The artificer (or at least the playtest beta) is out! A whole new class!

[Straw_Man]

Does T_G even post anymore?

  Healing is necessary now, and unless one of the splats let you circumvent the need for leader-healers they're going to be a permanent fixture on the map. That being said, you maybe could do without in an tactically optimised party with a secondary healer. paladin comes to mind, any other secondary healers out there?

  How you'll always be perfectly optimised for the challenge I leave as question to others   

[SorO_Lost]

I seen this class I was happy to see the scaling in the class powers. Restorative Formula & Curative Admixture both upgrade every five levels rather than this ten level tier crap.

However, we're not even two months into 4E's release and they are already changing how scaling works. This does not say much on WotC's end at all.

[Kuroimaken]

He's saying: Why would the DM throw encounters that seemed designed for your party to overcome easily at you? He should be making the distribution and type of enemies at least somewhat optimal. What's the point of an encounter that isn't challenging from the start?

Why would he not? Not every encounter makes sense. And it would make LESS sense if every encounter were designed to stump the players. In my experience, a DM can be creative with his encounters and make things challenging -- and there will STILL be people at full HP at the end.

Healing is necessary now, and unless one of the splats let you circumvent the need for leader-healers they're going to be a permanent fixture on the map. That being said, you maybe could do without in an tactically optimised party with a secondary healer. paladin comes to mind, any other secondary healers out there?

Picking up the Initiate of the Faith feat helps, but it doesn't work for multiple encounters. Maybe if your healing surge somehow healed more...

[PhoenixInferno]

He's saying: Why would the DM throw encounters that seemed designed for your party to overcome easily at you? He should be making the distribution and type of enemies at least somewhat optimal. What's the point of an encounter that isn't challenging from the start?

Why would he not? Not every encounter makes sense. And it would make LESS sense if every encounter were designed to stump the players. In my experience, a DM can be creative with his encounters and make things challenging -- and there will STILL be people at full HP at the end.

Your DM must be an idiot.

[Shigunaru]

I seen this class I was happy to see the scaling in the class powers. Restorative Formula & Curative Admixture both upgrade every five levels rather than this ten level tier crap.

However, we're not even two months into 4E's release and they are already changing how scaling works. This does not say much on WotC's end at all.

Restorative Formula and Curative Admixture both scales like the Cleric's Healing Word or the Warlord's Inspiring Word. Consistency is good .

[Kuroimaken]

Your DM must be an idiot.

Not really. Near TPKs are just as common in our group.

[Kuroimaken]

Restorative Formula and Curative Admixture both scales like the Cleric's Healing Word or the Warlord's Inspiring Word. Consistency is good .

Agreed. What kinda irks me is that the playtest Artificer is healing as well as a Cleric's supposed to. Granted they're both leaders, but that sort of bothers me.

The good news is that the Bard still has some space left for him... The Artificer sorta feels to me like a Controller/Leader mix. Maybe the Bard will be a Striker/Leader or a Defender/Leader mix? The latter is much less likely because of Paladins.

Edit: That reminds me... assuming no 3-way roles combinations and no more than 4 sources (since Barbarians and Druids will have the Primal source), that means a maximum of how many role/source class combinations? So far on the PHB, we have 1 class of each role, and in addition one leader, two strikers and one defender. Of these, four are Martial, two are arcane and two are divine. Then we have 12 role combinations (assuming primary and secondary roles, i.e. a class that is primarily a defender and secondarily a leader) and we're missing 9 "pure" classes (i.e. classes with no secondary roles and different sources than those already stated). That means WotC still owes us 56 classes (because the artificer counts as a Leader/Controller to me), 55 if you consider the Paladin to be a Defender/Leader gish.

[brislove]

the playtest artificer has a class feature that is ~ as good as a clerics....but it doesn't have healing powers at every level to choose from. the total healing that an artificer can do is significantly less than a cleric can put out.

[Kuroimaken]

the playtest artificer has a class feature that is ~ as good as a clerics....but it doesn't have healing powers at every level to choose from. the total healing that an artificer can do is significantly less than a cleric can put out.

Well, it IS the playtest version so far. Maybe the finished version will have more healing powers. Or maybe the final version artificer will be a support guy in an entirely different way. Too early to tell, I guess.

[brislove]

agreed for instance I'm pretty sure the AOE heal is supposed to be a standard action . since given a choice between healing one guy and healing everyone I doubt you would ever use the the single target...

[Kuroimaken]

agreed for instance I'm pretty sure the AOE heal is supposed to be a standard action . since given a choice between healing one guy and healing everyone I doubt you would ever use the the single target...

Unless you were being stingy, but if you're being stingy when everyone actually NEEDS the healing then you're doormat.

[DemonLord57]

agreed for instance I'm pretty sure the AOE heal is supposed to be a standard action . since given a choice between healing one guy and healing everyone I doubt you would ever use the the single target...

