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Old 05-29-2022, 07:31 AM   #11
Donny Brook
 
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

I would let them choose either way. Lop it off and treat it as regular use of Regeneration or try internal regrowth usong Regeneration at a significant penalty.
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Old 05-29-2022, 08:12 AM   #12
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

As far as "what can be done to heal this" goes, to me it comes down to why it happened in the first place. If it's the result of that specific PC taunting/challenging someone they really should not have (and the setup for the scene where it happened made that very clear), then it should not be an easy task to restore the hand to full function. In this situation I might have it be accompanied by a curse that makes prevents amputation/Regeneration from working properly until the curse is lifted.

If it was the result of a string of combat rolls or a situation where the PC was targeted to show how scary these guys are, then it should not be much more difficult than casting a Healing spell or two and waiting. The Regenerate spells should be able to fix this with no penality, it still takes a month for the hand to work again with basic Regeneration and Instant Regeneration costs a massive 80 Energy to cast.

Unless you've already established the cure at some point during the campaign. If you have established the cure, you should regard it as set in stone and not alter it outside special circumstances (such as the higher ranking members of the order having a nastier version).
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Old 05-29-2022, 08:21 AM   #13
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

Quote:
Originally Posted by RGTraynor View Post
So I've got a magical order in my gameworld that (among other things) does flesh shaping. PC got hit with a spell that made the bones in his hands go *poof*, but the flesh, tendons and viscera are otherwise intact. Medical technology is borderline TL 4-5.

Now: the party has a crack healer. Effectively, she's got just about every healing spell in the book short of Resurrection, and the worst skill level she has is 15. But I'm curious about what people think: does fixing the poor bastard's hand require Regeneration? (And if so, can the bones be grown back with it in situ, or does the hand need to be hacked off and start from scratch?) Restoration?

Obviously, I'll make a judgment call (and am leaning towards the healer's belief that this is an amputation/Regeneration situation), but how would you deal with it?
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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
I'd go with requiring regeneration, but you don't have to hack off the hand. He's missing important structural elements of his body, which is what regeneration is for. That the missing portions are weirdly selected is mostly flavor
I'm in agreement with Ericthered.

Regeneration regrows missing parts, the character has missing parts. Magic is all about filling in the fiddly details... there would be no special prep required.
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Old 05-29-2022, 10:32 AM   #14
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

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Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker View Post
I'm in agreement with Ericthered.

Regeneration regrows missing parts, the character has missing parts. Magic is all about filling in the fiddly details... there would be no special prep required.
Yes. Also note that even the non-Instant version of Regeneration is a 20 pt Spell that takes a month to work. It'd be 80 pts for Instant Regeneration.

This would be why gnerations of Gurps Magic healers haven't taken even just Restoration. They wouldn't have the 15 pts it takes to cast that one and you need to hole up for 30 days so you might as well go back to town and find an NPC to do it.

Also, there's some rules text in Evisceration about using Restoration to undo that Spell (if the victim survives long enough). I'd think you had to have the extracted organ to make simple Restoration work but if Restoration will put back a still beating heart it'd do bones. If you couldn't get back the bones you'd be back at Regneration.
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Old 05-29-2022, 02:18 PM   #15
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
This is why experienced healers know Resist Pain.
Which, of course, she does. Makes surgery (for which she likewise has a house spell that doesn't require opening the body) much easier!

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Also, there's some rules text in Evisceration about using Restoration to undo that Spell (if the victim survives long enough). I'd think you had to have the extracted organ to make simple Restoration work but if Restoration will put back a still beating heart it'd do bones. If you couldn't get back the bones you'd be back at Regneration.
Yeah, I just reread the text, but I think the key element to being able to use a simple Restoration is "The bad guy wizard yanked out your kidney, but here it still is, so hand it over and let me at it."

With that, some thoughts on some of the other responses:

* I'm militantly opposed to having how magical spells work be dependent on whether the PCs "had it coming" or not, any more than how a Fireball works ought to be dependent on whether its use (or the user) is somehow "worthy." How clerical prayers would work, possibly, but this isn't a clerical healer.

