Party's has no healer now. What do I do?


Advice


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So our parties cleric died the other day, That sucks but the real problem is when they were making a new character turns out they showed up and were no longer a cleric. Now, this party is already pretty unbalanced, our spell caster isn't able to detect magic, I don't think we have any ranged fighters and like... Now we're down a healer, I think that's going to be a pretty major problem. In retrospect I should of as the DM maybe said what we need and don't need. But either way, it's too late to switch things now and I don't really wanna have to force the former cleric to be a healer if they don't want to be one (especially seeing as they didn't like doing the actual healing part when in that role so it kinda defeats the whole point) so what should I do? The evil part of me wants to maybe wipe out a couple of smarter players that would be willing to actually step into the roles we need so we can have someone make something that's actually more useful to the party, But you know.. That's probably most definitely not the best way to go about things. Ideas?


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What are you working with? Is the problem that you have a lack of magic that cures HP or is the problem a complete lack of a way to cope with statuses like Blindness, Petrification, Poison, Death, Fatigue, Intestinal Hedgehogs, etc? Are you mostly running from published adventures, or homebrewing the encounters? What classes do you have now, and what levels?


Add some extra healing potions and a few scrolls of status removal/bring-back-to-life spells that are on the spell list of someone in your party to what they find in loot. That gives them the tools they need. If no one in the party has anything on their spell list that can take care of a particular status they need reversed (which is pretty uncommon, as even wizards can do a fair amount of status removal), provide an NPC in whatever "home base" they have that can do that spell casting for a fee. Or consider a magic item that gives them limited use of a spell they're desperately missing that can just be activated by command word.

Beyond that, if they find they need someone dedicated to in-combat healing, that's for them to decide and resolve (via cohort, hireling, or change of character). If they don't decide they need that resource, then that's their call to make too. My current party has gone for ten levels now without a traditional healer, and there's no appetite at all to change that. We can cobble together enough answers to issues with the party members we do have to make it through just fine.


Let the party wizard find or buy a wand or scroll (then learn!) of Detect Magic, and one of Infernal Healing.

So, nobody is a Cleric, and presumably, nobody is a Life Oracle. So what is everybody else in your party playing?

Rangers can use Wands of Cure Light Wounds.

NihilsticBanana wrote:
The evil part of me wants to maybe wipe out

If you want. That certainly is 1 way up the Learning Curve.


Wands of healing are the easy option. A healer is not as essential as one might think. Maybe hand them out as a reward?


As a DM you shouldn't dictate what players should or shouldn't do. Just let them have the ability to pay for healing services. This could mean going back to town every time they want to heal or even letting them hire an NPC with healing abilities. The NPC won't fight for them (that's not in their contract) but for X gold per day they will heal injured party members to the best of their ability.

Have the players pay at least half up front which is then kept safe somewhere in town. This way players won't try to get free healing by stiffing the NPC and/or stealing back what was paid to the NPC.

Sovereign Court

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As far as 'detect magic' goes, I vastly prefer the Lantern of Auras. Not only is it a lantern that doesn't need fuel, it also allows you to take a full round action to do the detect magic shtick. Its also made of cold iron, if you really need an improvised cold iron weapon for DR. You can also go with a divination Cloak of the Hedge Wizard for a similar pricetag.

In general the party shouldn't "need" an in-combat healer, but they will need out of combat healing. As mentioned, there are quite a few ways to accomplish that, between using the heal skill and recent planar feats, to wands of cure light wounds or infernal healing. It really depends on what the party makeup is. Condition Removal will be the stumbling block at higher levels, but most conditions can be removed with 'gold'.

Remember that if the party has access to a decent sized town, spellcasting services are basically always available (at the temple at least) and the going rate is 10gp x spell level x caster level. So 10gp for a CL 1 cure light wounds, which is actually cheaper than a charge from a wand. Though its probably more efficient to hit up the local Asmodeus Wizard Tower for a charge of Infernal Healing which heals 10hp over a minute for 10gp.


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You shouldn't "try" to wipe them out. But you don't have to hand wave the consequences of their decisions. If the combats become deadlier without a healer, then whoever dies might be tempted to make a healer. If the party happens to do fine without a healer, then I guess you don't have to do anything. Maybe if one of the other players wants to switch characters to a healer, then you make that easy for them to do, but I wouldn't force anyone to heal.

Out of combat, hit point healing should be easy enough to come by with enough wands. Status removal is what the party might struggle against. But again, just let what happens happen.


Punish them for their collective shortsightedness!

No, but seriously, you shouldn't worry about it. Maybe throw in some healing wands and scrolls, items and such, if you are feeling generous.

You should, however, absolutely punish them for ignoring ranged combat. Flying enemies. Enemy archers. Flying enemy archers...

Shadow Lodge

I've played at a lot of tables with no healer in the group. Consumables and paying npcs has always sufficed.


