Does anyone have any tips or thoughts? I’m about to run a campaign for a group of friends who have not played before and I am worried that none of them will want to play a healer class. I don’t really want to force them into a specific class or force them to use pre-Gen characters because they have all expressed how excited they are to create a unique character.
My thought is to possibly start them with some health pots in case of emergency if no one picks healer. Any thoughts on appropriate size health pot? They will be starting at level 1 so I can’t imagine they will need too much. Thanks in advance for tips. This is my first time DMing and I really want them to enjoy the game.
I use the standard healing potions if they are level 1. Those can be rewards and loot in addition to whatever else they find. Maybe have a friendly NPC they can go to to get patched up if their resources run out.
Be sure to remind them of using hit dice to restore hit points on short rests too.
Potions are one option, a healer sidekick is another.
You could homebrew a magic item for the party, or give one of the characters a Healer feat.
You can also discuss field medicine as a skill that any of them could use. Stabilize dying party members with a medicine check, and use an action to allow an ally to consume a Hit Die once per combat.
It is also encouraged to simply see what happens. Give them an encounter that is hard enough to make them worry, and they may come up with their own solution. Just have a contingency plan in mind until they are ready for the bumpers to be removed.
Does anyone have any tips or thoughts? I’m about to run a campaign for a group of friends who have not played before and I am worried that none of them will want to play a healer class. I don’t really want to force them into a specific class or force them to use pre-Gen characters because they have all expressed how excited they are to create a unique character.
Honestly, "don't worry about it" is a reasonable option; at low to mid levels hit dice do most of the heavy lifting anyway, mostly it's important to have a means of bringing characters at zero hp back into the fight.
Does anyone have any tips or thoughts? I’m about to run a campaign for a group of friends who have not played before and I am worried that none of them will want to play a healer class. I don’t really want to force them into a specific class or force them to use pre-Gen characters because they have all expressed how excited they are to create a unique character.
My thought is to possibly start them with some health pots in case of emergency if no one picks healer. Any thoughts on appropriate size health pot? They will be starting at level 1 so I can’t imagine they will need too much. Thanks in advance for tips. This is my first time DMing and I really want them to enjoy the game.
First, in a casual tone I'd tell them "Oh wow, you guys are going hard mode, you aren't taking the strongest classes in the game, ok, how weak do you want to be for the party". Taunt them a bit, let them know they are going to be having a hard time. Clerics in 5E are probably the best class in the game, they melee, they wear armor, heck they got one that casts fireball and wall of fire. You could mention some of the OP classes of healers (druid, bard, cleric, divine soul sorcerer, ranger, paladin) before they go the way they want to go.
If they choose not to have a healer, explain how death rolls work and how much time they'll have possibly to get their guys up (2 turns a player can be killed). Explain that healers have this spell called healing word that can help get a downed guy up. I do suggest you don't allow them to roll death rolls, you roll behind the screen. Explain that a player could be dead in two turns, how good is their medical skill, are they all going to carry healer kits?
For potions, do not go out of the ordinary and just drop healing potions on every encounter. Explain to them they might want to take a background with herbalist so at least they can make basic healing motion. For back healing give them the opportunity to get a sidekick healer but have one of the players run the healer, don't do a DMPC.
Play the game straight as you would with a regular party. Eventually they'll lose a player and they'll go hmm... so theres this thing called "healing word and its that broken, it would have kept me up?" and maybe they'd plan better and pick up a healer. D&D is a game, its got rules, there are ways to win and ways to lose. They are going to have to play very smart as a party, they better work on persuasion, deception, intimidation, and sneak to avoid encounters as much as possible. Just let them know you are looking forward to seeing how they are going to make this work and you'll be rooting for them.
I might not suggest requiring a party to have any specific makeup. When we sit down at session 0 to roll stats and HP, if no one chose a Rogue or Fighter, I don't worry about it. Why would I worry if there weren't a (insert X class here) present? The party needs to have the information required to make the decisions they need to make. If they choose individually, or collectively, to go without a thing, that's on them. I don't condone forcing or coercing a player to "choose" a character that they don't like. I feel that this is a rejection of player agency and overall, just poor form. This is a "them problem" and requires a "them solution".
