Cure Light Wounds: A Problem

Alright, so the players are deep in a dungeon (in this case, they were trying to retrieve a stolen item).  They've taken some damage, fought some goblins and an otyugh, and they get a moment to breath.  It's not enough time for a real rest, just a few seconds to catch their breaths.

The cleric decides to start healing, after all, it's what a cleric does...  and... oh look, 7-9.  He's already taken a -1 and he's not happy to go down further.  He CAN'T choose to lose the spell, because it is utterly vital - he knows that he has three other people to heal AND there's a good chance this first person will need to have the spell cast again.  So he has to choose the Draw Unwanted Attention/Whatever the Wording Is.

Now, I, as the GM, feel stuck.  The whole point of giving them a few minutes of rest is so that the game doesn't descend into a mad slapstick madness.  I want them to get a break, even if it's just a short dramatic pause for the players and their characters to unwind between high energy scenes...  but that looks like it's gone out the window now.  The games very rules have decided that our pacing was going too slow and now I have to introduce SOMETHING ELSE into the already madcap, slapdash comedy of errors the dice have generated up until this point...

What do you all do in these sorts of situations?

The specific wording is:
"•You draw unwelcome attention or put yourself in a spot. The GM will tell you how."

"Unwelcome attention" is pretty loose and flexible.  It doesn't need to be "more monsters show up, fight now."  It could be
- an enemy/heretic of the cleric's deity senses their presence in the dungeon, and starts searching the halls/making preparations
- spirits of those who died previously in the dungeon are drawn to the cleric and ask him for succor, release, or closure
- intelligent mice might see the cleric's healing powers and claim that he must be the Chosen One their prophecies speak of
- an intelligent artifact in the dungeon might turn its magic eye on the PCs and start to arrange events to get into/stay out of their possession.
- a planar entity opposed to the cleric's deity might sense that deity's minion meddling in the affairs, and send its own entity to the dungeon's villains
- the deity itself might be the unwanted attention:  "REALLY, DURGA, *THIS ELF SWINE* IS WHAT YOU SPEND MY FAVORS ON?"

The unwanted attention doesn't need to escalate things right here and now if you don't want it to.
It could be It could be a perfect opportunity

You could expand on whatever is already happening around them, give them the moments they need but tighten the security of intelligent creatures, put a new room up ahead with a new challenge, if theya re after a strong magical opponent the casting draws its attention from afar, and the cleric sees that gaze upon him, there is a LOT you can do there.

What I feel you may need to keep in mind when choosing a move is: "Think offscreen too".

I say because that has helped me immensely in two mere sessions.

The rules really do push for more "madcap action," it's true. I consider that a strength, but if you really want to give your players a break then do it. I made a custom move for my campaign specifically for this situation. I don't have it in front of me, but it was something like
When you heal the party during a rest, roll +Wis. On a 10+, everyone is at full hp. On a 7-9, choose one:
*it is exhausting, take -1ongoing until your next rest.
*the best you can do is restore 1d8 to each of them
*your diety requests some favor or task from the group, the GM will tell you what.

It's just a modified version of the normal spellcasting rules, but it doesn't present an immediate threat. It worked for us pretty well and the "diety request" was popular and led to some side quests to fulfilled in the area. Give it a try!

Good idea with the "attracts another spellcaster who is farther away to come hunt them"!

For my part: the wording is "you draw unwelcome attention or put yourself in a spot."

"Put someone in a spot" is one of the most versatile and potentially crippling Moves a DM can do. I know I have often underplayed such an opportunity. To quote the book "A spot is someplace where a character needs to make tough choices. Put them, or something they care about, in the path of destruction. The harder the choice, the tougher the spot."

A few ideas:

- "The spell works, but the amount of healing it had to do will drain the target rapidly, making them ravenous. The target will have to consume 3 Rations or they will gain the Weak (-1 to Str rolls) Debility." (A rest-time is a perfect time to make them Use Resources)

- "As you try to heal your ally, you feel that there is a seed of guilt and sin (past or present) in them. It will weaken your healing. They will gain half the heal amount unless they confess to you the guilty secret and gain absolution". (Character building!)

- "Your healing has attracted the attention of Death. The target gains an Ongoing -2 to any Last Breath rolls they might make for the next day." (Could be nothing, but they'll be even more scared of dropping to 0.)

- "The [injured limb] is too badly damaged. Choose to either restore the limb and be unable to heal the target again until you next Make Camp, or bind and splint and immobilize the limb, making it useless until you next Make Camp and restore HP instead."

Throwing out four or five castings of a spell in very short period ("just a few seconds" and "not enough time for a real rest") seems to be just the sort of situation where you need to stick to the Cast a Spell move.  But that's just where my "dial" is set, I suppose.  I really, really like Archangel3d's "Put them in a spot" options a great deal.

If there is actually a moment for rest, then Scrape's move seems spot on.

I'm going to put both in my toolkit. Thanks!

It's not enough time for a real rest, just a few seconds to catch their breaths.

...

...he knows that he has three other people to heal AND there's a good chance this first person will need to have the spell cast again.

Woah, I'm pretty into that "they must confess a sin" idea. That's just awesome.

Especially if there's some secret sin mentioned in their bonds or that occured in an earlier session.

In my game, I just said the cleric took half of the damage he healed onto himself (e.g. He heals six damage, but takes three damage himself). I guess you could call that "putting him in a spot" but I felt the spirit of the rule is "it'll work, but it'll cost you."

That's good, Drez, totally in the spirit of the rules. Doesn't the Paladin have a similar move that trades damage for healing?

Yes, that's how Lay on Hands works. On a 10+ you heal the target, on a 7-9 you heal the target but the damage is transferred to you.