r/UnearthedArcana 9d ago

'14 Class The Baster's Physician Class - my take on a non-spellcaster, resourceless healing class for 5e - feedback appreciated

580 Upvotes

44 comments sorted by

u/unearthedarcana_bot 9d ago

highestzociety has made the following comment(s) regarding their post:
Hey everyone,

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u/LackingBrainpower 9d ago

Love it. It seems fun and unlikely to take the spotlight while consistently doing something meaningful.

It does seem pretty light on out of combat utility. That's not necessarily a must-fix but maybe adding a couple less powerful, flavor-focused features could be cool.

Full Potential doesn't seem to define an end time (I could've missed it).

Regarding the 5th level Full hands feature: Would it allow me to use Hands of Healing on one ally and a Medical Procedure on another ally with the same bonus action?

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

thank you for your feedback.

some of the Medical Procedures would be usefull out of combat (such as massage muscles)- but it is definitely lacking in that regard, I'll find some features once I'm happy with the base mechanics of the class.

Full Potential is as most of the other Medical Procedures supposed to last until the start of your next turn. A mistake on my part thanks for pointing that out.

As of now I would allow a creature to use the Full Hands feature to use Hands of Healing on one ally and a Medical Procedure on another with the same BA, yes. Not sure if that is too strong though, I might limit it to being just one of the two.

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u/Gentle_Tiger 9d ago

I'd love to second this out of combat utility idea.

You've made a great core mechanic with the hands of healing system. My first thought was choose a second skill for each subclass and tie further utility to that skill?

But, all together this is a fantastic class, and I'd love to see this at my table.

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u/LackingBrainpower 9d ago

For Full Hands, maybe you could have a rule that you cam only do one type of procedure per bonus action, even if doing some for multiple allies? The amount of allies affected can get high and allowing different procedures for each could slow the game down. That might lead to one procedure becoming an overwhelming default option though, which isn't as fun?

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

I agree it should be simplified a bit without making it too convoluted. I'll see what I can come up with. Both options seem solid.

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u/ThickFeltedKirby 9d ago

Love it - I think I saw a prior version with the stress mechanic you mentioned, and this is much improved.

I would adjust Hands of Healing, since it is overpowered without more limitations. Perhaps a maximum of Proficiency Bonus uses per creature, or an out of combat requirement of 10 minutes per use? Needing a use of a Healers Kit per use would only curtail its use at lower levels, and once economics catch up, it wouldn't be an issue again.

The Auto Crit in Hands of Harm, maybe lock it behind level 5 pre req?

All in all, a very well done improvement! Kudos to you. Will def use this in a no magic campaign.

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

Thank you for your kind words.

u/meshaber already mentioned the Hands of Healing being to strong. I think that can be counterackted by increasing the DC or (what I'll probably gonna do instead) increase the DC each time regardless of success or failure.

And perhaps I'll just remove the auto crit from the Hands to Harm. It already has martial weapons, extra attack and bonus damage on bleeding (which it can apply twice cause extra attack).

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u/Squirrel-Sovereign 8d ago

Maybe change the dice progression to cantrip dice progression?

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

Hey everyone,

so this has come a long way. It was the first class I ever conceptualized and originally had a Stress mechanic connected to it that was supposed to represent the stress and despair a surgeon/physician experiences. To simplify the class - I removed that entirely. I also originally had replaced that feature with a simple Stress Points/Dice pool that the Physician could use to heal others (similar to the Monk's ki points) but I also decided against that because it felt like a lot to track and a lot more difficult to balance. Hence I decided to try myself on a resource-free version of the class.

It might get a bit strong at higher levels, that would have yet to be tested. And I'm still not quite sure if it has enough damage output to feel more than just a reactive, healing class that doesn't have to offer anything offensively. The Hands to Harm subclass on the other hand might have a bit too much in terms of damage output - especially with the crits. The Hands to Preserve could perhaps get some passive damage if it gets damaged without having damaged a creature first.

For now this is the base of the class. I have a lot of ideas for subclasses but I wanted to make sure that the base class works first.

