Between these 3 spell lists, which ones are best suited for support / buffing / healing / etc?

[Malik Gyan Daumantas]

Inquisitor, Bard and Alchemist.

[avr]

Depends what you value, and how much resources you put in. This is for different flavours of investigator, right?

Suppose you value healing most but you're not willing to put a single feat or equivalent class feature towards that because separately you want to maximise archery. Then inquisitor (via jinyiwei investigator) is basically the only option.

Suppose you value buffs most and you're willing to put everything to this cause. That looks like a questioner investigator VMC bard, probably with remaining feats & traits going towards aid another.

Suppose there are other characters including an evangelist cleric in your party and you want to stand out in support anyway. The ordinary alchemist list and the alchemist discovery (infusion) talent will let you hand out polymorphs which do entirely different stuff from anything the cleric can dream of.

Define your situation better Malik and we can help you more. The situations above aren't the only ones possible and more data is needed. Cutting down your words to the bare minimum makes it feel like you're asking a simple question - but you really aren't.

[Mysterious Stranger]

Two of the three list are spontaneous casters so will have a very limited number of spells available. Alchemist will need to spend a feat to be able to affect others with their extracts, and even then they can only affect a single target.

All of the spell list can restore HP, but that condition removal is the key to being an effective healer. Bards have very little condition removal spells so make the worst healer. Both Alchemists and Inquisitors get the important healing spells like restoration, heal and a couple of remove spells. The inquisitor can affect others without spending class features, but has limited number of spells known. I would rate them equal as healers.

Bards have a lot of good buff spells and even get early access to some of them. They also have other abilities besides spells to buff the party. Alchemists have the issue of only being able to affect a single target so are less useful at buffing the party but excel at buffing themselves. Inquisitors have very good buff spells and have class features that allow them to buff themselves even further. When it comes to buffs I would probably give bards first place, then inquisitors and put alchemists in third place.

All three spell list have decent utility spells. The alchemist is again running into the issue of not being able to affect others, but the others run into the limited spell issue.

What it is really going to come down to is are you looking at providing these spells to the party, or just yourself? If you are look to provide spells to the party as a whole the inquisitor is probably the better choice. If you are only interested in buffing yourself the alchemist has the advantage.

[Malik Gyan Daumantas]

avr wrote:

Depends what you value, and how much resources you put in. This is for different flavours of investigator, right?

Suppose you value healing most but you're not willing to put a single feat or equivalent class feature towards that because separately you want to maximise archery. Then inquisitor (via jinyiwei investigator) is basically the only option.

Suppose you value buffs most and you're willing to put everything to this cause. That looks like a questioner investigator VMC bard, probably with remaining feats & traits going towards aid another.

Suppose there are other characters including an evangelist cleric in your party and you want to stand out in support anyway. The ordinary alchemist list and the alchemist discovery (infusion) talent will let you hand out polymorphs which do entirely different stuff from anything the cleric can dream of.

Define your situation better Malik and we can help you more. The situations above aren't the only ones possible and more data is needed. Cutting down your words to the bare minimum makes it feel like you're asking a simple question - but you really aren't.

I honestly didn't think that far ahead, i wanted to ask in a vaccum, so i could have a better idea of what i wanted but both you and the other guy actually really helped me out way more then you think

[Azothath]

Malik Gyan Daumantas wrote:

Inquisitor, Bard and Alchemist.

Wizard(samsaran) mythic past lives Witch

Bards are pretty flexible, just a lot of 'influencing' spells.
Alchemist or more about bombs and self enhancement into maulers.
Inquisitors are combat-ish with some spells.

[Zwordsman]

I value Alchemist of this list the most. But it sucks that you need to spend a discovery to use. I think their list is better though.
but be aware folks can take them. and depending on the discovery/item combination it can even lock you out of a spell slot for a while.

I think a big consideration here is the way they prep spells. Alchemists must take the time to make the extracts. But its 1min per slot if I remember right. meaning at the morning you can leave several open and prepare them as the situations change over the day. You aren't "fast" at switching out but having the right option on tap is very useful. Which with your extract booklet you can get a lot of options

Inquistors however can pull out any spell they know when they need it. But you hit the limit of "known spells" and if you make the wrong choice or an unforseen situation you didn't account for you can hit a hard wall there as well.

I'm big on alchemists though.
As a note; alchemist can get spont healing and healing touch discoveries which is a little bit of healing. I think Inquistors can get access to the healing domains like clerics right? I'm less versed with them.

I feel like Bard is the least efficient healer but likely a good debuff/buff character. As it uses your turn to power up as opposed to their turn to power up(if they drinnk an elixir). So they get that time to swing and attack while you buff them. compared to buffing on their turn and losing out that initial
Last important note with Alchemist, even with Infusion. I believe you can not use "mass" targeting spells. As you are the target upon elixir usage. so you cant' then target others AFAIK. So that limits you on group buff/group heals heavily.