells? For example, cure light could heal something like 1d6/level (max 5).

[JusticeZero]

Why do they need to be relevant? Can someone answer that question first? Because I don't think i've ever heard an answer.

[Thanatosia]

Why on earth does anyone think that it is actually IMPORTANT that people be throwing healing spells during combat?
I have a personal theory people expect it when they come into D&D from playing video games, esp MMOs or Jrpgs, where healing in combat is a completely neccisary part of the gameplay & you typically have a party member who does almost nothing but cast heals - they have a preconcieved notion that that's what the cleric class is suposed to be all about.

And honestly, allowing action-economy effecient, effective combat healing could be a way to tone down the rocket-tag nature of D&D combat (provided you also find a better way of dealing with save or dies) if that rubs you the wrong way.

[JusticeZero]

That stumps me too, since the games you mention have to make special design decisions to make healing relevant. there have been games that don't have healing as relevant, and people continue to try to crowbar healing into it. In those, teams that rely on healing are the most incompetent groups you can have the misfortune of getting.

[Thiyr]

Why do they need to be relevant? Can someone answer that question first? Because I don't think i've ever heard an answer.

Strangely, answered in the link I posted. To quote the relevant bit:


Even more importantly, however - relying on item-based healing does not account for the notion that some players quite simply enjoy being the healer. To those players, a formerly-wounded ally’s “thanks, you saved my bacon!” provides as much satisfaction as the rogue rolling all 6s, the Barbarian dissecting a cluster of goblins with one greataxe swing, or the wizard dominating the BBEG’s pet war troll. When the other players are crowing about confirming criticals or breaking the cult’s basement door down, the healer’s player is patiently asking that they not end up as pincushions this time, or could they kindly avoid inhaling gas from the bloated corpse in the corner of the room…

In short, healing is fun - so long as you aren’t forced into it by a group that doesn’t know any better, and thinks they need you to do it. But even if you DO have a group of friends like that, and are unable to convince them of the very salient points listed above - you may as well pick a class that is good at the job, and fun to boot.

In short, its a role that people can have fun doing but is generally speaking rather difficult to do well, compared to other roles.

Personally, it isn't usually my cup of tea, but if people enjoy it, they enjoy it. Further, from a meta perspective, it can actually make encounter design more interesting if you do have someone who's a well-built, effective healer. As an anecdote, was in a game once (sadly, only for a session or two before work schedule conflicts meant i couldn't make it anymore) where we had a pretty solid ilumian healer (pretty sure they used the healer class). My first reaction was "Really? A healer? Why are you bothering with that, bah!". End of session, we're in Bahamut's realm in Celestia, squaring off (at the big dragon's request) against one of his avatars. DM expected it to be a curb stomp. He was a solid few CRs above us, was still a dragon, had a few extra (non-DR) goodies added in. But between a few negative levels taking the sting out of him (my end), and our beatstick taking a ton of hits and continuing to stand while having solid output(thanks to the healer), we managed to win said fight. Without a healer, best we could hope to have done was nova him down. but because we had someone who wanted to heal and actually did a good job of it, our effective staying power in combat was significantly higher than expected, which matters a lot when you're in situations where you -aren't- winning encounters on the back of a single spell. Only time i've seen a combat healer in play, and a decent demonstration that given encounters that are tailored to the playstyle (That is to say, encounters where the enemy's damage and durability will outlast yours barring recovery), they have a use.

Basically, if you have someone competent in the role, who isn't forced to do that, it turns what could be rocket tag into something more manageable. And when fights can last longer than two rounds, that gives opportunities for the encounter to actually have more impact. Obviously not every fight should need it, but still.

[JusticeZero]

It was never shown that that playstyle is not doable; the entire thread is rather on ways to make it the ONLY way to go, at least in part, by making a special exemption in the action economy JUST for healing people. At that point, I have to express concern.

[Jormengand]

It was never shown that that playstyle is not doable; the entire thread is rather on ways to make it the ONLY way to go, at least in part, by making a special exemption in the action economy JUST for healing people. At that point, I have to express concern.

The point is that healing is currently a waste of actions because your opponent can probably do more damage than you can do healing by spending the same actions/spell slots. Thus, someone who wants to heal... can't, really.

[Thanatosia]

That stumps me too, since the games you mention have to make special design decisions to make healing relevant.
That's the thing, D&D isn't by default designed around effective combat healing, but those who want it, experiment with altering the rules to make it relevent.

there have been games that don't have healing as relevant, and people continue to try to crowbar healing into it
I don't see any grand wide-spread attempt to crowbar healing into every game. But there are people who like that kind of playstyle, and so they try to adjust their particular game to accomidate it. I see nothing wrong with that.

[Thiyr]

It was never shown that that playstyle is not doable; the entire thread is rather on ways to make it the ONLY way to go, at least in part, by making a special exemption in the action economy JUST for healing people. At that point, I have to express concern.

I wouldn't say that the thread is making having a healer the ONE TRUE D&D EXPERIENCE for the group. Actually, that's kinda the opposite of the OP's group's reasoning, near as I can tell (The statement that healing is almost never a good choice, and wanting to make it viable.) Making it viable =/= making it needed. Like how, say, melee damage dealer is a viable option if done properly, but you can play without one.

And while certainly is is possible to make a solid healer without a houserule like this, it is certainly difficult to do, for a number of documented reasons. Again, that link i posted is primarily about demonstrating that point. There certainly are ways around the issues present in stock healing options. But the goal of houserules such as this one or others that've been suggested are to make base options have functionality enough to make them relevant, rather than making there be flat "you must take this class, these feats, and use these spells if you wish to provide healing" requirements to play the archetype.

[Slipperychicken]

Why do they need to be relevant? Can someone answer that question first? Because I don't think i've ever heard an answer.

Because players at times want to play as healbots and be relevant. And we also expect mid-combat healing effects to be relevant.

[grarrrg]

The worst of it is going to be realizing that it probably should carry over to the inflict spells (Aka: the Undead Cure), which might lead to some shenanigans.

Pathfinder already allows for non-standard action healing. Quick Channel Feat allows you to Channel Energy as a move action.
...
What you're proposing is quite powerful but might be better off as a house rule feat with Quick Channel and Quicken Spell being prerequisites to allow swift Cure spells without increasing the spell slot.
I'm not sure Quicken Spell is the best choice as a requirement, fitting yes, but it would be a hefty feat tax to non-full casters like Paladin or Inquisitor.

Combat Healing Feat
Requirements: Must be able to cast Cure/Inflict Light Wounds, [something else]
Benefit: When casting Stabilize, or a Cure or Inflict spell on a Willing Target you may do so as a Swift Action.
Special: This feat also applies to a Witch's Healing and Major Healing Hexes.


Potentially add a small downside? Maybe "But the dice are treated as 1 step lower" So a Cure Light would roll 1d6 instead?

[The Grue]

I'd say it's game breaking.

You want to give out heals a a swift ''free'' action. It takes away the balance of ''if you heal you give up an action''. So you'd want a heal and a full normal action. Seems like a bit much.

Because healing is already a competitive option in combat?

[JusticeZero]

The point is that healing is currently a waste of actions because your opponent can probably do more damage than you can do healing by spending the same actions/spell slots..
You can build for a more effective output of healing if you really want. If you were talking about PRCs and feats and the like, it would be one thing, but the proposal was a general rule change.

[facelessminion]

Seems overall a pretty nice upgrade, to me. It does sting for Life and Battle oracles... but perhaps their swift cures could be auto maximized, or allow for them to also swift Restorations and other condition removal spells, something like that.

[Dalebert]

To get perspective, this came up in a combat scene in which the party was caught off guard. Some assassins invaded our locked Inn room and got into place and started attacking us. It got pretty touch and go. Someone in my party was contemplating casting a cure light and I was discouraging it saying they should focus on taking down our enemies. Trust me that it really was a bad decision given a limited number of moves to do something effective before we risked a wipe. I was making the case that healing in combat is usually a bad call in terms of the action economy. I wasn't complaining about it. My complaint was more with my party doing something stupid that could get us killed. But it seemed to bother the DM I guess and he made the call for future games.

I wouldn't waste a feat on that with my witch but maybe I'd consider it if I were playing a good cleric who didn't have to waste slots ahead of time on cures.


They still consume your one spell per round and part of your daily allocation, so aren't always a good idea.

There's a one spell per round limit? I wasn't aware of that. Where does it state that?

[The Grue]

There's a one spell per round limit? I wasn't aware of that. Where does it state that?

I think she was being figurative. Barring quickened spells or extra-action shenanigans, a caster will be using one spell per round at most - not because there's a hard limit, but as a consequence of how combat turns work.

[Coidzor]

We were having a discussion about how it's almost never the smart thing to do to waste actions healing someone in the middle of combat. You're usually better off preventing damage or helping to kill off something that's hurting them. Then suddenly the DM declared this house rule on the basis that he wanted it to be a more viable choice. This does NOT apply to magic items. It's only when using a prepared spell. I haven't asked yet, but I think he will almost certainly apply it to the witch's healing hex as well since hexes are generally easier to use than spells.

Each Wednesday we alternate between his game where I'm a player and my game where he's a player. I immediately decided to apply the same house rule to my game. Did we make a horrible mistake? Anyone think this is game-breaking? Is healing in combat supposed to be a crappy choice?

Only if you believe Ivory Tower Game Design as part of the intent rather than after-the-fact asscovering. And agree with it.

The Healer being a class devoted to just that suggests that in-combat healing is not supposed to be completely sucktacular by design and intent.

I'd say that as a swift action that doesn't heal as much as the enemies are dishing out with their standard and full-round actions, it's probably more balanced this way.

Now, combine automatic range, better scaling with CL/level, and swift actions that can have move/standard/full-round actions traded for more of them... That might give you something gamebreaking in the ability to NOVA heal one's side in a conflict.


It was never shown that that playstyle is not doable; the entire thread is rather on ways to make it the ONLY way to go, at least in part, by making a special exemption in the action economy JUST for healing people. At that point, I have to express concern.

Uh, no, you're not quite reading it correctly then. :smallconfused:

It's acknowledging that the default setup is gimped and this way the OP's DM proposed that may make things less gimped and that the OP decided to make use of in their own DMing, though they wanted to see whether people thought it took things too far in the other direction of giving an advantage to healing rather than raising it up to the playing field of the rest of the game.

[JusticeZero]

You can build to be a better healer though, so I fail to see the issue. I know that a Vitalist can pull through in situations like that, and they're less overpowered in general use. I'm sure there are good divine casting options too.

[Coidzor]

You can build for a more effective output of healing if you really want. If you were talking about PRCs and feats and the like, it would be one thing, but the proposal was a general rule change.

To make healing less gimped by default. If you think that this general rule breaks when combined with certain feats, PrCs, and the like, then maybe you should be naming them?

[gartius]

There's a one spell per round limit? I wasn't aware of that. Where does it state that?

actually its an offical rule in pf.

Cast a Quickened Spell

You can cast a quickened spell (see the Quicken Spell metamagic feat), or any spell whose casting time is designated as a free or swift action, as a swift action. Only one such spell can be cast in any round, and such spells don't count toward your normal limit of one spell per round. Casting a spell as a swift action doesn't incur an attack of opportunity.


ive no problem with this houserule though it means clerics would have to prepare healing instead of converting spells on the fly more.


Quote Originally Posted by jedipotter View Post
I'd say it's game breaking.

You want to give out heals a a swift ''free'' action. It takes away the balance of ''if you heal you give up an action''. So you'd want a heal and a full normal action. Seems like a bit much.

no its not.

healing is generally unoptimal which cannot heal as well as the damage is dealt out. it also means that healbots dont feel leftout being forced to only heal their allies, encouraging more fun.

example of this is CMW vs scorching ray. 2d8+3 healing vs 4d6 averaging 12 hps healed to 14 damage dealt at 3rd lvl. at 7th lvl the same spells would heal/harm average 16/28 even comparing CCW which heals 25 which for a 4th lvl spell does not heal the damage a 2nd lvl spell dealt.

you see the problem.