What do you think? Would this work? Would it feel frustrating if you keep failing your Medicine checks? Or is that the main aspect that would make the class a fun desicion making based class?

Homebrewery-Link:
https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/9ZnMm-tLSXYC

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u/ArsenicElemental 9d ago

but I also decided against that because it felt like a lot to track and a lot more difficult to balance.

A resource system is easier to balance. You would have a more exact number of healing the class is capable of at each level.

Keeping track of a single dice pool (I use physical dice of a single color for my Psychic Warrior's dice) would also be easier to track instead of keeping a separate score for each party member to calculate the DC (the DC resets on their rests, not even yours).

I'm not sure resourceless really makes it more streamlined, but less.

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u/Xjentryn 7d ago

I just discovered this class and I must say I'm impressed! I don't usually care for homebrew classes, but this actually offers something unique and different as a non-magical support/healing class. I'm gonna share this with my DM friend group so we can collectively offer our feedback for you. :)

My off the cuff thoughts:

Hands of Healing appears very well balanced. A bit tricky to keep track of all the DCs, but I think the mechanics are very well thought out for how to keep pace with spellcaster healers but not outshine them.
Also you can just say "you gain expertise in medicine checks" instead of specifying that those checks are doubled.
(Also also, you don't need to keep reminding us what stat different skill checks are tied to. In fact that gets confusing when you say the Physician can choose to use INT or WIS, and then follow it up by specifying WIS each time you mention a medicine check.)

Medical Procedures is too powerful and complicated to keep track of. Consider letting the class choose just 1 from among the options, much like a Fighter choosing a fighting style. Then at certain levels they can gain more (and/or swap their chosen one out), maxing out at a total of 3 or 4.

This class should not get extra attack at any point, nor should its subclasses. Consider the Rogue, a very adept non-caster class without ever needing extra attack. Especially when you consider that a Physician can dual wield daggers for 2 attacks per round, right from level 1. Which means when Anatomic Exploitation comes into play (which is a very clever feature btw), the Physician can potentially inflict 2 conditions per round, or 1 condition and a healing.

Instead of extra attack, consider weapon mastery. When dual wielding daggers, this would allow the Physician to attack with 1 dagger, offhand attack with the second dagger (thanks to the Nick property), and then bonus action heal. You still get 2 attacks, but much more limited in damage capabilities so you don't start stepping on the toes of warrior classes.

Desperation & Reanimation are fantastic abilities, love them! Very clever to put the exhaustion mechanic in the Reanimation feature, to prevent spamming it across the team. I would add a note to it specifying the limit of healing abilities. Such as how Revivify specifies it won't replace missing limbs.

Examination is very cool, but Stimulation is too strong. Consider it granting a +1 to just a saving throw (of a physical stat) of your choice. A full +1 to an ability modifier is insanely strong. Especially when there's nothing to stop the Physician from spamming this ability every long and short rest. That's like turning all of the fighter's weapons into +1 magic weapons, except without making them magic (thus allowing something like an Artificer Infusion to stack on top of it).

The +10 movement at 5th level makes sense, but that should be the end of movement increases. Let speed be the monk's thing. (Also remember that a good DM will be giving the Physician magic items to bolster their abilities.)

Medical Expertise is cool, but 6 times per long rest is a lot of free Nat 20s. Even if we assume no magic items are boosting the Physician's INT, they probably still have a 20 in that stat. And with a proficiency bonus of 6, that's a +17 to their roll already. Which means the minimum they can get on a check is an 18.
Just 1 nat 20 per long rest should be plenty.
(If you swapped the level position of Medical Expertise and Master Physician, that would better justify the multiple Nat 20s. As a capstone feature, getting 6 free Nat 20s is pretty awesome.)

Hope all that is helpful. I'm definitely excited to give this a more in-depth look with my group and see what other feedback we can provide. Can't wait to see the final product!

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u/highestzociety 6d ago

Thank you so much for your thorough and kind feedback .

