Swift action cure spells -- good houserule?

[Elves]

Cure spells aren't practical to use in combat. Would they be more balanced if they were swift action casts? "Heal" would still be standard action.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Maybe do either swift or move? That way, you could do up to 3/round, since cure spells don't heal that much.

[CharonsHelper]

Cure spells aren't practical to use in combat. Would they be more balanced if they were swift action casts? "Heal" would still be standard action.

They aren't really intended to be in-combat spells. If they were a swift action, clerics & druids would only be THAT MUCH MORE powerful, and AC would matter that much less.

[heavyfuel]

They aren't really intended to be in-combat spells. If they were a swift action, clerics & druids would only be THAT MUCH MORE powerful, and AC would matter that much less.

They aren't?

To say they aren't effective as in-combat spells is one thing, to say designers didn't intend them to be used in combat is another.

[Ramza00]

Yes good houserule.

Most later splats, pathfinder, 3rd party both focus on making cure spells be greater range, faster action time, and / or affect multiple allies with the same low level spell.

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Only let the Cure line be swift action (not heal and status removing.) Yes this powers up druids, clerics, bards, etc but it is still not the most optimal use of spell slots or action times for Cleric, Druid, Bard, etc. Thus you are not really powering up those classes you are instead making things more consistent for very strong classes already. You have several good options not just 1 or 2. (Aka tier 2 vs 1 as an idea, except healing is not enough to bump up a class to tier 1 for you need to be good at half a dozen things to be tier 1 and adding 1 more thing is not enough.)

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Edit: One thing I seen before is do something like this. (Based off Channeled spells such as Channeled Pyroburst in PHB2 but there are also other similar spells in other books)

1st level Cure Light WOund
If you cast this spell as a swift action, it heals 1d6 points of damage plus 1/2 per caster level (max +5)
If you cast this spell as a standard action, it heals 1d8 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5)
If you cast this spell as a full-round action, it heals 1d10 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5)
If you spend 2 rounds casting this spell, it heals 1d12 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5) and any excess healing is granted as temp hit points up to half your hit dice. These temp hitpoints last up to 1 minute and do not stack with other temp hitpoints.

[Anthrowhale]

The feat 'Battle Blessing' does this for paladin cure spells.

[Elves]

Edit: One thing I seen before is do something like this. (Based off Channeled spells such as Channeled Pyroburst in PHB2 but there are also other similar spells in other books)

1st level Cure Light WOund
If you cast this spell as a swift action, it heals 1d6 points of damage plus 1/2 per caster level (max +5)
If you cast this spell as a standard action, it heals 1d8 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5)
If you cast this spell as a full-round action, it heals 1d10 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5)
If you spend 2 rounds casting this spell, it heals 1d12 points of damage plus 1 per caster level (max +5) and any excess healing is granted as temp hit points up to half your hit dice. These temp hitpoints last up to 1 minute and do not stack with other temp hitpoints.
To stay simple, perhaps standard or FRA maximize.

[heavyfuel]

I do think cure (and inflict) spells are "problematic" in that they usually don't do nearly enough to justify their action cost but they can be used effectively.

If you've never seen a clutch Cure Wounds then you probably haven't played with a decent Cleric. It's definitely not something that happens every fight, but it does happen. I'm currently playing a Cleric and by level 3 this has happened twice.

As such, Cure spells are actually pretty balanced in the sense that they aren't the best solution all the time, but sometimes can be just what the Cleric ordered. This isn't so great for, say, a Druid that needs to actually prepare them, but since Clerics can cast them spontaneously, then they're a useful tool in the Cleric's ginormous toolbelt.

If you want to make Cure spells useable more often, I don't think "auto-quicken" is the way to go. I'd go with "auto-maximize" instead.

There's still the high action cost, but at least the payoff is a guaranteed succees when you need some in-combat healing. No more rolling 1s when you needed at least 4s.

This change also makes potions less useless, which is great for bringing the healer from the brink of death with a CLW potion.

[Troacctid]

I agree with heavyfuel. I think cure spells could stand to have a little more power, but quickening is more than they need.

Rather than maximizing them, though, I'd replace 1d8 per spell level with 2d6 per spell level. The math is similar and it's more consistent, but you get to retain some randomness, which makes it more satisfying to resolve.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

They aren't really intended to be in-combat spells. If they were a swift action, clerics & druids would only be THAT MUCH MORE powerful, and AC would matter that much less.Wait; you think having a cleric or druid burning through their spell slots like kindling to heal makes them more powerful?

