Healing Word Question (Completely new player)

[Dinian]

As it says in the title, myself and 4 friends are completely new players (we played our first game tonight), and ran into a question about Healing Word.

Here is my questions, I will try to give as many details as possible, if I am not detailed enough please let me know.

Dinian, a swordmage with 26 Max HP a surge value of 6 and 8 surges per day, is in a fight with 2 kobolds, one of which is in front of him, the other of which is flanking him on his left. Relaeha, a cleric, stands 2 squares behind him. All PC and NPC's currently are at full health.

Initiative rolls are made. Dinian rolls a 19, the two kobolds roll a 15 and an 8, and Releaha rolls a 3.

Dinian attacks the kobold in front of him but misses. The kobold in front of him attacks and hits for 8hp. The kobold flanking on his left attacks and hits for 8hp. Dinian is now at 10 HP.

Relaeha casts healing word. Here comes the question:

When Relaeha casts healing word which of the following happens, or does something entirely different happen:

A. Dinian spends 1 of his 8 healing surges to heal for 6 AND then rolls an additional 1d6 and adds that total to his current HP. (This is what I think happens)

B. Dinian has a choice. If Dinian does NOT spend one of his healing surges he only heals for 6hp. If he DOES spend one of his healing surges he heals for 6hp + 1d6.

C. Something completely different.

If situation A is correct what happens if a priest cast healing word on a recipient that has no more healing surges. Is the target an invalid target and the DM lets the priest know? Does the spell fizzle? What happens.

Thanks in advance for your answers to what I am sure is a rather mundane question on these forums!

 

[Mr. Wilson]

The answer is A in your situation.

For the second part, once you are out of surges, you can't spend surges, and thus would be an invalid target for a healing word (but you could gain temp hp's or hps from powers that grant hps).

 

[cdrcjsn]

A special case exists for someone who's dying (0 hps or lower).

Even if you don't have a healing surge to spend, any healing grants you 1 hit point and you become conscious (page 295, PHB).

 

[Templhaven]

Okay, I was DMing this game, and my question is this....

IF the character receiving the Healing Word has NO more healing surges left, what would happen to the spell?

Would:

A. The spell go off, healing the character as if it was a FREE healing surge

OR...

B. Nothing would happen.

NOTE: I just read the second reply, but was posting this before I fully read the second reply. Please disregard. Thanks guys!

 

[Gruns]

As has been answered, the answer is mostly A, but a little better...
The Swordmage spends a Healing surge and gains:
6 hps for his Surge Value
1d6 hps from the Healing Word Power
AND (nobody's mentioned yet)
3-5hps from Relaeha's Healer's Lore ability, which adds their Wisdom modifer.
So with a little luck, Dinian could be back at full (with maybe some extra temporary HPs or some AC, depending on what Relaeha does with their Standard action!
Later!
Gruns

 

[Aulirophile]

Target spends a surge. They get surge+1d6+Your wis modifier, from Healer's Lore. The rest of the posts pretty much got it, but Healer's Lore is so easy to miss.

 

[kaomera]

Okay, I was DMing this game, and my question is this....

IF the character receiving the Healing Word has NO more healing surges left, what would happen to the spell?

I've always seen it played that you normally use Healing Word on a target who has no healing surges left. Healing Word allows the target to spend a healing surge (which regains the target's surge value in hp) and then restores additional hit points. You can't restore the "additional" hp unless you first spend the surge, because they're "additional". (Check out the Healing subchapter of the Combat chapter in the PHB. I found it really helpful to re-read some of the more "basic" stuff after running a few games of 4e, because a lot of it's not really entirely basic.)

Now there is an exception, as noted above: if the target is dying they recover to 1 hp even if they have no surges left. That's 1 hp total, they still don't recover any of the additional hps. (This is in the Death & Dying subchapter, which is right after Healing.)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yeah, if you don't have surges left then you can't benefit from surge based healing at all. There are still quite a few ways you CAN get some healing but they are more limited. A cleric could use a standard action to cast the daily Cure Light Wounds spell on you, which doesn't use surges. You could benefit from one of a plethora of item-based healing bonuses, like the one granted by a Battle Standard of Healing (all allies within 5 squares of the standard gain a hit point whenever another ally spends a surge within that area). Shaman also can grant extra healing without a surge depending on their class feature. There are also a number of powers in Divine Power which grant surgeless healing, including the at-wills Astral Seal and Recovery Strike. Regeneration also doesn't depend on surges, though it doesn't function once you fall below 0 hit points either.

The cleric daily Consecrated Ground is a virtual font of surgeless healing. It is rather bordering on impossible to kill off a party once the cleric casts that...