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Now, to get to your post I quoted: This is actually a perfect example, and shows the flaw in your philosophy. Who's judging the cake to determine if it's better or not? You cannot make a better cake because everyone thinks different kinds are best it's all determined by who's doing the judging.
I am sorry, but this is Deviant Art logic. "You can't say my scribbled crayon drawing of Sonic the Hedgehog is worse than The Scream, because someone somewhere might like it better." "You can't say my cake, where I accidentally used salt instead of sugar, is worse than your cake because someone could theoretically like pure salt cake better!" When someone says "X is better than Y," they are already saying it based on general assumptions of quality. In this case, that general assumption of quality is "being a more effective system of completing a combat successfully while using minimal resources." Wraithstrike specifically pointed it out in the first post of the thread. It is patently unnecessary for every successive poster to repeat that just so that you don't perceive them as "pompous" or "arrogant." It is at best silly, and at worst catering to hypersensitivity.
If you want a less combative approach, try: My cake is better when judged by this criteria, and here's why. That gives people the opportunity to say, "we don't judge that way, that's why your cake would be inferior" and it becomes a discussion about the merits of your premise instead of defending against your arrogance.
You cannot honestly ask that people qualify every statement."I believe this cake is better, if you judge on the criteria of not containing rat poison." It is assumed that "not poisonous" is a criteria for a good cake. Likewise, in terms of the game, "X is better than Y" can be assumed to be for the criteria of "successfully completing the challenges presented." You then proceed from there to compare the merits of the arguments in terms of this premise. It is silly to ask that every conversation be about the relative merits of "succeeding versus failing at tasks" as a premise.
Feel free to present a more specific premise for an argument. It is perfectly logical to say "Option X is generally stronger, but for another purpose or circumstance Y is better." "Your cake may be better generally, but my cake is superior for those that don't like chocolate." The issue here is that that is already baked into the premise. Look at Wraithstrike's original post. He went to great care to present the idea that while taking other options in combat was generally the superior choice in terms of effectiveness, healing in combat could certainly be superior in specific circumstances. It is a response to threads where people ask "Can we survive without a dedicated healer?" or lamenting that they are being forced to play a character dedicated to in-combat healing so that their party can survive. It is not some arrogant demand that everyone play the game the same way, but a response to "Misconceptions about not healing in combat."
However, you have somehow interpreted this as "If the healer does nothing except play with his butt until healing is needed, then having a healer is a bad idea." This is quite insulting, especially from someone arguing that others take extra special care to not offend. Beyond that, I cannot see this as anything but a misinterpretation, deliberate or not. The whole argument is that spending your action on an action other than healing (not "[playing] with [your] butt") is, more often, a more mechanically effective choice than spending that action on healing. Perhaps if you had read the whole thread instead of "few posts" you have referred to, you would already understand that.
I am sorry, but this is Deviant Art logic. "You can't say my scribbled crayon drawing of Sonic the Hedgehog is worse than The Scream, because someone somewhere might like it better.
Yes I can actually, if the criteria for judging is that the artwork has to be in crayon, well that means Scream is a horrible work of art based on that criteria. You seem to be getting confused by the analogies, so allow me to bring it back to game terms:
When you say "This build is better" you are saying that you have played in every style of game with every GM and every group of players in the world, I'm not entirely sure I'm going to put very much faith in that claim.
You cannot honestly ask that people qualify every statement.
First let me say, you do realize this is the vast majority of the problem with conversation the internet right? People make a statement as if fact, but can't qualify or quantify it. The fact that actually backing up your statements is so repulsive to you, is very telling. But I digress...
Here is the key element you're missing:
I don't give a rat's @$$ what you or anyone else does or doesn't do in your posts. Have I made that clear enough? You can insult every person on the planet personally and individually, and it won't effect me even the tiniest little bit.
What you seem to be missing, is that my post is not a complaint. It is the response to someone else complaining. Someone is upset that their posts are being attacked, or the reaction they're getting, I am simply offering an explanation as to why people may be behaving that way, and how to avoid that response in the future. Follow it or not, I really don't think I could think of anything I care less about.
