I was reading the alchemist thread where out of combat healing is partially discussed and the champion and lay on hands is mentioned
Do people think it was the design intent for champions to be able to lay on hands every 10 minutes to effectively function like a slower, but scaling cure light wounds wand from 1E but in character form
I just wonder as given enough time parties with champions can heal to full between fights . Time is easier to control than money which was the wand issue
It is also more limited as it is just one class.
Has this been discussed as removing the wand of infinite cheap healing was a big design aim
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I'm personally Ok with Champions being able to heal X every 10 minutes, especially because mostly anyone can get similar effects with Medicine.
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Yes it's been discussed. It's intentional, and was featured in Oblivion Oath pretty prominently.
In my opinion, it's a really good idea from a game design perspective as well as a story telling perspective. The wand of clw was better than the alternative of stopping, going back to town, and resting for a week, so replacing it with no means of reliable health recovery was not an option. The notion that the party should trudge forward while steadily losing HP was some kind of GM fever-dream. It literally only works when there's some huge ticking clock and everyone in the party has decided to roleplay a character who won't ditch when things get too hairy.
Allowing focus spells to take over means your main flavor choices actually matter, and get some of the spotlight. Being able to pray for 30 minutes and heal everyone up is a pretty appropriate story moment in these games.
Then, there's still the quite strong mundane healing that happens on similar timescales, but has its own quirks that make you glad when you have a paladin.
My only problem with this is that the cloistered cleric, who's job is to heal people, doesn't have a comparable option.
It's quite a bit later but they can do this with the advanced power of the healing domain.
@Topic: By level 6, everyone investing in some Medicine can heal about 20 HP per 10 minutes, potentially to 2 characters at once. Out of combat healing is really not an issue in PF2 if you have some time.
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Now the only vocal opposition seems to be "but how am I supposed to kill the whole party?!" in tone, whether intentionally or not.
That's not the GM's goal, so mission accomplished.
I was reading the alchemist thread where out of combat healing is partially discussed and the champion and lay on hands is mentioned
Do people think it was the design intent for champions to be able to lay on hands every 10 minutes to effectively function like a slower, but scaling cure light wounds wand from 1E but in character form
I just wonder as given enough time parties with champions can heal to full between fights . Time is easier to control than money which was the wand issue
It is also more limited as it is just one class.
Has this been discussed as removing the wand of infinite cheap healing was a big design aim
With how strong medicine is it seems kind of intended that downtime healing back up to full or near full HP is pretty normal if you have some time to work at it.
My only problem with this is that the cloistered cleric, who's job is to heal people, doesn't have a comparable option.
Medicine + maxed wisdom means they can downtime heal like champs.
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My only problem with this is that the cloistered cleric, who's job is to heal people, doesn't have a comparable option.
I would say that HP healing is one of his many jobs. And with his high wisdom he's got a talent for it.
But wrangling afflictions and high-speed in-combat healing are probably his more exciting healing jobs.
To say nothing of any more pro-active things that he can also do to prevent people from needing quite so many band-aids.
Thanks everyone
There is a lot here
I haven’t dissected the mundane medicine healing so didn’t appreciate that is was comparable
I also hadn’t considered the “better fantasy” point
It is good to know that the encounters apparently assume everyone starts on max HP. I am not convinced that was the intent of the dungeons designed in 1E by a long shot
I was never in the “how am I going to kill the party” camp - more the “how am I going to challenge the party” - and full HP allows a lot more grace
I also have no memory of toting clw wands in 3.5 but do in pathfinder . But that could just be that we weren’t good players / didn’t have magic shops available!
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I also have no memory of toting clw wands in 3.5 but do in pathfinder . But that could just be that we weren’t good players / didn’t have magic shops available!
Or everyone got bored of playing the Wand of Cure Light Wounds.
Cleric.
I meant cleric.
You all got collectively bored of playing a cleric around the time Pathfinder came out and replaced that role with a stick that cost basically nothing and let you play more interesting or varied characters. You didn't recognize that you'd done this because it wasn't a conscious decision, but a mob mentality of "someone else will do it" and no one did and no one was going to change their character so you solved the problem by saying, "I've got a few hundred gold left over, I'll just buy a wand."
If you were to take your group back to 3.5 I suspect you'd find a wand instead of a cleric as well. I know it would happen because my group migrated to the "buy a wand" stage before Pathfinder came out.
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I think it is basically intentional. Jason told the Champion from Geek and Sundry 'the secret' of using their lay on hands ability every ten minutes, after they went between encounters without doing it and were down HP still in their next encounter.
The interesting part of this, they made mundane medicine more powerful, made lay-on hands spammable, but they cut back the cleric's divine font ability. (potentially because it also functions as an attack) and they very specifically prevent healing alchemist from being able to spam creation of ubiquitous healing elixirs when their more martial fellows are able to make a couple types of bombs with no such limitations. If they were consistent about not allowing healing to be spammable, that would make sense, but it seems a bit contrary to the rest of the handling of the abilities.
I think it is basically intentional. Jason told the Champion from Geek and Sundry 'the secret' of using their lay on hands ability every ten minutes, after they went between encounters without doing it and were down HP still in their next encounter.
