Healing Spirit change

[cbwjm]

I think the general consensus is that healing spirit is broken due to out of combat trains of people walking through the spirit to heal up 10d6 hit points to each party member. I'm not sure that truly bothers me, but I was thinking about it after reading a post on Reddit, I thought it might be a cooler spell in general if, instead of casting it into a space you cast it onto a creature. I've bolded the changes

Healing Spirit
2nd-level conjuration

Casting Time: 1 bonus action
Range: 60 feet

Components: V, S

Duration: Concentration, up to 1 minute

You call forth a nature spirit to soothe the wounded. The intangible spirit manifests around a creature you can see within range. The spirit looks like a transparent beast or fey (your choice).

Until the spell ends, at the start of the target's turn, they heal 2d6 hit points. The spirit can’t heal constructs or undead.

As a bonus action on your turn, you can move the spirit up to 30 feet to a creature you can see.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the healing increases by 1d6 for each slot level above 2nd.

I increased the healing by 1d6 since it is now a single target spell, 2d6 healing at the start of your turn feels a little better than 1d6. Technically, it could heal up people outside of combat fairly efficiently since the druid could use a bonus action to move it after someone has healed to get 4d6 a round but I think I'm cool with that.

What I like about this version of the spell is that it's a spirit that is attached to a target, what other spells could be created that manifest as a guardian spirit? Even if new spells aren't created there is the possibility to refluff some spells. Protection from energy, water breathing, these are spells that could manifest as a guardian spirit providing some cool imagery. Cast water breathing on your ally and the image of a nereid might silently swim along with them, protection from energy might manifest as a dragon spirit imparting part of its immunity onto the player. I like the story of calling a protective spirit to aid an ally far more than just calling a spirit and placing it in a space on the battlefield.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I think the general consensus is that healing spirit is broken due to out of combat trains of people walking through the spirit to heal up 10d6 hit points to each party member. I'm not sure that truly bothers me

It seems like it breaks a vague rule of thumb Mike Mearls obliquely referenced in a podcast. Healing is meant to be a daily resource, and the amount to map to the level of the daily spell in question.

 

[CubicsRube]

What about simply ruling that a character can only benefit once from a healing spirit each time it is cast? I think the spell was poorly written and shpuld have included an out of combat limiter

 

[cbwjm]

What about simply ruling that a character can only benefit once from a healing spirit each time it is cast? I think the spell was poorly written and shpuld have included an out of combat limiter

Only once through means only a single d6 healing each which I think is a little too weak for the spell. The main reason I like my change is I think it is more interesting and could lead into some other "spirit guardian" type spells.

 

[Ancalagon]

I think the general consensus is that healing spirit is broken due to out of combat trains of people walking through the spirit to heal up 10d6 hit points to each party member. I'm not sure that truly bothers me, but I was thinking about it after reading a post on Reddit, I thought it might be a cooler spell in general if, instead of casting it into a space you cast it onto a creature. I've bolded the changes

Healing Spirit
2nd-level conjuration

Casting Time: 1 bonus action
Range: 60 feet

Components: V, S

Duration: Concentration, up to 1 minute

You call forth a nature spirit to soothe the wounded. The intangible spirit manifests around a creature you can see within range. The spirit looks like a transparent beast or fey (your choice).

Until the spell ends, at the start of the target's turn, they heal 2d6 hit points. The spirit can’t heal constructs or undead.

As a bonus action on your turn, you can move the spirit up to 30 feet to a creature you can see.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the healing increases by 1d6 for each slot level above 2nd.

I increased the healing by 1d6 since it is now a single target spell, 2d6 healing at the start of your turn feels a little better than 1d6. Technically, it could heal up people outside of combat fairly efficiently since the druid could use a bonus action to move it after someone has healed to get 4d6 a round but I think I'm cool with that.

