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Only in the most basic sense do we agree on this. In the instance of the Phoenix bloodline, it is a hard no from me. Not only does the spell deal no damage, it HEALS living targets. Attacks deal damage. This spell does not.
Attacks do NOT need to deal damage. That's not correct at all. Anything that requires an ATTACK ROLL is an attack. (not the only thing that is an attack). This spell REQUIRES an attack roll. Thus it is an attack. It heals, but it is an attack.
Damage has not been dealt and has not been subject to any sort of damage reduction or resistance. That happens after the damage has been totaled and APPLIED to the creature. Since the spell never does any damage, the DR or resistance of said creature never comes into play.
If no damage has been rolled, how much do you heal?
You can only critical when you deal damage.
No. You can only critical when you ATTACK. You might not do any damage. But that is based on the damage roll generated from the attack versus the resistances. You can still critically hit and deal no damage. (see also creatures with say 1d3-2 damage vs someone with DR 2)
See, this, I think is where you're getting an attack and a damage roll confused. An attack roll is (can be, it can also be an area) a D20 roll to hit. It can crit on a nat 20 (and hits). A crit does double the damage roll. This is the "normal damage" for the roll, with all other modifiers added, equals the damage. Subtract from this normal damage resistances or conversions... and you have damage taken (or healed) by the creature.
You're starting out with it being a "no damage" spell. I'm ending with it because it requires a damage roll to be converted. We disagree on what we think the order of operations is. For me it logically follows that in order to convert anything, we need that anything totaled first.
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You're starting out with it being a "no damage" spell. I'm ending with it because it requires a damage roll to be converted. We disagree on what we think the order of operations is. For me it logically follows that in order to convert anything, we need that anything totaled first.
The bloodline explicitly states the spell deals no damage. Logically, abilities that require damage to be dealt prior to activation cannot be activated because the spell deals no damage. Since they do not activate, they cannot be used to artificially inflate the value of the spell damage used to calculate the healing the spell ACTUALLY does. Use the spell description, and only the spell description, to calculate the healing done by the spell. Use abilities that directly modify the spell to help inflate the values. Get your GM to approve anything else.
I like the mundane combination of Faith Healing (Occult Skill Unlock), Healing Hands, Incredible Healer, and Signature Skill Heal... an Adept or Expert NPC could have this all online with less than 8HD...
1(level): Healer's Hands
3(level): Psychic Sensitivity
5(level): Incredible Healer
7(level): Signature Skill Heal
Too lazy to look right meow, but I am sure there are traits that could be exploited to jazz this up even further.
Simply being Human with Focused Study could get two "free" Skill Focus feats with 8HD... obviously use level one for Skill Focus Heal.
A Fighter with ranks in Knowledge Planes could very well pursue Flickering Step/Dimensional Savant for teleport pounce... as well as being an awesome healer.
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If you're mucking around with the heal skill then a healer's satchel is well worth having, both for HP recovery and for a bunch of more specialised uses.
I'm sort of puzzled by the focus on recovering HP slowly but with a high or even nigh unlimited amount per day though. Doing so is...easy. And usually pointless, unless you have an unusually masochistic party.
If you're mucking around with the heal skill then a healer's satchel is well worth having, both for HP recovery and for a bunch of more specialised uses.
I'm sort of puzzled by the focus on recovering HP slowly but with a high or even nigh unlimited amount per day though. Doing so is...easy. And usually pointless, unless you have an unusually masochistic party.
This. There is a reason why parties buy bundles of wands of CLW. That's you're all day, low speed healing solution. It's pretty cheap as things go.
When you need healing it typically needs to be much more than 5hp or so a round.
Heal is the go to healing spell/ability because you're healing 100+ hp per cast.
When monster are dealing 40+ damage per hit, fast healing 15 still doesn't cut it.
I'm sort of puzzled by the focus on recovering HP slowly but with a high or even nigh unlimited amount per day though. Doing so is...easy. And usually pointless, unless you have an unusually masochistic party.
I was about to post something similar.
If you want to compare it to a "real" healer, then you may as well look at a spirit guide oracle with double life. At level 18, you'd have double life link and double channel pools. Ideally, you'd combine that with shield other on your most damage prone teammate, but it's dangerous to do that on more than 2 targets. So, let's assume a monster deals 200 damage to your tank in the previous round. First, that damage is cut in half by shield other, so 100. Then, that damage is reduced by 10 from double life link. Finally, you will channel for 9d6, average 31.5. This leaves your tank at 58.5 remaining damage. If you expect another big hit like that next round, then you can also quick channel for another 31.5, to leave your tank at only 27 damage, from an initial 200. If you took fey foundling, the healer would also wipe out most of the damage dealt to himself from life links and shield other with those 2 channels.
The usual benefit of the slow, steady, endless healing is that you aren't spending actions to maintain it. That's why I presented the "totemic bachannal skald" and "life spirit spiritualist: involutionist" options.
But yeah, if you're spending an action you better be getting more out of it than 20 or 30 hp.
Trying to figure out a better way to the op's phoenix healer, you can't just take one level of phoenix sorcerer then go fire kineticist can you? And if you can, would the spell like abilities be treated as healing spells if you dipped life oracle for spirit boost? I think at will unlimited temporary hitpoints and healing could be useful done that direction, but it seems like you'd need some unlikely rulings for it to function.
Trying to figure out a better way to the op's phoenix healer, you can't just take one level of phoenix sorcerer then go fire kineticist can you? And if you can, would the spell like abilities be treated as healing spells if you dipped life oracle for spirit boost? I think at will unlimited temporary hitpoints and healing could be useful done that direction, but it seems like you'd need some unlikely rulings for it to function.
The OP's phoenix healer is based on putting acid splash into a "Schrodinger's damage-dealing attack" state, applying Painful Stare as though the spell would deal damage, and then using phoenix arcana to make the spell not deal damage, but still (somehow) benefit from the now-inapplicable Painful Stare.
As for getting Phoenix Arcana on a fire kineticist, that goes to the question of whether bloodline arcana can apply to spell-like abilities. It arguably should. You'll need to use the composite blast Blue Flame in order to keep up with kinetic healers, though. 18th level, 28 Con:
- Fire blast: (9d6+4)/2
- Blue flame: (18d6+4)/2. 2 burn.
- Wood healer: 9d6+4. 1 burn.
- Kinetic healer: 9d6+18. 1 burn.
Blue flame with the form infusion detonation compares fairly well to healing burst.
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As for getting Phoenix Arcana on a fire kineticist, that goes to the question of whether bloodline arcana can apply to spell-like abilities. It arguably should.
I've only seen convincing arguments for treating spell-like abilities like spells when they explicitly mimic the effects of an existing spell. It all stems back to whether caster levels and spell-like abilities should qualify a character for meeting requirements for prestige classes with specific spell level requirements for entry. The debate was hot back in the 3.0 and 3.5 D&D era, and about the Warlock class as well. Even Paizo went one way (which I disagreed with strongly) before they changed gears to not allowing it (which matched my stance).
I settled the argument on that matter for myself a long time ago. I lean towards 'only when they explicitly mimic an exiting spell'. So, a kinetic energy blast won't cut it. If a character could cast scorching ray or burning hands as a spell-like ability, I'd allow it. But not fire/blue flame blast.
