The group joins back up at the next convergences of swarm cats. Looking over the squirming mass, Courtney raises an eyebrow and turns to Peter. “So this looks like about the same number of cats as the last fight. What is special this time?”

Peter laughs, “Good eye, this is a different sort of challenge as compared to the last. Instead of increasing the number, I increased the damage output. This isn’t a bunch of 400 cat swarms. This is a gathering of more but smaller swarms. At about 200 cats to a swarm I’ve doubled the damage you will be taking. Even with your effective damage reduction options this will still hurt.”

Courtney groans, “Of course, tell me to do something besides healing and then throw a heal check at us.”

Peter shrugs, “Not like I planned it that way. You just had to go and show your hidden cards. Still, that means this will be an excellent training exercise. A good healer should be able to do other things anyway. Even if your job was to literally just stand there and heal you should be doing other things. For instance, a common side job is to act as a caller. You’re already there watching everyone so extending that to relaying what is happening just works.”

Courtney sighs at this but doesn’t have anything else to add, so she turns to the others. “Well, if there is going to be more damage coming down on us, I will have to buff Rosha for this one. My healing was keeping up in the last fight but with the extra damage that isn’t likely to be the case now.”

Jason scratches his head, “Wouldn’t you be able to prop that up with spot healing?”

Courtney pops out one of her claws, “The healing from the last fight depended on me constantly dealing damage. If I stop to cast a healing spell then I fall behind even more. If the fight lasts long enough I would end up only healing. My buff won’t quite cut the damage taken in half but will give me more of a buffer.”

Peter claps at this explanation. “Good! At least I won’t have to ding you on not knowing your own limits. Whether you researched the subject or just knew enough about your healing, it doesn’t matter. Being able to judge the trade-offs is very important, and people who use draining attacks to heal like you do tend to be the worst at it.”

Courtney nods, “A popular subject and of much debate. While I have read up on the various trade-offs of healing, some elder travellers in Rosha’s family have advised me on it. Basically, all the reading is worth nothing without actual experience. So while I do have an excellent base of theory on it, I have been going off what I have actually experienced.”

Peter nods, “A good stance to take. You received some excellent advice there. Now do any of you have some other thing to bring up, or are you all going to stop stalling and go fight some cats?”

Rosha shrugs, “I’ve been ready. It was you all chatting it up. Lets go!” And she moves off to attack the swarms.

Courtney reaches out to stop her but gives up and starts to cast her buff. Jason shrugs and hustles to catch up to Rosha as well. Seeing this as well, Courtney rolls her eyes and moves to catch up as the buff finishes.

Of course having cast the buff Courtney doesn’t have as much mana this fight as she did the last. In fact, as she tears into the swarm while flanking to the left, she doesn’t have enough mana to start up her draining aura on her claws. Not that she would have cast it right away even if she did. With the extra damage, she had decided to hold off until she had enough for a healing spell.

Even without the buff on her claws that still didn’t stop her from activating her bloodline shadows, reserving away a portion of her mana pool and regen rate. There was no way she could avoid it, after all it was her defense. The other two had gone with damage reduction, but as an illusion user and a part of an agility based race Courtney was much better built for avoidance.

Not even Jason’s dodging skills could avoid a swarm’s continual damage, but Courtney’s abilities were based more on magic than actual physical dodging. The cats would swipe at her only to have their claws pass right through. It wasn’t perfect but just as well adapted to dealing with the multiple minor hits as damage reduction was.

In fact, off on the sideline Peter is shaking his head. ‘They can deal with this alright, but I really wish I could get some hard hitting enemies on our trip. Jason should be fine, the slippery dodge tank that he is. Those other two however would have trouble with. Even the pantherkin’s shadow evasion can’t stop every attack. Maybe all the rest of the attacks phase through her but one good hit and she would be down for the count.’

‘Still, I have to figure out what to advise them to do. I am sure Courtney has an inkling about it, but as their temp teacher, I need a direction for them to go. Yes Jason is the tank and should be the focus, but that won’t always work. Though I can’t go too far or that could stunt their future growth.’

‘With that in mind my advice for Rosha is easy enough but Courtney is still a conundrum. In fact, for all I know, she might already have an answer. She is an illusionist after all and hasn’t really had the chance to use it because of fighting swarms. I guess I can just bring it up and see what they say. Nothing much else I can do about it, really. Plus the System isn’t exactly telling me to hold their hands all the way to max level or some such nonsense. Yeah, this is probably one of those situations where I should point out a problem instead of solving it for them.’