Quote Originally Posted by Caelestion View Post
To be fair, that sounds like an extremely niche problem.
Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
Not really. If you're relying mainly on Conjuration then you just recast your summons when they die--healing them is a total waste of time and effort, and I don't think it's even possible to do so in most cases (Atronachs just resist Healing Hands and its ilk, for example). So, a high-end Conjurer who can summon the denizens of Oblivion to his bidding but who couldn't cure a hangnail on a child is an entirely possible situation. I mean, you would expect Faralda to at least give you a choice of spells to cast to impress her, but no, she generally just picks one and you have to be able to cast it or else you're not getting in.
It's just an example, not a specific case, really. The five spells she asks you to cast are Firebolt, Conjure Flame Atronach, Fear, Healing Hands, and Magelight. A specialist in Illusion might prefer optimizing Frenzy over learning Firebolt, or a Destruction mage might have never cast a spell that didn't directly deal damage.