Party Without Per Day Abilites

[Thrawn183]

Ok, so I've been doing a lot of brainstorming about my personal preferences in regards to D&D, and I have to say I really dislike the idea of going to sleep every few hours when the main caster runs out of spells.

So I have a question for your collective wisdom. How would you build a party (4-6 PC's, non-gestalt) that has no limit to how long it can adventure in a day?

My first thoughts were immediately of Rogue, Dragonfire Adept, Warlock and Crusader. I guess quite a few melee classes fit the bill of non-stop action but I couldn't think of anything other than Crusader to handle healing, at least not off the top of my head.

I ask because it seems like the flow of the game would never get interrupted, therefore being more fun for all involved, and it would be pretty easy to find the right level of difficulty for encounters because you don't have characters changing what they are capable of doing every morning.

What are your thoughts?

Edit:
Suggested Classes:
Warlock, Dragonfire Adept, Scout, Rogue, Fighter, Dragon Shaman, Swordsage, Crusader, [Incarnum ?], Monk
Semi-suggested Classes: (ie. classes that can function after running out of per/day abilities
Paladin, Psychic Warrior (all day buff), Ranger

Non-suggested Classes:
Full-casters, Duskblade, Ninja
Recommendations on classes appreciated!

[kamikasei]

Binders have some per-day abilites, I think, depending on the vestige, but most are always-on or n-round-cooldown.

Factotums have a few of their abilities limited to once- or n-per-day but most applications are per-encounter.

Truenamers, crap as they are, have no per-day limits, right?

What about Incarnum users?

In a party, a Crusader won't provide all that much healing, and you are lacking anyone to provide buffs, utility effects, or serious battlefield control.

[SamTheCleric]

... wait for 4e? :smallwink:

Your problem will be divine casting (healing mostly)... Maybe a Warlock/Eldritch Disciple with a big charisma and extra turning using the Healing Blast ability to make Eldritch Blasts a ranged heal. Sure, it still is x/day ... but it is a little more versatile.

[Solo]

Use wands and scrolls?

[Thrawn183]

Sadly I don't really know much about Incarnum, so binders and such... sound really great, but I'll have to take your word on it. I'm taking the DAT tomorrow, and job shadowing all spring break so I won't be able to borrow books and read up on the system for a little while.

I realize that Crusader wouldn't be able to handle all of the healing. But there are some classes and feats that can heal characters up to half hp pretty much limitlessly. If that's what we ended up being stuck with, it might actually make combat pretty interesting. Would certainly put a premium on being able to get temporary hit points of any kind.

I guess that brings up a second point. How would you run encounters for this kind of a party? Obviously, the characters would appear to have less of an ability to nova, so the monsters wouldn't need as much of one either. This might make it easier for parties to say, run the heck away if an encounter is over their head rather than realize it once half the party is already dead.

Ninja Edit:
Wands of Lessor Vigor and Healing Belts rock my world. Unfortunately we never have down time to craft items in our campaigns (well, almost never, its an exception rather than the rule) so its rather tough to get a caster through 10 encounters in a day.

[JBento]

Get a Dread Necro and have everyone take Tomb-Tainted Soul :smallsmile:

[Thrawn183]

Good call, same thing would work with necropolitans instead of tomb-tainted I guess. I also love when people use cold immunity with lord of the uttercold to heal with cold substituted walls of fire (but that's just me.)

Any way for super-goody types to do this? Some DM's out there only run good parties and such.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Good call, same thing would work with necropolitans instead of tomb-tainted I guess. I also love when people use cold immunity with lord of the uttercold to heal with cold substituted walls of fire (but that's just me.)

Any way for super-goody types to do this? Some DM's out there only run good parties and such.Ignore alignment restrictions? Lawful Good Necromancers, while rare, should be possible.

"Go, my undead minions. Save the orphanage!!!":smallcool:

[Anteros]

Ignore alignment restrictions? Lawful Good Necromancers, while rare, should be possible.

"Go, my undead minions. Save the orphanage!!!":smallcool:


This is worth doing even if you're evil, just for the mental scarring of the orphans.

[JBento]

Ignore alignment restrictions? Lawful Good Necromancers, while rare, should be possible.