As far as your potions idea, sure it'll work. As for type, I wouldn't recommend anything past common until they have an indiviual HP pool large enough to contain the potion. I might suggest that, if possible, give them a patron to work for that might provide a resource or two to bolster the group once they come together.
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“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Plan for short rests and give them more chances to long rest than normal until they've got a few levels under their belt. A side kick npc elder healer to watch over them is also a good idea for the same reason.
Thank you so much for all the ideas. I think I will just not worry about it and let them figure it out. Maybe throw some basic healing pots in some scattered loot.
I just want to voice my disagreement for giving the party a healer NPC. The party is going to know why you gave them that particular NPC, and likely will feel that you thought they were incapable of surviving on their own, so needed a little deus ex machina to get through your campaign. There are enough players out there who might feel slightly annoyed with that kind of obvious DM hand-holding. There is also the issue that, at the end of any major fight, they are always going to have a nagging question of "did we win that fight? Or did we only win it because the DM gave us that healer?" which can make them feel less excited about their big accomplishments.
Things that are less obvious is just increasing the frequency they receive healing items. You can also take a page from many MMOs and make a homerule where consuming food prepared by the party increases the party's maximum HP for the rest of the day (have to make cook's tools proficiency useful somehow!).
You can also scale back your fights to the party, making sure your monsters do enough damage to be threatening, but not so much that the party cannot compensate through the use of hit dice.
Does anyone have any tips or thoughts? I’m about to run a campaign for a group of friends who have not played before and I am worried that none of them will want to play a healer class. I don’t really want to force them into a specific class or force them to use pre-Gen characters because they have all expressed how excited they are to create a unique character.
Well, how many people will be playing? Two, five? The larger the group, the bigger the chance someone will have a bit of healing (bards, Divine Soul sorcerer, someone picking a feat that gives you a healing spell etc.). Clerics don't need to be "the healer" (and Paladins & Druids can be). Depending on what campaign you want to run, it might not be "combat heavy" or allow them to pick another option to combat (and sudden HP loss). IIRC the Light beyond the Witchlight (?) Feywild adventure allows you to finish the campaign without a single fight, because it offers alternatives. If you don't want any sudden TPKs, giving out a healing potion and perhaps a wand of Healing Word with one charge can help, before you find out the playing style of your friends. I want to point out though, that if they behave like "murder hobos", they should feel some punishment (or consequences) for seeking out fights, without the means to recover.
Those are good points. I got worried that if there was a TPK they would lose interest, but yeah if they are murder hobos they should have struggles if they don’t pick any healing capabilities.
since it’s my first run as DM and their first run playing I am just going to start with the Lost Mine of Phandelver which has quite a few battles but it seems to be mostly set at 3-4 goblins at a time, at least while they are level 1 and 2. So I am feeling pretty confident in just having their benefactor hand them a couple health potions and seeing where things take us.
also, who knows, maybe I am worrying about nothing and one will want to play a character with some healing capabilities. It is 5 players so the odds are a bit better.
Keep in mind that combat is very swingy at low levels. A string of bad rolls can let a pair of goblins TPK a party of 1st level players right out of the gate.
Don't be afraid to modify combats on the fly. Introducing enemies in waves will let you control the flow of battle and avoid overcommiting yourself.
At the end of the day, just be up front with your party that you are new to DMing and reserve the right to "fix" things if you make mistakes. Your first adventure should be about everyone learning the ropes together.
Keep in mind that combat is very swingy at low levels. A string of bad rolls can let a pair of goblins TPK a party of 1st level players right out of the gate.
Don't be afraid to modify combats on the fly. Introducing enemies in waves will let you control the flow of battle and avoid overcommiting yourself.
That is also what the DM screen is for - the DM is fully capable of ignoring their dice rolls and fudging whether they hit/miss/how much damage they do in order to ensure combat runs smoothly.
That is one easy way to mitigate not having a healer - though you shouldn’t rely too heavily on fudging and should be careful to never get caught.
