What's the default way to build a doctor in GURPS?

[Michele]

Originally Posted by Langy

Have a decent chance of performing first aid in one second rather than one minute, no matter what condition the patient is in.

(being able to do this is why Action gives its medic template skill 20)

Heh, wow. Which brings about the question - what kind of campaign is this character for?

[Antheus]

Worth noting that original concept had no skills higher than 14. Skill inflation only resulted from optimization. And the really interesting thing that someone who is a good physician, diagnostician, and surgeon costs the same amount of points as legendary physician, good diagnostician and surgeon. Same with high skill in Guns - if you have skill-16 in Rifle and SMG default of 14 you can either spend 4 points to increase your skill with SMG or raise your Rifle skill and therefore your SMG default as well.

All said and done I am under impression that GURPS default rules are reasonably good for characters who are doing something unusual for them but when you try to build an expert in a few related skills you are either forced to have really high primary skill (sometimes higher than you would assign ) or you end up having character who costs more points and at the same time have lower skill levels.

[Gnome]

I see this as a big problem with the default system (and with the Healer talent which, like many other talents in Basic, is rarely point-efficient). I was interested to see this thread, because I'm in the process of using Template Toolkit to create templates for a Pulp Action artifact hunters type game (think Indiana Jones, The Mummy, Tomb Raider, Uncharted, etc.), and I was just compiling my list of skills for a Doctor template when I saw this post. Now I'm not sure if my template should even bother with Healer Talent or any skills other than Physician...but it's not much of a template if it includes only one primary skill!

[Anders]

Professional Skill: Doctor will probably still be needed. This would cover all the extra-medical stuff - rules and regulations, contact with authourities, the correct way to hit on nurses, etc.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Langy

Have a decent chance of performing first aid in one second rather than one minute, no matter what condition the patient is in.

(being able to do this is why Action gives its medic template skill 20)

Being able to do the literally impossible sounds like good justification for why such a level isn't realistic.
It's interesting that 3rd edition suffered from number of skills bloat, while now we seem to be suffering a skill magnitude bloat.

[Kalzazz]

Ill admit the sheer number of skills involved in being a healer seems like it is majorly skill bloat to me

[Toptomcat]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

I think you're leaning too much towards the mini-max, myself. Physician-20, IMHO, isn't a way to optimize your point totals. A skill that high represents one of the best in the region, if not in your entire nation, and there's no way in creation I'd let a recent med school graduate have that.

I mentioned 'TL 8 med-school graduate' as a shorthand for saying that I'd expect the character to have a wide variety of medically-related skills, as opposed to some more specialized fellow like a TL4 barber-surgeon or combat medic. I didn't mean to imply they were a recent graduate, but a 'surgeon with considerable experience.'

Originally Posted by Kenneth Latrans

Most physicians should have Physician-12 with Diagnosis-12 and most surgeons should have Surgeon-14.

Really? Again, the GURPS Bio-Tech Physician template has Physician-15 with the option for two levels in Healer, and I didn't get the impression that it was meant to be very cinematic/extraordinary. The Bio-Tech nurse has Physician-13.

Originally Posted by Michele

Heh, wow. Which brings about the question - what kind of campaign is this character for?

A Monster Hunters campaign, actually, and the character is supposed to be a vampire who was a medic in the Second World War, got his medical degree on the GI Bill, and has been actively practicing ever since. The higher skill levels thus fit the character eminently well... the original skills were the result of a somewhat constrained point budget, since vampirism and the combat capability to fit in a MH campaign are expensive.

[Victor Maxus]

When they say that a character should have a 12 skill level, what they are referring too is the idea that the 'Average' professional for just about any skill is 12. When GURPS character templates give a higher level, they are mostly describing an heroic, above average character, which is what most player characters will be. And depending on setting, some people will be higher than average but that represents a few elite that very few can achieve. The best example being any professional sports player who would need a 14 or 15 skill just to qualify. But at the same time, how many pro basketball and football players are there?

[Toptomcat]

When they say that a character should have a 12 skill level, what they are referring too is the idea that the 'Average' professional for just about any skill is 12. When GURPS character templates give a higher level, they are mostly describing an heroic, above average character, which is what most player characters will be.

On the other hand, GURPS also defines a character point invested in a skill as being reflective of about two hundred hours of learning, and doctors traditionally spend a much longer time in education and 'apprenticeship' than people in the vast majority of professions. I suppose the average doctor might have IQ 11 or 12 rather than Bio-Tech's 13, and less in the way of the template's optional Advantages- but that would still leave them with Physician-14 or 13.

[Adina]

Originally Posted by Toptomcat

On the other hand, GURPS also defines a character point invested in a skill as being reflective of about two hundred hours of learning...

No. <sigh>

200 hours --> 1 cp. There is no = in there, its a one way street.

As an option, 200 hours of (non-adventuring time) training may gain a character one point in a skill.