Jodokai, and yet there are actually judges who judge cake making and award cake-making trophies.
And they rarely agree from one contest to another.
Again, when did we become such an insecure society that anyone saying "I think this is better" becomes a challenge to our self-worth and self-image?
I think it's sad that people are so fragile that they fall apart if someone says "I think my way is better."
You can tell me you think your way is better all you like. I'll ask you to explain why and if I agree, then I'll adopt your technique and if I disagree I'll say "I disagree." Not "Stop JUDGING ME!"
I'm no longer even talking about healing vs. non-healing here Jodokai. I'm talking about the fundamental concept that it is somehow a social error to express an opinion of something being superior to something else.
I see this all the time in all sorts of different situations. Our culture has decided that judging is a worse sin than failing. And that's a pretty major reason why our society is failing so much.
This specific example is just a mild version of a much larger social suicide pact that the West has embarked upon.
Consider this: What you do if I walked up to you, started laughing and said: "You're so stupid, you actually think 1+1=2. You have to be an absolute idiot to think that everyone knows 1+1=10"
You personally may know that 10 is two in binary, but for the sake of this example, let's pretend you don't. So someone just called you stupid and an idiot, because you know that 1+1=2. You are now thinking that the person speaking isn't very intelligent because how can 1+1=10? Now, you think they are less intelligent than you, and have insulted you, how do you think you'd respond? How do you think the "average" person would respond?
If we change the initial statement: In binary 1+1=10. The response would be, well we use decimal, 1+1=2. And the conversation can move on from there.
Again to clarify, do it or not I don't care, if you don't, don't act shocked by the response.
What I have noticed is that a lot of people will read "here's how I do it" and hear "my way of playing is better than yours" instead.When you call someone inferior for not doing it your way, it really takes out any question of intent.
While I realize the thread has moved on, the whole premise of this thread is absurd. You can essentially boil it down to: Don't heal in combat, unless you need to, which is the same as saying Don't walk to that room, unless you need to go there. It really is a pointless statement.
Everything underneath it the only response is: Says who? Unless the OP has played with every single GM, they really have no idea how your group plays the game and/or how much healing is needed per combat.
The premise was not whether or not it is better to heal in combat. That just became the following topic.
The premise of the thread was that I was tired of my words being taken out of context when I said I believe out of combat healing is better.
What I might say was "Generally speaking you should not have to heal in combat."
It was somehow twisted into "If you heal in combat you are noob, and it is better to let people die in combat than to heal them".
To reiterate the premise of the thread was to clear up that misconception.
PS:I don't have to play with every GM. Had you read my post you would have known that I laid out certain conditions for not healing in combat to work, and I also basically said certain circumstances may change that. I repeated that several times, and so did others.
PS2:There was even a numbered list created which explained my position quiet well.
edit:clarification.
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The cleric is a hammer. The backside of the hammer can be used to pull nails to correct (heal) your poorly executed hammering, but should not be the primary use of the hammer unless you are bad with the hammer. To have a cleric focused solely on healing is like carrying a hammer solely to pull nails.
Did that hit the nail right on the head?
What I might say was "Generally speaking you should not have to heal in combat."
While it may not be intended, you are acting like the authority on how the game should be played. In your experience, you shouldn't generally need to heal in combat. Some people's expeiences are obviously different (as evidenced by a 15 page thread). You are making generalizations about every GM in the world.
PS:I don't have to play with every GM. Had you read my post you would have known that I laid out certain conditions for not healing in combat to work, and I also basically said certain circumstances may change that. I repeated that several times, and so did others.
PS2:There was even a numbered list created which explained my position quiet well.
Let's take a look at your "conditions".
1. Nobody is saying never ever heal your buddy and/or let them die. That is ridiculous.
2. Nobody is saying you will never ever have to heal.
3. What is being said is that the bad guys can put out damage faster than you can heal so the best thing to do is kill bad guys. The less bad guys there are the less damage output there is.