The interesting part of this, they made mundane medicine more powerful, made lay-on hands spammable, but they cut back the cleric's divine font ability. (potentially because it also functions as an attack) and they very specifically prevent healing alchemist from being able to spam creation of ubiquitous healing elixirs when their more martial fellows are able to make a couple types of bombs with no such limitations. If they were consistent about not allowing healing to be spammable, that would make sense, but it seems a bit contrary to the rest of the handling of the abilities.
In combat healing and out combat healing, the first option is more limited and usually have to spend limited resources the second option the only resource used is time.
Champion have spammable Lay on Hands out of combat, but in combat that is a precious resource that get competition with other focus powers as you level up like Divine Domains and litanies.
Mundane healing is powerful but takes time and the option inside combat is only a single time for the day.
My only problem with this is that the cloistered cleric, who's job is to heal people
I'm going to dispute this assertion. Divine font is a secondary class feature that relies on a non-primary stat to fuel it. Calling healing the cleric's 'job' seems like a bit of a stretch. You can build a healing cleric just fine, but it's hardly the only thing or even primary thing they do, nor should they have exclusive rights to the role either.
I was never in the “how am I going to kill the party” camp - more the “how am I going to challenge the party”
One thing to keep in mind is that this stuff takes time. You need 10 minutes of explicit downtime to recharge LoH or perform basic medicine (longer if you want to upgrade your treatment). If you're doing it once per party member that's a half an hour even for a small party and around an hour for a larger one.
I like the way they’re treating out of combat recovery. Making it take little more than time so the party can recover if they’re willing to wait. Or do it quickly at the cost of combat resources.
And it’s worth noting on the champion that they are down a resource until they recover. So it may be interesting to hit the party 5 minutes after the battle ends with something smaller. The rest of the healing hasn’t had time to work except for the Champion’s, and they stand a good chance of being out of focus so no mid battle lay on hands or domain spell. Seems like a fun occasional challenge.
Slightly off topic, but what are the best ways for a Champion to get more Focus?
Slightly off topic, but what are the best ways for a Champion to get more Focus?
Right now you can get a second focus at lvl 4 by multiclassing, without at lvl 6 by getting Litany Against Wrath.
But you only get better focus recovery at lvl 10.
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My only problem with this is that the cloistered cleric, who's job is to heal people, doesn't have a comparable option.Medicine + maxed wisdom means they can downtime heal like champs.This takes a few feats to accomplish (battlefield medic and continuous recovery), which everyone else in the party can also do. Don't get me wrong, I like mundane healing being opened up to everyone.
My issue is that the paladin basically gets the ability to magically heal the party up between encounters and the cleric doesn't. That doesn't make thematic sense to me.
It's also about the balance between martials and casters.
I can take a party consisting of a barbarian, a fighter, a rogue, and a paladin into any dungeon. As long as one of them is trained in medicine and has the battlefield medic feat (easily acquired from a background) we will never lack for HP. At level one, they can only use medicine once per hour, but the Paladin is healing 6HP every ten minutes. This party of martials won't run out of beat-stick, or lockpicking, or magical healing.
If I take a party of a wizard, alchemist, sorcerer, and cleric into a dungeon they will run out of spells and bombs after a few encounters. Then they are relying on cantrips and crossbows(alchemist). They will run out of magical healing because a party of casters is squishy. Again, mundane healing at level one is hourly. I run out of magical beat-stick, and magical healing pretty quickly. This party is likely to have to retreat and rest overnight to regain resources.
I understand that they wanted to break reliance on casters. I think they broke it a bit too much.
I Don’t think it’s anything near this bad. Though I am happy that a caster from each school is no longer a necessity.
For instance your second party, presuming they had some cohesion instead of being the absolute worst picks by default.
The wizard meta magic thesis and universalist means you can brain foes with your brain and hit a swath with a widened burning hands, eventually you may run out of juice but your cantrips aren’t terrible.
The alchemist, not actually a spell caster and as a class it has some notable problems. But it can pack a bunch healing, bombs, or mutagens and still leave space for a highly situational item like antidote. Then play with a crossbow or more likely light armor and a shield. It’s not far behind the rogue for AC if any. And no reason he can’t bring the lockpicks just as easily as the rogue.
The sorcerer may have a bloodline like demonic or draconic giving them a decent weapon if they’ve prepared for it, and if demonic they’ll be gaining temp HP regularly.
The war priest cleric has obvious appeal at a front liner and brings enough party buffs and in combat healing to keep them alive for a long while.
The caster party thus has piles of in combat healing, and while they may run out of the ability to nova they in exchange get to nova, and even without that they can have decent damage. The all martial party however has only 1 heal per combat (excluding everyone being a field medic which honestly the other party can do just as well.) and they can have major issues with foes who fly, are incorporeal, or just keep climbing out of reach. The champion may get to heal faster out of combat but once they take the easily accessible feat continuous recovery, so can everyone else.
Level 14 Bards can do the same thing with Smoothing Ballad but 9 at a time plus the Bard.