3.5 gave Clerics a whole bunch of shit to incentivise players to play them. This also created the drawback that they were one of the most broken OP classes ever.
4e's approach was to have Clerics attack while heal but people disregard 4e for a lot of reasons I won't bother getting into.
Is there a way to get people to want to play a support class WITHOUT giving that class basically every other option to get them to care about healing others?
I like playing support classes. Buffs and debuffs are generally cooler than healing, though.
The Wizard's whole gimmick in D&D is being a god-tier support.
Healing is ineffective support
Make healing a more effective role to play.
Have all classes support a little?
Don't have a support class?
I thought 3.P has been broken enough times to know this:
If you are playing Clerics are support you are doing it wrong. If you are playing ANY support outside of Haste + Starting a bard song you are doing it wrong.
There's only one good way of making people play support: get good players who understand that the game is not 100% about killing stuff. I had a player who quit the group I was in not really knowing how to RP and being a paladin smitebot with no morals. He came back a year later for a different game as a character who was party face (talked like a shady car salesman from Australia) and played a complete coward who powered up his allies by yelling at them while hiding behind the closest pieces of solid cover but could lie and cajole his way through just about any social encounter.
The other way that I can think of is to make a system where buffs/debuffs are really good and let the powergamers do their deadly work.
the buffers are the powergamers.
There's no real "hang back and buff other players exclusivley, but be really good at it" class in 3.x core since every healing class has easy access to heavy weapons and armor, even with the Druids conditions there's easy as fuck loopholes built into the system even if you disregard wildshape.
3.X's retarded insistance that every healer have front line capabilities, and that all forms of healing be touch range only, mean most healers treat healing as effectivley secondary to fighting. You smack the crap out of the bad guys and then use your support powers after, or at most in an emergency. Once you realize that undead are some of the most common enemies for DM's to use and that cleric's "support" can do damage to undead instead of you realize how fucking bad it really can be.
Yes, there are other classes outside of core that allow for more party centric support instead of being a tank that sometimes also helps, but those are secondary by definition and rarely show up in the meta. The support and healing roles were essentially fucked from the word go.
Not with shit like color spray being available it's not. Wizards are just straight better at locking down and hurting enemies than any frontline fighter in the game at basically every level.
Bards are pretty lightly equipped and full of support stuff, aren't they?
>but people disregard 4e for a lot of reasons I won't bother getting into
The solution is simple: ignore those fuckers.
>falling for the memes this hard
You really need to actually play the game instead of just mouthing off your ass-first hypotheticals that would only occur if the group was specifically trying to make the game unbalanced.
All your arguments are basically jokes that only idiots would bother repeating.
Buff support is Doing It Right. Battlefield Control support is Doing It Right.
It's just Healing that's shit.
I would love to play a support cleric but my current campaign, my DM told me that we don't need another cleric.
>Is there a way to get people to want to play a support class WITHOUT giving that class basically every other option to get them to care about healing others?
Yes, it's in your post.
>have Clerics attack while heal
Clerics didn't heal people in 4e. They just had the power to make people heal themselves.
That is patently wrong.
One distinguishing feature of Clerics compared to other Leaders in 4e is that they heal people.
What? I remember playing 4e. They basically had powers that let people use their own healing surges on themselves. But if they were out of healing surges, the cleric couldn't heal them.
>support is healing only
>But if they were out of healing surges, the cleric couldn't heal them.
Wrong. Cleric is the one class with access to surge-less healing.
I literally remember the rules saying that you caused someone to spend their own healing surges. Our fighter being out of surges and unable to be healed by the cleric and dying was one of the reasons we quit playing 4e.
If only there were something after 3.5 and 4e that people were playing in large numbers that didn't have overpowered clerics that stayed truthful to the traditional DnD concept of a cleric
I don't think a fully dedicated support class really suits the game design that well though
3.5 clerics often used stuff like divine power and wrath of the righteous though
i really like the arcana cleric but i admit it's a bit op
>shit tons of spells
>access to wizard spells aka best spells
>turn everything
>healing removes debuffs
Both of you are sorta right. Almost no one got as much surgeless healing as clerics BUT most cleric healing was still surge-based (Surgeless mostly turned up on daily powers or could only get people to bloodied)
Your cleric literally didn't pick those powers then, but they did exist.
Also, if the fighter ran out of healing surges you sucked at combat.
Just because you failed to pick powers like Astral Seal and Cure Light Wounds, doesn't mean Clerics don't have them.
