Being a caster on short notice

[Kazyan]

The party's wizard and cleric both died last session while another of the other players was already dead and rolling up something new. The replacements for our three dead party members are A) a warblade totally-not-an-ubercharger, B) a tashalatora psychic warrior, and C) a hexblade. If I'm remembering this all correctly, anyway. The other member of the party is an unoptimized paladin that is by far the best roleplayer of the group, something something Stormwind, and one of the only two remaining members of the original party.

The other is me, an Illumian Ranger 6/Chameleon 1, and the DM has basically told me outright that I need to use the Divine Focus due to our lack of a real divine caster. I have also noticed that we will not have a real arcane caster, either.

Filling in is way over my capacity, but it looks like this will be falling on me. How do I keep us* alive until Chameleon starts really kicking in? Ideas for what to do when I get the floating Bonus Feat next level are welcome, too.

*Myself and the paladin, mostly.

[WeaselGuy]

Well, ideally, you shouldn't have to be pigeonholed into a role that you either a) don't want to or b) are unable to fill. The DM should, consequentially, either work around the group composition, or let one of the 3 rerolling party members know that it would behoove them to fill one of the requisite roles.

All that being said, as a Ranger 6/Chameleon 1, I don't really know of much you can do in terms of powerful spellcasting. And with regards to the floating feat, it's usually utilized for crafting purposes, not that that will help out in this case. Maybe Practiced Spellcaster, to increase your save DCs/spell durations?

[Sliver]

You never need a divine caster. If your UMD is high enough, you can simply pick up wands of lesser vigor, which should be well within your reach at this level. You'll never be able to do in-combat healing anyway, so the 11hp a pop, for 550hp per 750gp wand, is going to cover your most basic needs.

Healing belts and eternal wands can also be a decent investment if you really want to have some renewable healing. A wand of lesser restoration, eternal or otherwise, can also fill most of what you need from that.

If the DM wants the divine caster role to be filled, hire a cohort.

[DMVerdandi]

Also, you should be using the divine focus anyway.

You get ALL DIVINE SPELLS. without needing a book, having arcane spell failure, or anything like that.
That means all domain spells, all those tasty spells from classes that no one remembers, all of it.

BUT, you should not be a heal-bot.
Only if you want to. If the DM want's that, as said, he can play a healer cohort.

[Segev]

With only one level of Chameleon, you're not going to be filling in for any full casters yet.

That said, the wand of lesser vigor is an excellent start. Also get everybody to invest in a Healing Belt (750 gp, from the Magic Item Compendium); this will make for usable (if not spectacular) in-combat healing.

Do confiscate your dead wizard's spellbook, if you can. You'll want to make your own out of it in downtime, for use with Arcane Focus. You can also sell/trade/give it to the next wizard to join your party.

One silly, silly thing you could do is devote your floating feat to Leadership, at least temporarily, and pick up a follower who is either a divine or arcane caster.

And if you'd rather not deal with the implications of temporary Leadership feats, there's always the simple option of hiring a hireling. Pay them to stand in the back and provide buff spells and healing. Give them protective gear and let them stay safely out of combat, themselves.