Support thread

Abathur is a specialist, but he's definitely got team support all over him.
Scouts, reinforces, soaks exp away from teamfights.
Medievh less so I suppose, but he's not going to carry any games, but his kit is really really interesting.

except here I guess.

Fuck I had multiple pages open and posted in the wrong section
>OP faggot etc etc etc

Or maybe my character can't be a Cleric because of his own nature. Dragon blood, sure, but really, he just doesn't have the diligence for regular piety.

Go back to your containment board here's the link >>>v

My bad

Hey, not trying to be a dick, just trying to keep things on topic. Have fun OP, you seem like a cool guy.

I refute your false claims. Cleric may be one of the most versatile, but they get beat out by classes intended for specific roles. Only thing that they win in is healin others, but that's an inferior mechanic.

>but they get beat out by classes intended for specific roles
Divine Power gives them a Fighters BAB, a STR bonus and a bonus to hp, making them effectively a fighter, but instead of borderline useless feats they get spells. There are various ways to cast Divine Power quickened or with an extended span, and even if we ignore that it's just a single spell of preparation to make you the equal of the fighter or other full-BAB classes. And that's ignoring the whole slew of other buffs available to the cleric.

There's also this one spell, I forgot which, that gives you +20 to every single skill check. It was a level 2 or 3 spell so you can put it on a wand, meaning a cleric can effectively pass all but the most complex of skill checks. Only at epic levels does the rogue begin to overshadow this low level spell.

As for damage output, a cleric can go two ways. Either add a few other buffs on top of divine power for physical damage, or use various metamagic feats to buff the fuck out of a few blast spells. Maximized, Empowered, Enlarged, Twin, what have you.

qed

Ring ring, the latest 2 editions are calling.

1 don't have metamagic.
2. that "plus like 20" isn't for skill checks, that's specifically for to hit rolls.
3. Shit for damage spells. Shit selection of control spells.
4. Each thing you've listed are from different domains, and if your picking one you aren't doing the others. You are choosing to be an auxiliary option for something someone else does better on top of being a healer.

Clerics are not the Ubermensch

>1 don't have metamagic.
Yes they do, I don't see why they wouldn't. They're not spontaneous casters (and even those can get it with a few tricks and exploits).

>2. that "plus like 20" isn't for skill checks, that's specifically for to hit rolls.
Nah mate.
wizards.com/dnd/article.asp?x=dnd/sb/sb20010504a
This is the one. Admittedly it's from a web supplement, but even Complete Adventurer has a less powerfull spell that does more or less the same thing (except it's level dependent and gives up to a +15 bonus).

>3. Shit for damage spells. Shit selection of control spells.
Depends on whether you include the Spell Compendium and/or your selection of domains. Spell Compendium gives clerics a huge boost in available spells, including quite a few decent blasting spells. And you only need one or two good ones to focus a blasting build around. And Spell Compendium is far from obscure, most DMs allow it in most 3.5e campaigns. It's not exactly some article from Dragon Magazine nobody read, it's about as commonly used as the Complete Books.

>4. Each thing you've listed are from different domains, and if your picking one you aren't doing the others.
Not per se. Divine Power is available to everyone (though it would favor you if you have the War Domain), Guidance of the Avatar is available to everyone, the blasting spells from Spell Compendium are available to everyone. Domains help, but even without domains there's enough a cleric can do.

And even if you limit yourself to just core (which gimps non-casters more than casters ironically) there's still more than enough a cleric can do. Sure, he loses the ability to trivialize the existence of the rogue and becomes less powerful in pure blasting, as well as the ability to dump Turn Undead uses into Devotion feats or Metamagic, but he remains one of the most versatile and one of the most powerful classes.

>Clerics are not the Ubermensch
They're tier 1, that's as close to übermensch as it gets.

I think we may be looking at different editions user.

Also, points for being reasonable and not having an insult in every other sentence. Truly you are above the plebeian masses.

Probably. I will freely admit that 3.5e is the most unbalanced shit ever and that 4e and 5e both do a better job at making the martials relevant (or at the very least not redundant) though.

As a DM, I aprove characters able to support but disaprove full support characters. I like my players to all be able to survive by themselves without needing the rest of the team.

I'm looking at 4e and I don't get an overpowered vibe out of clerics there... did you mean 5e? Not terribly strong in that either. Maybe i'm doing it wrong and need to go back to AD&D? No, a cleric who tries to frontline there for too long will be eating the dirt, what with the "full round to cast a spell, and being hit disrupts it" thing.

