D&D 5E Xanathar's Healing Spirit is 10d6 healing to the whole party out of combat?

[5ekyu]

Combat is part of the game.

If a spell is better than some out of combat, and worse than them in combat, that is part of how 5e balances options.

Out of combat, if this was a 6th level spell as you think it should be, it would have to be beefed up noticably to not be noticably weaker than nearly every other spell of its level.

As it is, it’s in line with other 2nd level spells.

Re the bold yes that is obvious and has been a point of discussion through out this thread. but when compared to the other main 2nd level out of combat spell prayer of healing - this one not only HAS a combat use (good or bad) that poH does not but also does more healing and more quickly OOC.

So, for some, that whole balance OOC and IC play and "in line with other 2nd level spells" is just not as crystal clear as it seems it is to you.

And, amazingly it has been since been suggested its intended effectiveness is much lower than how it is as presented in the RAW... which just seems odd for a spell so well in line with the other 2nd level spells.

Go figure.

What do we know?

Thanks!

 

[Ovinomancer]

Combat is part of the game.

If a spell is better than some out of combat, and worse than them in combat, that is part of how 5e balances options.

Out of combat, if this was a 6th level spell as you think it should be, it would have to be beefed up noticably to not be noticably weaker than nearly every other spell of its level.

As it is, it’s in line with other 2nd level spells.

Is it? Other second level healing spells are... well, prayer of healing, which can't be used in combat at all and is significantly worse out of combat, and upcast 1st level cure wounds and word of healing. So, then an upcast cure wounds is going to hit for 2d8, which is better than 1d6, but then stop. So, for a round after round long fight, Healing Spirit is better, for short, quick fights, upcast Cure Wounds is better. Word of Healing deals with an entirely different angle -- it doesn't really heal damage so much as get people up from 0, and the odds of it being upcast are pretty slim outside of having no 1st level slots available. Even then, it's not better than Healing Spirit, which can do the same but then continue to heal allies, outside of the action economy. So, then for the other 2nd level healing spells in combat, Healing Spirit is clearly better than Prayer, and conditionally better or worse than the other two healing spells.

Out of combat, it's absolutely no contest. Healing Spirit is far and away a better choice than any of the other available 2nd level healing spells. Not even an contest.

So, then Healing Spirit is competitive in combat, and clearly superior out of combat. The question remains, does it unbalance the game at all because of this?

You keep asking for a point at which it would actually unbalance a real game in play. Well, I offer my game as an example. Recently, the party finished an encounter and knew it couldn't take the time to rest and that additional encounters were likely. This pushed the party cleric to using his 2nd level slots (the party is 3rd level) to upcast some cure spells to deal with the large amount of damage 2 of the characters had taken. This made the choice to continue a risk, as the cleric no longer had those slots available to contribute. Had the party druid been able to use 1 2nd level slot to heal everyone (something that didn't happen, as 3 of the 5 characters carried damage into the next fight), that choice wouldn't have been made, and the party would have been able to continue with 1/2 the spell resources spent and all of their hitpoints returned. Could I modify the encounters to account for this? Sure, but if I have to modify the way I present encounters and their pacing based on whether or not there's a caster of Healing Spirit in the party, then I can easily say that Healing Spirit distorts the game all on it's own. Being able to counter it doesn't mean that it's not a problem. I'm the DM, I can counter anything I want. The question is: should I have to make as big a change as healing spirit requires and only if it's present?

Further, as I'm running a sandbox, altering the game in that manner isn't something I'm willing to do merely because Healing Spirit is present. So, it will very much alter how my party engages what was built - prior to XGtE - as an exploration and survival based game by making survival far less of a challenge while exploring. Unless I change it up because HS is present.

HS is a problem for my game. I've solved it by saying it only works once per round- so only 1 healing per round no matter how many people wander through it. The caster controls when it heals, so it's up to them who gets the goodies. This makes it still better than Prayer of Healing, but not by much, and still lets it be useful in combat, but, again, not as abuseable by tactically minded players (like mine). Further, it upscales by 1d6 every 2 levels, not every level. This helps me as well, as my Druid player can contribute to healing in a useful way, but not totally outshine my Life cleric player.

 

[guachi]

I’m with Mearls on this one. It’s a nice spell, that simply will not break anyone’s game. It breaks expectations a bit, but balance not at all.

That something doesn't "break the game" is the laziest excuse anyone could use. A car without seatbelts, windows or shocks can still move under its own power so it's not "broken" in the sense it can still operate but it's not a car people would choose to drive if they had better options.

In any event, the statement that the spell "will not break anyone's game" isn't even true. I took the spell in my AL game for one session with my Ranger. The Life Cleric, Druid (who couldn't take it because of stupid PHB+1 reasons) and the Bard were all rendered useless for healing. It literally "broke our game" to the point no one wanted to continue playing with the spell.

"It won't break the game" is lazy game design and lazy excuse making and it might not even be true when you use the lazy excuse.

 

[Stalker0]

Maybe a better question to ask....is Prayer of Healing a bad spell?

This spell is clearly better than Prayer. If Prayer is a weak spell, then this is simply a correction. IF Prayer gets decent use, then this spell to me looks OP.

 

[5ekyu]

Maybe a better question to ask....is Prayer of Healing a bad spell?

This spell is clearly better than Prayer. If Prayer is a weak spell, then this is simply a correction. IF Prayer gets decent use, then this spell to me looks OP.

I have seen prayer on most daily prep lists and used when needed, so it made the cut in most cases in the player's eyes.

But that will vary greatly i assume by the campaign structure.

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[The Crimson Binome]

Maybe a better question to ask....is Prayer of Healing a bad spell?

It's (up to) six times more efficient than Cure Wounds in a second-level slot, and Cure Wounds has been the de facto out-of-combat healing spell for as long as it's been around. If not for the existence of Hit Dice, which generally makes out-of-combat magical healing unnecessary, I would say that Prayer of Healing was already ridiculously overpowered.

 

[Zmajdusa]

I think this spell, is going to be banned at some tables and allowed in others regardless. The 2 games I'm playing in tend to have maybe 2 to 3 combats in between long rests, with 1 or to short rests being used in between long rests. In general it is better out of combat healing than a goodberry used by a life cleric, but if your party doesn't have a cleric or druid, a ranger with this spell could be the party's first aid kit in between fights. So I think it could be nice to have as a bandaid when no one wants to play clerics or druids, and has a paladin that just wants to smite with every spell they got. So in other words, the spell as written has its place in some games because of party make up.

 

[Bardbarian]

Can someone explain how this spell makes druids useless? I keep seeing this brought up.

 

[Iry]

Can someone explain how this spell makes druids useless? I keep seeing this brought up.

It doesn't? There might be considerable pressure on druids to prepare this spell during Adventure League games, thus making playing a druid less fun. Some of that meta might bleed into household games a little bit, at least the ones that are more competitive.

But nothing about it makes Druids useless.
Do you mean stepping on the toes of Life Clerics?

 

[5ekyu]

Make druids indispensable?

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