What I like about this version of the spell is that it's a spirit that is attached to a target, what other spells could be created that manifest as a guardian spirit? Even if new spells aren't created there is the possibility to refluff some spells. Protection from energy, water breathing, these are spells that could manifest as a guardian spirit providing some cool imagery. Cast water breathing on your ally and the image of a nereid might silently swim along with them, protection from energy might manifest as a dragon spirit imparting part of its immunity onto the player. I like the story of calling a protective spirit to aid an ally far more than just calling a spirit and placing it in a space on the battlefield.

This is really powerful, because it will bring people downed to zero back to life without another party member having to intervene. It would make a warrior in a toe to toe fight almost immortal. This is a must-cast the front line tank.

I do agree with you that the spell needs work, but this isn't it.

 

[MonkeezOnFire]

This change makes the spell function like Aura of Vitality, but at a lower level, able to be doubled up as you describe, and doesn't require active use of a bonus action if you aren't moving it. So it's probably still a bit too powerful. But I think this is an interesting direction to take the spell.

I think the simplest change for the spell would be for it to grant temporary hp instead of healing to ensure that it can't be stacked. This would make it similar to Heroism but usable by the entire party and without the condition immunity.

 

[5ekyu]

As a bonus action spell leveled right between healing word and mass healing word it looks clearly better than both of them in terms of total healing... but it eats a concentration slot and does it more slowly.

Consider:
1 Action to cast - concentration up to 1m
Cleric on casting ties spirit to creature - spirit rides the target.
Whenever a creature is being ridden by the spirit they regain 1d6 HP at the start of their turns. The spirit stays there until the spell ends or it flees.
If a ridden creature takes damage, the spirit may flee. Roll d20, 1-10 the spirit flees. if the damage is caused by an ally, the sprit flees automatically and refuses to return - spell ends.
As a bonus action on their turn the cleric can recall a spirit which had fled and assign it to a **new** target - a spirit will not go back to a target it has fled during this casting.
Scaling - if cast as higher level spell, the cleric *may but is not required to* add +2 to the flee roll for each level up. there are no dice of healing gained - just a better chance the spirit sticks it out when hurt.

 

[iserith]

Crawford suggests:

"If healing spirit has felt too effective in your game, try this house rule, which holds the spell to our expectations for it: the spell ends once the spirit has restored hit points a number of times equal to twice your spellcasting ability modifier (minimum of once). #DnD"

And adds:

"Healing spirit is exceptionally effective outside combat, and it does have the potential to exceed our expectations for it. I'll have my eye on it to see if it causes disruption in actual play, rather than in theoretical situations. If it does, we'll change it. #DnD"

 

[cbwjm]

This is really powerful, because it will bring people downed to zero back to life without another party member having to intervene. It would make a warrior in a toe to toe fight almost immortal. This is a must-cast the front line tank.

I do agree with you that the spell needs work, but this isn't it.

You can do that with the original spell so it isnt something that I'm too worried about with this version.

 

[cbwjm]

As a bonus action spell leveled right between healing word and mass healing word it looks clearly better than both of them in terms of total healing... but it eats a concentration slot and does it more slowly.

Consider:
1 Action to cast - concentration up to 1m
Cleric on casting ties spirit to creature - spirit rides the target.
Whenever a creature is being ridden by the spirit they regain 1d6 HP at the start of their turns. The spirit stays there until the spell ends or it flees.
If a ridden creature takes damage, the spirit may flee. Roll d20, 1-10 the spirit flees. if the damage is caused by an ally, the sprit flees automatically and refuses to return - spell ends.
As a bonus action on their turn the cleric can recall a spirit which had fled and assign it to a **new** target - a spirit will not go back to a target it has fled during this casting.
Scaling - if cast as higher level spell, the cleric *may but is not required to* add +2 to the flee roll for each level up. there are no dice of healing gained - just a better chance the spirit sticks it out when hurt.

There is no addition of casting modifier like healing word so it is only the dice that are doing the healing. 1d6 seemed too low to me, I was thinking mainly that it is a scaled up level 1 spell so I gave it 2d6 to start but maybe a lower number would still be best or a lower die size, 2d4 instead of 2d6. I could also see dropping it to 1d8.