Cure Wounds, Regenerate Wounds, & Vigor spells

[Davelozzi]

I was looking at the various Vigor spells in Complete Divine this morning. They're essentially updated versions of the Regnerate _____ Wounds spells that appeared in Masters of the Wild.

The text in the sidebar at the beginning of the spells chapter in Complete Divine states that certain spells changed names (and cites Vigor and Aspect of the Diety as examples) and in these cases they strongly recommend using the updated version. I would think that they would only bother to put in an extra note stressing this if there something really broken about the original version, but if anything the opposite seems to be true here.

Both the Vigor spells & the Regenerate spellls grant fast healing, the main difference being that the Regenerate spells have a clause that they only wounds received while the spell is in effect are healed, while the Vigor spells omit that clause. I think there are no other differences, though I was checking the Regenerate spells in a rush on my way out the door, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

At any rate, this seems strange to me as the Vigor spells are now so much better than the old staples of healing, Cure _____ Wounds. As someone pointed out in another thread, the only benefit of the Cure spells now (besides the fact that clerics can cast them spontaneously) is that the effect is instantaneous so they're better in battle. Compare the following spells cast by a 1st level priest. Cure Light Wounds cures 1d8+1 hp of damage (max 9, average 5.5). Lesser Vigor is a guaranteed cure of 11 hp over 11 rounds. At higher levels, this is even more pronounced. Each Vigor spell cures more hp than the max amount the equivalent level Cure can heal at the caster level when it first becomes available. As the caster level increases, the disparity only grows wider.

Now, in my experience, almost all curing is done after battles, so the duration is generally a non issue. Even at high levels, the Vigor spells are likely to have done their dirty work in well under 20 rounds, and that's only 2 minutes.

So are these Vigor spells too powerful? I'd say yes, and lean towards using the old Regenerate versions instead, but I'm interesting to hear what everyone else thinks. Was their something wrong with the Regenerate spells that made WotC feel the need to pump them up so much that they outshine the various Cure spells? Or is there something that I've missed?

 

[youspoonybard]

Cure X Wounds have another advantage:

By good/neutral clerics, they don't have to be prepared.

That's IMO the biggest advantage of them. Remember that all these casters have to actively prepare these spells.

Also, only Clerics and Druids get access to these spells, so wands of them aren't necessarily as valuable to the party (Whereas Wands of CLW can be used by Clerics, Druids, Paladins, Rangers, and Bards). For example, I DM a 3 person party, none of which have a level in Cleric/Druid (Ranger/Wizard/Eldrich Knight and Bard/Swashbuckler/Dervish).

Damage over time has always been much higher than instantaneous damage. Look at Call Lightning for example, max of 30d10 damage for a 3rd level spell? I'm kinda glad that healing spells have an equivalent.

*EDIT* But I've never had a problem with after-battle healing. From my experience, parties always buy enough CLW Wands (or Clerics in a Stick) to heal themselves to full. I've always assumed that party resources were expended in the using of the spells, not in the actual HP loss. I'm the guy that didn't have a problem with Shifters shifting every turn to heal up. At 15th level, if you can't find some way to heal yourself out fo battle, you've got bigger problems to deal with.

 

[Silveras]

I was looking at the various Vigor spells in Complete Divine this morning. They're essentially updated versions of the Regnerate _____ Wounds spells that appeared in Masters of the Wild.

The text in the sidebar at the beginning of the spells chapter in Complete Divine states that certain spells changed names (and cites Vigor and Aspect of the Diety as examples) and in these cases they strongly recommend using the updated version. I would think that they would only bother to put in an extra note stressing this if there something really broken about the original version, but if anything the opposite seems to be true here.

Both the Vigor spells & the Regenerate spellls grant fast healing, the main difference being that the Regenerate spells have a clause that they only wounds received while the spell is in effect are healed, while the Vigor spells omit that clause. I think there are no other differences, though I was checking the Regenerate spells in a rush on my way out the door, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

At any rate, this seems strange to me as the Vigor spells are now so much better than the old staples of healing, Cure _____ Wounds. As someone pointed out in another thread, the only benefit of the Cure spells now (besides the fact that clerics can cast them spontaneously) is that the effect is instantaneous so they're better in battle. Compare the following spells cast by a 1st level priest. Cure Light Wounds cures 1d8+1 hp of damage (max 9, average 5.5). Lesser Vigor is a guaranteed cure of 11 hp over 11 rounds. At higher levels, this is even more pronounced. Each Vigor spell cures more hp than the max amount the equivalent level Cure can heal at the caster level when it first becomes available. As the caster level increases, the disparity only grows wider.

Now, in my experience, almost all curing is done after battles, so the duration is generally a non issue. Even at high levels, the Vigor spells are likely to have done their dirty work in well under 20 rounds, and that's only 2 minutes.

So are these Vigor spells too powerful? I'd say yes, and lean towards using the old Regenerate versions instead, but I'm interesting to hear what everyone else thinks. Was their something wrong with the Regenerate spells that made WotC feel the need to pump them up so much that they outshine the various Cure spells? Or is there something that I've missed?

The only other change that I noticed is that they are now the same level spells for Clerics and Druids.

In the experiences of my game group, where we also cured after battle and not during, the player who introduced the Regenerate XXX Wounds spells into the game, as a Druid, managed not the notice they did not work after the battle. So we played them much as written in Complete Divine, and we did see the Druid overshadowing the Cleric as a healer.

Being able to cure potentially more total hp with a prepared spell than a spontaneously cast one makes some sense to me, but I do prefer the limitation that it only heals damage taken while the spell is in effect.

I am not impressed with Complete Divine's track record on spells (see my thread on errata). Languor had the confusion regarding haste re-worded (not that it helps ... I think it was clearer and more workable as it was), but they left the mangled wording on the Strength penalty as-is. The spell Bolt of Glory had been updated in the Book of Exalted Deeds ... Complete Divine undoes that update by coping-and-pasting the original wording into the new book. There are others, as well.