[Hiro Quester]

Casting a cure spell in combat is about action economy. There is usually something better a cleric can do with their standard action than cast a cure wounds spell. You are giving up that thing, to enable an ally to act. That is sometimes worth it when the ally is near death.

Making it a swift action undermines that action economy trade. The cleric could use a swift action each round to cure some wounds, as well as casting their standard action spell. This makes whether to heal in combat only a matter of spells per day resource use (unless you have a lot of swift action or quickened spells to cast).

That also makes it easy for your allies to expect to stay relatively healed all thought the combat. They will take that for granted.

Being able to refuse healing to dismiss the outsider or turn a bunch of undead, is an easy case to make to your ally.

Refusing to covert a Bull's strength into a swift action cure moderate wounds spell because you want to save it for buffing the fighter later (better use of resources) isn't going to be accepted as easily by the wizard who just took a fireball to the face.

[heavyfuel]

Wait; you think having a cleric or druid burning through their spell slots like kindling to heal makes them more powerful?

How is giving them more options making them weaker, exactly?:smallconfused:

No one is suggesting forcing a Cleric or Druid to cast these spells

[Elves]

If you've never seen a clutch Cure Wounds then you probably haven't played with a decent Cleric. It's definitely not something that happens every fight, but it does happen. I'm currently playing a Cleric and by level 3 this has happened twice.

If you want to make Cure spells useable more often, I don't think "auto-quicken" is the way to go. I'd go with "auto-maximize" instead.

For a healer-type cleric you probably want them to have a small swift action heal they can use every round, a moderate value standard action "clutch" heal, and then the limited-use big guns. Spontaneous cure could fill either of the first 2 roles depending on how you tune them. I can see the argument for boosting their value slightly and having them be intended for clutch rather than genuine point for point damage offset. Though at least for a healing focused character you should probably then also give a small swift action at-will heal.

[heavyfuel]

For a healer-type cleric you probably want them to have a small swift action heal they can use every round, a moderate value standard action "clutch" heal, and then the limited-use big guns.

Do I?

Being able to tank some hits is what HP and out-of-combat healing are for. Why exactly does the healer need some sort of small swift action heal every round?

Plus, as I've said before, I don't exactly consider Cure spells to be a "small heal".

[Troacctid]

If you're ECL 4 and you're healing an average of 13 damage with cure moderate wounds, that's, like, half your HP! That's a lot!

[Elves]

This makes whether to heal in combat only a matter of spells per day resource use (unless you have a lot of swift action or quickened spells to cast).
If you've already metered it with per-day resources, why also meter it with a harsh action tradeoff? As long as you prevent problematic novas, seems redundant to do both.



You are giving up that thing, to enable an ally to act.

Every class should bring power through surplus as well as power through optionality. Standard action heal is optionality (put the hp differential from your turn into +ally instead of -enemy). Swift action is the surplus.


Being able to tank some hits is what HP and out-of-combat healing are for. Why exactly does the healer need some sort of small swift action heal every round?
If the standard action heal is meant to be situational ("clutch"), then if their job is to be a healer you want to give them a healing ability they will use regularly. Also see what I said @Hiro. It also makes the numbers more interesting if you have a small stream of healing on the side. Note I'm only saying this for healing focused characters.


If you're ECL 4 and you're healing an average of 13 damage with cure moderate wounds, that's, like, half your HP! That's a lot!
Power attacks that hit are doing 21 at that level (2d6/6 str/8 PA), but yeah, it's certainly a less pronounced difference at low levels.

[CharonsHelper]

Power attacks that hit are doing 21 at that level (2d6/6 str/8 PA), but yeah, it's certainly a less pronounced difference at low levels.

IF they hit. If you're talking 3.5, going two-handed and giving up all of your BAB for more damage means that you'll likely miss more often than not.

You seem to want healers to work like they do in MMOs - where they can largely keep up with damage dealt if they do their job. That's simply not how D&D (or any TTRPG I've seen) is designed to work.

[heavyfuel]

If the standard action heal is meant to be situational ("clutch"), then if their job is to be a healer you want to give them a healing ability they will use regularly.


Power attacks that hit are doing 21 at that level (2d6/6 str/8 PA), but yeah, it's certainly a less pronounced difference at low levels.

Yeah, but Clerics aren't only healers. They're probably the strongest class in the entire game.

If a player wants to play a Cleric as a healer, then make this an expensive ACF. Say they lose a domain and Turn/Rebuke Undead for auto-quicken any Cure spell or something. As a blanket houserule for all cure spells this is definitely too strong.

