Healing 2 characters at once isn't so rare. If you are playing healer, you probably have shield other up on your alpha sponge. So after the sponge takes an alpha, you just channel back both of your hp.
Selective channel is pretty much required though, if you want to channel in combat.
How do you get to decide who takes the Alpha?(i assume by Alpha you meen the over buffed first attak from all bad guys that happens when you initiatet combat?) Sounds MMORPG stuff to me. Never seen a Alpha strike in PF.
The alpha sponge just goes in front. Opens doors first and such. It should work more often than it doesn't.
The alpha sponge just goes in front. Opens doors first and such. It should work more often than it doesn't.
I guess in a old style dungeon it could work. But i still dont undestand how the badguys all use there best attack move in round 1.
The alpha sponge just goes in front. Opens doors first and such. It should work more often than it doesn't.I guess in a old style dungeon it could work. But i still dont undestand how the badguys all use there best attack move in round 1.
Even if they don't, then in the following rounds the damage is more likely to be distributed anyway, so channel still has advantage.
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Even if they don't, then in the following rounds the damage is more likely to be distributed anyway, so channel still has advantage.The alpha sponge just goes in front. Opens doors first and such. It should work more often than it doesn't.I guess in a old style dungeon it could work. But i still dont undestand how the badguys all use there best attack move in round 1.
But healing is only worth any thing if it keep someone from falling so in most cases a Nice buff or attack is a better move. At least in my experiance.
But healing is only worth any thing if it keep someone from falling so in most cases a Nice buff or attack is a better move. At least in my experiance.Even if they don't, then in the following rounds the damage is more likely to be distributed anyway, so channel still has advantage.The alpha sponge just goes in front. Opens doors first and such. It should work more often than it doesn't.I guess in a old style dungeon it could work. But i still dont undestand how the badguys all use there best attack move in round 1.
Well, that's a separate argument from what we were already talking about.
Damage always out weights healing. ALWAYS.
This is not true. Given the same amount of feats, etc invested in it, and remembering that damage has to get past SR, DR, Saves, AC etc, we have shown the healing keeps up just fine.
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Damage always out weights healing. ALWAYS.
This is not true. Given the same amount of feats, etc invested in it, and remembering that damage has to get past SR, DR, Saves, AC etc, we have shown the healing keeps up just fine.
Who's shown this? Cause I've never ever seen healing keep up with damage outside of fighting 1/3 CR creatures. I don't think it's a terrible option, and useful in certain circumstances, but I think everybody agrees that outside of a dedicated Life Oracle keeping up for a few rounds, you're fighting a losing battle trying to heal all the damage you and your team receives.
Let's go to the dark side!
As a hangover cleric, using dazing channel means that I only do 1d6 of channel damage at 5th level -- okay 2d6, halved. But almost nothing is immune to the daze effect. You can stop undead. You can stop vermin. It's 30 feet radius of battlefield control so long as your charisma is sky-high.
It's not a healing build, but its super effective. I wound up doing it with Horus, so that I could have an animal companion that I could ride for positioning. My eagle is third party, but Nef is in a Razor Coast game. With paizo companions, I could still do this build with a Roc, but I'd need Ant Haul spell to get in the air at this level.
My investment in channeling is the feat selective channel, plus boon companion feat, handle animal skill and ride. Oh, and a trait to raise the DC of my channel. I think you could do a hangover cleric without the mobility of a flying mount, but our party was large. This makes it easier to exclude others.
Where the hangover build becomes problematic is any place where there are large numbers of innocent bystanders. Cities are a nightmare. You can't use it to save the orphanage that is being held hostage by bandits.
It may be odd that I only have a 14 wisdom in my casting stat, but Nef does mainly utility spells in her cleric slots. She's not the party healer. But boy is she useful at battlefield control.
