Healing Word (and the abuse thereof)

[jedrious]

Huh. Really now. I hadn't heard about this. Do you have a link (so I can show my DM? )

I wonder if this would stack with the Bard's Song of Rest.

Bard's Song of Rest is tied to the healing surges uses granted by taking a short rest not those granted by XXX Word

 

[Enaloindir]

I don't have a problem with the increased healing capacity, as it is, in fact, a trap for the party!

If you let the cleric increase the amount of hp each surge restores after a short rest, you reduce the amount of healing surges required to heal back up to full hit points. As a result, the party will be able to go through more encounters before they run out of surges. However, this means they have to spread out the use of their daily abilities over more encounters, and the party's overall power goes down.

(I base this on the observation that the party IMC mostly takes an extended rest when they are running out of healing surges, and only rarely when they run out of daily powers.)

So, let them "exploit" the system, I say. It really doesn't increase their power.

- Enaloindir

 

[Syrsuro]

And if it really bugs you, go Old School and send in a wandering monster....

Carl

 

[Thanee]

...everybody's healing surge value is basically doubled outside of combat just because they're standing in the same room with a cleric?

Nope.

Not because they happen to be standing in the same room with a cleric, but because they happen to have an expert healer among them.

So its just right.

How silly would it be, if there was no difference? Yeah, ok, I got this +15 to Heal and all those healing prayers, but yeah, sorry, you are on your own, because there happens to be no enemy in this room.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

And if it really bugs you, go Old School and send in a wandering monster....

That's something I noticed in the H2 adventure, which - at one point - has a random event table, that is rolled during every short rest (most of the time doing nothing, but still). It definitely made the players try to minimize resting (or rather not overdo it with resting) in the hostile environment.

Bye
Thanee

 

[CapnZapp]

Any rule that encourages the party to do double short rests I find metagamey and jarring.

In the spirit of Jonathan Tweet's proposed houserule* I would say a short rest without an encounter does nothing, is nothing.

That is, a houserule that specifically countermands the "Using Powers while You Rest" bullet point on page 263.

*) His rule was that extended rests doesn't restore used daily powers and used daily item uses, if taken after just a few encounters. The idea being to discourage novaing and to encourage the party to lower the power level by spreading out their dailies (or at least going through several encounters saving them for later).

 

[Thanee]

Any rule that encourages the party to do double short rests I find metagamey and jarring.

In the spirit of Jonathan Tweet's proposed houserule* I would say a short rest without an encounter does nothing, is nothing.

But you know that this leads to the exact opposite effect, right?

No bonus on healing surges during short rest means more healing surges being spent after each encounter, means less encounters per day, means more daily powers being used in the encounters, because you know you cannot go through more than a couple of those, anyways.

And what's so problematic about using a power twice in 10 minutes of rest, when it can be used once in 5 minutes of rest?

Sorry, you cannot rest for 30 minutes, you can only rest for 5 minutes or 6 hours!?

And how is it not (extremely) metagamey, that powers do not recharge, unless you met some monsters in between!?

No, that makes no sense at all, in addition to having negative effects on the game (i.e. the first part I mentioned).

Bye
Thanee

 

[ThirdWizard]

Any rule that encourages the party to do double short rests I find metagamey and jarring.

In the spirit of Jonathan Tweet's proposed houserule* I would say a short rest without an encounter does nothing, is nothing.

I would go the opposite direction. If you don't like healing word outside of combat, give them a reason not to use it. Say that healing surges spent during a short rest gain back twice the normal amount. It's a double edged sword, as if they foolishly try to save healing surges for short rests instead of using them in combat when they're injured, they deserve any consequences that come with that (i.e. death).

 

[chaotix42]

I like the idea of the cleric/warlord taking several short rests to use & recharge their healing powers. When the PCs take 20 minutes for some intensive healing I know I've done my job as a DM.

Sometimes the PCs don't have time on their side, but when they do I let them benefit from it. They can adventure longer that way.

 

[keterys]

The bard song of rest ability is actually very similar to something I pushed to have all leaders get, so that you wouldn't want to use healing words outside of combat.