4E Paladin Question

[Katana_Geldar]

I recently picked up Divine Power and one of the utility prayers had me confuzzled.

Virtue, it gives you temp hitpoints and use a healing surge. Why not just use a regular healing surge?

[Hashmir]

I don't know 4e, but it sounds like it gives you the hit points in advance -- rather than having to use it after you take damage. Lets you get your healing out of the way?

[Yoren]

While you get a lot of healing surges as a paladin, you can only use a healing surge when either a power allows you to or you use your second wind. So basically the power allows you another opportunity to use a healing surge in an encounter (besides your second wind).

[CorvidMP]

Simple you can only use a healing surge once per encounter by spending a standard action, its and action called second wind.

So if A-you allready burned your second wind for that fight and/or b- you want to attack as well as heal that round that power probably makes a lot of sense

[Sir Homeslice]

I recently picked up Divine Power and one of the utility prayers had me confuzzled.

Virtue, it gives you temp hitpoints and use a healing surge. Why not just use a regular healing surge?

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

[Katana_Geldar]

And I thought second winds and healing surges were slightly different

[Kurald Galain]

And I thought second winds and healing surges were slightly different

They are. Second wind is a special combat action that you can use once per encounter, that has the effect of letting you spend a healing surge. Various other things (e.g. Healing Word) also let you spend a healing surge.

[Not Five]

They are.

It's like this:

As a paladin, you start each day with a whole bunch of healing surges. Each surge is worth a quarter of your max HP. When you rest, you can spend any number of these healing surges you want.

While in combat, though, you rarely have time to spend five minutes resting and praying and bandaging your wounds, and so you can't spend healing surges just whenever you want to. Every player character has an ability called Second Wind, which they can use once per encounter as a standard action; that lets them spend one surge.

But people usually lose more than a quarter of their max HP in a given encounter, and if that happens they have no way to get them back. They can use their second wind to spend one surge, but after that they have a bunch of surges and no way to turn them into the HP which could keep them alive. If you're bleeding out on the ground and you've already used your Second Wind, it won't matter how many surges you have.

That's where healing powers come in. The little +1d6 a cleric's Healing Word provides (for example) isn't usually the important part: the important part is letting the target spend one of their surges.

[DMfromTheAbyss]

Except with the paladins lay on hands ability they can heal themeselves in combat.

Though it takes a turn away from smiting.. so it's apparently a way to buff before the fight to save a few moments during the fight.

[Kylarra]

Except with the paladins lay on hands ability they can heal themeselves in combat.

Though it takes a turn away from smiting.. so it's apparently a way to buff before the fight to save a few moments during the fight.

LoH is a minor action, so it doesn't take a turn away from smiting. The virtue thing is nice because of: a, it's hitpoints before you need them, saving you precious LoH uses and b, virtuous recovery feat, giving you resist all on the same turn you burn a surge, and c of course in the same vein as a, it's an encounter power so you can cheerfully pre-heal during each encounter without using limited LoH uses.

[nightwyrm]

Another thing is that temp hps do not count towards bloodied status. So if you like being bloodied (ie. a dragonborn) but dislike actually being half way to death, you grab some temp hps.

[kieza]

As others have said, it's essentially a way to front-load your healing. If you know ahead of time that you're going into a tough fight, you use Virtue to effectively start with +25% hitpoints. It just gives a little more damage capacity before the cleric has to start healing you.