* In like fashion, I'm not out to screw the PCs. Something happened, they're responding to it, and at level worst, amputation/Regeneration will of course work. It isn't even that the rest of the party's debating how to handle it -- she's a Master healer who's the head of obstetrics at the great civil healing establishment in the imperial capitol, and they're leaving the whys and wherefores in her extremely well-trained hands.

* How the original spell works oughtn't be relevant either. As it happened, while the PCs were alerted to her existence -- one of the bad guys shouted for help, using an honorific commonly associated with wizards -- the wizard was hiding, and struck the PC from behind, at range and from concealment, and so far still is on the loose, although they THINK they have her bottled up.


And thank you all for your responses!
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Last edited by RGTraynor; 05-29-2022 at 02:38 PM.
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Old 05-29-2022, 02:36 PM   #16
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

Also: just talked it over with the healer's player. (Being married to her, this wasn't hard.) Her intent is to amputate/Regenerate -- as opposed to Regenerate without amputation -- for two reasons:

1) She has no idea what actually happened to the hand. She presumes it was a spell, and they did get a glimpse of the wizard, who was wearing regalia consonant with that magical order of transformation specialists. But she doesn't actually know what spell might have been used. She's concerned that there was a curse involved, that the hand might be tainted or infected in some way, and that it will spread. They're in the field, and she doesn't have any ability to deal with curses.

2) She wants to autopsy the hand. Is it just bones gone? Are they all gone? Are the tendons still there? How is the blood flow working? Her notion is that this is the best way to figure out what the heck happened, and that furthermore the owner of the hand would not be thrilled about her doing this while it was still attached.
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Old 05-29-2022, 03:48 PM   #17
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

Quote:
Originally Posted by RGTraynor View Post
With that, some thoughts on some of the other responses:

* I'm militantly opposed to having how magical spells work be dependent on whether the PCs "had it coming" or not, any more than how a Fireball works ought to be dependent on whether its use (or the user) is somehow "worthy." How clerical prayers would work, possibly, but this isn't a clerical healer.
It's not about the same spells working differently when used by different characters (unless they have special traits that alter the functionality of spells). It's about establishing why something happened, which was left out of the OP.

The distinction between "Major warning not to taunt/mess with the BBEG via scary but non-lethal curse" and "Statted out spell hitting the target and defeating resistance".

The first is a plot point, the second is a combat interaction.

The BBEG loses a lot of their percieved threat if you treat a warning from them the same as a relatively basic combat interaction. Had it been some unique spell cast by the BBEG (or one of their ranking officers) all bets should be off as to what is needed to remedy the situation.
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Old 05-30-2022, 02:40 AM   #18
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Default Re: How would your magical healers deal with this?

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Originally Posted by WingedKagouti View Post
It's not about the same spells working differently when used by different characters (unless they have special traits that alter the functionality of spells). It's about establishing why something happened, which was left out of the OP.

The distinction between "Major warning not to taunt/mess with the BBEG via scary but non-lethal curse" and "Statted out spell hitting the target and defeating resistance".

The first is a plot point, the second is a combat interaction.

The BBEG loses a lot of their percieved threat if you treat a warning from them the same as a relatively basic combat interaction. Had it been some unique spell cast by the BBEG (or one of their ranking officers) all bets should be off as to what is needed to remedy the situation.

For the record: the party members are spending a couple months on the frontier estate of one of their number. A band of slavers working the border picked off a couple of slaves from the next manor over, and the party went and got the slaves back. They decided to bring in some extra firepower, and with that find the band of slavers and rain some frontier justice upon their heads. The slavers hit another nearby manor hard, got over a dozen prisoners, and the party crossed their back trail, caught up with them, and launched an immediate assault. And, well, dang, turns out the slavers had a wizard with them. And gosh, the wizard chose to use an invisible, unblockable spell available to her to zap the weapon hand of a swordsman waving what was obviously a magical rapier.

I'm still failing to see the relevance to my OP. HOW this was done, WHY this was done, whether the party's tactics in the battle were sound or not, whether the wizard was taunted or not (that'd be a Not), whether the attacking spell was "unique" or not (non-standard, anyway), whether the scenario itself made sense or not, not remotely pertinent.
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