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I've done a bunch of Google research, and read threads here, on Reddit, and on some other forums. It seems like the general consensus is that an Alchemist CAN act as a party healer in Pathfinder, mostly thanks to the Wasteland Blightbreaker + Chirurgeon Archetype combo and the Healing Bombs Discovery. There's some extra boosts in the form of Spontaneous Healing + Healing Touch Discoveries, too. A Wand of CLW is pretty boss, too.
'm playing in a game using the Strange Aeons, and the DM is kinda new. So he's wary of me getting TOO crazy with material from all sorts of random books. I think he'd prefer if I was just an Oracle or something, but... I've done Oracles and Clerics. I don't really enjoy them.
What I DO enjoy is the idea of throwing bombs at people to heal them, and fixing their wounds by stabbing a syringe of health into their face.
Does this sort of Alchemist seem viable to keep a party of fairly newbie players alive? Or should I bite the bullet and play something more mundane and more suited for healing?
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Here's a fun one: grab short/longbow proficiency (Elf?) use a dye arrow and use explosive missile with a healing bomb to heal allies by shooting them with paint from 100 feet away. Bonus points if that ally is surrounded by undead who take the positive energy damage.
Alchemists are one of the best party support characters, up there with bards. You are able to switch from party healer to damage dealer in a mere instant, and as an alchemist you have tools at your belt for most situations. It's a fun class and definitely works for people's needs.
An important thing for party healers to remember is that preemptive damage negation is, in a slightly roundabout way, healing. You don't have to worry about healing that 20 damage your ally WOULD have taken if your shield infusion saved the ally from getting hit in the first place. Similarly, you dont have to heal a party members falling damage after dropping off a cliff of you hand them an infusion of levitate.
You might also be interested in the Healer's Hands and Incredible Healer feats.
Also talk with your GM about Alchemical Allocation.
It's a very handy extract but some GMs might frown on reusable potions.
Also also, if your team is newbies... Yeah no. Go Alchemist. No amount of healing is gonna help you in book 1 if they are new. Be ready for maybe a death or two.
I'd say more but that's spoilers.
But no matter what you do, as long as you don't give up Brew Potion, you can still help with healing. I'd ask teammates to help fund your potion making services though.
Side note, maybe look into Potion based Discoveries. While the Archetype combo lets you pass out Heals, that's all it does. You can't buff people unless it's from the Healing subschool. so no Barkskin unless you pick up Infusion and really by that point you may kinda drop the Archetypes if you're going for it anyway.
So brew up some potions to share with friends, pass out heals for them ahead of time or set yourself up for Lay on Hands through alchemy.
Alchemists make even better healers than bards. With the Infusion discovery, the alchemist can hand out "temporary potions" to party members at the start of the day (and they gain access to the status removal "spells," also), so that the alchemist doesn't even need to use their actions to provide healing.
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I'm hoping to eventually find a way to heal people by stabbing them with syringes full of Cure. Maybe I could eventually load darts full of CLW into a crossbow and shoot people full of health from range?
A mad doctor can dream...
One of the other players has decided to be a Hunter, so there's another semi-healer in the group. We should be fine!
Are Alchemists mostly a Ranged class? I feel like by dumping so many Discoveries, Feats, and other things on making myself into a healer, I might be a kinda crappy Alchemist... that's my big worry. I still want to be able to buff my friends and deal some decent (ranged) damage while also healing them as needed.
If you're going to focus on healing that you should probably go Ranged anyway. You'd need a Feat/Mutagen/Homerule to really mix it up in Melee as an alchemist. Mutagen will let you hold your own as basically a psudo rage but our picks for melee are limited to Simple.
As for healing crossbow, that'd be something I might talk to your DM about. You COULD put Conductive on your crossbow, load it with a healing bomb and shoot it at someone.
I found a video of your alchemist here.
/cevah