Quote Originally Posted by Troacctid View Post
The Healer might have a primarily defensive role, but at least it actually has the tools to perform that role fairly effectively without running out of gas after two rounds, and it scales up to become more versatile later on. Also, Sanctified spells can provide some more proactive options, like diamond spray, and hammer of whatsit, and that one light spell that damages and blinds evil creatures, I don't know, I'm AFB, you know the one I'm talking about.
I know the sanctified spells. Again, not especially pertinent, because they push the healer high enough that them being better than the adept does not make the adept tier five.
Try running an Adept through some encounters, especially at lower levels, and you'll quickly run into problems because you simply don't have enough to do with your actions. I've only played them as a DM, but their typical play pattern tends to be either "Unload all your spells in one encounter because you're an NPC and you only have one encounter per day" or "Conserve resources by only casting one spell per combat, maybe two if the second one is 1st level, and then fire a crossbow for the rest of the fight." Sure, you can unload a lightning bolt or scorching ray...once. And then you're spent. It's not a role you can play on a consistent basis. Maybe you look okay in one encounter, but average out your performance over four encounters and it looks a lot less impressive.
The better spells are pretty decent on a one per encounter basis. More web than scorching ray, because unloading a single blasting spell in a combat tends to be sad. That you do have what is possibly the worst nova in existence is nice though. I don't think it's impressive, in any case, but it's not awful either. You're losing endurance but gaining surprising variety and some meaningful power.