Healing in PFS play


Pathfinder Society

51 to 92 of 92 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Silver Crusade 3/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Dorothy Lindman wrote:


Wait--you've encountered other players who won't use your wands on you out of combat?

One dynamic I've seen is that healers are often treated as sidekicks or porters, not characters in their own right. Combined with the tendency of new players to get handed the healer role, you end up with an attitude of "Just stand there and come heal me when I tell you to." It irks me when players constantly refer to a "healbot" or "Kyrabot"--especially when they then complain that they don't see any healers around. (Hm...why might that be, do you think?)

When we're running demos, anytime I hear a player sigh and say, "OK, I guess I'll have to play the healer", I ask the GM to run the demo with the highest number of low HP undead. Sure, Kyra can heal, but have you actually checked her stats to harm undead? She kicks ass.

My wand, my charges, party is getting/has gotten MAULED, nearly having to throw wadded up paper at the person who could USE said wand to get them to use it.

'Healer' "Oh, but I don't want to waste your charges!"

Me: "That's what they are THERE for."

'Healer' "uhhhhhh."

It's happened more than once with different people. Much to the exasperation of not only myself and some of the party members, but also the GM running.

Yeah, that's ridiculous. I've never seen that before either.

Locally, it is pretty standard that everyone brings there own wands, scrolls, etc. We pass gear all around the table at the beginning of the game.

"Here, take my wand of protection from evil. I can't use it, but I got it the last time I was magically captivated."

"I have a wand of mage armor if any monks, wizards, sorcerers, or witches here want a hit off of it."

"Here's a scroll of see invisibility." I can't cast that spell, but if you take it and we need it, you can just point me in the right direction.

We usually argue over whose wand will get used after every combat encounter ("No, use mine; I insist!" "But I'm Silver Crusade, I want to use my healing resources on you." "Here, I have a wand of infernal healing. It is more efficient." "No, use mine!"...)

And most of us have at least one level in a class that can use some kind of healing wand. Last night, I was the only one at the table who couldn't use a wand, and I think that is my only character like that.


The wand of CLW (or Infernal Healing) is normally my first prestige Item.
Then some armor and Weapon upgrades before I have the fame to buy the Cloak of resistance.

CLW, Infernal Healing, Endure Elements, Mage Armor. These are pretty much standard items.(well, paladins normally avoid the Inf Heal for obvious reasons).

But the items are of course shared with the party, since they make it easier to do the mission. Not sharing these items is nuts imo.

The Exchange 5/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm trying out a new wand for healing... At low levels a wand of Goodberries. Net healing per charge is only 2d4, but it comes in one HP units. So it'll be great to "top off" - being able to heal up that last HP or two without using an entire wand charge. No "wasted healing".

It wont be as useful as we level up, with a limit of 8 HP healing per PC per day - but then I'll still be using it to "top off" HP, and each berry is a "full meal"! I can see using it go get past encounters with "hungry monsters" - toss a few berries in it's mouth and it's not "hungry" any more!

Anyway - not a total replacement for a CLW wand, but useful in it's own way.... and the RP possibilities!

Halfling PC:"each berry is a full meal... how many have you had this morning? Five for me..."
Goblin PC:"BURP! ... 10 I think. Not heal me any more, but not so hungry right now..."

Silver Crusade 3/5

That's funny, nosig! I might steal that from you.

Edit: the downside is that the spell says the target is 2d4 freshly picked berries. I see potential for unwanted table variation here.

Dataphiles 3/5

In a game last night we had a party with a Paladin(me), 1 cleric, 1 cleric/sorc, a druid, and a rogue with a plus 18 UMD. It was awesome. Damage was never an issue, and everybody was capable of providing their own healing.

I would avoid people who refuse to use your resources to help you(and therefore the party)

The Exchange 5/5

is this thread about there being...

a) a shortage of PCs that can use/do healing?
b) a shortage of PCs that are "dedicated Healers (captial "H")?
c) the fact that there are some "socially challanged players" in our games?

if it's a or b, then I am reminded of other times...

I have heard someone commenting that "there are no Arcane casters in our area!"...

