My attempt at a healer class (3.5, core class, PEACH)

[Zaydos]

Okay I decided to attempt a healer class... actually first made it when Miniatures' Handbook came out and I was stunned by how useless the Healer class was (I'd rather play a cleric to heal), but I lost the original copy and remade it with more well useful abilities. I included some good aligned and exalted offensive spells in its spell-list, mainly trying to select light descriptor spells in those cases, because otherwise it would just not be fun to play (all you can do is heal) and I included defense buffs because an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. But I tried to make sure they didn't actually compete with clerics on either of these fronts. I drew their spells from the PHB, Spell Compendium, Book of Exalted Deeds, and PHBII.

At the behest of my PCs I introduced one as an NPC. It's a 5th level game and he's the only non-LA character. He's fought in two encounters, one a random lion encounter where the lion won initiative and reduced the wizard (who hadn't cast mage armor) to -7 hp with his full attack (5 hits) before they killed it with a single crit dealing 60 damage from the barbarian. He had the wizard at full hp within 2 rounds with just 1 1st level spell and had him conscious before the lion even died. The second encounter the rogue tried to scout up on a pair of ogres but one of them got a nat 20 on their listen check and heard her. They climbed up to get to her (a mere move action) and although one failed and fought the rest of the PCs coming to her aid she was stuck alone in melee against an ogre. Thankfully it was at reduced health (sneak attack + magic missile) and the healer made it in time that his aura of healing kept her above negatives while he killed it with a 3 damage spell and then healed her back by the time she was on the ground. So far he has fully healed the party from 2 encounters and the party has used a total of 4 first level spells (3 of them his) with the barbarian owning.

Sacred Healer
{table=head]Level|Base Attack<br>Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Special|0lvl|1st|2nd|3rd|4th|5th|6th|7th|8th| 9th

1st|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+2|Turn Undead, Sacred Healing, Caring Touch, Healing Bonus +1, Divine Spell Failure, Ranged Healing|3|2

2nd|
+1|
+0|
+0|
+3|Aura of Healing 1|4|3|-

3rd|
+1|
+1|
+1|
+3|Touch of Healing (bonus feat), +1 vs Death effects|5|4|2*|-

4th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|Mantle of Healing|6|5|3|-|-

5th|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+4|Aura of Healing 2, Aura of Protection +1|6|6|4|2*|-|-

6th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|Improved Turning +1, Healing Bonus +2, +2 vs Death Effects, Improved Ranged Healing|6|6|5|3|-|-|-

7th|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+5|Empower Healing 3 + Charisma modifier/day |6|6|6|4|2*|-|-|-

8th|
+4|
+2|
+2|
+6|Aura of Healing 3|6|6|6|5|3|-|-|-|-|-

9th|
+4|
+3|
+3|
+6|Divine Grace, +3 vs Death Effects|6|6|6|6|4|2*|-|-|-|-

10th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|Aura of Protection +2, Fast Healing 5|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-|-|-

11th|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+7|Aura of Healing 4, Improved Turning +2, Healing Bonus +3|6|6|6|6|6|4|2*|-|-|-

12th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|Maximize Healing 1 + Charisma modifier/day, +4 vs Death Effects, Greater Ranged Healing|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-|-

13th|
+6/+1|
+4|
+4|
+8|Bonus Divine Feat|6|6|6|6|6|6|4|2*|-|-

14th|
+7/+2|
+4|
+4|
+9|Aura of Healing 5|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-|-

15th|
+7/+2|
+5|
+5|
+9|Aura of Protection +3, +5 vs Death Effects|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|4|2*|-

16th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|Improved Turning +3, Healing Bonus +4|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3|-

17th|
+8/+3|
+5|
+5|
+10|Aura of Healing 6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|4|2*

18th|
+9/+4|
+6|
+6|
+11|Quicken Healing 3/day, +6 vs Death Effects, Supreme Ranged Healing|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|5|3

19th|
+10/+5|
+6|
+6|
+11|Revivify|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|4

20th|
+10/+5|
+6|
+6|
+12|Aura of Healing 7, Aura of Protection +4, Fast Healing 10|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6|6[/table]

HD: d6.
Skill points per level: 4 + Int.
Class Skills: Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Gather Information (Cha), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (arcana) (Int), Knowledge (nature) (Int), Knowledge (religion) (Int), Knowledge (the planes) (Int), Listen (Wis), Profession (Wis), Sense Motive (Wis), Spellcraft (Int), Spot (Int), and Survival (Wis).