Honestly, user, i don't know where you get your ideas.

>Implying the best Striker isn't the rogue or Ranger, Best defender isn't the Fighter, and best Leader isn't the Warlord.
It's like you don't even 4e.

I need more of these

I just realized that you think they're talking about 5e. No, Clerics aren't Ubermensch in 5e.

The two you're replying to are talking about 3.5e.

In that edition, clerics get the following:

Guidance of the Avatar, a 2nd level Divination spell for clerics only gives a +20 competence bonus on a single skill check. The duration lasts for 1 minute or until discharged. This can be put in a wand.

Clerics can fight just as well as fighters using Divine Power and Divine Favor, not to mention Magic Weapon/Mighty Whallop

Plus they have stellar control spells. Literally "What is Obscuring Mist, Darkness, Hold Person, Silence, Glyph of Warding, Stone Shape, Wind Wall, etc."

They get access to Harm, which utterly wrecks most other damage spells in the system. Followed up with a quickened inflict BABY wounds, boom there's a kill.

They're summoners as well, with the full "Summon Monster" line and Planar Ally, not to mention Gate.

On top of all of that, they can heal people/themselves.

Yeah we were looking at different editions. I'm thinking 5e.

Never met an mmo healer that uppity, not a useful one anyway.

Clerics still aren't bad in 5e. Healing isn't bad, and depending on their domain they can fulfill a variety of roles.

WHY DOES SHE HAVE ONE AND A HALF BOOB ?

I love how civil this thread is. I don't mean to say that cleric is a bad class. I like clerics, I just don't think they beat out everyone else like he was saying. specifically in 5e. Don't know bout 3 or 3.5. As for healing. It's not bad no, but I've heard arguments for it being more benificial to try and prevent damage through application of disadvantages and advantages and other forms of battle field control rather than trying to heal after It happens that made a decent amount of sense. I can't make them myself, I'm not invested enough to do the math, and I myself play clerics pretry often, but the heals in 5e aren't that good as far as I can tell.

Morales? Isn't that just a passive medic beam? How's that unusual? TF2 Medic, Wisp, Mercy, it's been done.
I agree that Abathur is really neat. Not full-on support, but he can contribute pretty well.

I'm typically dissatisfied with healing in RPGs. I'm spending entire turns just mitigating a single attack's worth of damage from one ally. My turn is reduced to: I heal [character] for... [rolls dice] damage. I find it more exciting to just summon my spirit weapon & my aura of death around my Trickery clone.

More /v/ related, but I recently tried WoW. Healing is also incredibly dull there. I've played Blizzard games with fun healing. I've played other MMOs with fun healing. WoW healing is just completely unfun.

My current character firmly believes that he is the hero of his own story. Basically he believes that he has plot armor and that things will always manage to work themselves out in the end.

This has gotten us into some situations, but so far we aren't dead so...

>Morales? Isn't that just a passive medic beam? How's that unusual?
Morales is a little off the norm since she's got no real offensive measures at all.
Mercy and Medic have backup weapons that, while not nearly as effective as the combat classes, can at least get kills with luck or headshots. Io wants to keep the harassment going. If their allies aren't nearby, they can try to make a poor offensive.
Morales struggles to damage even minions with her globs of uselessness. She can't even talent into damage like most other supports, not really. She is 100% of the time devoted to maintaining an ally and better than anyone else at it. Morales cannot even function alone.

Shit-tier anime artist, what do you expect?

You only heal in combat to keep people from making death saves. Anything else is losing tempo.

It's an internal monologue.

where the other tiddy

Yes, you have.

That's 80% of healers in every game.

We just don't say it to anyone except maybe friends in a different voice server. So much shit talking, but our DPS and tanks never hear it because that would just drag the group down more and we want to get the fuck out of there.

Trust me, you are being silently judged every time you stand in the fire.

My friends never realized how salty I am until I played with them drunk.

The filter was gone.

I kinda want to translate Nami into D&D, might just make the Tide callers staff into an item and call it a day (5e)

>Gunslinger Cleric
Supports mostly by crafting everyone's gear and arming the minions, spend most rounds invoking prayers to the Forge Lord and shouting at people about how to do their jobs better before finally saying hell with it and shooting things until the fight's over. Also runs an IC support role as the person who handles all our mercenary company's paperwork.

Dragon Disciple Bard is technically a support on account of buffing the whole party along with herself, but kinda shifted into frontline fighter when her AC spiked above the other melee warriors.

