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True, I worked that part out with the GM for the back story. I'll have to check that out, ask if I can change it.

Lightning Reflexes, Warrior Priest (bit of a role play thing), Combat Casting, Voice of Sibyl, Power Attack, and Exotic Weapon Proficiency Nodachi (in order to use a weapon that was awarded). Haven't picked the next feat yet, though.

And yes, I meant Calistria.

He worships Calistra, which is part of the inspiration to go with Monster/Demon Hunter.

In my current campaign, something of an arms race has developed between the players. I've found I'm woefully uninformed in some of these matters, if only due to inexperience.

Originally, it was the most experienced of us, who has been at this for over a decade. He came out of the gate with a Noble Drow that became a crazy mixture of classes that's become more ranged-based. After the debut of his character (and the death of another person), a degenerate serpentfolk came into the party, with 30 strength and 30 constitution at level 6. Needless to say, after all of that, I feel a little unprepared.

As it stands, I have an inquisitor that's mostly a party face (GM gave me stat bonuses in order to do so), and did some of the healing for the group. However, after a party-wide thrashing from a troll, a love-bite from a werewolf or two (causing his hair to turn white and eyes turn green), and impromptu eye surgery from a demon, not to mention the inclusion of a more dedicated healer, I figure this Inquisitor is going to be more dedicated to monster hunting, and general inquisitor activities (the copious amounts of physical trauma should be a good excuse, right?). I put out good damage, what with Power Attack, Bane, Judgements, and the many combat-related spells , but I feel like I'm not getting the most out of this Inquisitor, and could benefit from some new perspectives.

This inquisitor has:
5 levels of Inquisitor, 5 in commoner classes, with 2 levels yet unassigned due to experience from the last session.
B.A.B. 6/1
20 Str
18 Dex
16 Con
12 Int
20 Wis
20 Cha
Fate Inquisition (for back story, can be possibly changed if there's a serious reason for it)

He's built around two-handed fighting so far, but that can change. The GM seems pretty open to creativity, so long as I check with him before I implement things. I've been reading books and forums all day, but I've kind of gotten into a rut as far as ideas. It doesn't need to be optimized, though I would like to keep up with the party. So far I've been taking inspiration from Solomon Kane and Geralt of Rivia, which the GM seems to approve of, him being a big fan of backstory and general role play. Regarding books that are allowed, he only really hesitates on third-party material and 3.5 stuff. Any and all ideas are appreciated, thank you in advance!

In general an in combat healer isn't a necessity. You can't heal faster than enemies deal damage to your party or a PC would deal damage to an enemy, so you mostly end up trying to refill several rapidly emptying buckets when it would really be a lot more efficient to kill the thing poking holes in your buckets in the first place. That being said, it is an absolute necessity to have an out of combat healer. Pathfinder has extremely slow non-magical healing rates, and you need to have some way to get rid of stat damage and other debuffs. If your friend is playing a druid he can do this competently, you don't need to worry about fulfilling this role. Moreover, anyone with a decent UMD skill and a few wands of cure light wounds can also fulfill the bare minimums of the out of combat healer role.

My advice would be to make sure somebody can do between combat healing but beyond that not worry about missing a primary healer. Zen Archers are cool, be one.

I've read about that before, and it makes sense. I figure I'll try and touch base with all of the players, since it's not uncommon for someone to get on the verge of death mid-combat. I'm probably just worrying too much, since the real healing happens out of combat, and this time a rule to have Heal skill checks give back more hit points than previously may get us by.

I guess my big worry is that the GM personally asked me to play a cleric again, though he seemed open to me not doing so.

Play what you want to play. If (possibly the most significant word here) the encounters are level-appropriate for your party, the group will have time to figure out the healing needs to work out. As mentioned, the druid could be the party's primary healer with some planning. The former alchemist could very well step in and cover healing when they realize you aren't doing to do it.

Or perhaps the rest of the party can come up with a compromise when they realize you want to tread some new ground.

Do what you want to do. If your decision leaves the party without a healer, the issue will generally work itself out.

That's probably true, and is what I've been told. However, the encounters can be a bit... insane, and seem a little above our level. Hopefully, by starting again, the difficulty will go down. I was often channeling after every encounter, though that wasn't a big deal, and I tossed out cures fairly regularly.

A rather powerful, though previously wounded, enemy (a Planetar Angel) was summoned by some poor choices on the behalf of our party corpse, which lead to two deaths due to the fact that we were level six and in no way prepared. The rogue got mad, and killed all but me (the Alchemist and ranger were missing). In a previous encounter, I got lucky and received a little bonus from home ruling, the bonus being that, on an attack roll of a natural twenty, whatever I'm attacking instantly dies. So, with the angel and rogue dead, I was left alone when a tailor-made god came out, and tried to get me to make a pact, due to being "the strongest". Instead, I opted to try and kill him, hoping the 20 would take effect. Sadly, and predictably, it didn't work out.

Hello (howyalldoin).

I'm involved with a campaign that's recently been subject to a, to put it kindly, hard reset.

In less delicate terms, we all kind of freaked out and ran flailing into the meat grinder.

In the last campaign, we had a cleric (me) with the healing and luck domains, an alchemist, an undead sorcerer, a ranger (though he wasn't big on saying it directly) that used two weapons, a sword-and-board fighter, and some one that died so regularly his class may as well have been corpse. I've been told I didn't do bad in healing or damage (the group was decimated by a temporary player playing a rogue).

Now, I've been looking at getting into a Zen Archer. I'm familiar with monks, and am comfortable playing them, and after a few hours of reading, I've got a plan for the Zen Archer. My party, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be as big on planning as I am.

Two of them (the alchemist and ranger) are very experienced, and good at what they do. I trust their choices fully, and know we can make a party work with their choices. The undead sorcerer, a player that's always been good with casters, is looking at a druid, a melee druid I think. The guy that dies regularly is looking at a full orc (with the +4 Str and a -2 to Int, Wis, and Cha). Our knightly fighter is going two-weapon ranger, and our previous ranger is liable to, once again, go ranger. Not sure about the alchemist, since he seems to be interested in trying whatever.

We're going with a dice pool method, rolling 24 and keeping 18, and starting as level one NPC classes, only to become heroic at level five. Due to some heroics I pulled, I've been upgraded to having 100 points to spend, an amazing amount. The max I can have in each slot is 20 after racial bonuses, and I've been allowed to use the Oread, something I was looking at for the Zen Archer due to the +2 to Wis and Str, and the -2 to Cha. I've got a plan for the stats, and basically had the character made.

Then, I realized that we were going to have a lot of melee fighters, with no real healer.

For some background, this is a home-made campaign that's got a lot of potential damage bound our way. We get a lot of bonus items, but my super powered character is most certainly the highest: alchemist has ~87 points to spend, ~92 points for the oh-so mysterious ranger man, and low seventies for all others.

With all these points, I know I can make a pretty nasty cleric, though I'm loathe to make another one when I've been that for three campaigns.
So, I must ask, what are your opinions, everyone? I know a lot of you guys have more experience, or even just different perspectives, than I. What would you do in this situation?

For the short and sweet of it: I've got a mixed-up party, and I don't know if I should pick Zen Archer or Cleric. What do I do?