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Old 10-30-2021, 01:23 PM   #1
watsonsword
 
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Default Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Making a character who's body contains a reservoir of substance it can use to heal itself. When this substance runs out, the character can no longer heal until this substance is replenished.

I thought I could do this by combining regeneration and minor-regrowth with total-unhealing. The total-unhealing would have a treatment-mitigator. This treatment is not based on time, but on number of HP regenerated. The character can only regenerate X HP before total-unhealing activates. It then deactivated with treatment.

Thing is, with my current sources, there's no way for me figure out what the point cost would be!
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Old 10-30-2021, 02:09 PM   #2
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

I would use Healing (or regeneration) + Costs Energy Reserve (not Fatigue). This ER would be the "substance". So, when you run out of ER you can heal no more.
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Old 10-30-2021, 07:56 PM   #3
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Quote:
Originally Posted by lvalero View Post
I would use Healing (or regeneration) + Costs Energy Reserve (not Fatigue). This ER would be the "substance". So, when you run out of ER you can heal no more.
This sounds right to me.
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Old 10-30-2021, 08:31 PM   #4
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Agree with the above. And then you can cost it based on how easy or difficult it is to replenish the reservoir.
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Old 11-01-2021, 09:18 AM   #5
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Quote:
Originally Posted by watsonsword View Post
Making a character who's body contains a reservoir of substance it can use to heal itself. When this substance runs out, the character can no longer heal until this substance is replenished.

I thought I could do this by combining regeneration and minor-regrowth with total-unhealing. The total-unhealing would have a treatment-mitigator. This treatment is not based on time, but on number of HP regenerated. The character can only regenerate X HP before total-unhealing activates. It then deactivated with treatment.

Thing is, with my current sources, there's no way for me figure out what the point cost would be!
The GM would need to come up with a base assumption for how much damage the character is likely to take during, say, a day of adventuring (if this is in excess of your character's healing rate, he'd use your character's maximum healing rate instead). You then set the rate of treatment based on that.

So, let's say the GM decides your character is unlikely to typically take more than 100% of HP* of damage during a day of adventuring, and your character can regenerate at least that much (Regular Regeneration is good for 240% of HP per day). If you have a reserve of 100% of HP, that calls for Daily treatment. If you have a reserve of 1000% of HP, that's right between Weekly (700%) and BiWeekly (1400%), and so forth.

*I typically set each HP of regeneration as 10% of HP - so a character with HP 15 and Extreme Regeneration would recover 15 HP per second, not 10. Makes the jump from HP 19 to HP 20 less extreme. If you prefer to stick with things as-is, the above become 10 HP, 24 HP, 10 HP, 100 HP, 70 HP, and 140 HP, respectively.
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Last edited by Varyon; 11-01-2021 at 09:46 AM.
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Old 11-01-2021, 02:25 PM   #6
watsonsword
 
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

I apologize. I left out an important piece of information.

This substance does not replenish itself. So this feature is similar to a dependency, except it's not based on time. It can last indefinitely if the character takes no damage. But if it runs out, unhealing activates until the character ingests more.

Using current GURPS advantages/disadvantages and their mods, there's doesn't seem to be any way to do this!

Now, it would be so easy to simply invent this feature. Making these rules is not a problem. The problem is simply figuring out the point cost. According to the setting, Varyon's suggestion of a 24 HP reservoir for regeneration would be ideal.

The character is a class of NPCs called Zoids. Their bio is in the form a dialogue, this being the most important part:

Quote:
Are the Zoids machines or organic?

Something in between.

Cyborgs?

No. Cyborgs are organic with machine parts, or machines with organic parts. Even at the molecular level, the Zoids aren't machine or organic, but something in between.

Well... we've all seen the advantages of that firsthand. What about the disadvantages?

They can't heal naturally.

The hell are you talking about? I've seen them heal from getting impaled through-and-through in less than a day! Scarlessly!