He did this at a table with his back to another table where a Wizard, two bards and a Summoner were using the Summoners Eidolon as the tank, 'cause they didn't have a PC to fill that need...

But threads talking about a lack of XXX type characters always make me think of that.

(sorry - just needed to say that. Not real helpful I guess...)

Shadow Lodge 4/5

I would also like to point out, somewhat heartlessly, there are the rare times that you may have PCs who don't contribute enough in combat to be worth spending an action on healing when they're downed. A rare occurrence to be certain, but between using an action to bolster/support/flank with a still-standing 2HW raging power attacking barbarian or heal a small-sized TWF rogue who's been missing regularly, I'm choosing the barbarian unless the rogue is going to -CON next round. On the flip side of the coin, I've been the character that's gone down and had to talk the healer out of healing me so they could go and finish the fight by attacking/flanking/etc.

The Exchange 5/5

It seems like we are talking about different intances of healing.

"Healing in Combat" and "Healing after/between Combat."

I have encountered (more often on the boards than in person) judges who will have the monsters switch to killing downed PCs if the players use "Healing in Combat". Stating that the monster is intellagent enough to know that the PC needs to be dead or the healing will stand him back up. In this case, it is NOT an advantage to have a "Combat Medic" - as the monsters will focus fire, even after a PC drops. (shooting them when they are down).

just something else to think about....

Grand Lodge *

My cleric is not a dedicated healer, but Seaweed does have a lot of channel bursts. At 5th level my -2 is the only character I have in tier 1-5 so I get to play with a lot of firsties. The channel comes in very handy when you see two players with pale faces looking at their downed characters and I don't have to choose between them.

It is usually amusing when that same burst hits the mooks they dropped before falling themselves.*

It is much less amusing when people at the table yell/grumble at me for not having selective channeling (not dedicated healer).

*Rarely brings a mook back up, but GMs seem to stop tracking hp below 0 and the 'extra work' somehow becomes my fault. Which is to say I get amused when a person blames me for something they were supposed to be doing all along. This is NOT why I didn't take selective channeling.

As an aside, I think CLW wands tend have negatively impacted the game. They reward rocket tag over tactics or teamwork and have removed an element of risk in my opinion. :)

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

BartonOliver wrote:
If a non-caster is at all prepared, early level healing isn't that bad. The Vial of Efficacious medicine and a wand of cure light wounds (or infernal) are on almost every one of my characters.

I am quite curious what you tend to pay for that vial of it is on almost every one of your characters. Did you pay the printed 700 GP or the 9000 GP it should cost according to the crafting cost ?

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Jessex wrote:

Honestly, I hate having pure healers in the party since they tend to be so useless. I much prefer effective buffing clerics or the like who can heal ooc if the need arises.

Really after a character has gotten 2pp they should be responsible for their own healing.

Part of what I was going for was an answer to this -- If the people that CAN use the wands REFUSE to out of combat, what good is the 2PP paperweight?

Granted, I've only encountered this at conventions, and the tables had... other issues.

And there were two modules at my last convention where if I *didn't* have the Healing Domain rocking... it would have ended poorly for us.

... if you mean, that a character who is capable of using wands, was unwilling to use your wand on you or others... leave that table - not reason to enable those people.

Grand Lodge 5/5

Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
BartonOliver wrote:
If a non-caster is at all prepared, early level healing isn't that bad. The Vial of Efficacious medicine and a wand of cure light wounds (or infernal) are on almost every one of my characters.
I am quite curious what you tend to pay for that vial of it is on almost every one of your characters. Did you pay the printed 700 GP or the 9000 GP it should cost according to the crafting cost ?

700 as the item is listed. Until such a time as it is ruled differently that's the price. (I suspect it would either be banned or changed sometime after the Mask of Stony Demeanor) Although to be fair, I'd never looked at the crafting cost until you mentioned it.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps Subscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

My first PFS character was a Life Oracle. I was joining another group and decided it was best to make something that would be useful. I was new to Pathfinder, and Organized Play, but had played 3.5 during most of its duration. Decided it was best to be a support rule and see what everything else was like. I enjoyed the character.