...what? That's how 4e healing worked, healing surges represented endurance and ability to keep going. That's why environmental effects drained it and healing powers spent it.
4e is literally the solution to what you ask. It made clerics able to heal AND do something else without making either choice useless (see 5e) or OP (3.P). Plus, it added a bunch of support classes that worked in different ways but still had access to the basics of healing, giving players a bunch of couches.
I guess reading comprehension would be required to play a RPG.
The issue with 3.5 is that clerics best buffs are self only, plus free cast shenanigans. You're not playing support, you're playing supersayan.
>Inb4 best support is kill people fast
I'm pretty sure the healing word spell or whatever the fuck it was called literally said that it made you spend a healing surge. Yes, it did also heal like a d6 or something but that's peanuts in that system. I'm surprised I even remember this shit anyways, I haven't played the game in a decade.
You don't need to play anywhere full CoDzilla to be the back-row star.
And fuck, there's like half a dozen ways to depersonalize personal spells.
>really hurt, need a heal
>drink a healing potion
>doesn't heal me because I'm too tired
>everyone agrees this makes sense within the setting for magic to work that way
>look over and see the wizard literally throwing fireballs and teleporting into other dimensions
Did you not read the flavour text for healing potions?
>This simple potion draws on the body's natural healing ability to cure your wounds.
It's literally using your own energy to heal you. Of course it doesn't work if you are exhausted.
Oh wow makes sense definitely shouldn't be able to make any that actually just heal you in this very mundane nonfantasy land we live in
...what on earth are you even talking about?
After 3.5's CLW and Lesser Vigor wands making healing a nonissue, yes, that makes perfect sense.
They can, but only if you're bloodied and out of healing surges, which is really what you should be saving healing potions for anyway
>memes
>healing spells consistently heal less than a single enemy attack until Heal
>most Cleric party buffs are shit
>Divine Power exists
>Righteous Might exists
>persistent spell
Not in my book. Though I am usually the player who ends up playing support and face for the rest of my murderhobo/thieving party...
Powers that grant surge-less heals are a thing, and something that's generally considered rather valuable. Clerics have access to more surge-less heals than any other leader class if I'm not mistaken, though most leaders have at-least SOME access to surge-less heals.
The Artificer (For a value of surgeless) had a little claim to it. As ANYONE could spend the surge to make an artificer's healing potions you could heal the rogue without spending his own healing surges.
The healing costing a resource doesn't necessarily mean that "you don't heal."
If you really can't imagine healing happening because a surge was spent. Heals that cost no surges exist, though usually they are daily powers that you take with your D/U slots, and not one of the 2/3 encounter heals that the leader classes get as a core feature. There are also powers that grant surges, or otherwise increase the effective surges-per-day of the party.
Spending a surge in combat can normally only be done once per encounter (with second wind) and costs your standard action for the round unless you're a dwarf, which often means it's not tactically worth it. What made the cleric's healing tactically viable was that it allowed you to spend your surges (with bonus-get) in-combat, without the healed party sacrificing any of their tactical viability for the round. In much reverse of how in 3.PF in combat healing spells/tools were not tactically efficient, and out of combat healing were where the healing classes impacted the party, in 4e the leader's in-combat healing very much improves the party's in-encounter survivability, while their out of combat healing is a minor boon at best. It's a different game.
>4e's approach was to have Clerics attack while heal but people disregard 4e for a lot of reasons I won't bother getting into.
Isn't this sort of a non-sequitor?
>X game fixed the problem, but I don't like X
It's only the fix that matters, who cares what game it is attached to?
I usually end up playing the healer above, not the MMO healer. Even if my teammates are murderhobos or do suicidal things,I will heal them and support them: unless they are already too far gone, then I'm outta there.
> but be really good at it" class in 3.x core
>core
There's your fucking problem. Look at the healer class, which is shitty and underpwoered because "does one thing and only one thing" is how you end up as super fucking shitty in 3.5.
The healer sucks because its one and only thing sucks incredibly hard in 3.5, at least until it picks up Gate. Dread Necro is a significantly less underpowered class that's still focused.
arcana cleric? where is that?
Disgusting. I bet you also play girls and always want to "help" people in any way you can, don't you, you dirty little girl you.
Its basically a non-issue anyway since in combat healing is rubbish design
It's in Sword Coast Adventurer Guide.
I've never seen anyone in 4e run out of Surges except a low Con Rogue at lower levels. How on earth did your Fighter run out? You do know that 'Defender' doesn't mean 'tank' right? If only the Fighter is getting hit during the day, you're doing it wrong
No.