Wait, are you talking about Curative Admixture? (The second Healing Infusion they get) If you are, I don't think I'm going to use that one very much at all. It gives a small amount of temporary hp for a healing surge spent on their part. I think the main problem I have with it is that it doesn't scale well, really.

At first, if you have a really good Con, you can break about even with a Wizard's healing surge value. It's still not as much value for a healing surge, but useful if multiple people need it. It quickly loses value, though. Assuming an 18 in Con, you get 5 temp hp until level 6, when you get 6. Even if you then max out Con with Demigod and stat boosts, at level 30, they spend a healing surge to gain 15 temporary hp. Doesn't seem nearly as useful as a single, extremely powerful healing that only spends one healing surge. At that level, you'd probably give the same amount of temporary hp to a group of 4 or 5 as would be regained from a single use of your other Healing Infusion.

[Kuroimaken]

Wait, are you talking about Curative Admixture? (The second Healing Infusion they get) If you are, I don't think I'm going to use that one very much at all. It gives a small amount of temporary hp for a healing surge spent on their part. I think the main problem I have with it is that it doesn't scale well, really.

At first, if you have a really good Con, you can break about even with a Wizard's healing surge value. It's still not as much value for a healing surge, but useful if multiple people need it. It quickly loses value, though. Assuming an 18 in Con, you get 5 temp hp until level 6, when you get 6. Even if you then max out Con with Demigod and stat boosts, at level 30, they spend a healing surge to gain 15 temporary hp. Doesn't seem nearly as useful as a single, extremely powerful healing that only spends one healing surge. At that level, you'd probably give the same amount of temporary hp to a group of 4 or 5 as would be regained from a single use of your other Healing Infusion.

Not to mention, as a general rule, I think anyone would rather actually heal that much HP instead of granting the same value in temporary HP. Unless there's something I'm missing here.

[Infinitive]

I've gotta say, I really love this class.  I'm going to be running a D&D campaign (hopefully) in the relatively near future with a moderately strong technology influence (Ancient, fallen technological empire whose machines are rare if functional; a whole class of individuals exists to try and jerry-rig nonfunctional or malfunctioning technology into something saleable).  As this class dovetails so perfectly with what I wanted to run with anyway, I'll most certainly be using this class as a PC option; now they just need some Paragon paths to flesh it out a bit.

[brislove]

agreed for instance I'm pretty sure the AOE heal is supposed to be a standard action . since given a choice between healing one guy and healing everyone I doubt you would ever use the the single target...

Wait, are you talking about Curative Admixture? (The second Healing Infusion they get) If you are, I don't think I'm going to use that one very much at all. It gives a small amount of temporary hp for a healing surge spent on their part. I think the main problem I have with it is that it doesn't scale well, really.

At first, if you have a really good Con, you can break about even with a Wizard's healing surge value. It's still not as much value for a healing surge, but useful if multiple people need it. It quickly loses value, though. Assuming an 18 in Con, you get 5 temp hp until level 6, when you get 6. Even if you then max out Con with Demigod and stat boosts, at level 30, they spend a healing surge to gain 15 temporary hp. Doesn't seem nearly as useful as a single, extremely powerful healing that only spends one healing surge. At that level, you'd probably give the same amount of temporary hp to a group of 4 or 5 as would be regained from a single use of your other Healing Infusion.

Ya....I was....I thought they could spend a healing surge AND got temp HP equal to con mod +1. not spend a healing surge TO get the temp HP. I'll learn to read eventually.

[DemonLord57]

agreed for instance I'm pretty sure the AOE heal is supposed to be a standard action . since given a choice between healing one guy and healing everyone I doubt you would ever use the the single target...

Wait, are you talking about Curative Admixture? (The second Healing Infusion they get) If you are, I don't think I'm going to use that one very much at all. It gives a small amount of temporary hp for a healing surge spent on their part. I think the main problem I have with it is that it doesn't scale well, really.

At first, if you have a really good Con, you can break about even with a Wizard's healing surge value. It's still not as much value for a healing surge, but useful if multiple people need it. It quickly loses value, though. Assuming an 18 in Con, you get 5 temp hp until level 6, when you get 6. Even if you then max out Con with Demigod and stat boosts, at level 30, they spend a healing surge to gain 15 temporary hp. Doesn't seem nearly as useful as a single, extremely powerful healing that only spends one healing surge. At that level, you'd probably give the same amount of temporary hp to a group of 4 or 5 as would be regained from a single use of your other Healing Infusion.

Ya....I was....I thought they could spend a healing surge AND got temp HP equal to con mod +1. not spend a healing surge TO get the temp HP. I'll learn to read eventually.

Reading is tech 
But yeah, if it was that, I'd definitely use that a lot. It'd only be a little less overall health per person and would affect everyone. In fact, early on it'd be better as long as you have a good Con and use the temporary hp (got hit).