"Go, my undead minions. Save the orphanage!!!":smallcool:

"We need the babies for the ritual" :smalleek:

Also, Necromancers (has in Wizard specialised in necromancy) can be any alignment. Dread Necromancers can still be Neutral.

[Ogh_the_Second]

For non-narcoleptic healing, you can also use the Dragon Shaman (PHB2) - but only up till half full hp. The class has a (per/day) lay-on-hands-alike ability to boot.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

I find it ironic that you post this just as I get done with my Incantation-based classes: the Priest, the Wylder, the Bard, and the Arcanist. All are designed based on the Warlock, and designed to replace various spellcasting classes, making the world a more balanced place. However, I still need a lot of help with these, getting incantation lists filled, that sort of thing.

[Squash Monster]

Yeah, Dragon Shaman is good for this.

For a six person party without per day abilities, I'd go with something like:

Crusader - Tank, secondary healer (reach weapon, Stand Still, Thicket)
Dragon Shaman - Secondary tank, primary healer (guisarme, Improved Trip, extra aura stuff)
Swordsage - Damage machine
Swift Hunter - Skill dude A, secondary damage (shot on the run, and such)
Rogue - Skill dude B, secondary damage (twf sneak attacker)
Binder - Backup dude for whatever you're missing

[Thrawn183]

Heck, any evil necromancer I'd run would save an orphanage and wear bright colors while doing it to boot, just to sow confusion in my enemies.

I've actually played a dragon shaman using the whole healing to half hp aura. It certainly works for multiple lower CR encounters, but it isn't so hot when you run into a large final encounter at the end of a dungeon. And by not so hot, I mean everyone dies.

Edit (monster ninjas!)
That party looks like it would work pretty nicely. If people are beginning combat at less than full HP, it gives the crusader reason to open with a healing strike instead of trying to wait and time it until after someone gets hit. Funny how it changes things. Hmmm, I'm surprised no-one's mentioned a scout. Not that I have any idea how a scout would be useful outside of a 5th or 6th character in a party like this, I'm just kind of surprised.

[JBento]

Unless it's something on the lines of a red dragon. Then it's BOTH hot and everybody dies. :smallbiggrin:

[Thrawn183]

Unless it's something on the lines of a red dragon. Then it's BOTH hot and everybody dies. :smallbiggrin:

So would you rather have a character go out in a bang (like via red dragon), or in cold/creepy style. *le sigh* Why do white dragons have to suck so hardcore?

Ok, that's enough off topic for me.

To be honest, to facilitate this kind of party, I might be willing to take a healer and homebrew some stuff to change the class. Either 1) change it to some kind of warlocky healing style class or 2) Change the class to what would make sense, spontaneous casting with all healer spells known, this would probably still give enough healing to get you through the majority of an endurance run.

Someone mentioned an Eldritch Theurge earlier, has anyone ever tried to make a limitless healing class?

[SamTheCleric]

Eldritch Disciple...

Warlock 3/Cleric 3/ED 10... Casts as a 13th level warlock, 11th level cleric.

Figure at least an 18 charisma, extra turning... that's 11 turn attempts a day. Take Healing blast... 11 times per day you can make your eldritch blast heal someone. A 13th level warlock has what... 7d6 eldritch blast? Not including any other modifiers etc.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Eldritch Disciple...

Warlock 3/Cleric 3/ED 10... Casts as a 13th level warlock, 12th level cleric.

Figure at least an 18 charisma, extra turning... that's 11 turn attempts a day. Take Healing blast... 11 times per day you can make your eldritch blast heal someone. A 13th level warlock has what... 7d6 eldritch blast? Not including any other modifiers etc.

Actually, it's a whole lot easier, and cheezier, than that.

Transform Magic lets you heal allies by dispelling things. Only you can't dispel your own things. But if you have another Invoker around, he can buff something, you can strip it, for unlimited healing for the entire party.

Have a nice day.

[SamTheCleric]

Now that is some delicious gouda.

I tip my hat to you.

[Ganurath]

Everyone in the party takes Tomb-Tainted Soul, add in a Dread Necromancer who can provide infinite healing with the negative energy of Charnel Touch.

[Tokiko Mima]

You could also have a Celestial Mystic (BoED) around with their Fast Healing 5 20'-ish Aura deal.