[Thanatosia]

I think my biggest problem with making cure spells swift actions, is it doesn't really do anything to make you more of a healer. It just lets you throw healing on top of whatever else your main combat role is.... Ie, you're not dedicating yourself to healing, you're still buffing/crowd controling/meleeing/blasting, but now you add a free heal each round on top of it.

I think a better solution to fixing in combat healing is to leave heal spells as standard actions, but significantly increase the amount of healing - perhaps going as far as doubling it, and make healing spells ranged by default (so the healer doesn't have to run around and get in melee with everything when trying to touch his healing targets). Perhaps suppliment this with increased hitpoints to everything around the board as well, like giving everyone and everything +1 or +2 hp per HD automatically. This should slow down the pace of combat considerably if that is partially your goal.

[jiriku]

I think my biggest problem with making cure spells swift actions, is it doesn't really do anything to make you more of a healer. It just lets you throw healing on top of whatever else your main combat role is.... Ie, you're not dedicating yourself to healing, you're still buffing/crowd controling/meleeing/blasting, but now you add a free heal each round on top of it.

Yep. Healing as a by-the-way while also doing something more important and more relevant =/= making healing competitive.

[Thanatosia]

Actually, thinking on it some more, I think doubling the healing is too much and not the right solution. how about this insead. Remove the caster level cap from the spells, so a cure light wounds cast by a lv8 cleric does d8+8 instead of capping at d8+5, and then increase the caster level scaling as follows:

Cure Minor wounds (lv0) - heals 1/2 caster level, round up
Cure Light Wounds (lv1) - heals d8+caster level
Cure Moderate Wounds (lv2) - heals 2d8 + 1.5x caster level (round up)
Cure Serious Wounds (lv3) - heals 3d8 + 2x caster level
Cure Critical Wounds (lv4) - heals 4d8 + 2.5x caster leveel (round up)
Cure Deadly wounds (lv5) - new spell to fill deadzone between Critical and Heal - heals 5d8 + 3x caster level

Make the cure spells ranged (close), but probably leave heal touch to help encourage use of the cure spells. Increasing the CL scaling also helps make the healing domain more attractive for a healbot.

[StreamOfTheSky]

To make healing more relevant, perhaps healing spells could heal amounts comparable to damage spells? For example, cure light could heal something like 1d6/level (max 5).

I've always liked in videogames where healing items cure a certain % of a character's max hp. Means the healing item (spell, in this case) remains relevant throughout the game and it rewards people with high hp totals, instead of them just being a bigger drain on resources like in D&D. if you use max HD or something close (I use max 1st HD, then 3/4 HD for the rest) to GUARANTEE that the martial types have the most hp in the party, it'd work well.

Maybe CLW heals 10% max hp; Cure Moderate heals 20%; Cure Serious heals 30%; Cure Critical heals 40%.
You could always give each a minimum amount that it heals so that the spells aren't *worse* at the levels they're first available than they are in the normal rules.

EDIT: My other idea was to have the amount cure spells heal be based on a Heal check result, to make putting ranks in the skill useful for something. The higher level cures would apply a multiplier to the check result. Perhaps... CLW = 0.5 x result; CMW = 1 x result; CSW = 1.5 x result; CCW = 2 x result. Or could go 1x, 1.5x, 2x, 3x....not sure what a "fair" set of multipliers would be. It can be easy to optimize a skill check if one wants to...

[Thiyr]

There's a one spell per round limit? I wasn't aware of that. Where does it state that?


I think she was being figurative. Barring quickened spells or extra-action shenanigans, a caster will be using one spell per round at most - not because there's a hard limit, but as a consequence of how combat turns work.


Nope, it is an explicit rule. Both in PF, as mentioned above by gartius, and in 3.5 (as present on pages 144 under Casting a Quickened Spell, and page 174 under Casting Time in the 3.5 PHB) Its a hard limit with an exception built in for a single quickened/free action cast time spell (which was never updated to include swift actions. Bit of a sloppy editing dysfunction there).

[Coidzor]

I think my biggest problem with making cure spells swift actions, is it doesn't really do anything to make you more of a healer. It just lets you throw healing on top of whatever else your main combat role is.... Ie, you're not dedicating yourself to healing, you're still buffing/crowd controling/meleeing/blasting, but now you add a free heal each round on top of it.

I think a better solution to fixing in combat healing is to leave heal spells as standard actions, but significantly increase the amount of healing - perhaps going as far as doubling it, and make healing spells ranged by default (so the healer doesn't have to run around and get in melee with everything when trying to touch his healing targets). Perhaps suppliment this with increased hitpoints to everything around the board as well, like giving everyone and everything +1 or +2 hp per HD automatically. This should slow down the pace of combat considerably if that is partially your goal.

Yeah, about the only thing it does there is allow a double move, or, I think, some form of full-round-action movement, in order to get where the healing needs to be done. Which would probably be better accomplished by giving healing spells some range by default.

[Thiyr]

Yeah, about the only thing it does there is allow a double move, or, I think, some form of full-round-action movement, in order to get where the healing needs to be done. Which would probably be better accomplished by giving healing spells some range by default.

Actually, this just reminds me of a spell, Channeled Divine Health, which I like the model of in terms of speed. That is, it's more effective the more time you put in, so you can get it as swift if you want touch-range flat 1d8, up to 2 rounds of casting to get long-range 4d8+1/CL (max +20). I mean, the numbers are still on the low side (seriously? 4th level spell and you're capping out at 4d8+20 for 2 full rounds of casting? Weeeeeeakkkk), but if the cure line worked like that while scaling up (standard action for CDH is 1d8+10 max, so i could see taking those numbers and kicking them up higher for higher levels of the same concept) could make it work out well too. Need a quick pick-me-up while smashing faces? Drop it as a swift. know your fighter is gonna need a big bit of healing in two rounds becuase the dragon's gonna breath on them/time time-delay trap encounter is gonna go off on him again at that point? Start casting now, re-max him when it hits. Just a thought.

[qwertyu63]

I actually have a fix I have been meaning to try:

All "Cure X Wounds" spells have the following changes:
--Double the number of dice.
--Apply the effect of the feats Quicken Spell and Reach Spell for free.
----The caster may remove this free metamagic if they wish.

All "Mass Cure X Wounds" spells have the following additional change:
--Reduce the spell level by 1.

[Thanatosia]

Its a hard limit with an exception built in for a single quickened/free action cast time spell (which was never updated to include swift actions. Bit of a sloppy editing dysfunction there).
THere is an epic feat (multispell) that lets you exceed the 1 quickened spell/turn limit, but I don't know if it was ever updated to also allow multiple swift actions per turn (which would be required for it to be any use - i'm sure most DMs will houserule it if not officially updated to allow for it).

[Coidzor]

Actually, this just reminds me of a spell, Channeled Divine Health, which I like the model of in terms of speed. That is, it's more effective the more time you put in, so you can get it as swift if you want touch-range flat 1d8, up to 2 rounds of casting to get long-range 4d8+1/CL (max +20). I mean, the numbers are still on the low side (seriously? 4th level spell and you're capping out at 4d8+20 for 2 full rounds of casting? Weeeeeeakkkk), but if the cure line worked like that while scaling up (standard action for CDH is 1d8+10 max, so i could see taking those numbers and kicking them up higher for higher levels of the same concept) could make it work out well too. Need a quick pick-me-up while smashing faces? Drop it as a swift. know your fighter is gonna need a big bit of healing in two rounds becuase the dragon's gonna breath on them/time time-delay trap encounter is gonna go off on him again at that point? Start casting now, re-max him when it hits. Just a thought.

Definitely sounds interesting. Jiggering the exact amount of action spent to healing output ratio sounds like it might be a bit annoying though.

Seems quite worthwhile as a model once one did it tho...

[Elkad]

Part of the problem isn't the healing, it's the weakening of defenses, increases in damage, and general rocket-tag nature of 3x. But healing didn't get boosted at all. AC is so price-ineffective past your first few levels that either you skip it (and maybe try to compensate with miss chances) or gimp your offensive capability greatly. Damage skyrockets with character level, making hit points meaningless as well.

There used to be (2.0 and 1.0) spells to halve incoming melee damage (Deflection), or make you outright immune to a hit (Stoneskin). You only got half your str bonus to-hit, you needed a 16 before you got your first +1, and it capped at +7. Spells giving ridiculous bonuses (hello True Strike) didn't exist. Save DCs didn't exist except in rare cases, so high level characters with adequate gear always saved on a 2, meaning SoD/SoS spells were much weaker. Full dex bonus applied regardless of armor type. Critical hits didn't exist. The only way to do even double damage was either charging horseback with a lance, or setting a spear to receive a charge. Power attack didn't exist. And I'm sure I've forgotten various other techniques. Which meant even high level guys were missing half the time, only got 2 attacks hitting for D10+20 or so, stoneskin bounced the first hit whether it did 1 damage or 1000, and deflection halved the rest of the damage. A 20d6 spell likely didn't even do 20 damage (no maximize or empower vs auto-save and a ring of X resistance, for ¼ damage).

Combat healing looks a lot better when the fighter in front of you can tank the bad guy for at least 5 rounds anyway, and any cure/heal extended his life by roughly the spell level. If you want a defensive game, doubling all heals is probably the right place to start.

[jiriku]

We've been running with doubled healing dice in my campaigns for the past three years. It works in a balanced and reasonable fashion in our (predominantly Tier 3) environment, both for PCs and DM-controlled opponents.

[Coidzor]

So this thread has gotten me to thinking, and now I wanna know what you think of what I've thought, so....

Cure line spells heal 5*spell level+xd8+CL, with the CL cap boosted by 5 for each spell level up to Cure Critical which is uncapped. OR they double the dice they heal with and have their CL cap boosted by 5 or removed. OR heal d8s equal to spell level*2, which is modified by making them Mass versions, as well. (So CLW would be 2d8+CL and then CLW, Mass would be 6d8+CL? Maybe a bit overboard as a 3rd level healing spell doing 6d8...)

So Cure Light Wounds heals 5+1d8+CL, an CL goes up to +10, CMW heals 10+2d8+CL(up to +15), CSW heals 15+3d8+CL(up to +20), and CCW heals 20+4d8+CL(uncapped).

Cure Minor Wounds gets boosted up to (1d8/2 = 1d4) (5/2=2.5 rounds to 2) 1d4+2+CL/2(up to +5). Maybe 1d4+3+CL/2 so that at its cap it heals 9-12 instead of 8-11. OR 1d8 downgrades to the next die size of 1d6, instead. OR if dice are doubled, CmW becomes a 1d8 (+CL? CL/2? with cap of +5?)

Cure X Wounds, Mass line gets bumped down 2 spell levels, so CLW, Mass is a 3rd level spell; CMW, Mass is a 4th; CSW, Mass is a 5th; and CCW, Mass is a 6th level spell. CL cap moves up by 5 for each of them, save for CCW, Mass which is uncapped to go along with the base version's lack of a CL cap, and they heal the same amount per target as the now modified base versions aside from the CL.

May or may not increase the 5*spell level to account for the increased spell level of the Mass versions of the Cure spells. I'm leaning towards a yes, at least for adding in a Cure Minor Wounds, Mass.

