I've seen a number of posts on possible healing weapons (effectively making it a "class") and they always get jumped on as if they suggested infinite free energy for everyone. There is, however, one model of healing in the game that would actually work well and be fun, without being broken as long as it's balanced right.

The whole thing is contingent on a new game mechanic though: the Healing Window

So what's a Healing Window?

First off, notice how when you get hit in the game, the bars of your health turn purple for a split second before disappearing?

Simply put, every time you take damage in the game the bars would stay purple for about 5 seconds, maybe a little more (the time is just one of the factors that is up to OOO to decide what would be balanced). This is the Healing Window.

While your health bars are purple, if you are hit by any healing effect from a weapon, you can regain up to the damage you lost, turning the purple back into red. Once the "Window" is past however, the health is lost permanently, and healing effects do nothing.

Additionally, the Healing Window will always be half a bar less than the amount you actually lost.

Why is this important?

As many have pointed out, this game is all about blocking and avoiding damage. There is no mana: health is everything. If people had weapons that could heal each other, it would be almost impossible to die outside of mass amounts of enemies swamping you or boss encounters. People would just heal up to full between every fight, even if a cooldown was placed on the weapon.

Hmm. Still seems overpowered. What else?

Additionally, if you get hit again before your Healing Window elapses, the new HW cuts the previous one in half, rounded up. So let's say you take 3 bars of damage from one hit, and then 3 from another within 5 seconds or so. Your HW would be 4. Now if you get hit again before that HW expires for another 2, the HW would be 3.5 (keep in mind the half-bar "tax").

Why not just remove the previous HW if you get hit again?

This could be one way to go, but keep in mind the 5 second rule will still apply to the new window. It just seemed potentially frustrating as hell to, say, get hit for 10 bars from Vanaduke's swing, then a piece of debris hits you for 2 bars within the next second, or the JK goes nuts on you, and then one of his tiny slimes hits you before you can be healed. If you get hit a third time though, the first hit is pretty much reduced to nothing anyway.

Okay, interesting idea. Now let's talk weapons.

Here's where a lot of the balancing will come into play.

1) Swords:

I honestly can't see healing swords working all that well. For one thing, it makes very little sense, unless the Spiral Knights have some kind of healing lightsaber. If they do go the sword route though, it would definitely have to be a slow swing. Maybe even a 1 combo.

2) Guns:

This is where the majority of healing weapons would reside, I think. Short range beams at 3 a clip. Or an Alchemer line, with a 2 shot clip and the ricocheting bullets. An autogun-resembling cone of healing spray, that takes a long time to reload between shots. There's lots of versatility in guns, between bullet style, reload times, clip size and range that makes healing type weapons really interesting.

3) Bombs:

Bombs would be a neat line for healing weapons too, if a little more limited. Slow, slow charging bombs that heal in a moderate area all at once when it explodes, or one that leaves a "mist" on the ground that gives a tiny heal every few seconds to those that stay in it. Maybe even healing bombs that give POSITIVE status effects, like a Defense buff or a Status Immunity (once again, with long charge times to ensure downtime). Additionally, since healing bombs would be the only kind that could heal oneself (with the possible exception of randomly catching ricochets from the Alchemer-type gun), bombs would need to have at least a 5 second charge time to exceed the Healing Window.

Notice that for none of the above have I mentioned actual amounts for healing between each swing/shot/explosion. That's because this is yet another factor that OOO will need to measure and decide for themselves what would be balanced. It's also hard to measure health in small increments, since our bars only show us amounts in half-bars.

These weapons would follow all the usual rules, of course. Increased healing as they increase in stars/level, charge time reduction, attack speed reduction, etc.

Things to keep in mind

For one thing, remember that anyone who chooses to carry a healing weapon is giving up one of their weapon slots. For most this is half their arsenal, and for others it means giving up one of the precious swords/guns/bombs that round out their damage types.

For another, the picture I've painted of how this would work involves ALOT of running around, trying to be at the right place at the right time and healing what you can when you can. Players who just carry one healing weapon will likely get very few uses out of it as they switch between DPS and Healing. Players that choose to only heal will be reliant on their teammates to do DPS, and their very presence will make the enemies stronger without adding another damage-dealer to the mix, as usually happens when party size grows.

Keep in mind the healing window. Before you comment, think of how it would limit the way healing weapons work. Please do not post about how this would ruin the game and make hearts pointless and things too easy. Properly balanced, there is no way a healer (or even three) could keep one person alive indefinitely, especially thanks to the unhealable half-bar that comes with each hit.

Why not just have weapon effects that make enemies drop more health, or leech health on hits?

Many reasons, most notably:

1) These would become standard, "required" weapons. Even if they were relatively weak, not having these UVs or weapons would just be crippling compared to someone with them.
2) This changes the gameplay not at all. The point of including healing isn't to make the game easier, it's to offer a different style of play that makes the game more complex.
3) It would make partying with people without them painful, as only the ones with the effects would want to get the killing blows to get the hearts to drop, or if vampiric, people would compete with eachother to hit the easiest, safest mobs to get health back.

In total, terrible ideas.

Ok, thread over. Concerns, comments, criticisms, compliments?

Tl;dr version: Stop being lazy.