4. Most of the time if you have decent characters and use good tactics you will not have to heal in combat.
5. Once again, most of the time does not mean never.
6. Bookmark this thread if you have too.
Where is the If...than statement in this list? These are written down as statements of fact. 4 is particularly offensive, because you're essentially saying that if I have to heal in a lot of combats, I don't have "decent characters" and/or I'm not using good tactics. You cannot say that because you have absolutely no clue on how others play their games. Your whole premise comes from a standpoint that everyone plays games exactly like yours. You're making blanket statements about every game. A quick look at number 3 and can think of literally thousands of ways to make this completely untrue.
While I can appreciate getting tired of being misquoted, you really should have stopped there. Everything after it you're talking about things you can't possibly know.
I am not acting like a general authority on anything. My disclaimer were in place to prevent that thought. It has shown me that people will see what they want to see though.
The statement themselves are "IF" type statements.
I was not trying to write a guide. I was said more than once, and made it very clear that certain situations alter what I wrote.
I said "most of the time". How is that offensive. I can't account for every GM. Some GM's are particularly brutal. Sometimes the dice gods interfere. I have 3 or 4 sessions in a row where I was struggling to get roll above a 5. Guess what the party was doing? Healing.
I can't write out every possible scenario so I say "most of the time.."
Number 4 was pointed out by another post to which I replied, "I think we agree. Of course my premise also assumes the GM is not boosting encounters just to make sure you do heal. :) "
That is the truth. If you are facing stock monsters, and you have all of the bases covered you should not be healing after every combat. I am not saying you are having bad-wrong fun. I am saying that you can take different measures to not get hurt. Steve Godess came in saying that his group just plays and does not really care for tactics, and he provided good examples. Steve has fun though, and I never said anything negative to him about it.
Like I said I don't have to play everyone's game, and I am not assuming everyone plays like me. You are taking things out of context.
It is a fact that if you don't get hurt you don't have to heal.
It is also a fact that certain spells and tactics can largely influence if you get hurt or not.
Now of course the GM can overcome these, but by and large my statement is correct.
I accounted for new players, brutal GM's and various other things throughout this thread.
You can't name anything that makes my statement untrue since I have allowances for various types of gameplay.
I will use number 3 because I am assuming you are reading it is 4 enemies of any type will always outdamage 3 enemies no matter what those types of enemies are.
That is not what I am saying.
As an example if I have 4 fire giants as enemies and I kill one then the party takes less damage because 4 giants will outdamage 3 giants.
Of course you will probably say, well what if one of the giants crits.
To which I will respond barring corner cases, which means that on average I am right.
Is number 3 understood now?
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The cleric is a hammer. The backside of the hammer can be used to pull nails to correct (heal) your poorly executed hammering, but should not be the primary use of the hammer unless you are bad with the hammer. To have a cleric focused solely on healing is like carrying a hammer solely to pull nails.
Did that hit the nail right on the head?
"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail".
Confirmation Bias. Seems to be a big problem with threads like this. One group always plays a game a certain way, expects the whole world to be the same. Ignores data that shows otherwise, or dismisses the viewpoints that disagree.
More than one way to play cleric, more than one way to have fun.
Mechanically healing in combat is undesired due to efficiency, average DPR of balanced encounters out paces almost most all normal healing ability. This is fairly evident with a close study of the appropriate charts of monsters/NPC by CR.
In practice it is not uncommon to require healing, due to damage spikes (crits or focused fire), unfortunate circumstances, enemy/player tactics, or unbalanced encounters (its not too hard to balance things, but there are some pitfalls and not all groups are the same).
Yes I can actually, if the criteria for judging is that the artwork has to be in crayon, well that means Scream is a horrible work of art based on that criteria.
When someone says "X is better than Y," they are already saying it based on general assumptions of quality...Feel free to present a more specific premise for an argument.
You cannot honestly ask that people qualify every statement.First let me say, you do realize this is the vast majority of the problem with conversation the internet right? People make a statement as if fact, but can't qualify or quantify it. The fact that actually backing up your statements is so repulsive to you, is very telling. But I digress...
Wow. "Qualify" does not mean the same thing as "Quantify," and totally different from what is being said. To qualify your statement is to say "Build X is better than build Y, judging on the criteria of mechanical effectiveness in a game of the style that appears most common based on modules, other published products, and discussion " instead of "X is better than Y." It is entirely different from supporting your statements with concrete evidence or logical argument.
