Healing

[Thornir Alekeg]

Not a good idea. Every adventurer would keep a cadre of 1st-level Cleric hirelings, followers, or what-have-you, following him or her around to easily restore a significant chunk of his or her HP at a moment's notice, even when the adventurer is 20th-level and has 200 hit points or whatever.

You overcome this by putting a maximum number of HP you can heal based upon caster level.

Cure: Restores 50% of the target's total HP up to a maximum of 5 points per caster level.

 

[Pygon]

I wonder if there will be heal over time abilities that reduce the damage you take rather than just heal you at a specific time.

Sometimes you have the means to heal someone, but you just can't get to them before the next set of attacks finish them off.

If it's hard to track, 4e likely won't have it.

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

It will never happen, the math is too complicated for some people.

How about this then:

Cure Light Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to your level.
Cure Minor Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to 2x your level.
Cure Serious Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to 3x your level.
etc.

 

[RigaMortus2]

Perhaps they can have two types of healing spells. One type heals less than the other, but is only a Swift Action to cast. This lets the Cleric both heal AND still make an attack. The other type heals more HPs, but takes a Standard Action.

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

Perhaps they can have two types of healing spells. One type heals less than the other, but is only a Swift Action to cast. This lets the Cleric both heal AND still make an attack. The other type heals more HPs, but takes a Standard Action.

Or, some spells could have multiple casting times. So you could cast Cure Mod Wounds as a 2nd level spells for a standard action, or a 3rd level spell as a swift action.

Or for that matter, we just need one Cure spell that can be cast at different levels.

I'm all in favor of more versatility in the spells as opposed to more spells that are the same except for a few parameters.

 

[Mercule]

I'd be very happy if they somehow built the system so that hit points were mostly something tracked "per encounter" and for real wounds there was a condition track of some kind. Or only your last X hit points count as real wounds. Or something.

This would be great. The problem would be striking a balance between having the luck and fatigue restore and a smattering of real wounds that need healing. If it's only the bottom Con hps that matter, all you're doing is moving the danger of the -1 to -9 up a bit. The WP/VP split has a similar problem in that there is no good way to survive being splooted by a dragon.

Whatever the solution, rather than letting the "leader" heal and do something else (which sounds like it will come off pretty cheesy most of the time), I'd like to see the need for regular healing removed. If it's just the luck portion, forget about it. If it's actual bleeding, then take an action and do something interesting and worthwhile.

Take away the feeling that the cleric is propping up the other PCs, regardless of what else she's doing.

 

[The Grackle]

Things I would like to see:
Parties able to adventure just as well with or without a cleric due to better healing options from other classes.

Haven't they said this is the case?

[*]Less "incremental" magical healing - rather than cure light, cure moderate, cure serious etc., I would prefer to see "small" spells, perhaps on a per encounter basis, that can be used to stabilize a dying companion, and "large" spells on a per day basis that restore 50-75% of a character's total HP.

I'm guessing that healing will be like the mirror image of the wizard's damage spells. An at will heal that's pretty small, per encounter heals that are better, and per day heals for serious, mid-combat, life-threatening situations. Instead of named cure spells, there will probably be a class ability that heals whateverD8+level bonus.

 

[ideasmith]

How about this then:

Cure Light Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to your level.
Cure Minor Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to 2x your level.
Cure Serious Wounds = Heals an amount of hit points equal to 3x your level.
etc.

Are you using "your" to refer to the target, rather than the caster, here?

And will "Cure Minor Wounds" be increased from 0th level? (Or perhaps you meant Cure Moderate Wounds?)

 

[Jhaelen]

How about this then: [snip]

I have a feeling 4th.ed. is way ahead of you...

 

[hong]

Bah, I was doing that in Britannia 3E back in 2002!

(Although I added +1d8 on top of the target level bonus. You probably need a bit more oomph out of CLW at 1st level.)