Some of the positive energy channeling variants actually do a decent job of undebuffing. For instance, for Disease, the Positve Energy Variant Channeling heals your Channel Bonus worth of Ability Damage (for 1 ability that you choose for each channel. Not sure if any non-Evil Golarion deities support Disease Variant Channeling, so let's try another -- Farming Positive Energy Variant Channeling (should be supported by Erastil without complaint) lets your party ignore Fatigue for 1 minute, which might be just the ticket for your Barbarian or Bloodrager to get fully into the fight. Other Positve Energy Variants buff decently -- for instance, Art/Music Positive Energy Variant Channeling (should be eagerly supported by Shelyn) gives your Channel Bonus to your party on saving throws against illusions, sonic effects, and language-dependent effects for 1 minute, as well as, for what it's worth, the same bonus on Perform checks (and in parts of Council of Thieves, this would be genuinely important). Most of the good buffs last only until the end of your next turn or even for just one saving throw reroll (although that could actually be important), but this one lasts for 1 minute (as do scattered others). Some of them (like Weather, not because it's great but because it's easy to find) do not say how long they give a bonus for, so I would assume that they only last until the end of your next turn.
With respect to Negative Energy Variant Channeling, has anyone figured out a way to Channel Negative Energy (that isn't limited to Command Undead) while being Good? (The opposite is certainly possible -- Rules As Written let you be an Evil Oracle of Life with the Channel Energy Revelation.) I asked this in another thread, but only got one answer, which wasn't too optimistic (and the parts of the thread before my first post are from years ago, when much less stuff was out).
Somebody above recommended Channel Smite. I have re-read that feat several times, and for the life of me cannot understand why anybody would want to burn a feat on an ability that consumes a use of a decent area effect and does only the same damage to a single target (and they still get to save), but adding dependency upon your hitting with an attack roll (and you only get 1 shot at it unless you invest even more in getting it to work reliably, such as True Strike, which eats into your action economy and isn't available to most Clerics/Oracles anyway, or Greater Channel Smite, which seems like throwing good money after bad). Even when Channel Smite is just acting as a feat tax for something else (such as Guided Hand), it seems hard to justify. So why do so many people like this feat?
Who's shown this? Cause I've never ever seen healing keep up with damage outside of fighting 1/3 CR creatures. I don't think it's a terrible option, and useful in certain circumstances, but I think everybody agrees that outside of a dedicated Life Oracle keeping up for a few rounds, you're fighting a losing battle trying to heal all the damage you and your team receives.
Damage always out weights healing. ALWAYS.
This is not true. Given the same amount of feats, etc invested in it, and remembering that damage has to get past SR, DR, Saves, AC etc, we have shown the healing keeps up just fine.
Everyone doesn't agree. I don't agree. James Jacobs doesn't agree. Lots of people dont agree.
Do the math.
5th level:Take a Lightning Bolt. 5D6. 17 pts of damage. Save for half, then reduce by ER. Not much ER @ 5th level, but there's Evasion, etc. On the average you'll save half the time, so that's 3/4 damage or 12pts.
Cure Serious Wounds= 3D8+5 or 22 points. Beats even if you dont save.
3rd level; Scorching Ray, 4D6 , 14 pts but only hits 2/3 of the time. 10 pts.
Cure Moderate: 2D8+3 or 14 pts. Breaks even if you hit with every ray.
And that's not even talking is someone has blur or ER or any of a list of things. In general, damage spells can be expected to do half.
Yeah, I know, some people compare a Wizard with three feats, a trait, and two magic items vs a Base cleric casting the basic spell. That aint fair. if you compare, you have to compare builds which match the same amount of resources. Feat for feat, etc.
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Who's shown this? Cause I've never ever seen healing keep up with damage outside of fighting 1/3 CR creatures. I don't think it's a terrible option, and useful in certain circumstances, but I think everybody agrees that outside of a dedicated Life Oracle keeping up for a few rounds, you're fighting a losing battle trying to heal all the damage you and your team receives.
Damage always out weights healing. ALWAYS.
This is not true. Given the same amount of feats, etc invested in it, and remembering that damage has to get past SR, DR, Saves, AC etc, we have shown the healing keeps up just fine.
AC-focused characters will often take virtually no damage, in which case healing can easily keep up.
Not that healing all the damage is the goal. The goal is to keep your damage dealers going for the two or three rounds they need to win the battle. In my experience, this tends to work OK.