What you seem to be missing, is that my post is not a complaint. It is the response to someone else complaining. Someone is upset that their posts are being attacked, or the reaction they're getting, I am simply offering an explanation as to why people may be behaving that way, and how to avoid that response in the future. Follow it or not, I really don't think I could think of anything I care less about.
You stated that Adamantine Dragon had a "flaw in his philosophy" (but who judges what a flaw is?) and that making a statement without qualifiers (meaning "statements as if fact," which is different from quantification or support, mind you) was "arrogance in the extreme." Plus "If you want a less combative approach," meaning that you judged his post (on what criteria?) to be combative. If you wanted to just explain, you could have added qualifiers like "People perceive," "many feel," or "the system I personally prefer" but instead you made those dreaded unqualified statements as fact. Perhaps in the future, to avoid conflict you so fervently do not care about, you should follow your own advice?
What I might say was "Generally speaking you should not have to heal in combat."While it may not be intended, you are acting like the authority on how the game should be played. In your experience, you shouldn't generally need to heal in combat. Some people's expeiences are obviously different (as evidenced by a 15 page thread). You are making generalizations about every GM in the world.
PS:I don't have to play with every GM. Had you read my post you would have known that I laid out certain conditions for not healing in combat to work, and I also basically said certain circumstances may change that. I repeated that several times, and so did others.
PS2:There was even a numbered list created which explained my position quiet well.
Let's take a look at your "conditions".
1. Nobody is saying never ever heal your buddy and/or let them die. That is ridiculous.
2. Nobody is saying you will never ever have to heal.
3. What is being said is that the bad guys can put out damage faster than you can heal so the best thing to do is kill bad guys. The less bad guys there are the less damage output there is.
4. Most of the time if you have decent characters and use good tactics you will not have to heal in combat.
5. Once again, most of the time does not mean never.
6. Bookmark this thread if you have too.Where is the If...than statement in this list? These are written down as statements of fact. 4 is particularly offensive, because you're essentially saying that if I have to heal in a lot of combats, I don't have "decent characters" and/or I'm not using good tactics. You cannot say that because you have absolutely no clue on how others play their games. Your whole premise comes from a standpoint that everyone plays games exactly like yours. You're making blanket statements about every game. A quick look at number 3 and can think of literally thousands of ways to make this completely untrue.
While I can...
I'm someone whose group use clerics to heal in combat all the time - to the extent that it's close to the majority of what they do (certainly in tough combats).
.Nonetheless, there's no way Wraithstrike is putting himself forth as an authority on gamestyles, nor declaring my playstyle inferior. You have to read his posts in context - he's been advocating (in other threads) the view that healing in combat is usually suboptimal and he has no problem with people disagreeing with that. He has a problem with people ascribing the view to him that "Healing in combat is always wrong. It's better to let your fellow adventurers die than help them." and then disagreeing with that.
Thanks Steve. :)
No worries. I've got heaps out of this thread (both about healing in combat plus about understanding different playstyles), but it's hard to pick through all the arguments when so much time is spent arguing about what the other guy meant.
Wow. "Qualify" does not mean the same thing as "Quantify," and totally different from what is being said.
I'm going to assume you actually do know what the word "or" means, and just didn't read it in my post. If this is a false assumption please let me know and I will clarify it for you.
You stated that Adamantine Dragon had a "flaw in his philosophy" (but who judges what a flaw is?) and that making a statement without qualifiers (meaning "statements as if fact," which is different from quantification or support, mind you) was "arrogance in the extreme." Plus "If you want a less combative approach," meaning that you judged his post (on what criteria?) to be combative. If you wanted to just explain, you could have added qualifiers like "People perceive," "many feel," or "the system I personally prefer" but instead you made those dreaded unqualified statements as fact. Perhaps in the future, to avoid conflict you so fervently do not care about, you should follow your own advice?
I very carefully explained my stance in my post and even provided examples, you blindly attacking without reading and understanding what you're attacking doesn't present a flaw in my post. It also shows that it doesn't really matter what I post, you're just aiming to be combative.