Special Abilities:
Weapon and Armor Proficiencies: Wizard weapons and light armor.

Divine Spell Failure (Ex): A sacred healer does not learn the combat friendly somatic components of other divine spellcasters and as such suffers spell failure as an arcane caster when wearing medium or heavy armor and casting spells as a sacred healer.

Turn Undead (Su): As cleric ability.

Sacred Healing (Ex): You add your Charisma bonus to hp healed with all conjuration (healing) spells you cast. This does not apply to Vigor or other fast healing spells.

Caring Touch (Su): This ability functions as Lay on Hands except based upon your Wisdom modifier instead of Charisma. In addition you may give up 5 points of hp healing to remove fear (as spell) or 1 point of ability damage, you may give up 10 points of hp healing to cure paralysis (as spell), negate hold, stun, or daze, 15 points to cure blindness/deafness, cure disease (as remove disease), or neutralize poison (as neutralize poison), 20 points to cure 1 point of ability drain or remove 1 negative level, 50 points can reverse petrification, 100 points can be used to cure impotency or infertility, and they may expend 120 points to restore a creature that has died within 1 round to life as if with the revivify spell and may add 1 round to the amount of time they may have been dead for an extra 20 points of healing.

Healing Bonus (Ex): You gain the listed bonus as your caster level for all Conjuration (Healing) spells cast as a sacred healer.

Ranged Healing (Su): You can cast any conjuration (healing) spell that has a range of touch with a range of 20-ft. If you are using it on a hostile or unwilling creature you must make a ranged touch attack.

Aura of Healing (Su): You produce an aura that grants all known creatures within 60-ft of you which you recognize as allies fast healing equal to the number while at half or less health. This ability requires line of effect, but not line of sight as long as you know they are within the range. This ability does not heal creatures that are damaged by positive energy (such as undead) or that are not healed by it (such as constructs). A side effect is that it promotes growth in plant life over extended durations.

Touch of Healing: They gain the touch of healing reserve feat as a bonus feat.

Bonus on Saves versus Death Effects (Ex): They gain the listed bonus as a sacred bonus on saves against death effects.

Mantle of Healing (Sp): 1/day for a number of rounds equal to 3 + your charisma modifier you can gain a mantle of healing as a swift action. This mantle produces magical light as daylight except is considered a 3rd level spell. In addition you gain fast healing equal to your class level (this does not stack with your aura or any other sources of fast healing). As a move action you can shift the aura to another friendly creature within 30-ft. If you shift the aura it requires a move action each round to prevent the mantle from returning to you. A 3rd level or higher darkness spell negates the light created by the aura but does not negate the healing it provides.

Aura of Protection (Su): Any creature within your Aura of Healing is also warded by an aura of protection granting them a sacred bonus to AC equal to the bonus listed. This only affects those allies at ½ or less health.

Improved Turning (Su): Add the bonus to your effective cleric level for your ability to turn undead.

Improved Ranged Healing (Su): You can cast any conjuration (healing) spell that has a range of touch with a range of 40-ft. If you are using it on a hostile or unwilling creature you must make a ranged touch attack.

Empower Healing (Su): 3 + your Charisma bonus times per day you may treat any Conjuration (Healing) spell you cast as if it was empowered. This does not increase the casting time or the level of the affected spell.

Fast Healing (Su): You gain fast healing 5 at all times. At level 20 this doubles to fast healing 10.

Maximize Healing (Su): 1 + your Charisma bonus times per day you may treat any Conjuration (Healing) spell you cast as if it was maximized. This does not increase the casting time or the level of the affected spell.

Greater Ranged Healing (Su): You can cast any conjuration (healing) spell that has a range of touch with a range of 60-ft. If you are using it on a hostile or unwilling creature you must make a ranged touch attack.

Bonus Divine Feat: You gain 1 bonus divine feat of your choice.

Quick Healing (Su): 3 times per day you may treat any Conjuration (Healing) spell you cast as if it was quickened. This does not increase the casting time or the level of the affected spell.

Supreme Ranged Healing (Su): You can cast any conjuration (healing) spell that has a range of touch with a range of close (25-ft +5-ft/2 caster levels). You no longer need to make a ranged touch attack to target hostile creatures.

Revivify (Su): 1/day you may use Revivify as a supernatural ability, unlike the spell you may use this ability on any creature within 60-ft and line of sight and effect. When you use this ability you are fatigued till the end of the encounter.