In a case like this, where a dedicated battle cleric represents a third of the offensive capability of the group, you're probably better off attacking.
In a case like this, where a dedicated battle cleric represents a third of the offensive capability of the group, you're probably better off attacking.
And, why not have a dedicated healer/buffer instead?
A cleric is better off buffing, then healing only when the next hit will drop a party member.
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Do the math.
Cure Serious Wounds= 3D8+5 = 18 average (4.5*3+5), not 22.
Cure Moderate Wounds = 2D8+3 = 12 average (4.5*2+3), not 14.Guy with 18 strength, power attack, and a greatsword at level 5 = 19 (3.5*2+str and a half+PA) damage a swing on average, potentially more due to possibility of feat support/magic weapon/class abilities. Potentially has Haste support for two such attacks per round.
Guy with 18 strength, power attack, and a greatsword at level 3 = 16 (3.5*2+str and a half+PA) damage a swing on average.
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A CR 5 will have around 15 ac. Assume GS weilder is full BAB, then his total bonus To hit will be somewhere around +10 with all bonuses and penalties. Then that 19 average damage becomes closer to 15. And if you assume one side puts up haste then you have to consider that the other side put up something like blur.
The only real difference in healing and attack is that attacks have more/better feats than healing does. Mostly healing just has Fey Foundling, which has to be on the target and not the caster of the heals.
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Damage always out weights healing. ALWAYS.Better to prevent damage and help the team end encounters faster.
As stated multiple times: that's true, but it messes with the combat math. If a guy needs two hits to kill you and you negate one hit, you've postponed your death for one round. If there's one strong enemy versus a full party of you, everyone still has an entire round to wail on that guy. I've negated multiple Flame Strikes just by channeling, and that was the opponent's entire action, while the rest of my party still stood and beat the guy to a pulp.
Yes, it's not as good as outright damage, but sometimes you can extend the lifespan of a few fighters for just a few rounds, which could turn the tide of the fight in your favour.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Healing 2 characters at once isn't so rare. If you are playing healer, you probably have shield other up on your alpha sponge. So after the sponge takes an alpha, you just channel back both of your hp.
Selective channel is pretty much required though, if you want to channel in combat.
This.
I saw a non-healing build cleric with Selective Channel played all the way to 20/mythic 10 and Channel was STILL being used even at those levels.
It doesn't heal a LOT per person, but if you can get multiple party members at once, it can be very very nice.
With a point buy system, I would trade 2 points of STR for 5 points of CHA for sure!
As cleric, you won't be expected to be primary damage dealer, so spread the points around, you can easily boost STR with gear anyway, AND weapons can help on top of that. It is much harder to increase number of channels without using feats.
At higher levels, Shield Other proliferation is pretty easy too. A wand of shield other is really cheap at 4500 or 2250 if you craft it yourself. And with an hours per level duration it lasts most of the day.
Of course you may not want to cast SO on your entire party because fireball, but keeping it up on your two most commonly damaged teammates should not be a problem.
Do the math.
Cure Serious Wounds= 3D8+5 = 18 average (4.5*3+5), not 22.
Cure Moderate Wounds = 2D8+3 = 12 average (4.5*2+3), not 14.Guy with 18 strength, power attack, and a greatsword at level 5 = 19 (3.5*2+str and a half+PA) damage a swing on average, potentially more due to possibility of feat support/magic weapon/class abilities. Potentially has Haste support for two such attacks per round.
Guy with 18 strength, power attack, and a greatsword at level 3 = 16 (3.5*2+str and a half+PA) damage a swing on average.
Yes, opps, figured 5.5 ave, not 4.5. Still, it beats.
OK, sure. But he should only hit about half the time, at most 2/3rd. So, it's 10 or 13 vs 18 pts healing. Healing still wins.
16pts is 8 or 11, 12 healing still wins.
Not a lot of options that support healing, but you can get the Blessed Touch trait to add +1 to your heals.
Fey Foundling works rather well for healing yourself, but is hard to take advantage of. It does pair well with the damage you take from Shield Other though.