Now all that said, that is my last post to you until you calm down and stop blindly attacking without even understanding what you're attacking.
"I said "most of the time". How is that offensive. I can't account for every GM. Some GM's are particularly brutal. Sometimes the dice gods interfere. I have 3 or 4 sessions in a row where I was struggling to get roll above a 5. Guess what the party was doing? Healing."
Let's look at the statement again:
4. Most of the time if you have decent characters and use good tactics you will not have to heal in combat.I can read that "most of the time" one of two ways: If I have decent characters and good tactics I won't have to heal in combat very often, or I can read it as sometimes (in some games) even with decent characters and tactics I'll have to combat heal a lot.
It doesn't really matter which way you read that, they both go way farther than anything you could possibly know. Unless you have played in over 50% of the games out there, you can't know what happens even most of the time.
Again, I appreciate the need to stop people from misquoting you, but even a most of the time statement goes too far, a much better way would be "in my experience".
Jodokai, you apparently don't understand the difference between stating an opinion, and publishing a scientific paper.
If it is my opinion that "most of the time" a tactic is superior then it is perfectly accurate and appropriate for me to say "most of the time" the tactic is superior.
Because that's MY OPINION. Which is what is being presented. Not a peer-reviewed paper that is set to be published in Nature.
This is insane. This sort of hyper-sensitivity to the need for perfectly appropriate politically correct terminology is only superseded by the arrogant need to lecture people about how to be inoffensive in discussions.
The irony is so thick you could cut it with a spoon.
Wow. "Qualify" does not mean the same thing as "Quantify," and totally different from what is being said.I'm going to assume you actually do know what the word "or" means, and just didn't read it in my post. If this is a false assumption please let me know and I will clarify it for you.
You conflated the two in your statement:
People make a statement as if fact, but can't qualify or quantify it. The fact that actually backing up your statements is so repulsive to you, is very telling.
I said you can't expect people to qualify every statement, not that you can't expect them to support them. Your response that "backing up your statements" was apparently "repulsive" to me, besides using excessive language, left me only able to conclude that you did not understand my use of the word "qualify," as it had nothing to do with backing a statement up. It is about making a statement less absolute through the use of modifiers, not defending your original premise.
I very carefully explained my stance in my post and even provided examples, you blindly attacking without reading and understanding what you're attacking doesn't present a flaw in my post. It also shows that it doesn't really matter what I post, you're just aiming to be combative.
Now all that said, that is my last post to you until you calm down and stop blindly attacking without even understanding what you're attacking.
Yes, you did explain. And I disagreed. To disagree is not to "attack." This is the sort of thing that is being talked about. I fully understand what I am responding to (not "attacking"), and have endeavored to present my argument calmly. While I vehemently disagree with your position, I have tried to avoid saying anything insulting towards you personally or making any assumptions about your state. Meanwhile, you have gone to great lengths explaining how little you care, and making assumptions that I am feeling "combative," trying to "attack" you, or in any way not calm.
I will, however, assume that if you found my other responses so disagreeable you will have the same feeling towards this one and follow through on your promise to stop responding. We might as well end it anyway, as it seems some people are still making a valiant attempt to sneak conversations about healers between our walls of text. It has been a fun little digression, however, and I'd hope you don't ascribe my disagreement with you to animus. I mean, you are someone who writes coherently and tends to disagree with me. What could be better?
4. Most of the time if you have decent characters and use good tactics you will not have to heal in combat.
I can read that "most of the time" one of two ways: If I have decent characters and good tactics I won't have to heal in combat very often, or I can read it as sometimes (in some games) even with decent characters and tactics I'll have to combat heal a lot.It doesn't really matter which way you read that, they both go way farther than anything you could possibly know. Unless you have played in over 50% of the games out there, you can't know what happens even most of the time.
Again, I appreciate the need to stop people from misquoting you, but even a most of the time statement goes too far, a much better way would be "in my experience".
Nope, "most of the time", works perfectly well with the way I presented it. I know you have not read the entire thread, and considering how long it is I understand. You also did not read my other posts in other threads.
With all the limitations I put in place, "most of the time" fits perfectly well.