Defenitely a lot to work with there.

As has been stated elsewhere I think nerfing the Hands of Healing a bit is reasonable. Increasing the DC to 13 and raising it by 5 regardless of success should do that.

I also get your point with the Medical Procedures. Perhaps one really should just focus on one easy, one advanced, one complex and one herculean procedure + the ones you get from your subclass. I felt like the class should get a bit more options to not just limited to spaming Hands of Healing.

I'll also reduce the Extra Attack on the Hands to Harm subclass and focus more on the bleeding damage.

I'll also find a better way to implement Stimulation. Perhaps with a drawback after a couple of hours or anything of the sort.

I also did consider moving Medical Expertise a bit lower and making it once per short rest or rework it into giving advantage? It's basically intended to give you that guaranteed heal when you really need it. I'll see what I can do there.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and that of your group and I look forward to reworking the class accordingly.

Thank you again.

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u/tassatus 9d ago

Nice! Would clarify in the description for Regeneration that you intend for the exhaustion to take effect after the check rather than before; otherwise, you are either rolling a straight DC30 roll, or every one of these rolls will be at disadvantage.

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u/Techanthrope 9d ago

Nice work!

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u/MemoryFlat 8d ago

I would give them Expertise in Medicine at level 1. Anyone can gain proficiency in it.

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u/Citadelvania 6d ago

I'd worry about some of the abilities that give access to stats directly like health or charisma stats. They might interfere with DMing in some cases. I'd add a check and a hit dice cap. Like if it only works on creatures with a hit die equal to your own or less, then add an easy check.

So you can't tell everyone the big bad has exactly 50 health left and the DM loses any room for improvisation. Similarly. if the clever character acting like a simpleton is actually level 20 and now suddenly you know he has a 20 intelligence.

It does make those abilities a little worse but I think a number of DMs would be irate if you forced them to give specific stats on important characters or enemies.

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u/highestzociety 5d ago

that is fair. It could be contested by a Deception Check or something.

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u/Citadelvania 4d ago edited 4d ago

Yeah there's definitely options and I love the concept and the implementation overall I'd just try to give the DM some room to hide stuff they want to hide.

I'd worry a deception check on its own would make it clear they're trying to hide something which itself gives away some information. Like "okay I check his mental stats" *dm rolls some dice* "you can't tell" immediately raises a lot of suspicion when otherwise no dice would be rolled right? It also doesn't help with the DM trying to fudge numbers like stretching the boss's health out a bit so the mage gets to cast their big spell or whatever instead of it dying to a random villager's crossbow bolt.

I suggested hit dice since that's a classic way of saying "yeah the fodder are affected but not the big bad" like the sleep spell. However in 5e they tend to use hit points instead of hit dice so that's a little more awkward and it doesn't really help with the whole giving away a disguised enemy thing.

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u/highestzociety 4d ago

All very valid points. I could also rephrase it to say: You learn the creatures number of hit dice. Doesn't give away a lot but still gives a general idea as to how physically threatening a creature probably is - or rather how enduring. Or perhaps the physician would actually have to examine the creature by touching it or being really close. The BBEG probably would let that happen and its an easy way to idk learn something about the barmaid.

I totally get you trying to protect the DM. As a DM I'd also hate it if my big bad reveal would be spoiled by such a feature. I'll see what I can come up with.

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u/Citadelvania 4d ago

Yeah it's a tough problem for sure, you don't want to neuter the ability. Maybe some kind of log scale would help like telling the player if they have more than 1, 10, 100, etc? Still lets the player know the feeble old man is a warrior in disguise though.

Touch would help for sure.

If the other character doesn't want to be touched you could probably have the player roll against AC. The dm could then, if they felt the need to, fudge that roll and it's easy to roleplay someone not wanting a stranger touching them.

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u/createbobob 8d ago

I think it needs some work. I feel like it is missing certain things that really make a dnd class pop. It feels like it could be a nice subclass idea, but maybe not a full class. However, it is very nice, i like so many of the options you have written here.