As for PA dealing 21 dmg, that's okay, because to achieve that, the NPC will have to miss out on chance to hit. Trying to hit an AC 20 PC with only +5 bonus (+4 str and MW weapon) means you only deal 21 damage 30% of the time, an average of about 7 DPR when you account for crits.

The Cleric can definitely out-heal that if they are so inclined.

[gijoemike]

Wait; you think having a cleric or druid burning through their spell slots like kindling to heal makes them more powerful?

No, giving the additional power and option to do this without cost makes them more powerful. Dropping a Quickened Cure Serious to save a comrade then full round power attack the creature(s) that dropped them is very powerful indeed. Before if they failed to down a baddie the baddie could kill the downed ally. Now the cleric can save them in that one round and attack everything. That makes the fighter feel even more worthless than he already is.

The classic situation of "do you let your ally bleed a point of damage at the end of the round and attack the creature or do you heal them/stop bleeding" becomes irrelevant. Clerics can do both anyway, but now they would have it for FREE.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Maybe have it as a move action instead of standard or swift. That way you can't full attack and cast in the same round, but you can have use two move actions in the same round.

[Miss Disaster]

Keep in mind, Pathfinder has a way for any character to become a crazy-effective Healbot via a simple Full-Round Action using the Healer's Hands feat .... no spells at all. The feat is predicated on using your build resources to crank up your Heal skill as high as possible. Which is easy to do in PF - and definitely a lot easier to do than in 3.5. There's some accompanying feats & traits that help add some synergy to Healer's Hands healing hoopla. But they're not super-necessary.

[CharonsHelper]

Maybe have it as a move action instead of standard or swift. That way you can't full attack and cast in the same round, but you can have use two move actions in the same round.

Which would also change nothing for levels 1-7.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Which would also change nothing for levels 1-7.I'm pretty sure being able to cast two cure spells in one round is a pretty big change.

[CharonsHelper]

I'm pretty sure being able to cast two cure spells in one round is a pretty big change.

Sorry - I meant move instead of swift in lowering the power of the faster heal by not allowing full attacks.

[Psyren]

I agree with heavyfuel. I think cure spells could stand to have a little more power, but quickening is more than they need.

Rather than maximizing them, though, I'd replace 1d8 per spell level with 2d6 per spell level. The math is similar and it's more consistent, but you get to retain some randomness, which makes it more satisfying to resolve.

We do x(1d4+4) instead of xd8.

I think speeding them up in an option but should cost some build resource like feats, archetype, item or PrC.

[Elves]

The classic situation of "do you let your ally bleed a point of damage at the end of the round and attack the creature or do you heal them/stop bleeding" becomes irrelevant.
This almost never happens past the first few levels because the range of negative hp is so small.


Yeah, but Clerics aren't only healers. They're probably the strongest class in the entire game.
But not because of their cure spells. Nerf the OP parts, improve function for the non-OP parts where called for. In the case of the PHB cleric, yes, I could see this as an ACF for turn undead. My earlier reply to you was suggesting a different setup where cures stay standard action and the cleric gets a smaller-value swift action heal ability.


As for PA dealing 21 dmg, that's okay, because to achieve that, the NPC will have to miss out on chance to hit. Trying to hit an AC 20 PC with only +5 bonus (+4 str and MW weapon) means you only deal 21 damage 30% of the time, an average of about 7 DPR when you account for crits.
Plus BAB. The more important figure is that it equals the greatsword damage with no PA, which is fine. The game is tuned for low levels, but the numbers diverge as you get higher.

[heavyfuel]

But not because of their cure spells. Nerf the OP parts, improve function for the non-OP parts where called for. In the case of the PHB cleric, yes, I could see this as an ACF for turn undead. My earlier reply to you was suggesting a different setup where cures stay standard action and the cleric gets a smaller-value swift action heal ability.


Plus BAB. The more important figure is that it equals the greatsword damage with no PA, which is fine. The game is tuned for low levels, but the numbers diverge as you get higher.

I wonder how you intend to nerf the OP parts without carefully going over each the 1000 spells in the Cleric's list and nerfing each powerful spell individually.

No, not "plus BAB". You sacrificed your BAB in order to use Power Attack, remember?

[Elves]

I wonder how you intend to nerf the OP parts without carefully going over each the 1000 spells in the Cleric's list and nerfing each powerful spell individually.
There are a few worst offenders. Nerfing them goes a long way. But absolutely, they shouldn't get automatic access to so many spells. The point is that when a class is OP you should put the blame in the right place and not be averse to improving it where reasonable (like giving a wizard class features).