Spell Casting: Like a warmage, beguiler, or dread necromancer a sacred healer knows their entire spell-list and casts spells spontaneously. They are limited though in the use of slots marked with a *, these slots may only be used to prepare or cast Cure or Heal spells and if all their slots of a certain level are marked with * then they only learn any Cure or Heal spells of that level. Although a healer can be of any alignment only a good aligned healer may cast any spell marked as exalted, and evil aligned healers may not cast any spell with the good descriptor.
Sacred Healers use their Charisma to determine Spells per Day and the Save DCs for their spells

Spell List:
0- Create Water, Cure Minor Wounds, Detect Magic, Detect Poison, Disrupt Undead, Light, Purify Food and Drink, Resistance, Virtue.
Wizard Spells: Dancing Lights.

1- Bless Water, Cure Light Wounds, Deathwatch, Detect Good/Evil, Detect Undead, Endure Elements, Healthful Aura, Invest Light Protection, Ironguts, Lesser Vigor, Light of Lunia, Nimbus of Light, Remove Fear, Resurgence, Sanctuary.
From Druid’s List: Faerie Fire
From Wizard’s List: Lantern’s Light, Luminous Gaze

2- Align Weapon, Body Ward, Calm Emotions, Close Wounds, Consecrate, Continual Flame, Cure Moderate Wounds, Delay Poison, Gentle Repose, Healing Lorecall, Hide from Undead, Lesser Restoration, Lesser Spell Immunity, Light of Faith, Light of Mercuria, Protection from Evil, Protection from Negative Energy, Remove Paralysis, Resist Energy, Shield of Faith, Shield Other, Soul Ward, Spawn Screen, Stabilize, Status, Summon Elysium Thrush.
Exalted: Ayallia’s Radiant Burst, Luminous Armor.
From Wizard’s List: False Life, Life Bolt, Pyrotechnics, Shadow Radiance, Whelm

3- Channeled Divine Chield, Cloak of Bravery, Create Food and Water, Cure Serious Wounds, Daylight, Dispel Magic, Energy Aegis, Ghost Touch Weapon, Glowing Orb, Holy Storm, Invest Moderate Protection, Light of Venya, Light of Wisdom, Mantle of Good, Mass Lesser Vigor, Mass Resist Energy, Mass Resurgence, Protection from Energy, Remove Blindness/Deafness, Remove Curse, Remove Disease, Searing Light, Spark of Life, Speak with Dead, Vigor, Wall of Light.
Exalted: Brilliant Lumination, Phieran’s Resolve
From Wizard’s List: Flashburst, Stars of Arvandor, Whelming Blast

4- Channeled Divine Health, Contingent Energy Resistance, Cure Critical Wounds, Deathward, Delay Death, Greater Resistance, Healing Spirit, Light of Purity, Magic Circle against Evil, Make Manifest, Mass Align Weapon, Neutralize Poison, Positive Energy Aura, Renewed Vigor, Restoration, Revenance, Sacred Item, Seed of Life, Sheltered Vitality, Spell Immunity, Undead Bane Weapon, Wall of Good.
Exalted: Greater Luminous Armor, Sunmantle
From Wizard’s List: Blistering Radiance, Celestial Fog, Inevitable Defeat, Radiant Fog, Radiant Shield

5- Atonement, Blessing of the Righteous, Break Enchantment, Darts of Life, Dismissal, Dispel Evil, Disrupting Weapon, Greater Vigor, Hallow, Healing Circle, Incorporeal Nova, Invest Heavy Protection, Life’s Grace, Magic Convalescence, Mass Cure Light Wounds, Mass Sanctuary, Mass Shield of Faith, Radiance, Raise Dead, Revivify, Spell Resistance, Wall of Dispel Magic.
Exalted: Curtain of Light, Sicken Evil
From Wizard’s List: Lucent Lance, Mass Whelm

6- Animate Objects, Energy Immunity, Greater Detect Magic, Heal, Heroes’ Feast, Light of Courage, Mass Cure Moderate Wounds, Mass Make Manifest, Revive Outsider, Superior Resistance, Undeath to Death, Vigorous Circle.
Exalted: Storm of Shards
From Wizard’s List: Brilliant Blade, Ray of Light, Starmantle, Sunbeam

7- Forbiddance, Fortunate Fate, Greater Restoration, Mass Cure Serious Wounds, Mass Restoration, Mass Spell Resistance, Radiant Assault, Regenerate, Rejuvenating Light, Renewal Pact, Resurrection, Righteous Burst.
Exalted: Phoenix Fire
From Wizard’s List: Eladrin Form, Sunburst

8- Brilliant Aura, Chain Dispel, Death Pact, Greater Spell Immunity, Holy Aura, Holy Word, Mass Cure Critical Wounds, Mass Death Ward, Wall of Greater Dispel Magic.
From Wizard’s List:Overwhelm

9- Genesis, Mass Heal, True Resurrection, Undeath’s Eternal Foe.
Exalted: Armeggedon, Exalted Fury.
From Wizard’s List: Blinding Glory
Domain: Moonfire

So please any comments or suggestions.

