Recovering from unconsciousness? Magic effects

[sunstone]

Dear Forumwisdom-keepers,

we are playing a Fantasy Setting with normal magical influence (Dragonlance).

If a characters gets unconscious how does it work with magical healing or healing potions in general?

EG:
Knight Robert is at -6 HP and falls unconscious. He is healed by Sora Lighthand up to 10 HP. Does he wake up insantly on his turn and can act?
Or does it take minutes like said on p.423 ?

If it takes minutes how do you handle a fight with many unconscious players as this gets really boring for them to do nothing for hours. Yes our fights take some time, dunno why.

Cheers,
Sunstone.

[vierasmarius]

I don't know if there is one official answer to this. It seems like something that could vary based on the setting's magic assumptions. That said, if restoring the subject's HP isn't enough to wake them immediately, a spell like Awaken should be. Since its only prerequisite is Lend Vitality, the same prereq as Minor Healing, it's an easy spell for healers to take.

Originally Posted by Awaken spell, Magic pg 90

Sleeping or unconscious subjects get a
HT roll to awaken, at a bonus equal to
the caster’s margin of success. A subject
rolls at -3 if unconscious due to
injury, at -6 if drugged.

[Mathulhu]

I GM more than I play.

I would not expect an unconscious party member to get back in the fight. It would take them three or four rounds to go from awake to back in the fight and able to defend themselves.
In that time a decent opponent could put them back down or do serious harm to another party member.
When people start hitting the deck it's the time to demand surrender or try and put the foe down.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by sunstone

If a characters gets unconscious how does it work with magical healing or healing potions in general?

You wake up in the normal time for your current hit points, which if positive is 15 minutes. If you want to wake someone up immediately, use the Awaken spell (M90).

Originally Posted by sunstone

If it takes minutes how do you handle a fight with many unconscious players as this gets really boring for them to do nothing for hours. Yes our fights take some time, dunno why.

Probably insufficient use of deceptive attack, or very low attack/defense ratios, plus inexperience with the system, though GURPS combat is fairly slow. IME this is rarely a problem, because if you've got unconscious PCs and the fight isn't already most of the way done you're typically well on the way towards losing.

[Bruno]

I've seen Awaken written off as "a magical slap in the face", but it really is "restore consciousness" - it ends comas, breaks magical sleep effects like Peaceful Sleep, 'cures' sleep poisons, so on and so forth. It even cures Stun!

I would say that someone who has been healed of injuries that resulted in unconsciousness no longer gets the -3 to the HT roll to recover, although they still require it.

I would also allow the caster to burn more FP for a bonus to the HT roll, on a 1:1 ratio.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by sunstone

Dear Forumwisdom-keepers,

we are playing a Fantasy Setting with normal magical influence (Dragonlance).

If a characters gets unconscious how does it work with magical healing or healing potions in general?

EG:
Knight Robert is at -6 HP and falls unconscious. He is healed by Sora Lighthand up to 10 HP. Does he wake up insantly on his turn and can act?
Or does it take minutes like said on p.423 ?

If it takes minutes how do you handle a fight with many unconscious players as this gets really boring for them to do nothing for hours. Yes our fights take some time, dunno why.
.

I find that fights really speed up once most of the players and presumably their opponents are out of play. It's keeping them around that slows things down. That being said, if it's a vanilla Fantasy game, then yes there's a spell for that.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

I find that fights really speed up once most of the players and presumably their opponents are out of play.

I've seen situations where one character got critically hit and one-shotted on turn 1 of the fight, and then the fight slowed down and turned into an extended battle, but it's uncommon (more common at high tech, just because one-shotting someone is routine).

[Maz]

In combat-focused games with instant healing (magic, psychic or drugs), we tend to rule that anyone healed to full HP wakes up immediatly. It works well.

[Dustin]

It's not RAW but I let characters healed back to positive HP roll vs HT each turn to regain consciousness.

[The Benj]

There's no point in the Awaken spell if you can just wake up by being healed by other means.