When I started DMing, I also started with LMoP, and simply told my group, (who were all new players), "This adventure serves as context for the Main Campaign (homebrew). Your Main Characters already know that these heroes survived, but the specific details of their story were lost or twisted by the bards who sung their tale. While we know how the story ends, what happens along the way will have an impact on your characters later. If the adventure goes well, that might mean more power, allies, or resources will be available in your next life."
This freed me up to openly fudge some dice, and if anyone had died, we could take a break, and I would figure out how they actually survived, and then the story could proceed.
Once the Main Campaign started, the future would be scribed by the players, and they would have to deal with the consequences.
Run it as normal, a party can definitely succeed with out a healer they just have to play like being hit matters. That means they should be stealthy, flee when necessary, stock up on resources, talk their way through problems and use defensive tactics in combat. If they don't do that then feel free to let them die and so they can choose to pick a healer if they want to keep going head first or learn to work around it. As always my advice is design an encounter with at least one solution but don't feel like that solution always has to be combat, its perfectly ok to make combat the wrong answer but don't fudge it if the players surprise you.
Now what I do recommend you to add for parties with no healer is options to get resurrection, remove curse, remove disease and regenerating severe injuries so you don't feel like you need to hold back on those. They don't have to be in shops, maybe there are night hags with their cleansing stones, a lost artifact, a priest kidnapped some where or a magic pool in a forest. Just put these things some where or have a side quest planned with them to solve these problems. I actually advise that all home brew campaigns have a hag, witch or demon some where in case the players want to be a little ethically dubious to solve a problem. Its always great when that happens.
Lots of great ideas here already. from readily available healing potions (which means gold is used for them and not shiny new magic items lol) to a resurrection being available through an item or scroll or some such. I am part of a group with no healer (Barb, Monk, Ranger, Warlock) and we have stocked up on healing potions as best we can and tend to make use of short rests as best we can to burn some hit dice and keep healthy.
It for sure, creates a bit of challenge, but it's far from impossible, especially when the DM is aware and working with the group to make it possible (but not too easy) to move along without a handy medic.
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
Starting at 1st level, when they get to choose their specialisation at 3rd level they might decide that they could do with a little healing, and most classes have some sort of specialisation option which will provide some healing for the party.
Of course, at any level increase a party member could also decide to multiclass into a different class which might provide stronger healing.
Don't pander to their choices - the party levels up together, and if they do so with themselves in mind exclusively, then they may find they run into troubles.
On the other hand, make these things available if they seek them out. Don't say "hey, none of you have healing, so here's a healer or some health potions" because it makes that decision worthless. You wouldn't go the other way - "hey, you all chose spellcasters so here's a half orc named Bob who's going to do the heavy lifting and punching", would you? If their decisions do not have consequence, it won't make them think about them. at level 1 they have no healing - oh no, we nearly died! better get some healing as soon as possible - oh, that's a few levels away? Better go buy health potions then!"
If they get healing for free, why will any of them pay levels or money for healing?
About to start running HotDQ, so a potentially pretty lethal episode 1 and no cleric in the group (and the druid and ranger aren't keen on spending their potential on healing either). In principle I want them to sort this out themselves, but I do have a healer NPC ready in the keep if absolutely needed (assuming they can make it back there alive). I found an 'expired healing potion' in the homebrew (https://www.dndbeyond.com/magic-items/10600-expired-healing-potion) that she might have to use for them... 😉. I know the opening of HotDQ is supposed to be flexible with respect to the exact encounters to use, but I find it important to keep the sense of danger dialed up to 11, so it's a tricky balance.
This optional rule allows characters to heal up in the thick of combat and works well for parties that feature few or no characters with healing magic, or for campaigns in which magical healing is rare. As an action, a character can use a healing surge and spend up to half his or her Hit Dice. For each Hit Die spent in this way, the player rolls the die and adds the character’s Constitution modifier. The character regains hit points equal to the total. The player can decide to spend an additional Hit Die after each roll. A character who uses a healing surge can’t do so again until he or she finishes a short or long rest. Under this optional rule, a character regains all spent Hit Dice at the end of a long rest. With a short rest, a character regains Hit Dice equal to his or her level divided by four (minimum of one die). For a more superheroic feel, you can let a character use a healing surge as a bonus action, rather than as an action.