Let the players figure out what to do.
You're the GM, you don't get to decide what the players do. You get to put problems in front of them and see how they handle it. You get to have their actions (or inaction) have consequences.


Honestly from the GM viewpoint, the party is still a party. Run the encounters just like you have been. Don't do anything special or different. The players are the ones that need to make adjustments to the new party mix, not you.

If you want to be nice to them, throw in less items and more money. They will need the money to buy spell casting services or specific items to overcome the new challenges presented by their current party build and straight gold is the easiest to work with.

The Exchange

Wand of cure light wounds and first aid gloves.

first aid gloves

That deals with HP issues. Removal spells will be nice to have along with lesser restoration. The other casters should try to get these so they don't have to stop and runaway too often. But you control the enemies and could avoid long term negative effects before bosses.


HP curing isn't a problem. There are lots of ways to get access to CLW on a spell list or the ability to use wands of it. There's also Infernal Healing.

Both of those can handle out of combat HP restoration.

Generally my experience with Pathfinder was that in combat healing wasn't needed, and often wasn't useful. Killing the enemy faster was a better plan.

The big problem is condition removal, which they should come up with a plan for.

What is the party composition?

Liberty's Edge

Cleric In A Bag/Box Kit
Antitoxin x2 [100GP]
Antiplague x2 [100GP]
Healer's Kit x1 [50GP]
Wand Of Stabilize [375GP]
Potions
-Cure Moderate Wounds x2 [600GP]
-Lesser Restoration x2 [600GP]
-Remove Blindness/Deafness x1 [750GP]
-Remove Curse x1 [750GP]
-Remove Paralysis x1 [300GP]

Total Value: 3,625 Gold Pieces

Just requires someone with Ranks in Heal and Use magic Device

The Exchange

Potions for removal spells are hurt by the low caster level, can still be a life saver though.


If your party is heavy on martials, one or more of them might take the Item Mastery feat, Curative Mastery.

It's easy to get into (any 1st level martial could take it in theory), easy to use (any Bag of Holding grants full access to the feat's spell-like abilities), and doesn't provoke AoO when you use it. :)

Note that if playing in PFS, multiclass characters can only use one of their classes to calculate base Fortitude (thus, a fighter 2 / pally 2 has base Fort +3, not +6, for Item Mastery purposes.)

Note also that unlike most Item Mastery feats, Curative uses the item's caster level for the spell-like ability's caster level, not your BAB.


Stay low. Conserve Spell slots. Never cut a deal with a dragon.


DM PC built as a healbot/condition remover is a simple fix. Make them somewhat inept in combat so they hang decently far behind while the party moves ahead. Oracle is pretty good for this.

The other solution would be just ran things as is and don't switch it up. Maybe throw in some condition removal stuff/expendable healing. Our GM gave us this in one game.

Rod of Mercy:

Three times per day as a Standard action you may use a Rod of Mercy to cast Restoration on a target within range with no material cost. Additionally you may instead expend one use to cast Lay on Hands as a Paladin equal to this item's caster level (10) and mimic a single Mercy of your choice. This Mercy is chosen when this function is first used in a day and cannot be changed for 24 hours.

Liberty's Edge

Scavion wrote:

DM PC built as a healbot/condition remover is a simple fix. Make them somewhat inept in combat so they hang decently far behind while the party moves ahead. Oracle is pretty good for this.

The other solution would be just ran things as is and don't switch it up. Maybe throw in some condition removal stuff/expendable healing. Our GM gave us this in one game.

Or a cleric of Abadar, charging the group as they go with each clerical power they ask for. All the advantages of a Healbot with the disadvantage of remembering they have to include payments to another party member.

Spell Level x Caster Level X 10GP :3


Two good feats to consider to help take care of the HP needs.
Healer's Hands
Incredible Healer

Healer's Gloves and Vests of Surgery are cheap items and boost it up even further.


I like the Extraction Scarificator (2,500 gp) along with a Specialized Healer's Satchel (3,100 gp). The ES can do lesser restoration, and the SHS can handle ability drain, disease, and poison. The SHS also can work on up to 5 at a time.

/cevah

Liberty's Edge

Advanced Class Guide has a two feat chain that might work, if your Lawful Good.

Believer's Boon and Believer's Hands

gives you a 1/DY use of the first level Domain Power of a Deity and the other grants you a 1/DY Lay On Hands Ability

So as long as you follow a LG, LN, or NG Deity you can use these abilities

Sarenrae Grants the Healing Domain, which would give a 1/DY rebuke Death healing a person for 1d4+1 HP if they're below 0 HP

Although I like the idea of Abadar 1/DY Ignoring Difficult Terrain for 1 round

as you can take extra Lay On Hands to gain extra daily uses of the ability as well as count for Feats that require one to have Lay On Hands


Every intelligent adventurer should have some type of emergency consumable healing on them. Even the bad guys.

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