Edit: I finally realized it was never clear what stat their casting was based on. I decided to go with the less MAD decision of Charisma (synergy with 3 class features while Wisdom only has synergy with 1).

[Omegonthesane]

If you're going to have spell failure, why not just make the Healer's spells arcane spells and have done? The arcane/divine split is not sufficiently justified anyway, particularly with shugenja running around who don't need a patron deity (and druids, paladins, and spirit shamans, for that matter...) and the only reason for ASF as a balancing feature was to stop wizards and sorcerers wearing full plate or such shenanigans, because they have a flat-out better spell list than the armour-wearing Cleric in nearly all areas. This Healer doesn't have that kind of awesome spell list so doesn't need ASF limiting her.

Also, is there an alignment restriction? I don't see any reason to prevent Evil healers, but for some reason I'd have expected a few more obviously Evil-friendly features, like maybe draining people (willing, helpless, or yourself) to reload your Lay on Hands.

[Zaydos]

The only reason to keep them divine is the simple healing spells are divine and they draw mostly from the cleric list, mostly flavor. Also it allows them to access divine prestige classes.

I have no intention of saying "no you can't be evil" but I wanted to keep the focus on healing; as it stands it seems like as PCs they'd be restricted to good or at least neutral alignments because their offensive spells are all good but still able to be evil NPCs when I need to give the monsters an additional healing boost. Clarified that evil healers could not cast good aligned spells and that only good alligned ones could cast exalted (put it in spellcasting)... sometime I should type out the full fluff no time now (especially since I only half ave it in my head and it's world specific).

[Zaydos]

How about this as a feat:

Life Drain (General)
You can suck the life force out of willing, or helpless, creatures to refill your Caring Touch.
Prerequisites: Caring Touch ability.
General: As a full-round action you may drain hp up to twice your level from any willing, or helpless, creature. For every two points of hp you drain you regain 1 point of your Caring Touch ability. This cannot increase your Caring Touch beyond its maximum and you can only regain a number of points to Caring Touch in a day equal to its maximum value. This ability does not function on undead or constructs.

I limited the amount of hp you can regain in a day this way because otherwise whenever one of your allies was at half or less health you suck them to minimum and wait as they heal back to half.

[Omegonthesane]

The only reason to keep them divine is the simple healing spells are divine and they draw mostly from the cleric list, mostly flavor. Also it allows them to access divine prestige classes.
Flavour... It's a healer. Casting divine spells = Specifically devoted to a higher power IMHO, whereas a healer to me smacks of someone who practises a craft. Besides, it's not like myths of magicians with healing powers aren't there to crib from - just look at any witch doctor ever.

Gameplay-wise, a divine caster is a caster who does not suffer arcane spell failure. That is the only reason for a class to cast divine spells rather than arcane spells. And not being proficient with given armour is reason enough to not wear it IMHO, if you were trying to prevent healers from being heavily armoured - and frankly, if they're going to dip into another class to get heavy armour proficiency and they cast divine spells, then props to them.


I have no intention of saying "no you can't be evil" but I wanted to keep the focus on healing; as it stands it seems like as PCs they'd be restricted to good or at least neutral alignments because their offensive spells are all good but still able to be evil NPCs when I need to give the monsters an additional healing boost.
IMHO a Healer's only combat ability should be physical, even if that means full BaB. But if you want them burning heal slots for combat, then they should have the Evil mirrors of any Good-aligned spells they can cast on their list, so that evil Healers are not gimped. And believe me when I say that healing people can be very (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Fabius_Bile) evil (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Mengele) indeed (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GoodPowersBadPeople).