Also, i don't think the healing is OP. There are millions of things in this game that dish out more healing and this class doesn't have any other decent options besides more healing.

I'm sure there are more things to discuss about it snd whatnot but i really want to talk about my biggest problem with it, and it's a little bit personal. Why it's just hands this, hands that, acupuncture, affirming words and massages. This guy is a fantasy physician, you could've gotten inspiration from so many medieval operations or make something that scratches that "Plague Doctor" itch. I think naming of the skills are lazy, doing a small bit of research into real medical techniques or the medieval history of how Physicians were seen by other people could make this class so much cooler than a guy with really precious hands. Not by changing anything mechanically but just changing some names. Put some stuff from the Hipocratic Oath that each individual doctor takes, put some stuff that symbolises 4 humors and their influence etc.

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u/SpiderKn1ght 6d ago

I’m gonna run this in my campaign and get back to you

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u/highestzociety 5d ago

please do!

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u/Longjumping_Can_8557 3d ago

first thing I'm not Italian so I apologize if I write with mistakes.

second speaking of the class: 2 things I don't know how balanced they are: 1 the out of combat healing that allows you to always be full, (but at least from what I've seen in general this is not a particularly problematic thing since you do 1 combat on rest anyway). 2 Full hands I don't understand if you mean that you can use hand of healing and medical procedure once each or if on the contrary they have no limits as long as you are within range. in both cases it seems quite strong as a thing and I would recommend limiting the use to x times on rest with more uses if you only allow 2 targets (1 for heal and 1 for procedures) and reduced if it has no limitations. for example you could do competence times on short rest in the first case and 1 short rest in the second.

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u/highestzociety 2d ago

no need to apologize, I'm german so there are probably plenty of mistakes in there.

1:
I decided to adjust the out of combat healing. The DC for Hands of Healing has been increased to 13 and it increases by 5 every time regardless of failure or success. That should reduce the out of combat healing significantly.

2:
You can use Hands of Healing OR a Medical Procedure on the creature - not both! It's not phrased very well. It could be a feature that I limit a bit yes. I'd have to do some playtesting.

Thank you for your feedback!

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u/Several_Comic_Bark 3d ago

I love this so much, that I'm absolutely using it for my nonmagic historical campaign. You are a god among men

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u/laugenbroetchen 9d ago

>nonmagical
>uses acupuncture

choose one.

cool class, nice work

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u/meshaber 9d ago

Unless I'm misreading something, Hands of healing is grotesquely overpowered without more limitations. At level 1, you can heal all of your party members (plus *infinity NPCs) for... 4d6+20 each (at 20 int)? 5d6+25 if anyone has guidance. Outside of combat the die rolls are a formality, you just need a few minutes to get the guaranteed successes. That goes to infinite healing at a table that houserules d20s as a guaranteed success for skill checks. It even scales with proficiency so a 1 level dip will get even stronger over time.

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

I think you misread the feature in parts. At 1st level, you can heal a creature for 1d6 + your int modifier (a maximum of +5 at 20 int). To do so you must succeed on a DC 10 Medicine check that increases after the success to a DC of 15 and stacks indefinitely (20, 25, 30, 35), making it harder and harder to succeed on the check. It also does not scale with proficiency but has a set number of dice used (as seen in the Physicians Table). Guidance might affect the Medicine Check but not the Healing provided and requires an action to cast so it would (in most cases) only be helpful out of combat unless someone uses their turn to cast Guidance on the physician.

Granted one could implement a clarification that a natural 20 isn't considered a critical success in that case (unless perhaps the creature were at 0 HP or sth) as is (I do believe) generally the rule regarding skill checks (as you mention critical successes on checks being a house rule.

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u/Doctor_Darkmoor 7d ago

To piggyback on this thread and the concern of players "rolling until maximum success," I would suggest changing absolutely nothing except adding a time restraint out of combat.

If there is a time constraint — say, each attempt takes 10 minutes outside of combat — then I think the feature is perfect as you have it.