With that aside I think you do understand my intent even if you don't like the way I worded it.
I did not go into detailed wording because I was not writing a guide on how to not heal. The base assumption was that the reader was familiar with such threads.
We might as well anyway, as it seems some people are still making a valiant attempt to sneak conversations about healers between our walls of text. It has been a fun little digression, however,...
Curiously, I think your discussion is actually more on-topic than most of the posts featuring claims about healing.
The cleric is a hammer. The backside of the hammer can be used to pull nails to correct (heal) your poorly executed hammering, but should not be the primary use of the hammer unless you are bad with the hammer. To have a cleric focused solely on healing is like carrying a hammer solely to pull nails.
Did that hit the nail right on the head?
"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail".
Confirmation Bias. Seems to be a big problem with threads like this. One group always plays a game a certain way, expects the whole world to be the same. Ignores data that shows otherwise, or dismisses the viewpoints that disagree.
More than one way to play cleric, more than one way to have fun.
Mechanically healing in combat is undesired due to efficiency, average DPR of balanced encounters out paces almost most all normal healing ability. This is fairly evident with a close study of the appropriate charts of monsters/NPC by CR.
In practice it is not uncommon to require healing, due to damage spikes (crits or focused fire), unfortunate circumstances, enemy/player tactics, or unbalanced encounters (its not too hard to balance things, but there are some pitfalls and not all groups are the same).
What part of my post said something contrary to this?
Hammer. It is a tool with several purposes. Insisting on using only one side due to principle makes it less of a tool.
Jodokai, you apparently don't understand the difference between stating an opinion, and publishing a scientific paper.
With that aside I think you do understand my intent even if you don't like the way I worded it.
Again I'm not the one with a problem. Adamantine Dragon was the one with a problem with the way people responded to posts. I say again: I do not care how you word things. I do not have a problem. I was simply offering a suggestion as to why people may be responding in a particular way, and offered suggestions on how to avoid such a response in the future. If you don't care how people respond, I would be slightly confused by the post complaining about it, but cool feel free to disregard my advice.
Wraithstrike - I do get what you're saying, but I disagree with it (in my experience combat healing is essential at least once a session), or I think it's a little obvious (of course healers should try to kill monsters when they don't have to heal anyone), but neither concerns me a great deal.
LOL Jodokai, you have a nice revisionist history going on here. Your original post was the one expressing a problem with how people say their way is "better" than other people's way. That's what prompted me to reply to you in the first place. If you didn't "have a problem with it" why did you post that you did?
I do admit that I do have a problem with this constant refrain on these boards that it is some sort of social infraction to say "I think my way is better" when talking about a friggin' GAME for Pete's sake.
James, I will grant you that this is a non-linear situation. You can't just say "take this party and do the same encounter twice, once healing and once not healing." The approach you take leads to differences in how you approach combat initially so that direct comparisons are very difficult to accomplish.
A lot of this comes down to experience and playstyle. I've played this game a long time and I've been in parties that take both approaches. Both can be "successful" approaches, so it's not like one way is "wrong" and the other is "right." It really boils down to investigating the margins of the situation.
My point has been that while either approach can be equally successful in completing a single encounter, the "heal outside of combat" approach tends to conserve resources more efficiently and as such helps to combat the ubiquitous "fifteen minute adventuring day" problem.
It has been my experience that parties who avoid in combat healing tend to be able to go longer between full rests to recover spells and resources. Not that parties who avoid in combat healing tend to be more successful in combat.
So it really is an "at the margins" situation where we're talking more about overall efficiency than we are about combat effectiveness.
At least for me.
Jodokai, you apparently don't understand the difference between stating an opinion, and publishing a scientific paper.With that aside I think you do understand my intent even if you don't like the way I worded it.Again I'm not the one with a problem. Adamantine Dragon was the one with a problem with the way people responded to posts. I say again: I do not care how you word things. I do not have a problem. I was simply offering a suggestion as to why people may be responding in a particular way, and offered suggestions on how to avoid such a response in the future. If you don't care how people respond, I would be slightly confused by the post complaining about it, but cool feel free to disregard my advice.