For the local group, I know there are several healer types, a mix of primary healers, and others with some healing ability via wands, Lay on Hands, or spells. My group makes characters they like to play or that sound fun, and the second cleric that sprang up was an old Sarenrae Nun that likes to bake cookies and wields a frying pan like a mace.

If anything the local group I run lacks firepower, usually its only cause of a good healer that they get through to the end. The lack of firepower isn't cause they have a healer instead of someone else, its more because most of the local group is new to d20 rpgs or are younger players and the term Optimized Build does not enter the equation, which has resulted in some fun games but also means the games usually last a bit longer.

1/5 5/5

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
nosig wrote:

is this thread about there being...

a) a shortage of PCs that can use/do healing?
b) a shortage of PCs that are "dedicated Healers (captial "H")?
c) the fact that there are some "socially challanged players" in our games?

*snip*

It was more a question of 'Am I being weird for being concerned about this aspect of the game, when I have had several play experiences where the lack of a Healer (or even a healer) almost led to complete mission failure?'

So in a way it incorporates all three of those points above in various forms and shapes.

Follow-up: Is the trend towards Max Damage, ASAP due to the fact that this lack of in-combat healing promotes ending battles quickly?

Second Follow-up: If a GM told me that healing my party members gives him a reason to execute them when they're down 'just in case' if said opponent had not encountered the tactic with the party, I'd probably be seeking out a campaign official. Is this really a thing that happens in PFS play? If so, is it situational RAW or just GM fiat?

Silver Crusade 3/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Follow-up: Is the trend towards Max Damage, ASAP due to the fact that this lack of in-combat healing promotes ending battles quickly?

They are related, but neither causes the other.

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a combat healer in the party, it is usually better to deal as much damage as you can instead of healing other party members.

2. Regardless of whether or not you have a max damage dealer in the party, it is usually better to deal as much damage as you can instead of healing other party members.

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Second Follow-up: If a GM told me that healing my party members gives him a reason to execute them when they're down 'just in case' if said opponent had not encountered the tactic with the party, I'd probably be seeking out a campaign official. Is this really a thing that happens in PFS play? If so, is it situational RAW or just GM fiat?

Most GMs won't target downed or otherwise incapacitated characters. There are exceptions, namely when scenarios call for such tactics in their write-up.

It isn't something I would worry about.

Shadow Lodge 4/5

For your first question, I'm gonna quote myself from a different thread:

Quote:

PFS scenario design has the same issue that Guild Wars 2 (a MMO) has.

GW2 did away with the trinity (tank, heals, dps) so people were not forced into roles in a 5-person party. Initially, the playerbase still created tanky-type and support-type characters, but players realized all those builds did was extend fights and give bossess/mobs/etc more time to do more damage to the party. The community switched over to all DPS parties to burn through encounters--while players still had support abilities, for the most part, parties were based around damage-dealing and damage-boosting abilities first and healing/condition-cleansing skills second.

The PF system itself does not allow mmo-style "tanking" and generally, except in dire circumstances, in-combat healing is not the best use of resources. (And, with the easy access to CLW/IH wands, classes with CLW/IH on their spell lists and/or the UMD skill, post-combat healing definitely does not require a healer in-party for PFS.) For PFS scenarios, a competent six-person party primarily focused on combat ability or boosting combat ability with a secondary foci on skills or support abilities spread throughout the party is going to handily cakewalk through most PFS scenarios and use less resources than a "balanced" party by dint of ending encounters quickly. This has a snowball effect as it is assumed prior encounters tax the party's resources, but the party actually saves resources and can go full tilt in later in encounters.

This puts PFS in an awkward position: to change the meta-game of PFS scenarios would unfairly punish players with fair-to-middling system mastery or tables with problematical party composition, yielding a poor experience and driving away potential customers. Leaving it as is can lead to disengagement from their most involved players who grow bored from the lack of challenge, again losing players. While PFS has made strides in increasing the challenge in recent seasons (switching to the 6-person party assumption, Hard Mode), it is still hampered by the CR system and the necessity of one-size fits all encounters.