Divination specialist Cleric/Warlock plays a spotter well for the marksmen in our party, seeing in spectrums enough to catch anything trying to sneak up on our unit.

Clerics aren't priests or white mages, even though lots of people get the three confused:

>Paladin: Warrior with a side ability of healing and buffs
>Cleric: Dude balanced between healing and buffing, and fighhting
>Priest: Buff and healing dude with the ability to deal damage in certain situations
>White Mage: Pure buffs and support

>4E taxi valor bard
>Wow user, you don't even heal what the fuck
>Retain the highest killcount from the start of the game onwards based on environmental kills
>DM confirms I can specify certain allies to not receive benefits of my auras
>Allow NPC allies to benefit while ignoring the bitchy striker
>Rest of my party learns to lick my bootheels and stay within 30ft or die very swiftly

Feels good to be the boss.

Yeah, and that just always felt sorta... bland. I dunno, I feel like heals should have a better HP : action ratio.

It's even worse with the really good healers. I used to raid with 1%er guilds for world firsts a while back, and holy shit the salt was real. We had a second voice server for healers to coordinate buffs and such and the trash talk was ridiculous.

...

considering she's been shipped with damn-near everyone by now, I'd say you're right.
Pharmacy still my personal choice, though

Fuck you Soldier Dad and Healer Mom is best.

How about soldier grandad and healsnipe grandma, instead?

Infinity Represent

>Triumphs and/or woes of being a support
Triumphs are saving someone's life. Woes are games that mechanically punished for their role, like playing a cleric that actually heals during combat in 3.5 for example.

>Why do you play support?
Because I play with new people a lot and want to help them shine and enjoy the game. Also I like to be needed.

>Best support character
In a video game, Brightwing from Heroes of the Storm. Damage, disables, shields, passive healing, and a teleport to boot. You're a frustrating nuisance for the enemy team and both of your ultimates are escapes.

In a tabletop game, the Vitalist in Pathfinder. Heal your party without having to even be in the same room as them! You can even drain the life force of enemies to heal your party so you can hurt while you heal.

>Game with unusual supports
In a video game, Dragon Age: Inquisition. They don't restore health to allies, they just give them massive amounts of temporary hit points that degrade over time. Completely broken if built correctly despite not restoring a single hit point.

In a tabletop game, the Vitalist from Pathfinder, again. They're just really weird in concept and execution, but damn if they're not good at what they do.

>Triumphs and/or woes of being a support
The best feeling is keeping your team alive so they can beat an encounter. It feels good to consider yourself like a force multiplier that makes them all perform better. The worst feeling is watching your team die because they're idiots who make poor decisions, and knowing that you can't carry their asses.

>Why do you play support?
Because I'm a positive person and I like making sure everyone has a good time. Nobody likes to die, so I try my best to make sure that happens as infrequently as possible. It's funny, because as a GM I often throw horrific deadly challenges at my players with little to no warning.

Brightwing terrifies me But this arouses me

And they don't even really need to prepare healing spells. There's a reason they're called CoDzilla.

Guess again, buddy. 19 of the 20 most common jobs in the country are at risk of being replaced by robots, as are artists, writers, journalists, and musicians.

>thinking that people still won't prefer art made by "something with a soul" even though machines can make something as good if not better
>thinking that people will completely trust all of their news to be filtered through AI, something humans have had an almost genetic fear of since the concept was invented
Sorry, no.

I don't have much experience playing support characters in tabletop games but since others are talking about video games: I really enjoy the Captain class in Lord of the Rings Online. While most MMO supports/healers are squishy casters, Captains are a heavily-armored melee class that buffs/heals allies with shouts and melee attacks that put AoE buffs on their group including heals-over-time, damage/healing boosts, damage reduction, speed buffs, and status effect resistances, while also having several single-target utility buffs like 75% damage reduction on one target or causing an enemy to take 35% more damage. Not to mention it's way more satisfying to heal your allies by bashing skulls instead of standing around casting spells.

...

>Implying you will ever know

Keep one or two "artists" and "journalists" on staff to sign the papers or better, market it as "objective news" as opposed to dirty, political human news. add "i-" to it and morons who mistake inventions for progress will lap it up.

Probably because you're not the kind of idiot that would stand in AoE or pull two rooms ahead.

Played my share of MMOs back in the day and randomly assembled party can range anywhere from smooth ride to literal tard wrangling .