D&D 5E How Important is it that Warlords be Healers?

[Falling Icicle]

The recent discussions about the warlord class has got me thinking. The biggest controversy about the class in 4e was its ability to heal by inspiring others. This kind of "cheerleader healing" bothered a lot of people. What I'm wondering is, for those who are hoping that the warlord class will be in 5e, how important is it that they be able to heal? Couldn't the class be just fine as a warrior type that has powerful leadership and tactical abilities, without being able to shout wounds away? After all, when I hear the term "warlord" nothing about healing pops into my mind. To me, the term evokes images of generals, tacticians and warriors.

So how big of a deal is it to you that warlords have (or not have) the ability to heal?

And please, let's not turn this into another debate about how abstract hit points are or aren't. That topic has already been argued to death, and its dead corpse beaten until tenderized. I'm just wondering how important the healing issue is to those who like to play warlords, and whether or not it's something they'd be willing to do without.

 

[MarkB]

My perspective is that Warlord healing works in 4e, even with a "hit points as meat" perspective, because surge-based healing is not so much healing as patching wounds. I can understand that the concept becomes more problematic to envisage in the absence of surges or hit dice.

What I would like is for there to be some form of magic-free healing or damage mitigation available, either to specific class builds or more generally. I don't mind my warlord not being able to heal, but I don't want to take a warlord and then still feel like the party is crippled without a cleric.

 

[Sunseeker]

My opinion is: the more non-cleric healers, the better. The less reliant the game is on a single class in a single spec the game is, the better.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Mechanically, I think the way to go is to remove as many assumptions about healing and assumed sources of healing is possible. Then optional mechanics can be added in with more freedom and flexibility. On that level, a new and different class with significant healing abilities is a rather large step in the wrong direction.

More importantly, there should be a distinction between literal healing (actually closing wounds and repairing physical damage) and "healing"; warlord healing blurs that distinction.

Both the warlord concept and the nonmagical healing concept have some merit, but they are completely separate concepts, and are best addressed outside of the class system and outside of the base game. In other words, teamwork benefits, alternate fighter and other clas types based on command, alternate health systems, and nonmagical auras and aid rules are nice add-ons.

 

[MichaelSomething]

That depends, would you play with a cleric who never casts cure spells?

 

[Remathilis]

I'd be just as happy with some mix of DR/Temp Hp that grants their allies extra endurance without the trappings of "wound recovery". Else, I'd like to see some restrictions on shouting allies back to life.

 

[Kinak]

I'm not a 4e'r, but I don't particularly mind "HP as morale" healing. And, as Shidaku said, anything that spreads out healing more is nice.

But they should really just include warlord healing for 4e players' sakes. Suddenly dropping several favorite concepts was a huge disconnect between 3rd and 4th. I wouldn't wish that on the 4e community for their transition to 5th.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[Ahnehnois]

That depends, would you play with a cleric who never casts cure spells?

Yeah. I've had a few of those over the years, both before and after I started using the UA spontaneous divine casting rules (and thus taking cure spells from automatic to a matter of choice).

Flavor-wise, the match of divine magic and healing is very strange for deities that don't explicitly have it in their portfolio. A cleric of the god of trickery or necromancy or even the sun doesn't inherently have anything to do with healing. Moreover, the default cleric is built as a secondary warrior; IME most clerics prefer to use in-combat actions for things other than healing. Out-of-combat healing can be handled many ways and is already cleric-optional.

The association of divine magic and healing has always been odd; in the real world, healing has been more strongly with the sciences. It's a D&D-ism, and one that I wouldn't mind fading into the background. If I play a cleric, I want to do things that make sense for my religion, not be the default healer.

***

As to my own game, it's not uncommon to have evil clerics that never cast cure (or inflict) spells. The last cleric I played was a gnome cleric of trickery who rarely if ever healed anyone and focused on disguise and stealth. The two most memorable clerics my players ever had were one focused on destruction who occasionally cast healing spells after a fight and another who built his character around the healing domain and healed and hurt undead.

So, it varies, but I don't consider healing an essential part of playing a cleric.

 

[Gorgoroth]

Find me one warlord in any book whose battle field role is "healing"

IMO 4e invented this and it's been nothing but headaches since. I played one and loved it, mechanically, but at that point I didn't care because I'd long since given up trying to play 4e as anything but a turn-based combat game that has very disassociated mechanics to story. My DM didn't even grok the warden's marking ability, and that was supposedly magical! 4e made warlords heal better than a magical cleric...what? Warlords rocked in 4e, so much so that they completely crushed clerics out of the picture. That is a HUGE D&D design fail right there. Warlords should be good at helping you win the battle, not patch up their comrades. A warlord should "heal" stuff like mind-altering impediments, lifting the fog cloud of some evil wizard or curse by reminding them what they stand for and so on. Or, if they do heal, that healing should be strictly limited and require you to be literally next to them. I actually prefer some of the reaction-based prevention of damage, which is a mechanic that ends up doing the same thing if not better (an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!). He should be able to shout out "duck, man!" or "do defense drill #5", and allow you to boost your AC for a given attack.

When people say they want warlords to heal better than clerics, I shrug and think to myself, keep on playing 4e then. Or if you want a martial class to pick up healing ability, do it strictly via the healer specialty, case closed, there's your warlord + healer. Not all warlords should have healing, especially if they don't want / need to. The real problem is more that clerics were being overshadowed in the "leader" role of 4e, which lumped in all sorts of things. You want a support role class that does everything? Be a cleric. You want a support class that focuses on combat offense/defense-oriented tactical boons? Play a warlord. The problem here is that 4e pre-defined "roles" are creeping back in, and that leads people to think warlords should have functional true healing at range despite having no magical "spooky action at a distance" hand waving explanation. When you have to conjure up a contorted mechanical explanation for non-magical healing, especially during combat, that's where players of all editions except 4e rolled their eyes. And I LOVE warlords, probably because I'm a power gamer. I didn't see a reason to even play a full on warlord, I could do much better as a ranger|warlord hybrid and use my reactions or minor actions for warlord powers. A dedicated warlord build was uber powerful in 4e, which is right there ipso facto the reason they were played so much, not because clerics are "played out" or a boring class to play per se. At least, they shouldn't be a boring class to play. And if I can pick up a very good healing kit as a martial class, why can't a rogue be just as good a healer as a warlord + specialty?

IMO magical healing HAS to be better than non-magical healing. Period. Anything more than that requires too much unbelievability. Especially instantaneous healing at a distance. I really don't see what you guys' problem is with warlords preventing party damage before it happens rather than repairing it after it does. If you design the game that way, then it actually makes sense to have both a warlord AND a cleric in the party, and avoid the "too much healing, not enough damage" problem you'd get, since the warlord can focus more on damage-boosting boons than defense ones when the cleric is around. Yes, I get the imagery of "healing the spirits" through a good chat, but modern science shows that all that fancy good-will doesn't actually change e.g. cancer death rates one iota. Let's let magic handle the "magical" stuff, and leave non-magical stuff work the way you'd expect it to in the real world. In real life, if you apply bandages as a field medic, that only prevents the damage you've already taken from getting worse (stop the bleeding, put a splint in).

What the 4e warlord presupposes is an entire 21st-century ER contained within the charm of his sweet, soothing words, that can take you from 0 HP to full -- instantaneously, and at a distance!! Not even Star Trek technology can do that!!!

i.e. == IT is complete and utter BOLLOCKS

 

[MarkB]

Find me one warlord in any book whose battle field role is "healing"

I can't even think of any pre-D&D examples of clerics whose battlefield role is healing, so how is that relevant?