I think the last one is too much for this case but might be interesting for other situations.
First thing I do anyway is homebrew drinking a potion is a bonus action, this makes drinking a healing potion in the heat of battle a viable option, then just make healing potions more generally available at lower levels. then as they progress give them potion shops where they can buy potions to do the things Clerics normally do, removing conditions etc.
When it comes to resurrection this can be a little trickier, in the past when the players reached level 5 I gave them access to an item that cast revivify, it required a diamond be fixed to it (300gp worth) and casting the spell destroyed the diamond. It could be used once per long rest.
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Does anyone have any tips or thoughts? I’m about to run a campaign for a group of friends who have not played before and I am worried that none of them will want to play a healer class. I don’t really want to force them into a specific class or force them to use pre-Gen characters because they have all expressed how excited they are to create a unique character.
My thought is to possibly start them with some health pots in case of emergency if no one picks healer. Any thoughts on appropriate size health pot? They will be starting at level 1 so I can’t imagine they will need too much.
Thanks in advance for tips. This is my first time DMing and I really want them to enjoy the game.
I use the standard healing potions if they are level 1. Those can be rewards and loot in addition to whatever else they find. Maybe have a friendly NPC they can go to to get patched up if their resources run out.
Be sure to remind them of using hit dice to restore hit points on short rests too.
Potions are one option, a healer sidekick is another.
You could homebrew a magic item for the party, or give one of the characters a Healer feat.
You can also discuss field medicine as a skill that any of them could use. Stabilize dying party members with a medicine check, and use an action to allow an ally to consume a Hit Die once per combat.
It is also encouraged to simply see what happens. Give them an encounter that is hard enough to make them worry, and they may come up with their own solution. Just have a contingency plan in mind until they are ready for the bumpers to be removed.
Honestly, "don't worry about it" is a reasonable option; at low to mid levels hit dice do most of the heavy lifting anyway, mostly it's important to have a means of bringing characters at zero hp back into the fight.
First, in a casual tone I'd tell them "Oh wow, you guys are going hard mode, you aren't taking the strongest classes in the game, ok, how weak do you want to be for the party". Taunt them a bit, let them know they are going to be having a hard time. Clerics in 5E are probably the best class in the game, they melee, they wear armor, heck they got one that casts fireball and wall of fire. You could mention some of the OP classes of healers (druid, bard, cleric, divine soul sorcerer, ranger, paladin) before they go the way they want to go.
If they choose not to have a healer, explain how death rolls work and how much time they'll have possibly to get their guys up (2 turns a player can be killed). Explain that healers have this spell called healing word that can help get a downed guy up. I do suggest you don't allow them to roll death rolls, you roll behind the screen. Explain that a player could be dead in two turns, how good is their medical skill, are they all going to carry healer kits?
For potions, do not go out of the ordinary and just drop healing potions on every encounter. Explain to them they might want to take a background with herbalist so at least they can make basic healing motion. For back healing give them the opportunity to get a sidekick healer but have one of the players run the healer, don't do a DMPC.
Play the game straight as you would with a regular party. Eventually they'll lose a player and they'll go hmm... so theres this thing called "healing word and its that broken, it would have kept me up?" and maybe they'd plan better and pick up a healer. D&D is a game, its got rules, there are ways to win and ways to lose. They are going to have to play very smart as a party, they better work on persuasion, deception, intimidation, and sneak to avoid encounters as much as possible. Just let them know you are looking forward to seeing how they are going to make this work and you'll be rooting for them.
Some really great ideas so far.
I might not suggest requiring a party to have any specific makeup. When we sit down at session 0 to roll stats and HP, if no one chose a Rogue or Fighter, I don't worry about it. Why would I worry if there weren't a (insert X class here) present? The party needs to have the information required to make the decisions they need to make. If they choose individually, or collectively, to go without a thing, that's on them. I don't condone forcing or coercing a player to "choose" a character that they don't like. I feel that this is a rejection of player agency and overall, just poor form. This is a "them problem" and requires a "them solution".
