D&D (2024) The Problem with Healing Powercreep

[PHATsakk43]

That's a funny way to spell "Monte Cook".

I personally find Monte the apostate Cook who ruined initiative.

 

[Emerikol]

I personally find Monte the apostate Cook who ruined initiative.

I like Monte Cook but I don't like his Cypher System. I tried Numenera but it wasn't for me. I'm sad he doesn't produce more for D&D. Ptolus was magnificent. Now that is a city like I'd design.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think either I communicated my approach wrong or you misunderstood.
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 1d10 on a fighter and 1d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard

A cure serious wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 4d10 on a fighter and 4d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard

A cure critical wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 9d10 on a fighter and 9d6 on a wizard


The healing amount though is just like a surge. I use dice because it's more D&D like but that is the idea. The difference is you get unlimited surges but they can only be activated by magic. But for those of you liking non-magical healing, you could have one rest do your hit dice in healing. You could have a long rest do half your level rounded up in HD of healing.


I've wondered if healing as a subsystem should be separate from spells. I haven't decided yet.

You're talking about a proportional healing system, correct? I like it! Fixes a lot of issues with hit points as a concept (using a wounds system after people fall to zero fixes the rest IMO).

 

[PHATsakk43]

Back to the point, was Monte the one who added healing spells swapping to 3E?

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I think either I communicated my approach wrong or you misunderstood.
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 1d10 on a fighter and 1d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard

A cure serious wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 4d10 on a fighter and 4d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard

A cure critical wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 9d10 on a fighter and 9d6 on a wizard


The healing amount though is just like a surge. I use dice because it's more D&D like but that is the idea. The difference is you get unlimited surges but they can only be activated by magic. But for those of you liking non-magical healing, you could have one rest do your hit dice in healing. You could have a long rest do half your level rounded up in HD of healing.


I've wondered if healing as a subsystem should be separate from spells. I haven't decided yet.

5e (2014 at least) just has a single cure wounds spell at 1st level, but it adds a d8 per level if you cast it in a higher level spell slot, so that part is already taken care of. Neat idea to make the dice based on a character's HD. Works well for PCs, but would be tricky with the simplified NPC statblocks where HD are based only on creature size.

 

[Emerikol]

5e (2014 at least) just has a single cure wounds spell at 1st level, but it adds a d8 per level if you cast it in a higher level spell slot, so that part is already taken care of. Neat idea to make the dice based on a character's HD. Works well for PCs, but would be tricky with the simplified NPC statblocks where HD are based only on creature size.

You could just have a stat called healing dice. The monsters and NPCs aren't changing levels like crazy. So just assign them a die or dice. All healing powers can be expressed as a factor times healing dice.

 

[PHATsakk43]

You could just have a stat called healing dice. The monsters and NPCs aren't changing levels like crazy. So just assign them a die or dice. All healing powers can be expressed as a factor times healing dice.

Too fiddly to me, I’d just do CON in HP 1/day every five levels for martial builds and 1/4 or 1/2 for every one else.

Just make it a fixed number and based on ability scores.

 

[cbwjm]

5e (2014 at least) just has a single cure wounds spell at 1st level, but it adds a d8 per level if you cast it in a higher level spell slot, so that part is already taken care of. Neat idea to make the dice based on a character's HD. Works well for PCs, but would be tricky with the simplified NPC statblocks where HD are based only on creature size.

I think it would work better on NPCs, their hit die size is right there, no need to change anything. The tricky bit would be what happens with multiclassed PCs, do you use their highest die, their lowest, the die size based on their highest level? Single classed works fine, multi class confuses things. Otherwise, I like the idea of healing being affected in some way by hit dice.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I have a group that doesn't have a healer other than a Way of Mercy monk in case someone drops to 0. On the other hand they do burn through a lot of healing potions because I don't back off on difficulty.

But one of the things I liked about 4E is that my cleric felt like they could be more than just a healbot, they could be decent at support and heal when needed. While I don't want to go back to that, I still see people feeling like someone "has to" play a cleric with the 2014 rules. We'll see how well it works in practice when we actually start playing.

The other nice thing IMO was that you needed a Leader, not a Cleric. If you weren't interested in religious character or wanted to focus on combat with weapons, you could become a Warlord. Or if that wasn't your style, you could pick up your lute.

 

[Staffan]

I think either I communicated my approach wrong or you misunderstood.
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 1d10 on a fighter and 1d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard

A cure serious wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 2d10 on a fighter and 2d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 4d10 on a fighter and 4d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard

A cure critical wounds (the next one up I am assuming I don't own 5e)
At 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level, a cure light wounds does 3d10 on a fighter and 3d6 on a wizard
At 4th, 5th, and 6th level, a cure light wounds does 6d10 on a fighter and 6d6 on a wizard
At 7th, 8th, 9th level, a cure light wounds does 9d10 on a fighter and 9d6 on a wizard

No, that's pretty much how I understood it. Except 5e doesn't have cure light/moderate/serious/critical wounds, it just has cure wounds which gets stronger if you cast it using a higher-level slot.

The problem is that the power of healing here multiplies the level of the target with the level of the healing spell, so you're basically double-dipping on level when healing.

But for those of you liking non-magical healing, you could have one rest do your hit dice in healing.

What I primarily want is non-divine healing. In a system with 12-13 classes, no one class should be essential to an adventuring party. Especially not one that has the worldbuilding requirements of the cleric.