[Basic] Skill of the week: Physician and Physiology

[johndallman]

Physician is the IQ/H TL practical skill of helping the sick and injured and helping them get better by scientific methods. It defaults to IQ-7, First Aid-11 (the second biggest default penalty in RAW), or Veterinary-4; lots of skills default to Physician, including First Aid at unmodified Physician. Skill rolls are used to test general medical competence, and to help people recover from injury and illness (B423). The skill doesn't require specialisation, but physiology modifiers apply for different species.

Physiology is the IQ/H TL scientific skill of detailed biological knowledge about a species, primarily to support medical practice. The defaults are IQ-6, Diagnosis-5, Physician-5 or Surgery-5, and Surgery has a default to Physiology. It requires specialisation by species, and doesn't specify defaults for other species, but the physiology modifiers seem like a good starting point. The GURPS skill clearly encompasses the two related scientific fields of anatomy and physiology, which are often taught separately in medical training.

In many worlds, Physician does not exist at TL1-4, and Pharmacy (Herbal) and/or Esoteric Medicine are used instead. However, some TL4 or earlier worlds do have Physician: Yrth manages it because of its modern influences. At TL5+, a lot of medical knowledge comes under Pharmacy (Synthetic), and doctors know a lot about drugs, and how to apply them. With Physician, you can identify most drugs of your TL (-5 without a laboratory, +3 if you risk smelling or tasting them), but you need Pharmacy to make them. Physiology appears at TL4.

Both these skills date from GURPS 1e, and are boosted by Healer talent. Physician can be a counter to Cyclic attacks that inflict fatigue or toxic damage, can be used to fulfil the Maintenance disadvantage and control Wounded, and is required for full use of Surgery skill. It can also ameliorate critical failures of healing spells, and is hugely important in recovery from injuries and illnesses (B422-444). There's an interesting rule for Physician at TL7+, which has survived since 1e: the skill can operate at TL6 without any special training, provided you have a hygienic working environment.

Bio-Tech, naturally, adds a lot of material about these skills. There are several specific applications for Physiology, and it's a primary skill for the Physician and Forensic Pathologist templates. Physician gets a lot of attention: there are lots of specific tasks and equipment for it, the Medical Treatment flowchart and templates for many kinds of characters connected with medicine. Nurses have Physician as their primary skill, and it's also what anesthetists use. (Physiotherapy) is an optional specialisation, and I reckon physios should not have Empathy: you have to cause pain as part of the job. Suturing seems to be Physician, not Surgery, since nurses do it.

Physician is universal on templates for doctors; Physiology is sometimes neglected outside Bio-Tech. Action has extreme levels of Physician, used to simulate action-movie reality (I found it helpful to be even more extreme) and equipment, including smell-proof body bags, truth serums, drugging people to keep them quiet, and curing cinematic plagues. AtE covers medicine, plagues and injuries; Banestorm has its own plagues, low-tech Physicians, and patron saints. Dungeon Fantasy uses Physiology (monster type) quite a lot. High-Tech has plenty of equipment, and Horror introduces Physician (Psychiatric), for campaigns that deal with madness, defaulting to and from (General) at -4, plus medical procedures such as lobotomy and electroshock therapy; Madness Dossier has Physiology (Irruptor), and personality-altering drugs. Low-Tech has plenty on low-tech Physicians and LTC1 adds hospital organisation, which is well worth having. Magic has spells and magic items to assist Physician, and allows very high skill to substitute for Magery in some cases. Martial Arts has material on Physiology; Gladiators has more on low-tech medicine and Technical Grappling offers Pressure Points defaulting to Physiology. Mysteries has more poisons, and detail on real-world medical examiners. Power-Ups volumes 2, 3, 7 and 8 have examples for these skills. Thaumatology: Alchemical Baroque has a version of Physician/TL4, and Zombies uses Physician or Physiology for inventing ... you guessed!

What have you done with Physician that was weird, cool, or both? Have you used Physiology much?