Clarified that evil healers could not cast good aligned spells and that only good alligned ones could cast exalted (put it in spellcasting)... sometime I should type out the full fluff no time now (especially since I only half ave it in my head and it's world specific).
Why shouldn't evil healers be able to cast good aligned spells, or neutral ones use exalted spells? Power is no more or less virtuous or vile than the person who wields it, after all. If I use Mind Rape to change a rampaging demon into a force for good, I've done a ridiculously good act, even though the spell I used was [Evil]. Similarly, if I use the Sanctified spell Inquisition to force a paladin to tell me where his children are so I can rape and murder them in front of him, then where the MacGuffin is so I can destroy the world with it, I've done an Evil act with an Exalted spell. If I walk into an orphanage and cast the [Good] spell Righteous Smite, I'm a mass murderer, because the majority of those orphans do not qualify for a [Good] alignment or have enough hitpoints to survive 3d4 damage or make the save to turn that into 3d2, which they still wouldn't easily survive. And that's before we account for the poor abused souls who've already got an Evil alignment at childhood...


How about this as a feat:

Life Drain (General)
You can suck the life force out of willing, or helpless, creatures to refill your Caring Touch.
Prerequisites: Evil alignment, Caring Touch ability.
General: As a full-round action you may drain hp up to twice your level from any willing, or helpless, creature. For every two points of hp you drain you regain 1 point of your Caring Touch ability. This cannot increase your Caring Touch beyond its maximum and you can only regain a number of points to Caring Touch in a day equal to its maximum value. This ability does not function on undead or constructs.

I limited the amount of hp you can regain in a day this way because otherwise whenever one of your allies was at half or less health you suck them to minimum and wait as they heal back to half.
Should not require an evil, or even a nongood alignment. A good Healer should have the option of draining his friends if they volunteer, or if nothing else have the option of counting himself as a "willing creature" to refill his Caring Touch, without doing anything remotely evil.

[Zaydos]

The alignment requirement on casting, especially Exalted spells, is standard and nothing new, I simply restated it and if you wouldn't use it in your game the more power to you.

As for divine casting I grew up with BD&D so I still see the main difference as power source (even though ASF was stricter then) although I am thinking of waving the divine spell failure. While I will easily admit that in many myth systems there were arcane healers (take Norse where there isn't any divine magic and only knowledge of the secrets of how the universe works) I'm matching these more to D&D than any real world myth system so I gave them divine really that's fluff more than crunch.

If I wanted to get into really world-specific rules for them, well in my current campaign they get their powers from one of 4 gods all of them good aligned (because I only have 2 or 3 neutral gods at the moment and the evil ones are gods of death and negative energy or an orcish war god who would never have someone who didn't wade into melee as a priest) and I'm casting them in the role of natural divine conduits so that while their power is a blessing from the gods they do not necessarily know which god or why. Of the gods that do grant them their power I think only one could and would revoke it freeing up alignments once again. In my favorite campaign world I ran (a 12-20 game which ended when we went to different colleges) they'd be able to serve a wider variety of deities and off the top of my head I can think of a LG, NG, LE, CE, and TN human deities that would grant them powers without going into the list of other races' gods that would. In other worlds they could be other things.

As for the alignment on the feat that was mostly to show the difference in tactics between good and evil and a bit of worry about parties just going around and using that to vampire free hp for the pool between combats but the cap puts a stop to that much more than anything else. My general theory on aligned stuff is that it is a recommendation more than anything else.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Interesting. Looks much better than the Miniatures Handbook Healer. In fact, only one problem stood out to me:

Luminous Assassin? Really? Just knock those spells off the list (they seem so contrary to everything else on there, even given the light theme), and I'd give it my stamp of approval.

[Zaydos]

Luminous Assassin? Really? Just knock those spells off the list (they seem so contrary to everything else on there, even given the light theme), and I'd give it my stamp of approval.

... why did I give them that spell... well maybe it's because it was late when I made them... But you're right it doesn't belong.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

... why did I give them that spell... well maybe it's because it was late when I made them... But you're right it doesn't belong.

As promised...

*stamps approval with Approval Stamp*


This Class Has Been Approved by Djinn in Tonic

[Draken]

Looks nifty, with only one thing I believe should be taken into consideration.

With spell failure (no armor) and a d6 HD, this guy is squishy. Which means he shouldn't be too keen on going near combat. Which happens to be where the fighters get hurt.

So, what I mean, is that this fella needs the ability to use his heals at range. Maybe start at 20 ft., then increase to 40 ft., and to 60 ft. as levels go by.

[Zaydos]

With spell failure (no armor) and a d6 HD, this guy is squishy. Which means he shouldn't be too keen on going near combat. Which happens to be where the fighters get hurt.

So, what I mean, is that this fella needs the ability to use his heals at range. Maybe start at 20 ft., then increase to 40 ft., and to 60 ft. as levels go by.