For your second question, if you keep healing downed party members at the feet of enemies and the revived party members attack/cast/act/etc, the enemy has two options: eliminate the threat at their feet beyond healing or attack the healer. Depending on the boss and situation, they will tilt one way or the other. I often make a point of trying not to heal unconscious PCs at the feet of the boss because all you've done is made them a very vulnerable low-HP target (unless they have a specific way to end the fight other than "swing from prone with a -4 to hit").

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

Ibram Gaunt wrote:

The role of healers is an interesting one. One the one hand, they can save parties, BUT the fame goes to the Damage dealers.OOC healing is the norm I encountered so far. Most often with a CLW wand. Sometimes a chracter actually incvested in a CMW Wand. Only exception I encountered so far is the Life Oracle.

Then there comes some arrogance of damage dealers. I think I saw a thread here which quoted a Barbarian and a cleric (In fullplate and obviously not purely Heal oriented). The Barb player only said to cleric:"You can heal, so always stay behind me" or something similar to those lines.

That seems to be a common mindset. Plus many think such dedicated healers make the game boring, since many intended dangerous situations are not so dangerous anymore if you have a healer onboard who knows what he is doing.

Said Lifeoracle not only heals quite effectivly, but also gives as Reroll possibilities and other buffs.

I think that particular life oracle "using" both the Battlecry feat and the Pharasma channeling feat is more effective by giving us rerolls.

Of course that player is usually less dangerous in melee than a angry sloth (full plate without proficiency, the burned hands oracle curse) so, yeah there is that.

My hunter actually had cure light wounds as a first level spell, but I unlearned replaced it at some point. Those 1d8+5 where just to insignificant (and cure moderate wounds is not on the druid/ranger list as a second level spell).

Those first aid gloves were worth every GP though.

4/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

In particularly nasty circumstances, my summoner will play rescue squad while the eidelon does the combat heavy lifting. An invisible guy getting downed PCs out of harms way, tapping them with a CLW wand (highly trained UMD) and getting them back into the fight can be useful when things get rough.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ** Venture-Lieutenant, Florida—Melbourne

Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Healing in combat ca be a bit tricky, at some point (and before you get Heal) damage outpaces most available healing sources (maybe with the exception of channel energy.

I have never understood this logic. If you heal as quickly as everyone was taking damage then healing would be completely broken. The idea behind healing is to keep people in the fight longer, not to keep them in indefinitely.

Grand Lodge 4/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
trollbill wrote:
Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Healing in combat ca be a bit tricky, at some point (and before you get Heal) damage outpaces most available healing sources (maybe with the exception of channel energy.
I have never understood this logic. If you heal as quickly as everyone was taking damage then healing would be completely broken. The idea behind healing is to keep people in the fight longer, not to keep them in indefinitely.

The problem isn't that damage outpaces healing, it's by how much. It can very easily get to the point where the amount healed won't keep someone in the fight any longer than if they weren't healed.

3/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Also, that 2 pp price is for a Wand of Cure Light CL1, right? What happens when parties get to higher levels?

They have plenty of PP to afford wands...

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Part of what I was going for was an answer to this -- If the people that CAN use the wands REFUSE to out of combat, what good is the 2PP paperweight?

Well, it should not come as a surprise that there are a#@!+%$#s in PFS, since there are in every walk of life. But I've never sat down with any; just lucky I guess.

Now I'm wondering if there is anything I could do about that if it happened at a table I was GMing. I'm pretty sure it would be a code violation for Paladins, but I am drawing a black for other classes. Alignment infraction, maybe?

_
glass.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 *** Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant

glass wrote:
Now I'm wondering if there is anything I could do about that if it happened at a table I was GMing. I'm pretty sure it would be a code violation for Paladins, but I am drawing a black for other classes. Alignment infraction, maybe?

If it happened at one of my tables I'd remind the player of the Don't be a Jerk rule as well as the 3 tenets of Pathfinder Society Explore, Report, Cooperate

Dark Archive

Infernal healing maybe something people refuse to use. Especially if they have other means.

I have a Theurge with an abundance of 1st level &2nd level healing I prefer to use these up prior to tapping wands.

There may be some cases where people are not being jerks.

Grand Lodge 2/5

I usually ask people if they're okay with feeling devilish for a minute before I go tapping them with the better of my two healing wands. (Well, if they're conscious anyway.)