They have reservoirs of a base substance that their bodies are made of. Their wounds don't heal themselves. Instead, they use this substance to heal. And their bodies can't make the stuff. Imagine you have a bag of stem cells inside you. If you get cut, your skin can't regenerate. Instead, your body uses up some of those stem cells to close the wound. And those stem cells can't replicate! When you run out, you can never heal from anything again until your bag is refilled from outside.

How's that different from us needing food?

There's a reason organic life is made of such soft stuff. It might be easy to break, but it's also easy to mend. But if you're made of harder stuff? You don't mend so easy. Our bodies can use food to make the substance they need to heal. Imagine you can't do that. Instead, that substance has to be manufactured in a lab. And if that lab disappears...

You starve?

Maybe after years. But the main thing is, you just can't heal anymore.

So the superhuman powers of the Zoids come at the expense of adaptability?

Last edited by watsonsword; 11-01-2021 at 02:28 PM.
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Old 11-01-2021, 02:43 PM   #7
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Perhaps vitality reserve that doesn't immediately keep you alive is appropriate?
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Old 11-02-2021, 06:23 AM   #8
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Quote:
Originally Posted by watsonsword View Post
The character is a class of NPCs called Zoids.
Can PC's be Zoids? If not, you probably don't need a point cost. There's a partial exception if a PC can have one or more Zoids as personal Allies or Enemies. In that case, however, you have a bit of leeway with points (keep in mind the GM builds Allies and Enemies, not the player), given such characters are meant to be up to 100% (or whatever level you purchase) of the PC's point value, so if we're a little off in our estimate, it's probably fine.

If you still need a point value, I think the only thing you're missing is the rate at which you expect these characters to accumulate injury while involved in an adventure (you don't need to worry about the ones working on the fringes of space or whatever - those probably just have Doesn't Eat and maybe a Quirk that they need to occasionally consume some Zoidpaste or whatever). Note that, given the large gaps in time per -5% for the Mitigator, you can get away with a pretty rough estimate. You said 24 HP sounded about right for the full reserve, from which I'll assume they have Regular Regeneration and have enough on a full tank to heal for a full day. If you expect them to suffer around that much injury or a bit more in a day (again, a day they are involved in an adventure and/or combat), Mitigator: Daily Treatment -60% works. If you expect them to take less than that, but more than 3 HP injury, go with Mitigator: Weekly -65% (24/7=~3.5). If you expect them to take between around 1 and 3 HP per day, go with Mitigator: Monthly -70% (24/30=0.8). If you expect them to only take less than that, Mitigator: Seasonally* -75% (down to ~1 HP injury every 4 days) or Mitigator: Yearly* -80% (down to ~1 HP injury every 15 days) should work. You may wish to apply the inverse to their Regeneration and Regrowth - arguably, Daily would be -40% on an Advantage, while Weekly would be -35%, Monthly would be -30%, etc. This probably gives an excessively-high discount, however (-30% for having to take a drug once a month is rather high); you may wish to look at Power Ups 8: Limitations for ideas of more proper costs.

Note here we're using the pricing for time-dependent Mitigators. This is similar to how one makes a "Until [event] occurs" Duration in Ritual Path Magic - the GM figures out how long it's likely to take for said event to occur, then sets the cost of Duration based on that. If the GM expects the event to happen in a year, you pay for 1 year Duration - and even if the event doesn't actually happen for decades, the spell stays in effect until it does (or the magic gets dispelled).

*Note I don't think these are RAW, but roughly follow the Day->Week->Month pattern.
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Old 11-02-2021, 08:48 AM   #9
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Until you said that about the Zoids, I was wondering if this was yet another poster trying to play Vampire: the Masquerade but in GURPS! Maybe some of those who've done that could chime in here? Exactly the same scenario, it looks like.
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Old 11-02-2021, 11:34 AM   #10
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Default Re: Regeneration + Mitigated-Unhealing based on Number of HP Regenerated?

Maybe something like Unhealing with a mitigator and Regeneration with a Trigger?
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