Wraithstrike - I do get what you're saying, but I disagree with it (in my experience combat healing is essential at least once a session), or I think it's a little obvious (of course healers should try to kill monsters when they don't have to heal anyone), but neither concerns me a great deal.
How many encounters do you generally have in a session?
When you have to heal are you facing encounters that are APL=CR or APL+3?
If it is APL=CR is after your resources have been drained, due to the dice gods or other abnormalities?
Does your group play in such as way as to try to restrict enemy damage such as buffing the group, debuffing bad guys, and so on?
There are some of the variances I addressed before.
If you are facing harder combats, then its likely that you can be forced to burn more resources.
-James
James, I think that this is perhaps one area that we are not seeing eye-to-eye.
The point of buffing/debuffing/battlefield control and tactics is to make "harder combats" less "hard" in the first place, which is what allows the combat to consume fewer resources.
Healing, in general, does not make "harder combats" less hard. It just helps you survive them. Using tactically appropriate buffs/debuffs/control spells makes combat less hard, which means you "need" less healing to survive.
Since buffing/debuffing/tactical control can be spread across the party's spellcasters, this means that you have less of a problem with "guys, we have to stop. I'm out of heals."
PS: And for the record as far as resource burning, in my experience it is the group going for the 15minute workday nuk-a-thon that are the burners by far. Others can be inefficient for a variety of reasons, but the nova-ers are the reason that dispel magic got changed from checking each spell as it used to be food run time...
Well, on that note you and I probably violently agree.
I keep trying to frame this as an "at the margins" debate. To me it is important that our party conserve resources as a key tactical goal. It has been my experience through years of playing that the single most frequent reason for needing to rest is that the healer is out of heals. Usually this happens when the other casters are still doing OK with their blast, battlefield control or buff spells.
It is in large part because of this single point of resource drain that I began working with my parties to redefine the role of "healer" in the party. My goal as party resource manager is to do as much as possible to ensure that all of the resource limited party members deplete their resources at about the same rate, and that this allow as much exploration, combat and role play opportunity as possible.
I also have pushed hard for managing other consumables as well. I agree that too many people view consumables as "last ditch" needs and they never reach that point of "last ditch" so the consumables are never consumed. I try to incorporate consumables into the general tactics such that using a wand, a potion, a scroll or a magic item is factored into the overall effort.
For example, pearls of power are great, but I see too many people waste them because they don't automatically use them, and end up using them in combat, wasting a standard action to do so. That's poor action economy management. With my prepared spellcasters I actively plan to use pearls in encounters so I can recharge my spell outside of combat.
I might not be on the exact page as Wraith on this since my major issue about in-combat healing is all about managing the action economy most efficiently, not just in THIS encounter, but for the entire adventuring day.
It may be that I am unusual in my deep and abiding dislike for poor resource management. I really, really don't like it.
This thread is still going?
What have we resolved?
PS: And for the record as far as resource burning, in my experience it is the group going for the 15minute workday nuk-a-thon that are the burners by far. Others can be inefficient for a variety of reasons, but the nova-ers are the reason that dispel magic got changed from checking each spell as it used to be food run time...Well, on that note you and I probably violently agree.
I keep trying to frame this as an "at the margins" debate. To me it is important that our party conserve resources as a key tactical goal. It has been my experience through years of playing that the single most frequent reason for needing to rest is that the healer is out of heals. Usually this happens when the other casters are still doing OK with their blast, battlefield control or buff spells.
It is in large part because of this single point of resource drain that I began working with my parties to redefine the role of "healer" in the party. My goal as party resource manager is to do as much as possible to ensure that all of the resource limited party members deplete their resources at about the same rate, and that this allow as much exploration, combat and role play opportunity as possible.
I also have pushed hard for managing other consumables as well. I agree that too many people view consumables as "last ditch" needs and they never reach that point of "last ditch" so the consumables are never consumed. I try to incorporate consumables into the general tactics such that using a wand, a potion, a scroll or a magic item is factored into the overall effort.
For example, pearls of power are great, but I see too many people waste them because they don't automatically use them, and end up using them in combat, wasting a standard action to do so. That's poor action economy management. With my prepared spellcasters I actively plan to use pearls in encounters so I can recharge my spell outside of combat.