A CR 5 will have around 15 ac. Assume GS weilder is full BAB, then his total bonus To hit will be somewhere around +10 with all bonuses and penalties. Then that 19 average damage becomes closer to 15. And if you assume one side puts up haste then you have to consider that the other side put up something like blur.
The only real difference in healing and attack is that attacks have more/better feats than healing does. Mostly healing just has Fey Foundling, which has to be on the target and not the caster of the heals.
Exactly.
Yes, sure, there are more offensive Feats etc than healing feats. But there are some class abilities , like Healer's Blessing & Enhanced Cures which are pretty nice.
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Basically all I've read is a case that some over grated healer can for a few rounds keep up with an equal leveled 2 handed power attack character.
Because 3-6 feats makes it equate to keeping up with a power attack 2 handed user.
Not all fights are optimal either but let's just take level 1.
2d6+8 verse 1d6 channel or 1d8+1.
My mony is on the damage winning verses your limited resources.
Alot of what isn't assumed in the scenarios is resource management...if your blowing 1-3 channels a fight and some other form of healing (wand, spell, ect) your burning a lot more resources than the enemies your fighting. Thus your adventuring day is cut shorter as well as the danger of people going down and needing breaths of life on a regular.
I have never seen a heal keep up on a 1 to 1 exchange with equal CR challenges.
Tho opinions differ around this site.
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I don't want to derail this too much, and let me just say that I actually like channeling, think it's a cool ability, with a lot of neat options tied to it, but I still don't think it keeps up with damage, because I've played the support/healbot character. I've found you can only reliably heal up to about 3/4 of the damage your team can take most of the time, meaning that in a protracted engagement healing loses, but that's not the point of healing, it's to keep everybody up just long enough to finish off the enemy. When I hear people say "Healing builds are good" I can agree with that, when people say "healing keeps up with damage", I find it a little disingenuous. Mostly cause I've looked at the math.
So, let's take a look at level 1 characters. An unchained monk with 18 str can do d10+6 str+3PA for an average of 14.5 dmg a round, twice this if he flurry's. Also he should hit level appropriate enemies 65% of the time, so say he can only flurry once every other round, his average damage with accuracy taken into account is 14.1375 a round. I don't know any option for a first level healer to heal 14 points of damage every round.
But a better example for channel might say fireball? Because they're both burst effects. So at level 5 a wizard casts fireball for 5d6 damage, or 17.5 damage, save for half, likely made 50% of the time. Cleric channels for 3d6, or 10.5 average healing. So everyone who makes their save is fine, people who didn't take 7 damage after everything's said and done. So, in order for this to work, or healing to be better everyone needs to make their save all the time, or have fire resist 7, which, unless you're a specific build with permanent fire resistance, or know you're fighting a fire based enemy, and will therefore have resist energy up, this isn't very likely.
All of this is using level equivalent abilities, with no special tricks, or even uncommon circumstances. In fact with the fireball example level 5 is the worst comparison for damage, cause the damage scales twice as fast as channeling. Also, as people have mentioned, there are a lot more tricks for adding damage, like a simple empowered fireball at level 10, 15d6 damage versus 5d6 channeling. Aside from that, you're also often facing enemies who are above your CR, who's damage output is higher than what a PC can put out in a round.
Once again, I'm not saying channeling, or healing, is bad here. It's just not designed to keep up with damage output, and will only do so in the absolute best of circumstances, which isn't really what you should be planning for. It's the fights that will kill you that you should plan for, and kill it before it can kill you is usually the play style that the numbers encourage.
Still, a Heal or Breath of Life at exactly the right time can be a beautiful thing.
That would depend on the level. At lower levels, martials trump casters. This is as true for offensive as for defensive magic.
I have an amusing anecdote but it has spoilers
As most have said, positive energy channeling (with selective channel) is useful at low levels, even during combat. At higher levels, you typically have better options and can save it to top everyone's hit points at the end of the day.
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Because 3-6 feats makes it equate to keeping up with a power attack 2 handed user.Not all fights are optimal either but let's just take level 1.
2d6+8 verse 1d6 channel or 1d8+1.
My mony is on the damage winning verses your limited resources.
