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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sword of Spirit" data-source="post: 6455312" data-attributes="member: 6677017">Just to weigh in on some of the general discussion about roles and healing...In prior editions (except 4e) the effectiveness hit the party would take from not having a full healer was greater than it is in 5e.You basically have had 4 traditional D&D roles (and I'm going to disagree with the other poster on what they were): melee tank, healer, mage, "thief" (for lack of a better term). If you were missing any of those roles in your party, you would seriously suffer in a standard campaign. It would create an unbalanced party. There is nothing wrong with that, and it can be quite fun to play such a party. However, it is something that everyone needs to be aware of at the start of the campaign. If you are playing an unbalanced party in a standard campaign, you are going to have to deal with things that are significantly more challenging than they otherwise would be, and you might have to find alternate ways to get things done, or just admit it isn't worth the effort to try certain things.There are a lot of different ways to fill these four roles in 5e. Here are examples of just the most obvious ways of doing it:Melee Tank:FighterPaladinBarbarianRangerCleric (Life, Nature, Tempest, War)Druid (Moon)Healer:ClericBardDruidPaladinMage:WizardSorcererBard (Lore)Thief:RogueLockpick + Investigation + Stealth proficienciesAnd then you can get creative and come up with all sorts of other ways to fill those roles. A couple of rangers, a monk, a tome warlock with the ritual caster invocation, with one of those characters having the relevant thief proficiencies is an unorthodox 4 character party that can hit all of those roles by spreading them out. Multiclassing also works.So I question how many groups will actually be unable to produce any players who are excited to play any options that provide a sufficient amount of healing to a 5e party to fulfill that role.In 5e default healing, it feels to me like the healer role is no more important than any of the other four--and perhaps even less important.Personally, I'll likely be using lower healing options because I like the effects on the campaign, and even so, I feel like it wouldn't be much more of a disadvantage in a party to lack a full healer than to lack someone who fulfilled any of the other roles. A party can really benefit from an archer dishing out massive damage, but they can get by without one of those a lot easier than they can without someone with a high AC and hp standing in the front line. A light cleric or druid can lay down some boom, but without a mage's utility effects it just isn't going to be the same. The thief role is the easiest one to fill in 5e, so not having it filled is almost a conscious choice.For those who really have problems with a healer role for some reason, the action surge option in the DMG is probably enough to totally eliminate the need for a healer role. At that point healer gets moved into the secondary roles category--those that help the party but aren't vital, such as holyperson, nature child, face, or friends in low/high places. I'm not personally a fan of moving healer into a secondary role, but it seems to me that the DMG provides enough options to keep the healer role as important or unimportant as a group would like it to be. Some houseruling may be required.</blockquote>

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