I might not be on the exact page as Wraith on this since my major issue about...
From what I am reading we are very much in agreement. :)
The less resources you waste(not just use) the longer you can adventure. Every thing that I don't use in encounter #1 is available for later fights if needed. That is why I don't like seeing people cast spells out of boredom or "just because". When it gets to the point where the party has the battle in hand I switch to crossbows or cantrips.
Wraith, my druid probably goes one step further in spell rationing. She will use her bow unless it is abundantly clear that a spell is absolutely required from her.
This way when we get to the big boss battles, she usually has most of her spells left, and she can really bring the hurt spell-wise when it counts.
I posted on this thread a month ago, and as it is still going, I would like to say something to the #1 (Never heal in combat, period) advocates, along with those who think that healing should only be reserved for bad luck or mistakes.
If you never have to heal in combat, your GM is being too easy on you.
I'm probably going to get some flak for saying this, but chances are your party is either optimized enough to need a higher CR to challenge it or a GM that will play monsters/NPCs to their full effect. Granted some monsters are mindless or too stupid to use tactics, but most aren't. I often see monsters encountered in strange and disadvantageous terrains. Kobolds should attack from ambush and with traps. Hobgoblins should fight as a team. Dragons should have plenty of room to fly. A discerning opponent should probably try to kill the arcane caster in the first round if he can. A monster with a wisdom score above 5 should roll a heal check to see if a dropped PC is dead or not. If they succeed: coup de grace if not threatened. Oh...and use those special abilities like poison on hit and so forth. I've seen GMs skip things like that they that either from neglect or to "be nice" and turn the encounter into a cakewalk.
It has been argued that having a healer is a crutch. No more than always having somebody buff you. If your arcane caster goes down to -8 in the surprise round (if you say this is impossible either you cheat, you lie, or you've never had a GM worth his salt) and the fighter and rogue don't get their haste, and with the additional loss of 1/4-1/6 of the party's action resources, they've been effectively castrated.
I am not trying to suggest that every encounter should put somebody below 0, nor am I suggesting that healing and buffing are the same thing or equal in value. I am saying that having somebody who can slap on some serious in combat healing (i.e. nothing less than 'Heal' at higher levels) can be necessary at times, and if it isn't, your group isn't doing it "wrong" per se, but I would submit that you aren't being "challenged."
A last note is one of roleplaying: people have noted that it can be fun to play a dedicated healer. I this is true, but it isn't for me. However, regardless, I do normally play Lawful Good characters and the typical PC is thought to be 'good' battling 'evil.' If you are a good cleric serving a good deity, and you have an ally near death, can you morally not heal them in order to lay the smite on somebody? I don't think even Iomedae would be happy with that, let alone a goddess like Sarenrae. Frankly, I think that's the sort of thing that gets clerics stripped of their powers.
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I posted on this thread a month ago, and as it is still going, I would like to say something to the #1 (Never heal in combat, period) advocates, along with those who think that healing should only be reserved for bad luck or mistakes.
If you never have to heal in combat, your GM is being too easy on you.
I'm probably going to get some flak for saying this
You'd get less if you said 'is possibly being too easy' rather than 'is being too easy'. It also helps to not call others liars and cheaters without a shred of evidence to back up your assertion.
Also, you're falling prey to the very misconceptions this thread was made to combat. No one is saying you must never heal in combat. You're attacking a strawman.
If you are a good cleric serving a good deity, and you have an ally near death, can you morally not heal them in order to lay the smite on somebody? I don't think even Iomedae would be happy with that, let alone a goddess like Sarenrae. Frankly, I think that's the sort of thing that gets clerics stripped of their powers.
One DM tried to force our cleric's playstyle once... the result was: nobody wanted to play clerics/paladins at his table. Bad idea.
If you want to increase combat difficulty to a point where healing is required, you'll find out that healers who didn't focus their entire build (feats) on that will fail to keep up. And if they focus on healing the'll usually fail at everything else...
I dislike 1-trick-ponies, as much as I dislike the holy trinity.