As far as your potions idea, sure it'll work. As for type, I wouldn't recommend anything past common until they have an indiviual HP pool large enough to contain the potion. I might suggest that, if possible, give them a patron to work for that might provide a resource or two to bolster the group once they come together.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
Plan for short rests and give them more chances to long rest than normal until they've got a few levels under their belt. A side kick npc elder healer to watch over them is also a good idea for the same reason.
Thank you so much for all the ideas. I think I will just not worry about it and let them figure it out. Maybe throw some basic healing pots in some scattered loot.
I just want to voice my disagreement for giving the party a healer NPC. The party is going to know why you gave them that particular NPC, and likely will feel that you thought they were incapable of surviving on their own, so needed a little deus ex machina to get through your campaign. There are enough players out there who might feel slightly annoyed with that kind of obvious DM hand-holding. There is also the issue that, at the end of any major fight, they are always going to have a nagging question of "did we win that fight? Or did we only win it because the DM gave us that healer?" which can make them feel less excited about their big accomplishments.
Things that are less obvious is just increasing the frequency they receive healing items. You can also take a page from many MMOs and make a homerule where consuming food prepared by the party increases the party's maximum HP for the rest of the day (have to make cook's tools proficiency useful somehow!).
You can also scale back your fights to the party, making sure your monsters do enough damage to be threatening, but not so much that the party cannot compensate through the use of hit dice.
Well, how many people will be playing? Two, five? The larger the group, the bigger the chance someone will have a bit of healing (bards, Divine Soul sorcerer, someone picking a feat that gives you a healing spell etc.). Clerics don't need to be "the healer" (and Paladins & Druids can be).
Depending on what campaign you want to run, it might not be "combat heavy" or allow them to pick another option to combat (and sudden HP loss). IIRC the Light beyond the Witchlight (?) Feywild adventure allows you to finish the campaign without a single fight, because it offers alternatives.
If you don't want any sudden TPKs, giving out a healing potion and perhaps a wand of Healing Word with one charge can help, before you find out the playing style of your friends. I want to point out though, that if they behave like "murder hobos", they should feel some punishment (or consequences) for seeking out fights, without the means to recover.
Those are good points. I got worried that if there was a TPK they would lose interest, but yeah if they are murder hobos they should have struggles if they don’t pick any healing capabilities.
since it’s my first run as DM and their first run playing I am just going to start with the Lost Mine of Phandelver which has quite a few battles but it seems to be mostly set at 3-4 goblins at a time, at least while they are level 1 and 2. So I am feeling pretty confident in just having their benefactor hand them a couple health potions and seeing where things take us.
also, who knows, maybe I am worrying about nothing and one will want to play a character with some healing capabilities. It is 5 players so the odds are a bit better.
Keep in mind that combat is very swingy at low levels. A string of bad rolls can let a pair of goblins TPK a party of 1st level players right out of the gate.
Don't be afraid to modify combats on the fly. Introducing enemies in waves will let you control the flow of battle and avoid overcommiting yourself.
At the end of the day, just be up front with your party that you are new to DMing and reserve the right to "fix" things if you make mistakes. Your first adventure should be about everyone learning the ropes together.
That is also what the DM screen is for - the DM is fully capable of ignoring their dice rolls and fudging whether they hit/miss/how much damage they do in order to ensure combat runs smoothly.
That is one easy way to mitigate not having a healer - though you shouldn’t rely too heavily on fudging and should be careful to never get caught.
When I started DMing, I also started with LMoP, and simply told my group, (who were all new players), "This adventure serves as context for the Main Campaign (homebrew). Your Main Characters already know that these heroes survived, but the specific details of their story were lost or twisted by the bards who sung their tale. While we know how the story ends, what happens along the way will have an impact on your characters later. If the adventure goes well, that might mean more power, allies, or resources will be available in your next life."
This freed me up to openly fudge some dice, and if anyone had died, we could take a break, and I would figure out how they actually survived, and then the story could proceed.
Once the Main Campaign started, the future would be scribed by the players, and they would have to deal with the consequences.