Cure Minor Wounds, Mass gets added as a 2nd level spell and heals (1d8/2 = 1d4; (5*2)/2 = 5) 1d4+5+CL/2(up to +10 or +15). OR if dice are doubled, heals 1d8+CL (cap +10 or so)

Then at some point the spells gain the ability to heal (CmW to CCW) 10, 20, 30, 40, 50% of target's max HP out of combat, then gain the ability to either do so in combat or be cast at close range instead of touch(or increase the range for the Mass line which already has range) with the standard spell effect. I'm thinking of basing it on ECL so it rolls over to benefit non-full-casters, such as Pallys/Bards/Rangers. Not sure when to place it though. ECL 10 was the first place I thought about it and then ECL 15 after that, but… might be a little late for the lower level spells and a bit soon for the higher level ones?

[Psyren]

Why do they need to be relevant? Can someone answer that question first? Because I don't think i've ever heard an answer.

Because literally every RPG that is not D&D and has healing magic allows players to do this without making it into some horrible chore worthy of punishment. Some people enjoy doing it. It's also valuable from a metagame standpoint; it's a valuable yet skill-light way for a newer player to integrate into a new group or learn the game.

[JusticeZero]

Because literally every RPG that is not D&D and has healing magic allows players to do this without making it into some horrible chore worthy of punishment.
One, I disagree on that point since healing is generally not that huge; two, it isn't a horrible chore in D&D; three, if you enjoy doing it, you can sink player resources into making it work. Mailman builds are fine even though blasting is meh, that doesn't mean that blasting needs to be buffed until everyone can act like a mailman.

[Psyren]

One, I disagree on that point since healing is generally not that huge; two, it isn't a horrible chore in D&D; three, if you enjoy doing it, you can sink player resources into making it work. Mailman builds are fine even though blasting is meh, that doesn't mean that blasting needs to be buffed until everyone can act like a mailman.

It's not that huge in D&D. Try fighting anything important in an MMO, or Final Fantasy/Shining Force/Breath of Fire et al., or Earthbound, or Chrono Trigger, or Might & Magic, or Exile/Avernum, or Ultima, or countless other party-based RPGs without in-combat healing - your party ends up more or less creamed unless you vastly overlevel the fight in question.

And yes, it is a horrible chore in D&D, for all the reasons I listed in my Vitalist handbook: poor reach (most healing spells are touch range), poor scaling (can't keep pace with most damaging spells or attacks) and poor tempo (you're trading an action for an action, or even two actions if you provoke thanks to the first problem).

Sinking resources is a poor solution for healing because very few resources truly help the problems I listed. Metamagic helps but tends to make the various Cure X spells even less efficient. A domain like Healing with a beneficial power has the drawback of basically adding no spells to your list that aren't already there, plus the power itself adds little. And so on.


Nearly every group I have played with has had to houserule healing in some way to make it worth a damn. Even something as simple as "cutting the dice" - i.e. changing every 1d8 to 1d4+4 to make healing less swingy - is a houserule, and a bandaid to boot.

[JusticeZero]

Well, people who want to heal should push to play a Vitalist. Clerics are already very high powered without it.
Also, I played on CoH, and did lots of kicked up endgame stuff with minimal healing and no downtime, using defensive buffs and debuffs.

[Psyren]

Well, people who want to heal should push to play a Vitalist. Clerics are already very high powered without it.

Yeah Vitalists are great healers - but that's the problem, they're one of the few (if not the only) classes that tries to make healing fun for the healer, especially once you throw in the more offensive slants like the Soulthief or Sadist. Everyone likes being healed, particularly after a nasty attack sequence or AoE, but healer is often relegated to whoever showed up last to character creation day. The closest I've seen to an official class that manages to shake up the D&D healing paradigm is the Life Oracle, thanks to its Life Bond and Safe Healer abilities, not to mention Energy Body (run through allies to heal them, then burst out a channel to heal them even more - there isn't a group alive who wouldn't be talking about that after the session if you save their bacon that way.)

Other classes treat healing like something annoying the players might do to disrupt a DM who is trying to challenge them, and so the system makes healing in combat as inconvenient as it possibly can without actually banning it. This is one area I have to hand it to 4e - they made a "healer" role actually interesting to those who want to be one.

As for Clerics - yes, they're powerful, but that power has next to nothing to do with their healing abilities, short of the Heal spell itself.


Also, I played on CoH, and did lots of kicked up endgame stuff with minimal healing and no downtime, using defensive buffs and debuffs.

With respect, CoH is a totally different genre (superhero BMU rather than fantasy RPG) so I wouldn't really expect healing to be part of the paradigm there. Beyond that, I don't know much about it as I've never played it myself.

I would more expect D&D to be concerned with attracting new players from thematically similar games first and foremost - i.e. the ones with orcs and elves - rather than raiding superhero titles.

[Thiyr]

It's not that huge in D&D. Try fighting anything important in an MMO, or Final Fantasy/Shining Force/Breath of Fire et al., or Earthbound, or Chrono Trigger, or Might & Magic, or Exile/Avernum, or Ultima, or countless other party-based RPGs without in-combat healing - your party ends up more or less creamed unless you vastly overlevel the fight in question


Exile/Avernum


Eeeeeeeeee


Sorry, but those games are piles of nostalgia for me. Doubly because I rediscovered my copy of the first two avernum games (playing through 2 right now)

And that is an entirely accurate description of how it plays out. Because you can heal a significant chunk at low cost while out of the line of fire, you very often find yourself keeping your priest(s, in case you build 2, or you have an off-priest) back to keep the meat alive. Or, if you're me, you wonder if its prudent to bring them into firing range to do multi-target hits to clear the area faster. But when your melee guy(s) only have ~50 HP and those two ice puddings are walking up, laying a cold field to do some passive damage, and whacking him for 35 damage, you need heals (and that mercy "at 0 but not dead yet" they give you).

Or think about the difference in encounter design from d&d vs where these people are often attributed to coming from, WoW. Your level appropriate raid boss is built on the expectation of having a constant stream of heals going to the tank, enough that between mitigation, positioning, and the heals, the tank can last a few minutes against something that would kill a solo tank in probably half a minute tops. This allows them to give the boss a high amount of durability of their own: hp in excess of 10x player totals. If the tank couldnt soak the damage, then every boss would be rocket tag by necessity. This means that they have time for concepts like enrage timers (finish fast or you're done!), terrain-based hazards (don't stand in the fire!), set pieces (getting eaten by an elder god and fighting it from the inside, mind controlling a dragon to smash eggs). These are the things that make boss encounters different from trash mobs. Even the straightforward bosses, the pure tank-n-spank guys, still require more than simply *fire the biggest guns you have as much as possible*.

D&d, on the other hand, often struggles on that end. 3 rounds is a long encounter for traditional encounter design, and oftentimes accepted wisdom is "if its dead, it can't kill you. Kill it first". Monster HP as printed is low enough compared to damage out that there is never really reason not to, say, whocktroop your AC to oblivion. But if you have competent heals, you can have boss encounters be longer lasting. Your meatshields can soak near-fatal hits and not worry so long as heals are able to keep them going, meaning your boss encounter can take 5 rounds to finish, maybe more. It means players in mid-op have to decide if the speed they gain is better than the longevity sacrificed. Further, it means you can have mechanics for the players to us outside of their traditional class features. Prevent Ozzie from turning the cranks to set off traps. Set up el gigante under the suspended boulders long enough for someone to bury him, etc. This means more options for encounter design, leading to more memorable major encounters.

Now, is this possible without having dedicated healer? Yes, but its harder to pull off. Diablo is a great example of that. No heals in sight. So everyone needs piles of no action cost potions, life leech, regen, health orbs in d3, mitigation, plus just plain avoiding damage to begin with. The game is built around that assumption by giving players the tools to self heal at low cost. And that leads to the same offsense vs defense tradeoff. Does the gain of 2 seconds off my kill time for Baal justify the loss of 5% life leech?

D&d lacks those assumed things. Your fighter is in no way expected to find a vampiric weapon, the barbarian has to use a standard to chug that overpriced potion, etc. Without that, the only choice is the rocket tag. But if healing is made more palatable, that can be mitigated. Make life leech more common, or at least less gear dependent without forcing everyone to build a king of smack if they want to melee. Make healers capable of doing their job without giving up everything else, and you allow variety without forcing someone to play the pregen healer cleric because you need a healer that doesn't suck. Because opening design options up is a great thing.

[Lans]

healing is generally unoptimal which cannot heal as well as the damage is dealt out. it also means that healbots dont feel leftout being forced to only heal their allies, encouraging more fun.

example of this is CMW vs scorching ray. 2d8+3 healing vs 4d6 averaging 12 hps healed to 14 damage dealt at 3rd lvl. at 7th lvl the same spells would heal/harm average 16/28 even comparing CCW which heals 25 which for a 4th lvl spell does not heal the damage a 2nd lvl spell dealt.

you see the problem.

You have to take into account the chance that SRay misses. A wizard with maybe +3 to hit vs a touch AC of say 10 misses about 30% of the time makes the average about 10.

Same deal at 7, though the chance of it missing at that level is probably close to the 5-10 percent range.

Also see below


The point is that healing is currently a waste of actions because your opponent can probably do more damage than you can do healing by spending the same actions/spell slots. Thus, someone who wants to heal... can't, really.

But should healing completly negate the damage of an attack? I'm on the vein of thought that healing should keep people fighting till the battle is won. Example enemy's damage kills PC in 2-3 rounds, healing makes that 4-6.


If you think thats too weak of an effect, would you consider adding status removal and/or buffs to the spell effect? Say a buff of spell level-1-3?

[JusticeZero]

I'd honestly rather negate the attack itself than reverse the effects after the fact. It's a lot more interesting play to be going "okay, I think Argle is going to charge, so I need to ward him now, and watch to see if I need to protect Swishyboom in case they really can move as fast as I think they can" than it is to go "Huh, my turn? Who's hurt worst?"

[Psyren]

Eeeeeeeeee


Sorry, but those games are piles of nostalgia for me. Doubly because I rediscovered my copy of the first two avernum games (playing through 2 right now)

I would love a 2D, single player, 3.5/PF-based game set in the Exile engine (or one similar to it at least.) Something that's low on graphics so they can cram as many rules in as possible with minimal art assets.



...
D&d lacks those assumed things. Your fighter is in no way expected to find a vampiric weapon, the barbarian has to use a standard to chug that overpriced potion, etc. Without that, the only choice is the rocket tag. But if healing is made more palatable, that can be mitigated. Make life leech more common, or at least less gear dependent without forcing everyone to build a king of smack if they want to melee. Make healers capable of doing their job without giving up everything else, and you allow variety without forcing someone to play the pregen healer cleric because you need a healer that doesn't suck. Because opening design options up is a great thing.

Exactly this. And honestly, D&D is perfectly poised to do in-combat healing right - making it a viable and fun strategy for those groups who want it, without it being a mandatory slot in every party for the ones that don't. You absolutely can get by in D&D without needing an in-combat healer, because there are viable techniques people are using even now to mitigate incoming damage (like battlefield control, various debuffs or disposable summons), and those can work on any enemy. You have to be a little smart about which ones you use when - not much point trying to blind a pack of oozes for example - but the toolbox as a whole is never arbitrarily taken from your grasp.

As a contrast - in a game like, say, Final Fantasy, you need at least one dedicated healer because literally none of your magic except for blasting will work on the bosses. Can't blind them, can't charm them, can't weaken them, can't stun them, can't confuse them, can't run away, can't even summon something else for them to whack for a couple of turns while the punching bag party member fumbles a potion or two out of his pack. MMOs have similar restrictions, with half your class' toolkit rendered pointless in most boss fights except for very specific set-piece phases, and even then the battles are generally balanced so that using your control abilities just brings the fight back to parity with a dedicated healer or healers rather than replacing them.


I'd honestly rather negate the attack itself than reverse the effects after the fact. It's a lot more interesting play to be going "okay, I think Argle is going to charge, so I need to ward him now, and watch to see if I need to protect Swishyboom in case they really can move as fast as I think they can" than it is to go "Huh, my turn? Who's hurt worst?"