No, not "plus BAB". You sacrificed your BAB in order to use Power Attack, remember?
And in a couple levels with shock trooper, wraithstrike, iteratives and everything else that falls apart. It has to in order to keep pace with SOLs. That could be an argument for giving swift action cures as a mid level class feature to keep them relevant.

[heavyfuel]

And in a couple levels with shock trooper, wraithstrike, iteratives and everything else that falls apart. It has to in order to keep pace with SOLs. That could be an argument for giving swift action cures as a mid level class feature to keep them relevant.

So, is everyone of your NPCs uberchargers with stat arrays far above the standard?

You can rationalize all you want. You're still overbuffing a class that needs no buffs and you're removing nuance and strategy from the game.

[sreservoir]

In a lot of groups, this is likely to be a roundabout nerf to the cleric's spells/day due to this effect:


That also makes it easy for your allies to expect to stay relatively healed all thought the combat. They will take that for granted.

Being able to refuse healing to dismiss the outsider or turn a bunch of undead, is an easy case to make to your ally.

Refusing to covert a Bull's strength into a swift action cure moderate wounds spell because you want to save it for buffing the fighter later (better use of resources) isn't going to be accepted as easily by the wizard who just took a fireball to the face.

[Elves]

a class that needs no buffs
This line always comes up in relation to the T1s. It doesn't hold up. Take the cleric, sor and wiz. These classes "need no buffs", but they become better designed and more functional classes if filled in with class features. I'm not even necessarily arguing that swift cures are the way to go, but the fact that something is overpowered on aggregate doesn't mean you should refuse to buff underpowered options, it means you should nerf the overpowered ones.


you're removing nuance and strategy from the game.
At a certain point it stops being nuanced and just becomes an underpowered option that's rarely worth using. But you seem to have missed that I agreed with you, there should be "tactical choice" standard action healing. I added that there should also be smaller-value swift action healing to make combat healing more feasible as a default strategy for a healing-focused character. The cure spells could fill either role depending on how they're tuned.

[Morty_Jhones]

well everyone seems to on the line that simply changing the spell to a swift action would make it MEGA powerfull cuss then the cleric would get 2 spells...

THIS IS WRONG

page 1 of the spell casting rulles spell caster may only cast ONE spell per round, yes there are feats that alow some extra/outliyers.

It would be OP becuss it would alow a cleric to get someone up from near death and still crump heads, affectivly making healing a constant anoyance which it can be already.

Also you would be making the clerics life a missery.. don't forget monsters have clerics too they know how powerfull this swift healing is and the fool has to be in range to do it. EVERY intelagent monster would target the party cleric. Meaning that at the end of the 1st round the party cleric would be dead or bleading out on the floor.

[Thac0 Redeye]

Our group just started using this house rule. Our cleric is actually a Cleric/wizard Mystic Theurge. We had come to the situation where no one wanted to be the cleric because it always turned into a walking band aid, and was not fun to play. the main stipulations were only cure light - serious can be cast as swift, no restoration or any thing like that. We also included an extra spell allowed at each level that must be prepared as the healing conj spell. Also the spell cannot be enhanced by any form. (meta-magic or class features like pelor servant PrC stuff). Yes the bad guys use it too. It has not hurt our game at all. we started at level 1 and now are around level 12. As a matter of fact my character just died. So it's not a game breaker. The cleric still has to be close enough to cast the spell.

[sleepyphoenixx]

There is already a swift action (immediate even) healing spell, Close Wounds (SpC).
Sure, the healing is absolutely pitiful, but you can boost that with feats and gear if you're really committed to wasting your swift actions on healing instead of doing something productive with them (no one does this).
Or you could just use Delay Death (SpC) which is also an immediate action spell. And doesn't get you trapped in the downward spiral of trying to keep up with enemy damage.

But if your party turns out to really need healing all the damn time - as in in-combat healing, not stuff that can be covered by a wand of CLW/Lesser Vigor and Healing Belts - i'd suggest investing in a Healing Nodules plant graft (MoE) as a party - 1 free "potion" of CSW/hour, forever.
And at least with this one your injury-prone friends waste their own actions instead of yours, leaving you free to cast spells that actually deal with the enemy.

Because let's be honest here, chances are that the need for any in-combat cure spell you cast could've not only been avoided if you'd used the same spell slot on a buff, summon or BFC instead, it would've probably been a more efficient use of your action.