Quote:
Originally Posted by ericbsmith
The immediate benefit of surgery is usually that you will stop bleeding and the continuing risk of infection decreases dramatically. The secondary benefit is that your body will be able to start healing, which it may not have been able to do with a large gaping wound or a ruptured spleen, and it can start healing in a way that is more beneficial to you - i.e. a set bone will heal in a way that will allow you to walk again instead having a permanently crippled leg.
The problem is that most of these benefits fall below the resolution of what GURPS - and most RPGs - bother to keep track of.
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That sounds right. With more detailed injury rules, many injuries would just be normal "lose HP; heal them back" basic injuries, but some would be problematic: injuries that "bleed out" internally or otherwise result in ongoing HP loss, or, going longer term, injuries that resist healing, or become infected, or heal improperly (leaving behind some sort of affliction or disadvantage, or future potential for these).
Diagnosis would be the skill to distinguish basic from problematic injuries. Physician and First Aid would be the skills to promote healing of basic injuries. Surgery would be the skill for dealing with problematic injuries. Surgery wouldn't heal HP; it'd generally cause damage (though high skill should lessen that; either way, you want a patient as healthy and stable – i.e., high HP – as possible before surgery). But it could try to stop the ongoing bleeding, or fix the internal problem (including removal of foreign bodies) that impedes healing, or help prevent lasting afflictions.
Largely beyond the scope of GURPS, though various books provide some concrete uses for Surgery. A tinkerer GM could easily come up with more.
Quick 'n' dirty example: Players rightly fear crippling as an effect of major injuries. Say there's a chance (1-2 on 1d6?) that any such injury is one that could benefit from surgery. Allow a Diagnosis roll to determine this. If diagnosed properly, allow a Surgery roll to aid the healing. This means some immediate HP loss for the surgery, plus the ever-present chance of critical failure, so it's not something to engage in lightly. But if successful, the surgery adds to the HT roll to avoid crippling – possibly a career saver for the PC.