If they refuse that, I've got a backup wand of Cure Light Wounds to appease the folk with rigid implements stuffed too far up their... *ahem*, with "uncompromising morals".

Scarab Sages 5/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:


The reason I ask is because between a weekend onvention and some PbP I've seen, there are very rarely healers?

I think it is also regional and sequential. People who did play healers and then retired those characters are less likely (perhaps) to make their next character a healer.

I've also seen that wands and pregen (Kyra and Selah who herself is pretty good at 7th) take people along.

Then when they hit 8-10 range modules, or post 11 games, and pregens can not be present there are issues.

The channellers can certainly make many encounters easier, but I've not heard of too many Eyes teams that went the full way without someone who could do some in combat healing besides wands (I'm sure they exist).

The healers get bombarded from many angles, from selfish who demand they use their spells/wands to their characters, to GMs who punish parties with effective healers, angst at spells choosen, - so a person really needs to want to play one, and it is in purest form a support character- the Sidekick not the Hero.

Infernal Heal Wands in my experience are more common than cure light wounds - when time is not an issue, a charge for 10 is desired better than 1d8+1 - and one can place it ahead of time for instant stabilize in battle (just don't be fighting inquisitors or paladins)

Silver Crusade 3/5

I have one dedicated Healer (a cleric with the Merciful Healer archetype). I made him after two consecutive TPKs in our area, as no one seemed to have about any healing capabilities at the time and the "bring your own CLW wand if this isn't your first scenario ever" -thing hadn't become a trend yet.

He has been fun to roleplay, but I must admit that there have been times when he has been kinda useless in combat after the first round. He buffs the first round, but after that, well, many buffs won't stack or the party has moved too far away from each other/him. And as Merciful Healer, he cannot even use his channels against undead, something I've cursed a few times. I know I probably should've started summoning or something, but I've too lazy to stat up the summons, and well, offensive spells are kinda scarce on the cleric list. (Str 10, so no going into melee himself).

But when the battles aren't going that well, well no one seems to complain about having him in the party. I've also finally gotten some offensive spells on my list on the later levels, and also some debuffs (like Dispell Magic). Though he is now on level 12, so I'm won't be playing him that much anymore. Which is a shame, because in the end, he is one of my favorite characters (not the best build, but that is mostly because he was one of the earliest).

5/5 *****

Dhjika wrote:
The channellers can certainly make many encounters easier, but I've not heard of too many Eyes teams that went the full way without someone who could do some in combat healing besides wands (I'm sure they exist).

My group had 4 players with 2 sorcerers, a sorcerer/gunslinger/eldritch knight and a paladin archer. We also had a planar bound deva for the first 3 parts. About the only in combat healing that happened was the occasional lay on hands the paladin dropped on himself. Otherwise the two sorcerers were entirely capable of locking enemies down until the two ranged damage dealers finished them off.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Wow. I find this whole thread fascinating, mostly because my definition of healing is so completely different. I see healing as a much, much bigger category.

I can recall having this conversation with another player, who was having trouble keeping up healing the party damage as we fought in a burning building. 'You know, if you had cast resist energy instead of cure moderate wounds, I would have absolutely no need of further healing. Instead, you've used three spells in the place of one.

So, I think of healing more in terms of support, and I find clerics are still greatly useful. But not for restoring hit points, that's not the primary problem after level three. Instead, clerics (yes, also oracles, and perhaps a few others) are useful for all of the 'remove awful condition spells'.

It's the cleric spell list that has lesser restoration, remove paralysis, delay poison, and resist energy. Clerics can treat disease and poison with a skill check, and can remove curses. Invisibility purge lets everyone beat down the invisible monster, as can daylight.

A well prepared 'healer' should be able to keep everyone tip-top, and thats worth quite a lot.

3/5

Eric Clingenpeel wrote:
If it happened at one of my tables I'd remind the player of the Don't be a Jerk rule as well as the 3 tenets of Pathfinder Society Explore, Report, Cooperate

Well of course, but I am assuming that already happened and was not persuasive.

_
glass.

