D&D 5E (2014) How important is party balance in Next? (iow, how necessary are clerics?)

[Giltonio_Santos]

In my current game, the only healer in the party is a druid played by someone who happens to miss some sessions and leave earlier in others. By now, the events are happening inside a city, so I let his character go elsewhere whenever he goes NPC-mode, and the group manages to survive just fine without him.

The "we're going to need a cleric" thing just happens because the archetype, in general, seems to have less appeal than rogue, fighter and mage types. Otherwise, people would realize that a party without a warrior is lacking both in damage output and resistance, a party without a rogue is lacking in general scout skills and a party without a mage has no crowd control to spare.

Each class brings a unique take to the game and improves the party in that direction. Classes with healing power are just the same in this regard.

Cheers,

 

[SteveC]

A lot of this depends on the game style. For a traditional dungeon crawl campaign, yes a cleric is a necessity. The notion of classes that could heal without magic is pretty much absent from Next, so yes, it's back to "who wants to play the cleric."

For some campaigns, of course: if you're looking at a small number of combats with lots of social encounters or just plain encounter avoidance you can make do without one. The healing rates (heal everything overnight by default) give you some decent options if there aren't going to be a lot of battles, but once you need combat healing, it's back to cleric again.

It seems like this is pretty much seen as a feature as opposed to a bug, so...

 

[Kobold Stew]

I'll add that the Cleric is fun to play (and to ref) in Next. Between the skills from a cool background and the choices early on, there's no sense that it needs to be played as a support class, which (IME) was not the case in previous editions.

Next makes me want to play the party Cleric (admittedly, I've not yet played one above level 4).

 

[Ichneumon]

I'll add that the Cleric is fun to play (and to ref) in Next. Between the skills from a cool background and the choices early on, there's no sense that it needs to be played as a support class, which (IME) was not the case in previous editions.

Next makes me want to play the party Cleric (admittedly, I've not yet played one above level 4).

Clerics in Next are great. Though I'm jonesing to play a death one.

 

[pickin_grinnin]

Well by that logic the game plays just fine without fighters, rogues, wizards or anybody else. You can be a party of commoners and merchants and have a rip-roaring good time.

You can. One of my favorite characters of all time was a farmer with no combat skills whatsoever.

 

[doghead]

Well by that logic the game plays just fine without fighters, rogues, wizards or anybody else. You can be a party of commoners and merchants and have a rip-roaring good time.

Which you can.

However the time-honored D&D truism "who's gonna be the cleric" exists for a reason. Indeed Clerics are not necessary, but (at least in 3e and 4e) they are extremely helpful ...

Which is also true.

So I'd let the players choose to play whatever they like. It just means that they, and you, may need to make some adjustments.

thotd

 

[Desdichado]

I believe very strongly, in any game, not just Next, that it is the GM's job to come up with an adventure that suits the characters he has. Anytime any GM of any system is trying to strong-arm anybody into playing something that they didn't want to play, the game has already failed before it began.

 

[dd.stevenson]

Levels 1-5, I've run lots of sessions w/o clerics or other magical healers. They're not necessary, so long as the adventure pacing allows for short rests.

 

[Desdichado]

Well by that logic the game plays just fine without fighters, rogues, wizards or anybody else. You can be a party of commoners and merchants and have a rip-roaring good time.

Yes, that's true.

However the time-honored D&D truism "who's gonna be the cleric" exists for a reason. Indeed Clerics are not necessary, but (at least in 3e and 4e) they are extremely helpful, much more so than an extra fighter.

It exists because there's a lot of bad GMs.

 

[doghead]

It exists because there's a lot of bad GMs.

You might genuinely hold this opinion. But as a contribution to the discussion, it doesn't add very much that is constructive.

thotd