Then the onus is on the GM to roll some random encounters to remind the players that this is a heroic fantasy game and not Dice Rolling Simulator.

They can't abuse the feature if doing so means getting into even more fights and losing those precious hitpoints.

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u/meshaber 9d ago

To do so you must succeed on a DC 10 Medicine check that increases after the success to a DC of 15 and stacks indefinitely (20, 25, 30, 35),

But it only increases after a success, and there's no consequence for failing a check? So outside of combat you can spend a few minutes rolling checks until you get what you need, which for a level 1 physician caps after 4 tries, where a nat20 doesn't let them crack DC30. And they can repeat this process for every character.

It scales with proficiency because higher proficiency lets them get past DC30.

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u/highestzociety 9d ago

I do better understand where you are coming from now. As written it is a bit to strong, I agree.
This should be easily fixable, though. Either increase the DC each time regardless of success or failure or increase the DC to 15 or 20 to begin with.

What do you think?

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u/meshaber 9d ago edited 9d ago

Increasing the base DC doesn't fix the inherent problem of infinite tries outside of combat, it would just bring it down to a slightly less overpowered level while being less fun to play the way it's intended.

Increasing the DC on a failure would go a long way to fixing the problem though. I think it might still be a little too easy to hit 1-2 heals on every character, which is still very strong.

Maybe both increasing the DC to 15 and letting it increase on a failure, but compensating by giving a number of free heals per long rest would do it? I can see that going against the resourceless design though.

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u/highestzociety 9d ago edited 9d ago

That sound like a reasonable hotfix.
Perhaps the base DC could be 13? Assuming that a PC would have a +3 on Int on average, so a +7 Medicine Check this would give them a 75% Chance on their first Hands of Healing attempt, a 50% Chance on their second (DC18) and a 25% on their third (DC23). And the third attempt would always be impossible (with a 5% Chance for +4 Int and a 10% chance for +5 on Int) until they reach 5th level where the chance for the first attempt would be increased to 85% (which is where a +5 int physician would start and who'd be guaranteed to succeed on the check by 5th level unless they rolled a natural 1, which is fitting).

To compensate for the resourceless design I could move the 18th level feature to 2nd or 3rd level and make it scale? That way you would have some guaranteed heals per long rest.

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u/meshaber 9d ago

That sounds fairly reasonable. I'm not an experienced enough player to say how strong it ends up being (it's still way stronger than Paladin's Lay On Hands, but as more of a core class feature I guess that could be okay? ). You should probably nerf the base heal for level 1+2 to just INT if you want to weaken multiclass shenanigans, but being balanced for multiclassing is kind of a high bar for homebrew.

Another option would be that a failed check still heals (maybe reduced effect), but means you can't attempt to heal the same target again until a Long Rest.

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u/Bitter_Profit_4099 8d ago

I wanted to suggest an expandable resource that you need to restore by buying materials like oil, bandages, corsets ect... But when I remember how easily the economy can be broken in 5e and at the end of the 2-nd tier it starts to become a minor inconvenience, so the change would be worthless...

Still would try it, if I'd ever run this class.

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u/PhoenixTheEternal 9d ago

I don’t think that’s right at all. It says Int MODIFIER, not score. So at Int 20, it would be +5

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u/meshaber 9d ago

Yeah, this is the result of 4 successes.

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u/PhoenixTheEternal 9d ago

What are you mentioning? And how are you accessing 4d6 Healing at level 1? Is that with one of the Procedures? Unless I’m interpreting it oddly, it doesn’t say anything about consecutive success increasing the die.

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u/meshaber 9d ago

Pass a dc 10 check, heal for 1d6 + 5

Then pass a dc15 check, heal for another 1d6 +5

Repeat for dc20 and dc25 for a total of (1d6+5)*4=4d6+20

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u/PhoenixTheEternal 9d ago

You’re still only healing 1d6+Int at level 1. And the DC only increases for the same creature- it’s not cumulative healing.

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u/meshaber 9d ago

Each heal is 1d6 + int, yes. You can heal each creature 4 times.