4/5

Anonymous Visitor 163 576 wrote:

Wow. I find this whole thread fascinating, mostly because my definition of healing is so completely different. I see healing as a much, much bigger category.

I can recall having this conversation with another player, who was having trouble keeping up healing the party damage as we fought in a burning building. 'You know, if you had cast resist energy instead of cure moderate wounds, I would have absolutely no need of further healing. Instead, you've used three spells in the place of one.

So, I think of healing more in terms of support, and I find clerics are still greatly useful. But not for restoring hit points, that's not the primary problem after level three. Instead, clerics (yes, also oracles, and perhaps a few others) are useful for all of the 'remove awful condition spells'.

It's the cleric spell list that has lesser restoration, remove paralysis, delay poison, and resist energy. Clerics can treat disease and poison with a skill check, and can remove curses. Invisibility purge lets everyone beat down the invisible monster, as can daylight.

A well prepared 'healer' should be able to keep everyone tip-top, and thats worth quite a lot.

I would put things like energy resistance in the "buff" category, but I completely agree with things like lesser restoration, remove paralysis, etc. getting put in the "healing" category.

I tend to think of the "healer" role as "keep the rest of the party functioning". So curing one character's Dex damage might be more important than healing someone else's HP damage. I also use the "rounds remaining" measure: if I think the bad guy is going to last more rounds than the injured party members, I start healing to extend the number of rounds the party can last.

A big part of this strategy, though, depends on the GM. A lot of GMs won't describe the effects you're having on the bad guy, so you have no clue how hurt he is. That makes it kind of hard.

Sovereign Court 4/5 5/5 ** Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden

My personal issue with playing clerics is this.

- Clerics get very few skill points, and that makes it hard to feel like you're contributing fully in the noncombat part of the game.

- The really nice cleric spells, like the ones that remove truly awful conditions, don't start coming until 3rd circle. For the first 4 character levels a wand of CLW does nearly as good a job as a cleric. And then the dynamic reverses significantly.

So it takes a bit long before you get to the good part of playing a cleric.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16

Resist Energy falls in the 'preventative healing' category. it's akin to casting False Life. You stop the damage taken before its taken.

Another way of looking at it is DR for energy. Less damage taken, less to be healed. And at 10,20 or 30 hp/use, much better then most healing spells for the level you get it.

Buffs can mean any precast spell with a long duration, true enough. but 'buff' usually infers more directly to stuff that enhances combat performance, typically th/dmg, AC, or saves.

If it falls in prevents damage, it's definitely something for a healer to take into consideration.

==Aelryinth

5/5 *****

Aelryinth wrote:

Resist Energy falls in the 'preventative healing' category. it's akin to casting False Life. You stop the damage taken before its taken.

Another way of looking at it is DR for energy. Less damage taken, less to be healed. And at 10,20 or 30 hp/use, much better then most healing spells for the level you get it.

Buffs can mean any precast spell with a long duration, true enough. but 'buff' usually infers more directly to stuff that enhances combat performance, typically th/dmg, AC, or saves.

If it falls in prevents damage, it's definitely something for a healer to take into consideration.

==Aelryinth

Communal Resist Energy probably wins the award for "Most Useful Spell Ever" from our complete run of Emerald Spire. It neutered many many encounters on its own pretty much and prevented more damage than anyone was ever going to heal in combat.

5/5 *****

Ascalaphus wrote:

My personal issue with playing clerics is this.

- Clerics get very few skill points, and that makes it hard to feel like you're contributing fully in the noncombat part of the game.

- The really nice cleric spells, like the ones that remove truly awful conditions, don't start coming until 3rd circle. For the first 4 character levels a wand of CLW does nearly as good a job as a cleric. And then the dynamic reverses significantly.

So it takes a bit long before you get to the good part of playing a cleric.

Low level clerics work extremely well. They can simply wade into combat with a two handed weapon and drop the occasional control or buff effect.

As far as condition removal remove fear, sickness and paralysis all crop up from levels 1-3 and all deal with otherwise crippling conditions. Certainly the group I ran By Way of Bloodcove for would have benefitted from Remove Sickness as half of them were nauseated after the first round.