[Thrawn183]

So, to all the people who have ever run a party like this before, what did you think?

Did you have trouble taking on reasonable CR'd encounters? Did the lack of a standard arcane caster hurt much? Were you able to find conventional ways around obstacles that you would normally just... I dunno, fly over?

[Draz74]

Yeah, Dragon Shaman is good for this.

For a six person party without per day abilities, I'd go with something like:

Crusader - Tank, secondary healer (reach weapon, Stand Still, Thicket)
Dragon Shaman - Secondary tank, primary healer (guisarme, Improved Trip, extra aura stuff)
Swordsage - Damage machine
Swift Hunter - Skill dude A, secondary damage (shot on the run, and such)
Rogue - Skill dude B, secondary damage (twf sneak attacker)
Binder - Backup dude for whatever you're missing

Pretty good. Seems like the Rogue is pretty redundant, though, with the combination of Swordsage and Scout.

To shorten this to 4 characters, I'd suggest:
1) Crusader
2) Dragon Shaman
3) Dragonfire Adept
4a) either Rogue 1/Swordsage x, or
4b) Swift Hunter Scout archer.

[Thrawn183]

Hmmmm, I think I'll edit the first post to have a list of classes that would count and classes that wouldn't (for all day adventuring of course.) Shout out anything I miss, because I'm sure I'll miss any and all of the Incarnum stuff.

Edit: Schneeky, do you think you could provide some more information like class/feat/book? Looks like an interesting way of going about things (kind of like a spellthief with a ring of invisibility)

[Benejeseret]

Spellthieves.

Find a caster, steal from him. Never have to sleep to regain spells

This way you can be a "full caster"-sortof or have lvl9 spells possible

[Danin]

I have to throw my vote in for:

Factotem (Is there anything they can't do? :smalltongue: ) as they have a limited healing ability (times/day, but can serve in a pinch)
Binder because... well... everything is useable always (more or less).
Kinght for crowd control and near unlimited use of his Knights challenge ability
and Crusader or Eldrich Deciple to heal

Now, although you have no primary healer you have 2 classes that can heal, 3 classes with UMD and the Binder can bind the grandmother huntress for unlimited cure lesser wounds.


Come to think of it, Warlock / Druid? / Eldrich Deciple // Binder / Cleric / Tenebros Aposite (spelling?) or some such could provide unlimited healing per day. Bind Tenebros and you can use Turn undead every 5 rounds. I think the build would work, I don't have my books infront of me... you'd have to make sure you didn't take any levels in TA while you took them in ED.

[CthulhuM]

If you're up for using some variant rules, there's already a system out there that pretty much eliminates the adventurer narcolepsy problem. It's called recharge magic (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/rechargeMagic.htm). I'm using it in the campaign I'm running, and so far I've been quite pleased.

Basically, it allows spellcasters to cast as many spells as they want outside of combat, and maintains limits on spells with long durations (minute/level or longer) or potential abuses for casting them repeatedly (many divination spells) by having a specific downtime for those spells, ranging from 5 minutes to 24 hours.

For spells cast in-combat, it limits the spellcaster by making a given spell-level go offline for a few rounds after it is used (how long depends on the spell level and the level of the spellcaster), so casters can't, for instance, constantly spam their highest level spells. It's actually a decent balance, particularly in NPC spellcasters, since it forces them to use at least some of their lower level spells.

[Seffbasilisk]

If even one member of the party has the tomb-tainted soul feat, or you just unleash the negative energy to disperse, Shadow Sun Ninja can provide unlimited/day healing...

[CockroachTeaParty]

I've ran a game with a Dragon Shaman PC in it. Eventually we made a motto for him: "Dragon Shaman: keeping the party mediocre."

Sure, he could keep everyone at half hp, but that still meant that they needed to rest if they really wanted to be back to full health. It was useful, no doubt, but not as useful as somebody dishing out lesser vigors with a wand.

The incarnum classes would work fine for a party such as this, although they do need to rest if they want to switch out their soulmelds. Also, I'm not convinced truenamers are really as bad as everyone says they are. Not until I've playtested one at low, mid, and high levels. Ultimately they're abilities are limited in a 24 hour period, but they can do limited healing and buffing with their lower level utterances.

Grr... Truename magic is just so cool... Why must it be so... Just... grr.