D&D with no Healing Magic! Would it work?

[Elrik_DarkFury]

We don't have a cleric in our group -nobody wants to play the healer..
The way the group acts changes a little-they think twice before doing something stupid,but the lack of healing makes the game more interesting and dramatic.
The man who charges in the middle of the battlefield is more heroic and brave(or stupid) when there is no healing to save his ass.
Maybe as a DM you have to throw less difficult monsters but experienced players can handle difficult situations with good planning and a little luck .
Don't forget to alter the rule about the healing rate of the pcs when they rest just to speed up the game.

Oh,i really enjoy the campaign i currently play(althought we can purchase a potions).

__________________
The Wizard

 

[CalrinAlshaw]

My suggestion, you should create enounters centered around the fact that the PC's aren't going to be able to heal. The standard CR 5 monster vs a ECL 5 party might whoop on them because the CR assumes a healer of some capacity within the party generally.

Calrin Alshaw

 

[Ao the Overkitty]

I can't say how it'd be like in higher levels, but we were without healing magic for the first few levels of our campaign. Well, we had 1 cure light wounds per day once we hit second level. No healers in the party and it wasn't safe to go into town to get healing (the church priests were likely to have us off'd before we got out of the city anyway).

So, a game without healing consisted of a LOT of down time. We'd get into one, may two encounters, then be stuck resting for about a week. Is it any wonder why we now have 3 cleric cohorts and a paladin cohort in the party?

 

[dead]

The gist of the setting is:

Evil deity (BBG) is cast down to the Prime by other deities, said deities sever their ties to the prime. Boom, no clerics other than those of the BBG.

Said evil deity makes several attempts to take over, fails twice (iirc) and succeeds the third try, around 100 years ago. Now he has his clerics hunt all magical items with magic sniffing creatures for fear that those with said items could oppose him.

Weapons are outlawed, and magic users are hunted down and killed. The best way I've seen it described (and what I thought when I got it at release) is "What if Sauron won?" Your players can either fight against it in a nigh-hopeless battle, or for it.

Sounds very interesting. Where does the healing magic come from? Lost divine magic items from banished gods? Or, recovered divine magic items from the Big Bad Guy?

 

[dead]

I'd recommend one of the VP/WP variants then. The players would have to learn how to retreat, but that's a good thing. With a WP/VP variant, they would recover vitality points pretty quickly on their own, but would have to be very careful when they started taking WP damage. Crits would be a lot more deadly, though.

This VP/WP sounds very interesting, but I don't want HPs to change because the PCs might do some world-hopping into my regular D&D game.

 

[dead]

You could go midway about it: remove all divine casters. But you still have the Paladin, Ranger, and Bard that can cure, in effect these 3 classes would become the new mainstream healers (especially a high charisma paladin and lay on hands).

This way, you still have some healing, but remove the PC's reliance on the pletora of healing usually available to them. Of course, very soon you might find that your new healer (pally, ranger, or bard) picks up the craft wand feat to store some wands of cure light so that they can stay longer in a room to room adventure.

HTH, YMMV.

Naw, I wouldn't let these classes have such powers. I consider these powers reliant on a *divine* connection and I wanna sever that connection utterly and completely.

 

[LostSoul]

Yes.

Change all damage to Subdual damage. PCs recover quickly enough to continue adventuring.

You can add on other rules to get exactly the feel you're looking for, but this is a good basic fix.

 

[dead]

I don't know if you really want to go that far with it, or just 'ignore' healing magic in general.

I just wanna ignore divine magic.

But you've actually got me thinking. Where does *arcane* magic come from anyway? Is this also governed by the gods in D&D? I mean, take a look at the Dragonlance world with its 3 moons. Each moon represented one of the *gods* of magic and the Wizards of that world would draw their power from it.

When the gods left Krynn (before the War of the Lance), could Wizards still cast spells? Can a DL fan clear this up for me?

 

[CalrinAlshaw]

Well, the way Midnight works, is the Paladin and Cleric spell lists are chopped off, and a special class can learn any other spell on any other spell list (except purely deity-divine magic). Since Druids and Rangers recieved their magic from "nature", and the planet still exists, those spells are still available. Basically, you lose out on raise dead and the better versions, and restorations about the lesser version. Plus you don't get healing as powerful, since clerics had the most powerful healing.

All the spellcasting classes were removed (including bard, ranger, and Paladin) as well as the monk. In their places are 3 new classes (Monk-variant, Ranger-variant, and the spellcaster, (which has 3 sub-types, you choose 1 of the subtypes). Anyhow, spellcasting is great at lower levels, but the caster gets progressively weaker later on, and all magic using people that aren't members of the BBEG god's religion, are killed on sight. (That includes people with magic items). Anyhow, it's a pretty grim world.

Calrin Alshaw

 

[Baron Opal]

Midnight Healing

"Channelers" are the main spell casters in Midnight, although anyone can learn how to cast spells if they spend the feats. Channelers can learn Cure Light Wounds and I think Cure Moderate and Serious. Channelers have access to all spells that are not solely confined to the Cleric list. This does eliminate Heal, Raise Dead, Restoration and some others.

Also, Channelers, and everyone else for that matter, has to spend feats to learn schools of spells. Some schools, like Evocation, is split into more than one feat. So, to get any kind of reasonable attack spell you have to be a significant level. I'm not sure if this applies to healing magic, but it might.

It is certainly possible for the PCs to capture useful items from the bad guys. There might be distasteful requirements to use that item, however. And, those who have the items are usually Channelers themselves or Legates. Legates are the servants of the BBEGod and straight clerics. So, the people who have those items are usually very powerful and well guarded. It's usually much safer to crawl into the woods and hide for two weeks and let your wounds heal over time than try to get the items or even cast the spells yourself.

It's a very interesting setting. You have to get your mouth in shape for the fact that the direct approach is almost always the worst one. You must skulk, hide, sneak and otherwise be unseen. But, every once in a while, you can leap out of a wharehouse, fireball the Legate's ship, and get away.

Baron Opal