Ok let's be honest here. If you're fighting something at level 1 that hits you for 2d6 +8 you don't need a healer. You need a hearse.
I can't find a single Adventure Path that has a fight where your group would fight something like this. But even if you did, you'd still heal the person to keep from dying, while the rest of the group fought the other guy, (hopefully with color spray or archery or some such). Even in your example (which must be pvp I'd wager) no healer is going to sit there and say "well the rogue just took 16 damage and is now about to die. Better run into combat and swing my mace to finish this fight. That's more important."
Let's go back to the OP and answer a simple question with a simpler question. Is channeling good? Well.. what level do you get mass cure light wounds? Because of you're a channeled character it's about 8 levels sooner and that's awesome.
At least with Mass Cure Light Wounds, you don't need to take a feat to not heal the bad guys though.
I think most of us can agree that Selective Channel should have just been baked in to the ability. But them's the rules.
Because 3-6 feats makes it equate to keeping up with a power attack 2 handed user.Not all fights are optimal either but let's just take level 1.
2d6+8 verse 1d6 channel or 1d8+1.
My mony is on the damage winning verses your limited resources.
Ok let's be honest here. If you're fighting something at level 1 that hits you for 2d6 +8 you don't need a healer. You need a hearse.
I can't find a single Adventure Path that has a fight where your group would fight something like this. But even if you did, you'd still heal the person to keep from dying, while the rest of the group fought the other guy, (hopefully with color spray or archery or some such). Even in your example (which must be pvp I'd wager) no healer is going to sit there and say "well the rogue just took 16 damage and is now about to die. Better run into combat and swing my mace to finish this fight. That's more important."
Yes, good points. Remember, we're talking about whether or not it is a good idea for a PC to heal, so the foe is usually some Monster from the Bestiaries. Nastiest weapon-wielding monster at low CR is oddly the Orc, who does falchion +5 (2d4+4), which is pretty nasty. But a decent warrior will have AC 15 at least so the orc hits him less than 50% of the time. In fact the bog standard NPC Fighter has a AC of 20.
One thing to keep in mind OP is that you don't need a big strength in order to be great as a battle cleric. Yeah you read that. Unless your toting around a tower shield and plate armor you don't need 17+ strength; I could even argue against 16.
For example.... There are TWF cleric builds based on bless equipment chain and demon domain that allows you at level 12 to be attacking at +6 to attack and damage with two Bane weapons 4 times. Without any strength or power attack mods that represents 8D6+24+(4*weapon) damage. Conservatively that's about 65 damage again without the "usual mods". Get a crit fishing weapon, wakizashi, and we can get bigger numbers.
Channeling can be lethal.
I am unsure if you are serious, how Many set up rounds to get both weapons to be bane? And how Many rounds a Day can you get +6 on attacks? And how Many feats did you spend, including the exotic weapon proff?
I'm more just wondering how they think +6 to attack is a reasonable number for level 12...
Because 3-6 feats makes it equate to keeping up with a power attack 2 handed user.Not all fights are optimal either but let's just take level 1.
2d6+8 verse 1d6 channel or 1d8+1.
My mony is on the damage winning verses your limited resources.
Ok let's be honest here. If you're fighting something at level 1 that hits you for 2d6 +8 you don't need a healer. You need a hearse.
I can't find a single Adventure Path that has a fight where your group would fight something like this. But even if you did, you'd still heal the person to keep from dying, while the rest of the group fought the other guy, (hopefully with color spray or archery or some such). Even in your example (which must be pvp I'd wager) no healer is going to sit there and say "well the rogue just took 16 damage and is now about to die. Better run into combat and swing my mace to finish this fight. That's more important."
Yes, good points. Remember, we're talking about whether or not it is a good idea for a PC to heal, so the foe is usually some Monster from the Bestiaries. Nastiest weapon-wielding monster at low CR is oddly the Orc, who does falchion +5 (2d4+4), which is pretty nasty. But a decent warrior will have AC 15 at least so the orc hits him less than 50% of the time. In fact the bog standard NPC Fighter has a AC of 20.
I am unsure what your position is on this. You seem to be on both sides?