Will my party function without a healer?

Question

At the moment there are 5 of us that will be playing this campaign, and it's only the first time playing for one of us.

The party at the moment is:

Bard (College of Lore) - Me

Rogue (Arcane Trickster)

Sorcerer (A homebrew that will effectively turn him into an earth bender)

Ranger (Hunter) - First timer.

Wizard (Divination)

I know that I'm the obvious choice to be the party healer, but honestly, I'm tired of it. In the last couple of campaigns we've played I've been both Druids and Clerics, and I want to experience something else. It's the ranger's first time playing, and I'm happy for him to play as a ranger (because all of us have pretty low wisdom otherwise). The order above is also the order that we decided our characters in.

We're playing Strahd by the way.

My questions are:

1. Are we all going to die quickly?

2. Do you consider this party in any way balanced?

Answer 1

Your party will probably be OK. I've played 5e in a party whose only healer was a druid who spent most combat in wild form, rather than providing any in-combat healing. We didn't really have any problems - although it's possible the DM was intentionally going easy on us.

If you find your party has trouble, you've got a number of options:

• The simplest thing you can do (even at level 1) is take regular rests and short rests so you don't enter combat already low on HP. Short rests let you use hit dice, and long rests completely heal you. The main things that can block this are if your DM is planning a campaign where you'll spend a lot of time pursuing or being pursued; or if you're not being challenged enough and the DM decides to provide more encounters per rest so you have to conserve your once-per-day abilities. You can avoid both of these through communication with your DM.
• You can buy healing potions. In addition to providing in-combat healing, you can use them if you need to save an injured NPC for plot reasons or something like that.
• Your front line fighters can prioritise avoiding taking damage over doing damage. For example shields, heavy armour, feats that add hit points or dexterity, disengage bonus action, etc.
• As a bard, you can take cure wounds - and your ranger can take cure wounds and goodberry. You can pick those at later levels, so there isn't a door being closed for good if you start without them.
• Someone in your party can take a feat like magic initiate or a level in another class (letting them pick up a spell like goodberry), or they can take the healer feat (letting them heal a creature directly)

Answer 2

Your party will be OK.

I finished DMing Tyranny of Dragons recently with a healer-less party, and once they got past the first few levels, they were killing things so quickly that the lack of a healer didn't really matter. Or rather, it did, because using that fifth spot for more damage as opposed to a healer was what was causing the encounters to end so quickly.

As for the balance question, no, your party is not balanced. It appears to be entirely made up of damage dealers. But, like I explained earlier, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Granted, my party did have a barbarian tank, but frankly, he was putting out large enough amounts of damage that he could have been considered a damage dealer as well.

I hope this helps!

Answer 3

I am playing CoS myself at the moment, but it is my first experience with D&D5e. We have a cleric in out party but she doesn't heal very much. Because of that I have chosen to take the inspiring leader feat at fourth level. It allows me to give up to six allies temporary hp equal to my cha bonus + my level.

I think that would be very helpful for your party, as well. And it is not healing, nor does it take up action during combat.

Without healing or temporary hp things might be tough. And I am not sure taking short rests will always be possible. In addition, as discussed here having a pc at zero hp can be a problem in regards to regaining hp through spending HD.

Answer 4

In 5e, the Bard, Cleric and Druid are all equally good at being healers. At least at early levels.

• They all get access to the same number of spells slots.
• They all get access to Healing Word and Cure Wounds.

"But what about Clerics?"

A Cleric with the Light Domain has no special benefit over say a Bard. None of their Domain abilities involve healing. Their Channel Divinity doesn't heal.

At the end of the day, if the Bard decides to provide healing services, that's a pretty fair setup. Heck, the Bard's inspiration dice provide some extra defenses at key points.

The primary source of healing in the game is really hit dice. So the key is to have enough healing to keep people up until they can take a short rest.