I think you're probably right, I'll need to work on that. I could just give him medium and heavy armor which would make sense for a battlefield healer (an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure) or give him ranged healing like you suggested. Which do you think would be more powerful and would one be too powerful compared to stuff other than wizard, sorcerer, cleric and druid (if it's OP compared to them I should just scrap it altogether)?

[Omegonthesane]

Only going to quote the bits that I actually have anything to still argue with you about, so don't be too worried. The class overall is good.


The alignment requirement on casting, especially Exalted spells, is standard and nothing new, I simply restated it and if you wouldn't use it in your game the more power to you.
For Exalted spells you are correct, but for everything else, only - and I mean, only - clerics have ever been restricted to casting spells of their alignment in 3.5. Even Favoured Souls don't have that restriction.


As for the alignment on the feat that was mostly to show the difference in tactics between good and evil and a bit of worry about parties just going around and using that to vampire free hp for the pool between combats but the cap puts a stop to that much more than anything else. My general theory on aligned stuff is that it is a recommendation more than anything else.
If it's only a recommendation, then sure, recommend that it's evil-aligned, but don't make it an ironclad rule. As I said, drain a willing target could mean sacrifice your own hitpoints to help other people.

Ranged healbotting would not be OP at all, in fact 'just' negating another person's action is almost a waste of your own action. Bear in mind this guy does have a d6 hit die and poor BaB; he has no business near the front lines, so ranged healing is the best bet.

[Sanity]

There's some feats that let you cast touch-spells at range, anyway. I don't see the problem in giving the healer the ability as a class ability.

I think that ranged healing would be better fluff-wise. Clerics are already the armour-wearing healer types, I'd prefer playing a lightly-armoured heal battery.

[Zaydos]

Okay I gave them ranged healing, making it require a ranged touch to affect unwilling/hostile creatures (just to stop them from auto-hitting with ranged Heal spell on undead although I think they don't need that to be scary to undead). I started it at 20-ft at 1st level and upped it to 40-ft at 6th, 60-ft at 12th, and close (25-ft +5-ft/2 levels) at 18th which at that level should equal out to 85-ft and cap out at 20th at 90-ft and let you ignore ranged touch attack rolls then. Little unsure whether I want you to wait a few levels to have it but it makes them feel more right.


For Exalted spells you are correct, but for everything else, only - and I mean, only - clerics have ever been restricted to casting spells of their alignment in 3.5. Even Favoured Souls don't have that restriction.


Chaotic, Evil, Good, and Lawful Spells: A druid can’t cast spells
of an alignment opposed to her own or her deity’s (if she has one).
For example, a neutral good druid cannot cast evil spells. Spells
associated with particular alignments are indicated by the chaos,
evil, good, and law descriptors in their spell descriptions (see
Chapter 11: Spells).

Druids have it too so I always assumed it went for the rest. I never read the other divine casters that thoroughly, but you're right favored souls don't have the limitation. Then again I've only once had a character contemplate playing a favored soul then they saw the reduced armor proficiencies and the Charisma requirement, decided to play Cleric and by the time the campaign started the next week I think they were a fighter of some sort (he liked warriors).

Thanks you everyone for the advice and help. More comments are always welcome.
P.S.: I'm removing the alignment requirement from the Life Drain feat, the cap to hp recovery should be enough.

[Lord Loss]

I was going to play this class. But then...

I personally don't like the idea of ranged healing. Why? Because clerics and their healing bretheren don't usually get a chance to shine. If they're healing from far away, they'll never get in close to save the fighter in the nick of time. They'll never plant the killing blow on the gigantic ogre menacing the party. I think that armor would make this class much more enjoyable to play.

[Zaydos]

Variant: Armored Healer
Gain: Proficiency in medium and heavy armor and shields (except tower shields)
Lose: Ranged healing and Divine Spell Failure.

Does that help? I was going to go one way or the other and honestly I consider this the weaker option (especially with Greater Luminous Armor and the ease at which they heal ability damage). I haven't gotten to test the class further but so far he had two epic moments (healing person from -7 to full with 1 1st level spell and 2 standard actions and killing an ogre) and one required Healing Touch and the other required Lantern's Light since he couldn't get within heal range in time and his only hope of saving the PC was an attack spell dealing 1d6 damage.

Really I understand the idea that melee is more epic, but decided to steer away from cleric. Maybe because I originally made this class as a cloth wearer in 3.0 or maybe just to try and keep them from being CoDzillas but I shouldn't have to worry so much about that.