And there's nothing wrong with that, but "who's hurt worst" is a game some people like to play, especially coming in from other RPGs where that question is more expected. It also has a much lower barrier to entry than the skills required to prevent damage up front for someone who is new to the system.

[Lans]

Why not go a step further and immediate action? This would let you get an extra bit of healing and let you be a bit more active if I remember the swift-immediate exchange right

[georgie_leech]

Why not go a step further and immediate action? This would let you get an extra bit of healing and let you be a bit more active if I remember the swift-immediate exchange right

It would have to worded extremely oddly; by default Immediate Action Healing being triggered off attacks or damage would occur before the actual damage takes place.

[Lans]

It would have to worded extremely oddly; by default Immediate Action Healing being triggered off attacks or damage would occur before the actual damage takes place.

There is precedence with close wounds

[Korahir]

i also thought hard about the numbers i want the heal spells to actually heal and i found out that the problem is more basic than math going over average damage a spell, beatstick, monster etc. does at level x.
To me the basic question is: what do I want to compare to the amount healed?

some possible answers:
Average damage of a monster or dedicated damage dealer (full round action) of the same CR as the healer.
Possible amount of HP summoned by the summon monster x or sna x lines
Average HP of a "tanky" character of the according CR


My current answer would be: a viable heal spell has to fully heal a PC at every level or apply a heal over time that heals significantly and breaks action economy. In the end a heal spell has to compete with the following:
Spellcasters ending the encounter with one standard action
Beatstick ending the encounter with a full round action

So shouldn't the dedicated healer be able to get both those guys a free second chance ticket? As mentioned above it pretty much is rocket tag in higher levels.

what do you think?

[DarkSonic1337]

I'd make the cures/inflicts swift actions when used to heal, and in addition create more standard action healing spells such as.

Area healing spells-these could be interesting in that they (like damage spells) do not differentiate between friend and foe.

Heal+debuff removal spells-One of the things that makes the "Heal" spell so good. These would be the direct counterpart to damage+debuff spells.

Heal+buff spells-healing is generally seen as reactive (undoing damage) rather than proactive (preventing damage), but these new spells would combine a little of both. Heal up and use the buff to hopefully need less healing later.

And finally, spontaneous casters who chose to learn a cure spell add the other cure spells to their spells known as well.

Maybe this would overdo it...but frankly I wouldn't mind seeing what an optimized healer plays like with these modifications.

[icefractal]

One, I disagree on that point since healing is generally not that huge; two, it isn't a horrible chore in D&D; three, if you enjoy doing it, you can sink player resources into making it work. Mailman builds are fine even though blasting is meh, that doesn't mean that blasting needs to be buffed until everyone can act like a mailman.Actually, blasting being underpowered without a bunch of specific feats and choices being made is a significant flaw in D&D. It's often glossed over because "Wizards are T1, why would they need any fix?" But frankly, that's BS. People aren't playing a class, they're playing a specific character, and a dedicated-blaster Wizard without metamagic reduction or the few specific good spells is a T5 character. And that's terrible.

Same issue as Sword-n-Board. The fact that you could be an ubercharger instead with the same class, and own it up all over the place, does not mean that S&B doesn't have a problem.

And to bring it on topic, the fact that you could be a RSoP with the right feats and make healing actually effective doesn't mean it's acceptable for healing to suck without that. If something is presented as an option in the game it should actually work out of the box.

[Thiyr]

One, I disagree on that point since healing is generally not that huge; two, it isn't a horrible chore in D&D; three, if you enjoy doing it, you can sink player resources into making it work. Mailman builds are fine even though blasting is meh, that doesn't mean that blasting needs to be buffed until everyone can act like a mailman.


Actually, blasting being underpowered without a bunch of specific feats and choices being made is a significant flaw in D&D. It's often glossed over because "Wizards are T1, why would they need any fix?" But frankly, that's BS. People aren't playing a class, they're playing a specific character, and a dedicated-blaster Wizard without metamagic reduction or the few specific good spells is a T5 character. And that's terrible.

Same issue as Sword-n-Board. The fact that you could be an ubercharger instead with the same class, and own it up all over the place, does not mean that S&B doesn't have a problem.

And to bring it on topic, the fact that you could be a RSoP with the right feats and make healing actually effective doesn't mean it's acceptable for healing to suck without that. If something is presented as an option in the game it should actually work out of the box.


I'd actually say this. There's a bit of a difference here between blasting and damage. Blasting is suboptimal, but even without mailman-level op, it's functional. If we're judging individual builds on the tier scale (which doesn't really make sense to me*, but whatev's), I'd still peg it above t5. Partly because even straight blaster wizards often have utility stuff around (even if just as things to better enable blasting), partly because for most purposes, that damage output is still comparable to a similar level of op from other damage dealers. Perhaps a bit lower, but made up for by a handful of nice minor bonuses (no range penalties, either touch attacks or no attack rolls most of the time, free move-n-attack).

Healers, on the other hand, don't tend to have those luxuries. Even if we assume the cleric is healing with just their spont-cast cures, that means they're eating into those prepared utility spells. Further, where blasting has comparable numbers to other damage dealers, healing is, obviously, a step behind. It also has far less obvious methods of improving itself. Grab empower and maximize and you're pretty good for low-level blast-op. What do you grab to improve your ability to heal at the same op-level, though? It takes a tad more book diving to pull that off. And even with that, you're -still- probably gonna lack the oomph of a stock damage dealer.

Now, I'm gonna bring up one of the big, classical examples of why healing sucks. You -can't win by healing-. Its an axiom I learned from my time playing MtG, and it applies in the majority of encounters here as well. If you're doing nothing but regaining HP, you're doing nothing to end the encounter. Now, in MtG, that tends to make healing effects less desirable. "I've gotta waste card slots, card draws, cards-in-hand, and mana on getting back some life? Bah!" And that has a point. But WotC actually realized a few thing that tend to work around that, in order to make life gain more palatable. Mainly, there's a plethora of "Do X and gain life" effects (lockdown a creature and gain 4 life. do X damage and gain X life. Destroy an enchantment and gain 3 life) and there's life gain just being plain more efficient than damage (Lava Axe does 5 damage to a player for cost 5. Nourish give a player 6 life for cost 2). Life gain can't win you the game, so its relegated to being either a rider effect on something else you want, or it's bigger so it can be an effective stalling tactic. You can see similar logic in Hearthstone as well, between the priest and mage hero powers (heal 2 vs damage 1).

The same logic can apply to d&d. You still can't win by healing. So either healing needs to be a rider effect (and those tend to be things that, when done well, people actually consider good. Devoted Spirit gets props for this, and Wrathful Healing is kinda nutty like that) or it needs to be highly efficient. Heal is the posterchild of big, but it isn't terribly efficient (still a single target melee range standard action spell, using up a 6th level slot. Level you get it, it's 110 HP. Notable, but comes a tad late, and its never really gonna be an insignificant spell slot to use).

Of course, you can still get big. It takes good op, proper use of resources, etc. You're right about that. But you are still losing that efficiency battle (a healer built up to mailman levels of op is still gonna fall behind). Unless you're optimizing a level or two above everyone else, you're behind by a significant margin. basically, blasting is meh, but healing as it stands is bleeeeeeeghhhh.

[INoKnowNames]

I don't see the need to make cure spells swift actions. And I feel like making them a ranged spell should require some trade off. But the fact of the matter is that in mid to high op (in low to no op, such as in Oots, this ain't even a problem), the biggest problem is that the spells are weaker than damaging spells at the same level, and are more onpar with spells one level lower than themselves.

In fact, wasn't this a Wizard design choice, to have Clerics have lesser damaging spells because they can cure and buff? I remember seeing something like that in the DMG, eitha in customizing spell lists or makin' new spells. In any case, I feel like making them swift actions is really only useful for when someone needs to be taken out of negatives (assuming they even make it that far at all, since 0 to -10 is a rather hard range to reach the higher level enemies get), and even then, that just means the next hit will still most likely kill the target in question.

Instead, rather than 1d8+caster level (with higher level ones just adding a bit more D8), I'd say to make them scale the way the other spells do. I'd alter the spells a bit something like this (actually, I might be able to get someone to test this):

Cantrip: Cure Wound for 1 point of damage.
1. Cure Minor Wounds for 1d2 per caster level.
2.Cure Light Wounds for 1d4 per caster level. Mass Cure Wounds (being a higher level spell, this one can scale point per caster level like the others).
3. Cure Moderate Wounds for 1d6 per caster level. Mass Cure Light.
4. Cure Serious Wounds for 1d8 per caster level. Mass Cure Light.
5. Cure Critical Wounds for 1d10 per caster level. Mass Cure Moderate.
6. Heal for a full 12 per caster level. Mass Cure Serious.
7. Mass Cure Critical.
8. Mass Heal.

Maybe the single target ones can have a cap of 20 for caster level, and the Mass versions just 10, justifying the lesser max by being able to heal multiple targets at once, which seems like an even trade off. A Cleric gains 6th level spells at Caster Level 11 if not multiclassing at all. Heal would cure 120 points of healing to one target, with a bunch of other abilities healed, too. Mass Cure Serious would cure on average 40 points to a single target, but if it heals even 3 people for that much or more, it's made itself as useful in most cases. Currently a Cleric would gain 2d8+caster level max 30 Cure Moderate Mass. Which doesn't seem as hot in comparison.

While the percent based options are interesting, and probably helpful, I don't see any reason to make the cure spells function so much more differently by design than the large majority of the other spells. And I find making them heal less to a lower level or lower total hp target than a higher level or higher hp target to be weird, despite the fact that the same spell should heal the same to each, but just be worth different amounts. I might just not be getting the point.

[Pex]

The same logic can apply to d&d. You still can't win by healing. So either healing needs to be a rider effect (and those tend to be things that, when done well, people actually consider good. Devoted Spirit gets props for this, and Wrathful Healing is kinda nutty like that) or it needs to be highly efficient. Heal is the posterchild of big, but it isn't terribly efficient (still a single target melee range standard action spell, using up a 6th level slot. Level you get it, it's 110 HP. Notable, but comes a tad late, and its never really gonna be an insignificant spell slot to use).

Of course, you can still get big. It takes good op, proper use of resources, etc. You're right about that. But you are still losing that efficiency battle (a healer built up to mailman levels of op is still gonna fall behind). Unless you're optimizing a level or two above everyone else, you're behind by a significant margin. basically, blasting is meh, but healing as it stands is bleeeeeeeghhhh.

Then I play an Oracle of Life and blow your theory out the window as I do use healing as a combat winning strategy and am very successful at it. I will grant you I don't only cast healing spells and I would never advocate such, but my party wins the hit points attrition battle. I effectively double or triple the party's hit points, depending on combat circumstances. Party members do not drop, so we don't lose action economy, unless the CR is at +2 and even then only for a round or two. An Oracle of Life does have advantage over the cleric in that he can heal as a move action and a swift action a couple of times a day allowing for standard action other stuff. A cleric can do some healing as a move action with Channel Energy with a feat, which I also have for my oracle. I don't even have the Life Link revelation that fans of the Oracle of Life really like, especially for Oradins.

By healing the damage of a party member I negated all the actions the enemy took to do that damage. Some of my healing is more than that damage, some of it is not. I don't always have to heal more than the damage taken. It's enough that the amount I heal plus the party member's current hit points is more than the damage to be dealt so that buys at least one round that party member is up and doing stuff. Multiply that by the number of party members that more than makes up for my cost of doing healing that round, and even then as an oracle I still could spend my action to cast an attack or buff spell.