My 3.5 cleric opens every battle by casting Bless on the party. We have this weird tendency to open battle with the party crammed in a hallway, cleric in the back.
>not realizing Clerics are one of the best classes in 5E.
Knew a dude whose favoritest thing was making his cleric a better fighter than the fighter, using spells and shit, and he never did healing.
I like playing support
Just not good at it
Also like being bullied for it
faggot
>Is there a way to get people to want to play a support class WITHOUT giving that class basically every other option to get them to care about healing others?
Give supports a lot of possibilities for support outside of healing. What I'd do for example is give clerics a lot more battlefield control, buff and debuff spells (ways to influence the field of battle without directly inflicting or healing hp) and give them some minor direct damage spells. Meanwhile the wizard should be the opposite of the cleric: a lot of flashy damage dealing spells (sometimes with rider effects) and very few ways to directly debuff, buff et cetera. This makes playing support classes a lot more tactical and a lot more fun. You may not be inflicting direct damage, but you're blinding dragons and summoning walls of fire left and right. And if push comes to shove, you can still vomit out a ray of divine light.
This is correct. Out of combat healing is invaluable, but can be achieved through many means. In-combat healing on the other hand is next to worthless unless an important member of your party is on the verge of dying, a situation that shouldn't be common. Any turn you waste on casting a healing spell is a turn you could've used casting a much more useful spell. The opportunity cost of in-combat healing is huge.
In 3.5e (and to a lesser extent 5e) this is incredibly easy. Hell, in 3.5e you only need to cast Divine Power to become a better fighter than the fighter, and you STILL have the rest of your spell list left.
Something else you can learn from 4e is that support doesn't just mean healing.
Look at the Warlord. One of the best leaders in the game, has a decent amount of healing but is also an active, inspiring leader of men who can extol their allies on to greater things. That's how you make a support character, an active and engaging one to play, rather than reactive and passive.
Just make it so support isn't necessary for normal play, but makes other character's able to do insane fucking shit. The answer to most problems with what made clerics and druids broken is restrict most spells to not be self castable (buffs, not basic healing stuff), then make all their crazy spells be buffs for other characters. Make it so a cleric plus a fighter could kill three wizards.
The thing about healers is that they're actually super fun, just very narrow in their role
Since you need to be right up close to whoever is taking hits to heal them, but also can't wear armor, you are effectively dependant on the party's fighter/paladin/whoever to protect you while you stay at their side.
You are mechanically made more vulnerable, and mechanically encouraged to form a sort of 'knight/damsal' relationship with your party members as a result. Your high charisma and wisdom and low combat ability encourage you to avoid conflict and act as a diplomat. Also you get to ride a unicorn.
It's a class where the mechanics encourage roleplay on a fundemental level... Playing as intended outright makes you feel like a princess.
I wouldn't play one all the time, but it's a legitimately unique experience I didn't think I'd get out of 3.5. Personally, I'd much rather have that than a fairly typical Cleric playstyle.
>support is only about healing
That's where you wrong. Buffing your team and incapacitating your opponent is also being a support. Also is not because you are a support class that you can't smash the face of your ennemy.
As a Healer, you are literally less useful to the party than nobody.
I love playing support. Always have. I have two gripes with it, though, that make me hate support classes in most games.
1.) They're always overpowered. Their value is always significantly greater than any other class, which makes me feel like I'm cheating or not really trying to challenge myself, and it infuriates me when the enemy has one because it's so obvious how fucked they'd be without one. If a single class makes or breaks a party, then that class is too strong, and inevitably someone is going to feel like they're forced to play support because the party doesn't have one yet -- it's just poor game design. I do realize that game developers make supports super strong to entice people into playing them, but that's not the strategy they should be employing; if you want someone to play something, make it FUN to play it.
2.) In medieval fantasy games, supports are usually the gayest classes. Clerics, bards, and druids. I can't play one for more than a single game. Dicksucking a deity isn't fun to me, I can't pull off charming or musical, and nature is for queers.
Healslut till the die I die
Mate you're going to need a huge reason why even the worst full caster in the game is worse than a monk or a fighter
Monks and fighters are also tier 5, and thus worse than nobody.
You must be great fun to play with
As long as we're not playing 3.PF or nobody asks for character advice, I'm just a teacup of sunshine. But if you try to stick shit in my face and call it a game, I'm going to call it shit.
