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Hello! My local group is wrapping up the end of our heroic campaign (we're all Level 18) soon, and with it comes the exciting prospects of the new campaign another one of the players will run.
That said, there are some circumstances conspiring that have given me a challenge which I've been struggling with for the last week, and finally thought I would turn to the creative and knowledgeable message board community for some advice.
The Background:
I tend to play support role characters, generally some kind of Arm or Anvil in combat, and this time it seems like it will be the same. I am moving to the other side of the world soon, so I'll be joining in by Skype to the sessions when possible, but we've discussed already that should time schedules not match up on occasion, that my character can be NPC'd for the party. Since this time Leadership/cohorts/etc are not allowed, it won't be an extra burden for the GM to use the character. I do, however, want to make the general playstyle of the character simple enough for the GM to manage in that situation.
In the last two games I've played a charming robin hoodette Bard turned into Cleric (Evangelist), and then an Arcane Trickster who died and was replaced by a vehemently anti-necromancer Arcane Archer. I was hoping to play a not-so-magic based character this time (especially since with our high level game I am a bit burned out of all of the caster-y things).
It is set in a homebrew world we have been playing in, with the player characters as orphans around the age of 5, witnessing an event that hints at their future fates (ie, background/explaining why they will go on to become what class/etc). Then it snapshots to their reunion in their early teens after having been separated, and their decision to join the local militia in order to do service to earn their citizenship right in the country.
The game will take off in their late teens/early twenties (character Level 3), and will likely go until Level 13-14 and see them grow up.
The campaign world setting is a living world - we're starting effectively 50 years after the end of the previous game this GM ran (the campaign before the one we just are finishing) and fleshing out a neighboring region.
Although we're starting "in the militia", we're definitely rising from humble roots. It feels a little like a Fire Emblem game, but our region is a bit Age of Sail technology wise, with guns being decidedly less common and in the early firearms set of rules.
The other players are making:
A melee barbarian, A natural attack ranger (maybe guide archetype), and a sword+board inquisitor (who will be our 'party leader').
Obviously we're missing out on a lot of the Arm + Anvil aspects. It also means we have 3 melee, so either I go melee/switch hit and get the GM to just design encounters around that, or play another ranged character. (Or GM is fine at encounter design/shaping around us, so probably fine with me doing either).
A note on healing:
Two games ago I played the Bard and reclassed into a Cleric(Evangelist) because wand of cure light wounds was not doing enough for us for us for in combat healing/condition removal (rest of party was Magus, Monk, Fighter/ninja, Gunslinger). Last game we had a Paladin who could cover out of combat healing, but we struggled in combat until our Fighter took Leadership and got a cleric cohort. It looks like this time I'll need to cover the in combat healing aspects/condition removal.
I'm aware that one way to also try to reduce the reliance on healing is debuff/crowd control in combat, too, so some kind of compromise seems best.
Summary: Characters start at Level 3.
Characters are orphans who have known each other since childhood.
Not Allowed: Dwarves (cultural reasons), Elves (age difference problem for orphanage), gnomes (same reason as elves)
The other Players: Melee barbarian, natural-attack ranger, sword+board inquisitor.
My dilemma: I've considered Cleric, Shaman, and Witch as the big three that seem like they would let me swing between Arm and Anvil with healing as necessary. However, I have played magic/caster characters the last few games and I was wondering if anyone has any creative ideas or suggestions on ways to effectively support the above party preferably without one of those three classes.
Thank you for your time!