[Thiyr]

Then I play an Oracle of Life and blow your theory out the window as I do use healing as a combat winning strategy and am very successful at it. I will grant you I don't only cast healing spells and I would never advocate such, but my party wins the hit points attrition battle. I effectively double or triple the party's hit points, depending on combat circumstances. Party members do not drop, so we don't lose action economy, unless the CR is at +2 and even then only for a round or two. An Oracle of Life does have advantage over the cleric in that he can heal as a move action and a swift action a couple of times a day allowing for standard action other stuff. A cleric can do some healing as a move action with Channel Energy with a feat, which I also have for my oracle. I don't even have the Life Link revelation that fans of the Oracle of Life really like, especially for Oradins.

By healing the damage of a party member I negated all the actions the enemy took to do that damage. Some of my healing is more than that damage, some of it is not. I don't always have to heal more than the damage taken. It's enough that the amount I heal plus the party member's current hit points is more than the damage to be dealt so that buys at least one round that party member is up and doing stuff. Multiply that by the number of party members that more than makes up for my cost of doing healing that round, and even then as an oracle I still could spend my action to cast an attack or buff spell.

That's my point though. Healing is a delay tactic. If, for some reason, your entire party was nothing but Life Oracles and you did nothing but heal, you would lose. To use MtG parlance, it's not a win condition. No matter how many actions of the enemy you waste, if you don't have some means of offense, you will lose. It's an extreme example that will never occur in actual play most likely*, but it serves to demonstrate why healing needs to be more efficient than damage if it wants to compete for the same resources, namely that its purpose is to extend the longevity of your -ability- to do damage.

(Also, I don't know PF terribly well, so i have no idea how well oracles work overall, but my point is class-independent)


*I suppose you could have players who really, really want to try and do the "Team Cleric" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0077.html) wait for all your enemies to get tired of you and leave strategy, but that...is pretty unlikely to occur consistently.

[Coidzor]

There is precedence with close wounds

True, though I think it might be a bit more comfortable/smoother to expand Close Wounds into a line of spells on its own or combine it into a sub-option of the Cure line than to convert the main line of healing spells to immediate actions only.

(edit: Also, thank you for the reminder that Close Wounds exists.)


I don't see the need to make cure spells swift actions. And I feel like making them a ranged spell should require some trade off.

I think it depends on how they're buffed. I could certainly see it shaking out that the amount they heal is roughly fine for something dropped as a supplement to the main actions taken that round, and so developing an offshoot to cover some level of swift-action healing or expanding close wounds to cover swift/immediate action healing niche.

What sort of trade-off though? Currently raising the spell level is too much of one and the main option for doing so as RAW stands. Include an option for using either the original or a slightly buffed version of the cure line at range instead of the better value touch-range standard use revamp?


Instead, rather than 1d8+caster level (with higher level ones just adding a bit more D8), I'd say to make them scale the way the other spells do. I'd alter the spells a bit something like this (actually, I might be able to get someone to test this):

Cantrip: Cure Wound for 1 point of damage.
1. Cure Minor Wounds for 1d2 per caster level.
2.Cure Light Wounds for 1d4 per caster level. Mass Cure Wounds (being a higher level spell, this one can scale point per caster level like the others).
3. Cure Moderate Wounds for 1d6 per caster level. Mass Cure Light.
4. Cure Serious Wounds for 1d8 per caster level. Mass Cure Light.
5. Cure Critical Wounds for 1d10 per caster level. Mass Cure Moderate.
6. Heal for a full 12 per caster level. Mass Cure Serious.
7. Mass Cure Critical.
8. Mass Heal.

Maybe the single target ones can have a cap of 20 for caster level, and the Mass versions just 10, justifying the lesser max by being able to heal multiple targets at once, which seems like an even trade off. A Cleric gains 6th level spells at Caster Level 11 if not multiclassing at all. Heal would cure 120 points of healing to one target, with a bunch of other abilities healed, too. Mass Cure Serious would cure on average 40 points to a single target, but if it heals even 3 people for that much or more, it's made itself as useful in most cases. Currently a Cleric would gain 2d8+caster level max 30 Cure Moderate Mass. Which doesn't seem as hot in comparison.

Interesting idea. I kinda wanna try out that idea along with Psyren's take for (XdY+Z)*CL as the model. Partially because I'm just tickled by the idea of being able to use (A+B)*C in D&D... sorta...

I'm slightly torn between this idea of stretching up the Cure line of spells to 5th to meet Heal at 6th and lowering Heal down to a 5th level spell, standardly, though. I like how Heal and Cure Critical are differentiated here, though. Maybe incorporate some other ideas and add on progressive anti-debuff riders as the Cure line progresses up until it gets its Heal on?

Definitely would be interested in the result of testing. My biggest concern, I think, would be low levels, such as level 1 where the party's cleric can only heal 1d2 damage a pop. Less problematic with something like infinite cantrips/orisons, but could be a source of wonkiness until 3rd or 4th level, maybe. Going with 1d2 for cure wounds and then 1d3+X for cure minor and 1d4+Y for cure light, and so on might help with that, though it'd also quite probably require rejiggering Heal again to some extent.


While the percent based options are interesting, and probably helpful, I don't see any reason to make the cure spells function so much more differently by design than the large majority of the other spells. And I find making them heal less to a lower level or lower total hp target than a higher level or higher hp target to be weird, despite the fact that the same spell should heal the same to each, but just be worth different amounts. I might just not be getting the point.

I guess it was just one way of approaching allowing them more relevance at later levels/greater effect out of combat for filling back up and then getting on with things. If you expand their scalability instead of just buffing the static number of dice though, that seems like it eliminates the need for that.


I'd make the cures/inflicts swift actions when used to heal, and in addition create more standard action healing spells such as.

Area healing spells-these could be interesting in that they (like damage spells) do not differentiate between friend and foe.

Heal+debuff removal spells-One of the things that makes the "Heal" spell so good. These would be the direct counterpart to damage+debuff spells.

Heal+buff spells-healing is generally seen as reactive (undoing damage) rather than proactive (preventing damage), but these new spells would combine a little of both. Heal up and use the buff to hopefully need less healing later.

And finally, spontaneous casters who chose to learn a cure spell add the other cure spells to their spells known as well.

Maybe this would overdo it...but frankly I wouldn't mind seeing what an optimized healer plays like with these modifications.

AoE healing spells definitely seem like they'd be interesting, though I'm not quite sure what model would be best to start working from, especially with the disincentive to bunch up anyway. Though I suppose if they were powerful enough to incentivize bunching up, that'd be potentially a win or at least a wash for AoE blasting, too... Or at least have a clear metric for pitting them against one another to see how they stack up...

The main issue with this that I can see is the workload generated, since once you start doing that, it'll probably make some other areas seem all the more glaring and in need of remedy, as well as actually coming up with appropriate buffs to add. Debuff removal sounds more workable though, and I'd say that between Panacea's precedent and the potential evolution of adding on heal+debuff removal to the Cure Line as they progress to meet Heal that it'd probably be fairly doable.

Definitely agree with the point about Spontaneous casters, though. It'd actually allow Favored Souls to be Healer-types, which may or may not be good, in the long run. xD

Definitely something to consider how Op-Fu would influence things, aye. And potentially interesting to watch in action.

[INoKnowNames]

First, wow. So unprofessional that I did 2 Mass Cure Lights in my write up. I meant for the first one to obviously be a Mass Cure Minor. That's my fault for doing this stuff when I'm supposed to be asleep.


I think it depends on how they're buffed. I could certainly see it shaking out that the amount they heal is roughly fine for something dropped as a supplement to the main actions taken that round, and so developing an offshoot to cover some level of swift-action healing or expanding close wounds to cover swift/immediate action healing niche.

What sort of trade-off though? Currently raising the spell level is too much of one and the main option for doing so as RAW stands. Include an option for using either the original or a slightly buffed version of the cure line at range instead of the better value touch-range standard use revamp?

My initial thoughts when I tried to compile my adjustments were that between lowering the level of the point where one gains access to the mass cures (the first core mass is the still very weak Light Mass, and as a 5th level spell, where as my slightly buffed version is made available as a 2nd level spell), and Close Wounds being able to cover emergency "You need to stand up Now!" situations, that if anything needed to be done it could be more or less handled. Expanding Close Wounds a bit to continue to cover the "Emergency! Emergency" niche while letting the Cures handle the "Let's actually get your organs back inside you while I have a second." niche seems like what I'd choose to do. Close Grievous Wounds and Mass versions of Each come to mind.


Interesting idea. I kinda wanna try out that idea along with Psyren's take for (XdY+Z)*CL as the model. Partially because I'm just tickled by the idea of being able to use (A+B)*C in D&D... sorta...

Yay, I'm helping!


I'm slightly torn between this idea of stretching up the Cure line of spells to 5th to meet Heal at 6th and lowering Heal down to a 5th level spell, standardly, though. I like how Heal and Cure Critical are differentiated here, though. Maybe incorporate some other ideas and add on progressive anti-debuff riders as the Cure line progresses up until it gets its Heal on?

I wanted to respect how even most optimizers here appreciate the Heal spell, so I didn't want to move it too far from it's pedestal, though I don't think it'd hurt the system too much to do so, so long as other spells around that level (Panacea come to mind) are also dropped. Though the poor Healer class loses out on one of it's biggest advantages that way.

To help make the others more relevant in different situations, I suppose incorporating other antidebuff cures into them shouldn't hurt, though I would mind at what level those antidebuffs are made available, for the sake of not entirely invalidating the "fixes just one negative condition" spells. To make this not sound like gibberish, at 1st level a Cleric has access to remove fear. I'd rather not allow Cure Light Wounds the ability to remove fear as well as heal. Maybe Cure Moderate.

I'd also note that for adding these additional effects, Inflict Spells, which should still function similar to the Cure counter parts, are kinda getting the shaft, unless they get some bonus. That's another reason why I say to fix the Cure spells with the least maintenance possible.


Definitely would be interested in the result of testing. My biggest concern, I think, would be low levels, such as level 1 where the party's cleric can only heal 1d2 damage a pop. Less problematic with something like infinite cantrips/orisons, but could be a source of wonkiness until 3rd or 4th level, maybe. Going with 1d2 for cure wounds and then 1d3+X for cure minor and 1d4+Y for cure light, and so on might help with that, though it'd also quite probably require rejiggering Heal again to some extent.

I was actually thinking that one could use the Heal Skill to be able to heal based on individual injury, with the spells being for when you absolutely positively must restore hit points immediately, at least until they are strong enough to provide for most of the healing. I've actually also considered adding one's ranks or result in the heal skill to the amount healed, though maybe that might require a feat if the full result can get added, due to how high some skill checks can be made.


I guess it was just one way of approaching allowing them more relevance at later levels/greater effect out of combat for filling back up and then getting on with things. If you expand their scalability instead of just buffing the static number of dice though, that seems like it eliminates the need for that.

The most important thing in my book, aside from keeping things both good and balanced, is that the spells not seem out of place too hard. Healing can and should be a thing, but the more extensive a fix is for something so simple, the more I think too much effort is being put into it. And I still hate the idea of a spell healing two targets at equal levels for different amounts. It messes with my fake ocd.

[Thiyr]

So. Quick thoughts on what you threw out there, I-no. I think with bigger effects, you can get away with standard action costs, but swift action healing deff has its place as well. I think that's why CDH is so intriguing to me. It neatly rolls up cost vs reward conceptually. Downside of course being how the cost and the rewards really doesn't match up at all. I think ranged heals still really need to be a baseline though. Otherwise, at least from that encounter design standpoint, all that changes is that dumb opponents (that is, animal intelligence) will be easy to take down, while anyone capable of recognizing there is a healer will just target the guy a square behind the meat. Melee will 5-foot step and paste the heals, archers and casters will light them up like the Fourth of July or fill them up with enough munitions to stock a small army, and all of a round (and a PC) is lost. Range at least offers a bit more protection there.