>Is there a way to get people to want to play a support class
Pretty much this. YOU are the one who chooses who lives and dies outside the DM, because lets be honest most of us play with idiots who don't take prep time before delves into the abyss like a sane humanoid being of 8+ INT. YOU are the one that gets to choose the pace and almost decision making of the story, because if you don't go to X then most won't either because they know they are fucked. YOU can also be absolutely certain that, in most cases, the party will side with in conflicts. Barbarian bitching about why you didn't heal him after he triggered the tenth trap in a row? Team calls him a fucking moron. Rogue asking why you're doing bare minimum to keep him alive after he's unlocked shit for "you guys"? Rest of the team says that his failed checks to hide his thieving rogue fingers from the majority of the loot makes people angry.
Feels good being support mains in almost every genre/medium that has such a class.
Make every hit below half HP cause bleed and disease rolls. The bleed causes a total of D/d10; roll a zero and it doesn't stop. Magic healing stops surface and internal bleeding.
>doesn't heal me because I'm too tired
A healing potion works even if you don't have any surges, as long as you're bloodied
Gods can have more than 20 class levels. Let them do quests for their god(s) to get past 20 total class levels, with 20 total outside of the divine support class. Quest to get to 21 total, then to 26, 31 & 36? Smaller quests if they don't want to get as far before the next quest.
Make heals used primarily in emergencies. Any other time, your support class is doing something else. Primarily crowd control or buffing/debuffing.
It's way more fun to prevent damage entirely by making vines strangle the enemies than to play whack a mole with their HP.
I used to love playing an all-heals-and-cures 2e support cleric. Then I met a player who referred to me as "his potions." That ended it for me. I began by looking to build a cleric that couldn't be replaced by a potion bottle or a magic ring. This led me to questioning the original idea of holy-men-as-instamiracle-healers. This in turn led me to question hit points and the scope of injuries incurred in combat by fighters.
I read some descriptions of battle wounds in Romance of the Three Kingdoms and in The Three Musketeers. As larger-than-life heroes, they were able to take a lot of punishment without dying. It feels like modeling this makes more sense as an action-limiting condition rather than just a number.
With that, healing would be a discipline of all characters, differing according to how they prosecute the game world. The power to very rapidly end an injured state would be nearly godlike, but the discipline to fight on while injured might be a separate discipline. Just my current thoughts.
This is one of the inherent flaws of D&D someone has to be a support character otherwise no one will be able to heal other characters. Why not just make support NPCs who accompany the PCs?
Played a fighter in a game last month and ran out of surges, but then I was the only melee in a party of five and the gm crit me four times in that adventuring day. Even so, if you're not running out of surges your gm needs to push much harder.
proper warlord in 5e when?
Never. Martials can't have nice things.
Aside from buffs and debuffs, preventing damage intelligently is much more effective and efficient than healing damage after the fact. That's where the strength of a cleric lies.
Best example I can give is something that happened to my party:
While in a town, a green dragon got the drop on us and started bombarding us with acid breath. In the first round of combat, our cleric used a communal Protection from Energy to keep us from getting hit too hard by the acid breath. After that wore off he followed up with a communal Resist Energy. This gave us enough time to set up a ballista and shoot the dragon's wings, forcing it to land, thus allowing our barbarian to attack it in melee where he was optimal.
The damage that was mitigated by the communal Protection from Energy on a party of five was TWELVE TIMES more than a maximum roll on a single cure spell of the same level (At level 8, 96 * 5 = 480, compared to a Cure Critical Wounds maximum roll of 40).
>If only there were something after 3.5 and 4e that people were playing in large numbers that didn't have overpowered clerics that stayed truthful to the traditional DnD concept of a cleric
>I don't think a fully dedicated support class really suits the game design that well though
Not everyone is cultured enough to play Dungeon World.
It will be released right alongside the tactical combat module.
So much hype. Why I believed then? I know why: 4e. I thought they had learned good game design
They did. Some of them.
And then the Marketing department pitched in.
>preventing damage intelligently
i dunno your story doesn't seem a clever way to prevent damage
The cleric is not a support class... A cleric is the main and all others support him with fighting archery and magic. The good cleric is in the center of a group with high charisma and social skills able to manipulate authorities and such.
Overall in classical sense in 4 man team, you should aim - One fighter one rouge and one mage + the other class - bard, cleric something that can buff anyone but also by that standard is the most important because it makes everyone better.
This setup is ideal from DM point of view because it gives the most option for story hooks and provided clever and involving plots.