Run it as normal, a party can definitely succeed with out a healer they just have to play like being hit matters. That means they should be stealthy, flee when necessary, stock up on resources, talk their way through problems and use defensive tactics in combat. If they don't do that then feel free to let them die and so they can choose to pick a healer if they want to keep going head first or learn to work around it. As always my advice is design an encounter with at least one solution but don't feel like that solution always has to be combat, its perfectly ok to make combat the wrong answer but don't fudge it if the players surprise you.
Now what I do recommend you to add for parties with no healer is options to get resurrection, remove curse, remove disease and regenerating severe injuries so you don't feel like you need to hold back on those. They don't have to be in shops, maybe there are night hags with their cleansing stones, a lost artifact, a priest kidnapped some where or a magic pool in a forest. Just put these things some where or have a side quest planned with them to solve these problems. I actually advise that all home brew campaigns have a hag, witch or demon some where in case the players want to be a little ethically dubious to solve a problem. Its always great when that happens.
Lots of great ideas here already. from readily available healing potions (which means gold is used for them and not shiny new magic items lol) to a resurrection being available through an item or scroll or some such. I am part of a group with no healer (Barb, Monk, Ranger, Warlock) and we have stocked up on healing potions as best we can and tend to make use of short rests as best we can to burn some hit dice and keep healthy.
It for sure, creates a bit of challenge, but it's far from impossible, especially when the DM is aware and working with the group to make it possible (but not too easy) to move along without a handy medic.
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
Starting at 1st level, when they get to choose their specialisation at 3rd level they might decide that they could do with a little healing, and most classes have some sort of specialisation option which will provide some healing for the party.
Of course, at any level increase a party member could also decide to multiclass into a different class which might provide stronger healing.
Don't pander to their choices - the party levels up together, and if they do so with themselves in mind exclusively, then they may find they run into troubles.
On the other hand, make these things available if they seek them out. Don't say "hey, none of you have healing, so here's a healer or some health potions" because it makes that decision worthless. You wouldn't go the other way - "hey, you all chose spellcasters so here's a half orc named Bob who's going to do the heavy lifting and punching", would you? If their decisions do not have consequence, it won't make them think about them. at level 1 they have no healing - oh no, we nearly died! better get some healing as soon as possible - oh, that's a few levels away? Better go buy health potions then!"
If they get healing for free, why will any of them pay levels or money for healing?
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About to start running HotDQ, so a potentially pretty lethal episode 1 and no cleric in the group (and the druid and ranger aren't keen on spending their potential on healing either). In principle I want them to sort this out themselves, but I do have a healer NPC ready in the keep if absolutely needed (assuming they can make it back there alive). I found an 'expired healing potion' in the homebrew (https://www.dndbeyond.com/magic-items/10600-expired-healing-potion) that she might have to use for them... 😉. I know the opening of HotDQ is supposed to be flexible with respect to the exact encounters to use, but I find it important to keep the sense of danger dialed up to 11, so it's a tricky balance.
I'm also considering using the 'healing surges' optional rule from the DMG (https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/dmg/dungeon-masters-workshop#HealingSurges):
This optional rule allows characters to heal up in the thick of combat and works well for parties that feature few or no characters with healing magic, or for campaigns in which magical healing is rare. As an action, a character can use a healing surge and spend up to half his or her Hit Dice. For each Hit Die spent in this way, the player rolls the die and adds the character’s Constitution modifier. The character regains hit points equal to the total. The player can decide to spend an additional Hit Die after each roll. A character who uses a healing surge can’t do so again until he or she finishes a short or long rest. Under this optional rule, a character regains all spent Hit Dice at the end of a long rest. With a short rest, a character regains Hit Dice equal to his or her level divided by four (minimum of one die). For a more superheroic feel, you can let a character use a healing surge as a bonus action, rather than as an action.
I think the last one is too much for this case but might be interesting for other situations.
First thing I do anyway is homebrew drinking a potion is a bonus action, this makes drinking a healing potion in the heat of battle a viable option, then just make healing potions more generally available at lower levels. then as they progress give them potion shops where they can buy potions to do the things Clerics normally do, removing conditions etc.
When it comes to resurrection this can be a little trickier, in the past when the players reached level 5 I gave them access to an item that cast revivify, it required a diamond be fixed to it (300gp worth) and casting the spell destroyed the diamond. It could be used once per long rest.