As far as the actual numbers thrown out, coidzor had a good point as far as "only 1d2 at first level is kinda really rough". Later on it has potential, but comparing by way of avg dmg healed, your cure minor only beats the efficiency of the normal cure light at caster level 7, and even then only because the normal CLW has a cap at CL5. Higher level spells scale better in your setup, but your cuew light only beats stock cure mod at CL7 as well. Next level up that point is CL6. The 4th level spells is where it starts off superior, which again, is at CL 7.

Further, compare healing to doing damage again. Just pulling some iconic blast spells from the phb, magic missile is slightly more efficient than your first level heal. Scorching ray blows second level out of the water. Fireball matches at 3rd, but also hits an area. 4th doesn't really -have- an iconic blast spell. Still, overall it again comes back to 4th level spells/CL7 being where your setup pulls ahead.

Now, maybe with heal checks brought in, it could work out better, but just from what I see, its mostly fixing things up later on. If that was your aim, it works out, but...feels off to me. I will say I like the "mass cure one level up" thing though. Definitely makes group heals more viable. Probably always gonna be the most efficient option if there is more than one person hurt, though. Something to consider.

Edit: also, I find d2s to be something to be cautious of. Most people don't have dedicated d2s, and there's always the "wait, was heads 1 or 2?" when using coins. Also, flipping a lot of coins can slow things down a bit. Just another consideration from a playability standpoint.

[Coidzor]

So. Quick thoughts on what you threw out there, I-no. I think with bigger effects, you can get away with standard action costs, but swift action healing deff has its place as well. I think that's why CDH is so intriguing to me. It neatly rolls up cost vs reward conceptually. Downside of course being how the cost and the rewards really doesn't match up at all.

Sorry, I think I've missed something here. What's CDH again? :smallconfused:


I think ranged heals still really need to be a baseline though. Otherwise, at least from that encounter design standpoint, all that changes is that dumb opponents (that is, animal intelligence) will be easy to take down, while anyone capable of recognizing there is a healer will just target the guy a square behind the meat. Melee will 5-foot step and paste the heals, archers and casters will light them up like the Fourth of July or fill them up with enough munitions to stock a small army, and all of a round (and a PC) is lost. Range at least offers a bit more protection there.

Yeah... I probably haven't been weighing that as much as I should've been either. I think part of what makes me leery is also making the Inflict line ranged or only allowing either line of spells to be ranged if they're being used to heal.

Since if we get the cure line up to do relevant amounts of healing then unless it's decoupled from the inflict line, that means that the Inflict line become very good for single-target ranged blasting, and if we make healing superior to blasting in terms of the numbers game, that'd make inflict into super blasting(?). Though maybe some restriction like half the effect when using it to damage as to heal? Though that'd be a bit wonky with the Inflict line since healing undead seems to be an afterthought.

Maybe change the names and fluff of the lines of spells a bit so they both primarily focus on healing Positive or Negative energy based creatures respectively? :smallconfused:


As far as the actual numbers thrown out, coidzor had a good point as far as "only 1d2 at first level is kinda really rough". Later on it has potential, but comparing by way of avg dmg healed, your cure minor only beats the efficiency of the normal cure light at caster level 7, and even then only because the normal CLW has a cap at CL5. Higher level spells scale better in your setup, but your cuew light only beats stock cure mod at CL7 as well. Next level up that point is CL6. The 4th level spells is where it starts off superior, which again, is at CL 7.

That's part of why I like the stabilizing effect of some static anchor, potentially one based upon the spell level. 5+1d2 = 6-7 hp per heal is much more reasonable than healing 1 or 2 hp per spell, especially when an orison will always heal 1 hp anyway. Maybe still a bit low though. 10+1d2 for 11-12 hp healed is definitely a step up from the original CLW, especially at higher levels. and in either case, the static anchor will get overshadowed by the dice at higher levels.


Further, compare healing to doing damage again. Just pulling some iconic blast spells from the phb, magic missile is slightly more efficient than your first level heal. Scorching ray blows second level out of the water. Fireball matches at 3rd, but also hits an area. 4th doesn't really -have- an iconic blast spell. Still, overall it again comes back to 4th level spells/CL7 being where your setup pulls ahead.

Not sure how best to address that aspect, though...


Now, maybe with heal checks brought in, it could work out better, but just from what I see, its mostly fixing things up later on. If that was your aim, it works out, but...feels off to me. I will say I like the "mass cure one level up" thing though. Definitely makes group heals more viable. Probably always gonna be the most efficient option if there is more than one person hurt, though. Something to consider.

What, you mean like allowing heal checks to heal HP damage? :smallconfused: Depending upon how you jiggered that, it'd probably take care of the out of combat healing pretty handily, I suppose, leaving spells to mostly be used in combat scenarios...

Definitely seems like something to consider. Wait... Isn't there already a skill trick or something in 3.5 that allows something similar?


Edit: also, I find d2s to be something to be cautious of. Most people don't have dedicated d2s, and there's always the "wait, was heads 1 or 2?" when using coins. Also, flipping a lot of coins can slow things down a bit. Just another consideration from a playability standpoint.

(1d3-1)s or 1d3s would simulate them well enough and be quicker to roll, since d6s are the easiest die type to come across, IIRC. The only issue would be the minor difference between a naked 1d3 and a naked 1d4, though the 1d3-1 avoids that, I think.


First, wow. So unprofessional that I did 2 Mass Cure Lights in my write up. I meant for the first one to obviously be a Mass Cure Minor. That's my fault for doing this stuff when I'm supposed to be asleep.

I got ya anyway after I double checked, thankfully. :smallsmile:


My initial thoughts when I tried to compile my adjustments were that between lowering the level of the point where one gains access to the mass cures (the first core mass is the still very weak Light Mass, and as a 5th level spell, where as my slightly buffed version is made available as a 2nd level spell), and Close Wounds being able to cover emergency "You need to stand up Now!" situations, that if anything needed to be done it could be more or less handled. Expanding Close Wounds a bit to continue to cover the "Emergency! Emergency" niche while letting the Cures handle the "Let's actually get your organs back inside you while I have a second." niche seems like what I'd choose to do. Close Grievous Wounds and Mass versions of Each come to mind.

Close Wounds is already multitarget, I had thought. I'll go re-read it in a moment to doublecheck that... Not quite sure how you'd make a mass version unless you just made it into X number of smallish bursts or a single larger burst? :smallconfused:




Yay, I'm helping!

It's almost like we're actually bouncing ideas around in a roughly civil manner, or something. :smalleek: I'm so out of my element here! x.x


I wanted to respect how even most optimizers here appreciate the Heal spell, so I didn't want to move it too far from it's pedestal, though I don't think it'd hurt the system too much to do so, so long as other spells around that level (Panacea come to mind) are also dropped. Though the poor Healer class loses out on one of it's biggest advantages that way.

Yeah, don't want to give out too much earlier on and do away with Heal. One of the main real things I've heard said against Heal is that it's considered to be maybe a spell level too high, at least if I'm recollecting correctly, and definitely a bit too high of a level for Druids, which part of why I like bringing Heal down to 5th level in addition to making it so that there's not a dead level in healing spells between the Cure Line and Heal.

Definitely a good point about having to then take other spells like panacea into account, I'd overlooked the potential ramifications beyond the HP game.

True, the Healer does lose out a little bit on that. On the other hand, revamping and beefing up the healing spells that are the Healer's bread and butter still boosts up the Healer's ability to do its job. Whether it shapes up like how the revamp to the skill system in Pathfinder mostly did away with the niche for Rogues as being skillmonkeys without a good set of synergistic features or something more to back it up, is something that'd probably vary a bit and would be soething to keep in mind.

I think some might consider it a sign they've hit their benchmarks and others a thing to be avoided... I'm not quite sure where I'd fall, though I suspect that the Healer would probably need at least some tweaking after any serious revamp/fix/retooling/rejiggering of the healing spells.


To help make the others more relevant in different situations, I suppose incorporating other antidebuff cures into them shouldn't hurt, though I would mind at what level those antidebuffs are made available, for the sake of not entirely invalidating the "fixes just one negative condition" spells. To make this not sound like gibberish, at 1st level a Cleric has access to remove fear. I'd rather not allow Cure Light Wounds the ability to remove fear as well as heal. Maybe Cure Moderate.

True.


I'd also note that for adding these additional effects, Inflict Spells, which should still function similar to the Cure counter parts, are kinda getting the shaft, unless they get some bonus. That's another reason why I say to fix the Cure spells with the least maintenance possible.

Yeah, the risk of making the Inflict line too good by rolling other spells up into them and making them highly efficient damage dealers is something we can't forget.


I was actually thinking that one could use the Heal Skill to be able to heal based on individual injury, with the spells being for when you absolutely positively must restore hit points immediately, at least until they are strong enough to provide for most of the healing. I've actually also considered adding one's ranks or result in the heal skill to the amount healed, though maybe that might require a feat if the full result can get added, due to how high some skill checks can be made.

Ahh. Ok, I think this is what Thiyr was replying to. I totally missed this paragraph the first two times I read through this post somehow. :smalleek::smallconfused:

I think the primary limiting factor would be the action taken. So a full-round(check result-5?) or multi-round(check result or even something like 1.5x, 2x, or even 3-4x depending upon time?) Heal check would do more than a standard action(say check result - 10?). Maybe stabilization/remove bleed could be moved to swift or move actions along with that.

Though it'd also make the whole long-term care component mostly null without creating some kind of mundane charged item like med-kit with X uses with a cost of Y gp per use or something along those lines. Not necessarily a bad thing though, since those rules aren't really used all that often except at low levels and sometimes(?) in justifying someone surviving falling into a gorge and being incapacitated but surviving.


The most important thing in my book, aside from keeping things both good and balanced, is that the spells not seem out of place too hard. Healing can and should be a thing, but the more extensive a fix is for something so simple, the more I think too much effort is being put into it. And I still hate the idea of a spell healing two targets at equal levels for different amounts. It messes with my fake ocd.

True. X% HP isn't really a good stylistic fit with the rest of the spells. And if you get the spells to scale properly then you wouldn't really need to worry about the x% to keep them somewhat relevant at higher levels.

[Thiyr]

sorry, was typing from phone before. CDH = Channeled Divine Health, a spell I mentioned earlier in the thread, the one which you can spend more actions on to get a larger effect.


Yeah... I probably haven't been weighing that as much as I should've been either. I think part of what makes me leery is also making the Inflict line ranged or only allowing either line of spells to be ranged if they're being used to heal.

Since if we get the cure line up to do relevant amounts of healing then unless it's decoupled from the inflict line, that means that the Inflict line become very good for single-target ranged blasting, and if we make healing superior to blasting in terms of the numbers game, that'd make inflict into super blasting(?). Though maybe some restriction like half the effect when using it to damage as to heal? Though that'd be a bit wonky with the Inflict line since healing undead seems to be an afterthought.

Maybe change the names and fluff of the lines of spells a bit so they both primarily focus on healing Positive or Negative energy based creatures respectively

excellent point. I think "half effect when used offensively", or just plain having it do the original xd8+CL when used offensively works. Even if it gets a range, I don't think that's -too- bad, if its doing the original numbers.


What, you mean like allowing heal checks to heal HP damage? :smallconfused: Depending upon how you jiggered that, it'd probably take care of the out of combat healing pretty handily, I suppose, leaving spells to mostly be used in combat scenarios...

Definitely seems like something to consider. Wait... Isn't there already a skill trick or something in 3.5 that allows something similar?