Shadow Lodge 4/5

I'm playing an Oracle of Life in an Emerald Spire group and it has been a strange experience. On one hand the character is much more tightly built than any of my previous healers, none of which were oracles, and it has actually done plenty out of combat too(Seeker oracle with high strength and an adamantine nine-section whip), but on the other hand the known spells list is very limiting and I miss the good Fortitude save clerics have.

Back on topic though, I've found clerics really excel in heavy duty buffing even without picking any archetypes which specialize in that. E.g in RotRL, my cleric used to pump the barbarian full of extended spells and watch his potential skyrocket. While outfitting my oracle, it's been the funniest thing to find out what kind of crazy buffs Paizo has managed to fit into the system. The RotRL campaign had about 10 sessions left when APG came out, so updating my clerical knowhow has been a journey: air bubble, blessing of fervor, communal align weapon&resist energy recentering drone, suppress charms and compulsions, remove sickness, etc. I expect life bubble will be next.

Shadow Lodge 3/5

My first real character was a cleric built as a healer, and I often found that I just had very little to nothing to do.

That's until the tough encounters came up (hello, Shades of Ice 2) when suddenly the party gets all WOW, I'M GLAD WE BOUGHT A POSITIVE CHANNELING CLERIC WITH US!

Shadow Lodge 4/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I distinctly remember causing so much damage while gm'ing a 3rd season 7-11 that two dedicated healers had to work their butts off to keep the frontline from dying. It was just a pitch black hall full of tentacles, ratfolk and screaming. We've liked healers ever since.

1/5 5/5

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Muser wrote:
I distinctly remember causing so much damage while gm'ing a 3rd season 7-11 that two dedicated healers had to work their butts off to keep the frontline from dying.

Which leads to a different question...

Those who have healer experience, is multi-classing viable with clerics to get the very much needed skill points? So far my answer has been 'yes', but I'm trying to get a feel for things like the 7-11 bracket and such?

Scarab Sages 5/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
Muser wrote:
I distinctly remember causing so much damage while gm'ing a 3rd season 7-11 that two dedicated healers had to work their butts off to keep the frontline from dying.

Which leads to a different question...

Those who have healer experience, is multi-classing viable with clerics to get the very much needed skill points? So far my answer has been 'yes', but I'm trying to get a feel for things like the 7-11 bracket and such?

14th level Cleric here... I have basicly two skills..

Perception (where I can out-do most any PC of my level)

and ... a bit of Diplomacy.

Only two skill points a level (and one of those is the Favored Class Bonus).

Yeah - skills are not my suit.

But I haven't really found the lack - I normally leave all that to my fellow pathfinders.

But then, that's their 15 minutes of fame, and who am I to deprive them of that? We all get our enjoyment differently - and that makes this a wonderful game right?

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Muser wrote:
I distinctly remember causing so much damage while gm'ing a 3rd season 7-11 that two dedicated healers had to work their butts off to keep the frontline from dying. It was just a pitch black hall full of tentacles, ratfolk and screaming. We've liked healers ever since.

Yeah, I think I remember that one. I hit the barbarian for 90 points of damage, then he killed the enemy. That was about the closest I came to messing anyone up.

2/5

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:


Those who have healer experience, is multi-classing viable with clerics to get the very much needed skill points? So far my answer has been 'yes', but I'm trying to get a feel for things like the 7-11 bracket and such?

I know nothing of multiclassing, and less fo high tier play, but you don´t necesarily need to multiclass to obtain the skill points.

Garret my buffer cleric. Just obtained the 4th level, and have 9 different skills, 3 of them maxed.

The trick; human for +1 skill point, Int 12 for +1 skill point, and willing to spend Favored class for another +1 skill point. Thats 5 skill points per level, if you invest at least 1 in your class skills you can make some checks, maybe not as well as the wizard but better than the fellow pathfinder who dumped Int.

1/5 5/5

Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Playing a tengu kills the human, and I've been going for the extra skill point on the Slayer class (the class I started with and favored), have Int 12.

Wei Ji:

51 to 92 of 92 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Organized Play / Pathfinder Society / Healing in PFS play All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.
Recent threads in Pathfinder Society