I was more referencing what I-no brought up that you missed (and i missed you missing at first). From what he said, it sounds kinda like how wounds in hackmaster work, where you track each wound separately and each one heals separately, and then using heal checks to take care of individual ones? Its got potential, but I'm not sure. For some reason I almost think having that "static" part of the spell be tied to heal ranks could be nifty as well. It gives the skill some utility, it gives the spell a bit more solid of an oomph, and it still scales if you keep investing. Maybe put a per-spell cap on that.


1d3-1)s or 1d3s would simulate them well enough and be quicker to roll, since d6s are the easiest die type to come across, IIRC. The only issue would be the minor difference between a naked 1d3 and a naked 1d4, though the 1d3-1 avoids that, I think.

Still, I find that it often bogs things down when you have to mess around with what the dice is showing vs what that means. Was playing hackmaster (which i have little experience with, to be fair), and was rolling a fair number of d3's for weapon damage. A wonderful thing to roll when you have exploding dice, as an aside. But I rolled those different than everyone else. i go with the 1-3 is normal, 4-6 subtract 3 (so 4 is 1, 5 is 2, and 6 is 3, respectively). everyone else went with "half number rounded up", so 1 and 2 count as 1, 3 and 4 cound as 2, 5 and 6 count as 3. I kept that consistent, and we were an agreeable group, but it caused confusion when other people looked at my dice. Not saying it's impossible to deal with, just that the more they come up, the more likely it's gonna cause issues between people misunderstanding things.


And because the quote doesn't make much sense out of context: in regards to how healing and damage line up to each other, and not having a good idea on how to address it. While I'd like to see testing on the matter, I wouldn't mind seeing heals-per-round overtaking damage-per-round in instances of same resources expended, if it's gonna take a standard action to do. It comes back to the "you can't overcome most encounters with pure healing" thing. Either you want it to be quick/an add-on and less potent (so it doesn't interfere as much with you ability to fry your enemy), or you want it to be time consuming and Big. If I'm wasting a turn keeping someone alive instead of getting the encounter over, it needs to be a major thing. If a wizard steps up and launches 3 magic missiles at my buddy, doing his average 7.5 damage, spending a turn and a spell to erase that seems reasonable to me. It's retroactive counterspelling of damage spells, in another sense. (interesting note, at CL 6, where that MM would be being cast, a CL 6 CLW would heal 9.5 damage, actually fulfilling that role. That said, i chose magic missile because it's iconic, not because it's the best option for face melting. I've got nothing wrong with there being a handful of above-the-curve damage spells, given that there's a reason to ever -not- use them. Scorching Ray is actually a good example. Fairly efficient damage per CL (outside of that cap) at the CL you get each new ray at. But its fire, it's got SR: Yes, and it needs 3 attack rolls (and, in niche situations, it being a ray can be a detriment as well). There are situations its not the ideal choice. The better the blast is, the more severe and consistent the reasons not to use it need to be.

[Pex]

That's my point though. Healing is a delay tactic. If, for some reason, your entire party was nothing but Life Oracles and you did nothing but heal, you would lose. To use MtG parlance, it's not a win condition. No matter how many actions of the enemy you waste, if you don't have some means of offense, you will lose. It's an extreme example that will never occur in actual play most likely*, but it serves to demonstrate why healing needs to be more efficient than damage if it wants to compete for the same resources, namely that its purpose is to extend the longevity of your -ability- to do damage.

(Also, I don't know PF terribly well, so i have no idea how well oracles work overall, but my point is class-independent)


*I suppose you could have players who really, really want to try and do the "Team Cleric" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0077.html) wait for all your enemies to get tired of you and leave strategy, but that...is pretty unlikely to occur consistently.

Of course someone has to take offensive action. If you never hurt the enemy eventually your healing resources will run out and then you die. However, it is sound strategy if one member of the party uses healing in combat. It's not ubersupreme the best and doesn't have to be. It works well enough.

The problem with healing in combat is one of attitude, not effectiveness. Some players just find the concept boring. They believe wrongly that is all you do. They don't think that a healing cleric will also cast buff and attack spells. Others have the attitude that healing doesn't contribute to the combat. A warrior they see getting in the bad guy's face and hacking him to bits. The warrior takes hits himself and is near 0 hit points. The cleric heals him so that the next hit or two won't drop him. The warrior player dismisses that action even though he gets hit, doesn't drop to 0 because of that healing, and then wails on the bad guy dropping him. He doesn't appreciate the big help the cleric just gave him.

Then there's the spellcaster player who wonders why didn't the cleric just attack the bad guy himself with a spell. He could have. That's also an effective tactic. I'm not denying that. However, just because he could have doesn't mean it would have worked. The bad guy could make his saving throw. The cleric could fail to get through spell resistance. The cleric might not have an appropriate spell. The cleric could have been buffed himself and did his own hacking. Also an effective strategy; I don't deny that. However, the cleric might miss on that to hit roll. Even if he does hit the damage might not be enough to drop the bad guy. The warrior PC could have also missed of course. There is no guarantee and not supposed to be. Healing the warrior PC and let him get the kill is just another tactic.

[caimbuel]

As a long time DM, I see where the need for this is. My wife loves to heal, does not matter what game. If you cant get a decent healer in that game she will move on. I work with her tho, I feel blessed to have a gamer wife :smallsmile:

My biggest issue with that changes anyone has suggested is that you really step on the toes of some class's like the vitalist, life oracle, and healer. I personally think a vitalist heals fine and can turn combat into AP+4 as baseline if everyone is optimized. But to heal and buff Vitalists give up a lot, 1/2 bab, very limited spells known, etc. Why buff up an arguably tier 1 cleric to be better. YMMV

EDIT: spelling

[Psyren]

As a long time DM, I see where the need for this is. My wife loves to heal, does not matter what game. If you cant get a decent healer in that game she will move on.

Exactly - some folks just plain enjoy it. And you know what? Maybe after a few sessions playing healbot, they throw out a bless or prayer. and from there it's a fairly short hop to saying well why don't I try this flamestrike thing out, and before you know it they are prepping a holy word or two while they check the Bestiary for helpful summons. In short, they see they have this big list, realize they automatically know the whole thing and decide to take a few moments reading it. It's fine, you know?


My biggest issue with that changes anyone has suggested is that you really step on the toes of some class's like the vitalist, life oracle, and healer. I personally think a vitalist heals fine and can turn combat into AP+4 as baseline if everyone is optimized. But to heal and buff Vitalists give up a lot, 1/2 bab, very limited spells known, etc. Why buff up an arguably tier 1 cleric to be better. YMMV

I would require a class that wants the faster healing to take their more healing-focused archetype or option. Clerics would need True Healer, Oracles would need Life Mystery, Witches would need Hedge Witch, etc. That way you narrow the buffs down to the folks who do want to play healbot first and maybe do other things second.

[Coidzor]

As a long time DM, I see where the need for this is. My wife loves to heal, does not matter what game. If you cant get a decent healer in that game she will move on. I work with her tho, I feel blessed to have a gamer wife :smallsmile:

My biggest issue with that changes anyone has suggested is that you really step on the toes of some class's like the vitalist, life oracle, and healer. I personally think a vitalist heals fine and can turn combat into AP+4 as baseline if everyone is optimized. But to heal and buff Vitalists give up a lot, 1/2 bab, very limited spells known, etc. Why buff up an arguably tier 1 cleric to be better. YMMV

Aside from the Vitalist, due to being Psionic and not interacting with healing spells in the first place to my knowledge, most of the proposed changes would benefit the life oracle and (3.5)healer as much or more than the cleric or druid (and would also benefit bards, paladins, and rangers, IIRC). (Can't really find a PF Healer, though I haven't looked particularly hard) The main toe-stepping area I see is the OP's proposal of making them swift actions across the board, though I think there's probably a way to make a less-potent-than-standard-action-healing swift-action spell without toe-stepping, or at least, without serious toe-stepping.

The cleric isn't T1 because of its healing, though spontaneously converting to the cure line of spells as it becomes needed is nice, and, yes, becomes nicer if those spells are made nicer. Giving them the option to more relevantly heal means that if they do that, then they're that much less likely to do anything game-breaking that round.

Especially if swift action heals are kept as supplementary to standard action healing rather than becoming the new base action for healing spells.

Buffing the numbers on healing spells to parity shouldn't really be stealing the Vitalist's thunder though. :smallconfused: Buffing the numbers on healing spells to the superior position though, yeah, you don't want to do that while Vitalists are on the table unless you're also going to buff their numbers to some extent as well, though it sounds like their combination buff-healing shouldn't need too much of a nudge. I'm not very familiar with Vitalist, so I might be missing something there.

Similarly, Life Oracles' have several tricks which should require relatively little tweaking to continue to be relevant(especially their ability to do standard action healing as a swift-action if they so choose. provided that standard action healing isn't phased out...) if we're just talking about buffing the base numbers on healing spells. If the numbers are buffed to parity, then the life oracle's buff to numbers should push it into superiority; if the numbers are buffed to superiority, then the life oracle's buff to numbers potentially becomes less relevant, yes, or it means that instead of mostly healing they're fully healing.

Maybe this creates a need to tweak them to give more temp HP to the party (or give it for longer) to compensate for having their thunder stolen. There are several of the mysteries which do get made irrelevant or would need updating as a result of any serious change, and that's something to keep in mind, though reviewing the archetype... I'm not really seeing anything good enough to justify the base system continuing, either.

Could definitely help inform changes to the base healing spells though, to keep it in mind.

As for the healer class/archetype in PF... I'm not familiar with that one in the slightest, so I can't really comment. If you're talking about the merciful healer cleric archetype (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/cleric/archetypes/paizo---cleric-archetypes/merciful-healer), then the only thing that'd really interact would be if we made the cure line ranged by default, where it'd still gain more than it lost, since even without provoking AoOs to heal, if one would've been doing so without it, one might not be positioned as well as one would like. If you're talking about porting in the 3.5 Healer into PF, then the Healer should love the base healing spells being buffed. :smallconfused:

[caimbuel]

Vitalist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/classes/vitalist) is here. I am a firm believer in if its your game run it how you want. You will know if it works by your players coming back week after week. That said smaller changes may work better, Healing does scale pretty bad compared to damage, tho that is a hard coded mechanic that offence scales well and def is iffy at best. One house rule I did allow in the past was empower was +100% for heals and only +50% for damage. Hopefully some re-balance is coming in the new Unchained and Unplugged.

As always YMMV

[Dalebert]

I have to admit that on a purely conceptual basis, it makes sense for healing to not keep up with damage. Destruction should be easier than creation. Think about the effort put into building an tower versus slinging a boulder at the base and knocking it over into pieces. That doesn't mean it makes sense in game mechanics.

[Psyren]

I have to admit that on a purely conceptual basis, it makes sense for healing to not keep up with damage. Destruction should be easier than creation. Think about the effort put into building an tower versus slinging a boulder at the base and knocking it over into pieces. That doesn't mean it makes sense in game mechanics.

For turn-based games like D&D and Pokemon that does make sense. For real-time games it's often the opposite, because healing has to be strong enough to compensate for slowness in the player's reflexes. So I suppose it depends somewhat on the medium.

[Pex]

I have to admit that on a purely conceptual basis, it makes sense for healing to not keep up with damage. Destruction should be easier than creation. Think about the effort put into building an tower versus slinging a boulder at the base and knocking it over into pieces. That doesn't mean it makes sense in game mechanics.

It's not necessary for the amount of healing to equal or exceed the amount of damage. When I choose to heal a party member in combat my goal is not to get him to full. My goal is to keep him from reaching 0 hit points for as long as possible so he can still do stuff. I don't heal him right after his first amount of damage taken, with the exception of such an overwhelming amount he is very, very close to 0 which happens once in a while. I do other stuff, but I don't always need to nor always capable of getting the kill when another party could do it just as well or better at that particular moment if only he had at least 1 hit point.

[icefractal]

I have to admit that on a purely conceptual basis, it makes sense for healing to not keep up with damage. Destruction should be easier than creation. Think about the effort put into building an tower versus slinging a boulder at the base and knocking it over into pieces. That doesn't mean it makes sense in game mechanics.Counterpoint - supposedly, HP don't directly represent "meat points" - not every loss of HP means a direct injury, it could mean exhaustion, running out of luck, bruising, etc. So from the perspective that a warrior with 150 hp who's taken 100 damage might not have even been injured more than a few superficial cuts yet, why would it take such a massive spells to recover his energy and confidence? Especially when earlier in his travels, he could be brought back from death's door by merely a CMW?

Going along that line of thought, the Cure serious should really restore a percentage of HP, not a fixed number. Which might be a good way to do it.

[Slipperychicken]

Counterpoint - supposedly, HP don't directly represent "meat points" - not every loss of HP means a direct injury, it could mean exhaustion, running out of luck, bruising, etc. So from the perspective that a warrior with 150 hp who's taken 100 damage might not have even been injured more than a few superficial cuts yet, why would it take such a massive spells to recover his energy and confidence? Especially when earlier in his travels, he could be brought back from death's door by merely a CMW?

Going along that line of thought, the Cure serious should really restore a percentage of HP, not a fixed number. Which might be a good way to do it.

I sometimes want to subscribe to this in 3.5, but the terminology nixes it. When I "hit" my "target" and "deal lethal damage" with my "+1 Flesh-Grinding Shortsword", that doesn't mean I'm making the guy tired, or depleting his luck-meter, or giving him a slight abrasion or a bruise. It means that I rammed a 2ft long piece of metal into his reeking guts, spilling his blood and viscera all over my gauntlets and tabard, and the blade is now twisting itself around in the wound and causing enough needless suffering to give human rights groups an aneurysm. The target having loads of hit points just means that he's badass enough to remain conscious and fighting despite such grievous injuries which would surely kill lesser men.

Also, I think the injury thing more of an issue inherent with nonsensical hp-scaling and a lack of wound-effects, than it is with how healing spells work.

[Coidzor]

I sometimes want to subscribe to this in 3.5, but the terminology nixes it. When I "hit" my "target" and "deal lethal damage" with my "+1 Flesh-Grinding Shortsword", that doesn't mean I'm making the guy tired, or depleting his luck-meter, or giving him a slight abrasion or a bruise. It means that I rammed a 2ft long piece of metal into his reeking guts, spilling his blood and viscera all over my gauntlets and tabard, and the blade is now twisting itself around in the wound and causing enough needless suffering to give human rights groups an aneurysm. The target having loads of hit points just means that he's badass enough to remain conscious and fighting despite such grievous injuries which would surely kill lesser men.

Also, I think the injury thing more of an issue inherent with nonsensical hp-scaling and a lack of wound-effects, than it is with how healing spells work.

Err... Isn't the problem that the rules are all over the place with both being used so that HP is both representing how many swords one can fit into one's face before dying and also something more ephemeral depending upon type of healing and damage source?

[prufock]

I'd say it's game breaking.
In what way? It's still using up daily resources, so it's not like a character will be shooting off cure x wounds every round. Classes like Crusader in 3.5 heal and do damage with the same action. Other games have healing surge/second wind that allow you to heal as a swift action, etc etc. It's going to change the game, it certainly shouldn't break the game.


Why do they need to be relevant? Can someone answer that question first? Because I don't think i've ever heard an answer.
1. Irrelevancy is bad game design. Seriously. Who wants a character that has a bunch of abilities, skills, spells, feats, or powers that are irrelevant? If an ability is irrelevant, it may as well not exist in the game.
2. It's fun. Healing can be fun, yes, and it's a lot more fun when you aren't fighting a completely losing battle. It shouldn't be so strong that winning is guaranteed, nor should it be so weak that it's a wasted action; it should be balanced such that it contributes to winning the encounter.

*

With the ideas people are tossing around, has anyone considered removing the random part of the equation? Instead of 1d8+your level, how about a flat number (plus your level, if desired)? Or model it after Heal, and just heal a number per CL. Heal restores 10/level, so what if we had CSW at 8/level, CModW at 6/level, and CLW at 4/level, and CMinW at 2/level?

[Svata]

When I "hit" my "target" and "deal lethal damage" with my "+1 Flesh-Grinding Shortsword", that doesn't mean I'm making the guy tired, or depleting his luck-meter, or giving him a slight abrasion or a bruise. It means that I rammed a 2ft long piece of metal into his reeking guts, spilling his blood and viscera all over my gauntlets and tabard, and the blade is now twisting itself around in the wound and causing enough needless suffering to give human rights groups an aneurysm.

Quite frankly, that was beautiful.

[prufock]

When I "hit" my "target" and "deal lethal damage" with my "+1 Flesh-Grinding Shortsword", that doesn't mean I'm making the guy tired, or depleting his luck-meter, or giving him a slight abrasion or a bruise. It means that I rammed a 2ft long piece of metal into his reeking guts, spilling his blood and viscera all over my gauntlets and tabard, and the blade is now twisting itself around in the wound and causing enough needless suffering to give human rights groups an aneurysm. The target having loads of hit points just means that he's badass enough to remain conscious and fighting despite such grievous injuries which would surely kill lesser men.
Why, though? I would consider this a critical hit, and the description can be based on the amount of damage dealt. Not every "hit" is shoving your blade through his guts. Some hits just knock the wind out of your opponent, or rattle his brain, or slice through a muscle, or...

[Dalebert]

Why, though? I would consider this a critical hit, and the description can be based on the amount of damage dealt. Not every "hit" is shoving your blade through his guts. Some hits just knock the wind out of your opponent, or rattle his brain, or slice through a muscle, or...

Come on. Just humor him. You know the old saying--"Aim for the stars and you might just hit the moon."

[Andreaz]

It's not necessary for the amount of healing to equal or exceed the amount of damage. When I choose to heal a party member in combat my goal is not to get him to full. My goal is to keep him from reaching 0 hit points for as long as possible so he can still do stuff. I don't heal him right after his first amount of damage taken, with the exception of such an overwhelming amount he is very, very close to 0 which happens once in a while. I do other stuff, but I don't always need to nor always capable of getting the kill when another party could do it just as well or better at that particular moment if only he had at least 1 hit point.That's the thing, though... If that healing doesn't buy your friend more than one turn, odds are you'd be better off doing that offensive action on your own. Same number of offensive actions taken, same or lesser spell toll, same conclusion to the fight.

Since your first reply to "healing doesn't win combats" felt rather brash, i'll try to clarify what I believe (and believe agrees with what the bulbasaur pal there said): Healing alone does nothing. Watching you two trade words it became clear both of you were doing the exact same thing: fighting the fight while using big heals whenever big heals were called for. Both of you rejected the ideas of "never healing" and "only healing" as suicidal approaches, even.

And that's fine! Big heals are unquestionably useful, necessary at times!
But the big heals don't begin until you get into the later mass heals, Heal and their ilk. And even then we can still come up with other actions that are on a similar effectiveness.
So, uh, please don't fight?

Back to the OP: Making all Cure spells(but not magical completion Cure items) swift won't break the game. It'll help a good deal since one can now both swing a hammer and heal the adjacent pal, but... you're still burning a spell slot on Cure. And we only have so many spells to burn per day! A prolonged fight(or series of fights) will barely change by making swift Cures.

If you really want to viabilize the little heals like Devoted Spirit does (which I thoroughly approve), make a class feat(ure) that allows you to burn healing resources with extreme efficiency as a rider effect. Maybe something like "at the beginning of the fight choose one single-target Cure spell of [level. second highest? 1 spell level per four caster levels?] you can cast. Every time you [trigger action], that spell is cast on nearby allies (maybe at half potency). You only spend one such cure spell no matter how many times this happens."

Trigger actions may be things like a full attack, or casting a buff on your allies. (by default you'd only get one)

So a more fighty cleric would heal nearby allies (5 feet / 4 levels?) every time he wails on the enemy.
A frailer cleric would heal all allies buffed when he casts a buff.
A blasty cleric could heal allies proportionally to whoever his last flame strike scorched.

And of course a wounding counterpart could always be used! Do the same for Inflict!

[Dalebert]

Back to the OP: Making all Cure spells(but not magical completion Cure items) swift won't break the game. It'll help a good deal since one can now both swing a hammer and heal the adjacent pal, but... you're still burning a spell slot on Cure. And we only have so many spells to burn per day! A prolonged fight(or series of fights) will barely change by making swift Cures.


Agreed. I told the DM last night that I'm very unlikely to actually prepare cures spells even with the house rule. If I had a cleric's substitute as needed ability I might use them occasionally.

[Coidzor]

Agreed. I told the DM last night that I'm very unlikely to actually prepare cures spells even with the house rule. If I had a cleric's substitute as needed ability I might use them occasionally.

It's probably not too unbalancing if it was extended to all prepared casters that can cast the cure line of spells. I mean, in Pathfinder that's, what Druids, Rangers, and Paladins that would gain the ability to trade out a spell for a Cure/healing spell? In 3.5 it's a great boon to the Healer base class which had that component overlooked, and the most powerful class added to the mix of those that would benefit would be Ur-Priest.

Some prereqs *might* need rejiggering as a result, but there's nothing too earth-shattering that requires being able to spontaneously cast or convert spells into cure spells AFAIK.

I suppose there'd be a potential thematic issue with negative energy channeling clerics getting access to both spontaneous inflict and cure and then having to either live with that or give all clerics spontaneous inflict and cure or stick all clerics with spontaneous cure only or spontaneous cure and inflict but only for healing purposes.

[Psyren]

I sometimes want to subscribe to this in 3.5, but the terminology nixes it. When I "hit" my "target" and "deal lethal damage" with my "+1 Flesh-Grinding Shortsword", that doesn't mean I'm making the guy tired, or depleting his luck-meter, or giving him a slight abrasion or a bruise. It means that I rammed a 2ft long piece of metal into his reeking guts, spilling his blood and viscera all over my gauntlets and tabard, and the blade is now twisting itself around in the wound and causing enough needless suffering to give human rights groups an aneurysm. The target having loads of hit points just means that he's badass enough to remain conscious and fighting despite such grievous injuries which would surely kill lesser men.

Also, I think the injury thing more of an issue inherent with nonsensical hp-scaling and a lack of wound-effects, than it is with how healing spells work.

This was hilarious, kudos :smallbiggrin:

[Dalebert]

It's probably not too unbalancing if it was extended to all prepared casters that can cast the cure line of spells. I mean, in Pathfinder that's, what Druids, Rangers, and Paladins that would gain the ability to trade out a spell for a Cure/healing spell?

My knee-jerk response to that was "Wait, that would make clerics less powerful, relatively speaking" but then I was like "Oh, that's a GOOD thing." Clerics are fracking obnoxious. They know all their spells and never have to worry about losing them due to a lost or destroyed spellbook or familiar. They get more spells per day than a wizard through domains (which adds yet more to spells known). They can wear armor and cast spells and get good hit points. They get spontaneous cures and energy channeling which allow AoE healing or controlling AND healing undead (even better, IMHO). Anything that knocks them down a peg is okay in my book.

Of course, one of my favorite characters of all time was a (cloistered) cleric, so he was kind of like a wizard who could wear armor AND had lots of skill points.

[Psyren]

It's probably not too unbalancing if it was extended to all prepared casters that can cast the cure line of spells. I mean, in Pathfinder that's, what Druids, Rangers, and Paladins that would gain the ability to trade out a spell for a Cure/healing spell?

You forgot Witches and Alchemists - the former can also spontaneously cure using the Hedge Witch archetype. The latter can spontaneously cure in reverse with the Chirurgeon archetype - namely, they can prepare all their extracts as cures, but swap them out for other extracts throughout the day as needed.