[Basic, Powers] Cost issue with Healing Alternative Abilities

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by johndallman

There was a claim that AAs of the same basic power are wrong, but the workability of AAs of Afflictions are evidence that isn't always true.

Yes, but, as I said, Affliction's the outlier here, not everything else. In general, I think you're going to run into problems trying to combine Alternate Abilities and the "Only X" sort of limitations. They're just not designed to be used together.

Actually, even Afflictions are probably better built, as Refplace said, with Alternate Enhancements on one Affliction, rather than Alternate Abilities.

Originally Posted by johndallman

Diseases: Healing [30], Affects Self +50%, Magical -10%, Diseases Only -40%, Immediate Preparation Required, 1 minute (time for basic treatment), -30%, Triggering substance, Common (Woundwort and first aid kit) -20%, 4/day -20%, net cost [9].

When used to cure disease, the subject still has to recover from the symptoms. Healing hit point damage done by the disease works, but doesn’t wipe away symptoms.

Regeneration (Slow), Magical -10% , [9], as an AA of Diseases [2]. These are both abilities that affect the character that has them.

Injuries: Healing [30], Magical -10%, Injuries Only -20%, Immediate Preparation Required, 1 minute (time for basic treatment), -30%, Triggering substance, Common (Woundwort and first aid kit) -20%, net cost [6].

Here's what I'd suggest for this build: Both Healing abilities are the same advantage. Put all the shared modifiers on it as normal (that is, Magical, Immediate Preparation Required, and Trigger). Then, total the modifiers for the different "packages" - for diseases, that's Affects Self, Diseases Only, and Limited Use, for a total of -10%, while for injuries, it's just Injuries Only, -20%. Use Either/Or limitations to get a final limitation value of those two of -2%, which I would round up to -5% (smaller Either/Or limitations tend to undervalue the final limitation, I feel, so rounding up is reasonable).

That gives you a final build of
Healing (Magical, -10%; Immediate Preparation Required, 1 minute (time for basic treatment), -30%; Triggering substance, Common (Woundwort and first aid kit), -20%; Either Affects Self, Diseases Only, and Limited Use, 4/day Or Injuries Only, -5%) [11]

This, I'll note, is actually cheaper than building it as two separate Healing abilities, so some points are saved.

Originally Posted by johndallman

Can stabilise a mortal wound, at a cost of 10FP.

A question - is the injury healing supposed to be an absolute last resort, "only use this to stabilize a mortal wound" sort of thing? If it is, you could include another limitation, basically the reverse of Capped, where you must spend a certain amount of FP, no matter how severe the wound actually is. I'd price that at -5% for the number of FP past 1 you have to spend, so 10 FP minimum would be -45%, for example.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

I would because during any given turn they are only going to be able to defend using one or the other, not both. So when they are hit with both fire and ice attacks in the same turn, one gets through.

I'd still rather build that with Either/Or limitations, I think, rather than Alternate Abilities.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

That gives you a final build of

Healing (Magical, -10%; Immediate Preparation Required, 1 minute (time for basic treatment), -30%; Triggering substance, Common (Woundwort and first aid kit), -20%; Either Affects Self, Diseases Only, and Limited Use, 4/day Or Injuries Only, -5%) [11]

This, I'll note, is actually cheaper than building it as two separate Healing abilities, so some points are saved.

So it is. I had not fully understood what you were suggesting, and thought that it would be more expensive this way. I'll see what my GM thinks of it.

A question - is the injury healing supposed to be an absolute last resort, "only use this to stabilize a mortal wound" sort of thing?

No, it isn't. I do want to be able to stabilise mortal wounds, however.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by johndallman

I'll see what my GM thinks of it.

He likes it, and I'm going ahead with it.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by johndallman

He likes it, and I'm going ahead with it.

Glad it worked for you!

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

Glad it worked for you!

Thanks for the help!

[RogerBW]

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen

I think the core problem here is trying to take what's actually one advantage (Healing) as two different advantages and make them Alternate Abilities of each other. I don't think that's the intended use, and is always going to have problems.

Speaking as the GM in question… yes, that was one of the basic problems I had. The two modes of Healing are effectively already AAs of each other, so it's not surprising this breaks a bit.

The other basic problem is that a limitation of "half the time" is -20%, not -50% - I assume, deliberately, to reward players for low-complexity characters - and so the broken-down version tends to get more expensive than the basic one. (Which is not as bad as getting cheaper, but not good.) I.e. if you buy Healing Injuries Only [24] and Healing Disease Only [18] you end up with Healing, but for 12 more points.

I'm very happy with Either/Or as a solution here - indeed, I'm probably going to prefer it over AAs where possible.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by RogerBW

The other basic problem is that a limitation of "half the time" is -20%, not -50% - I assume, deliberately, to reward players for low-complexity characters

No, it's deliberately, because players have the amazing ability to turn "half the time" into "Actually I only wanted to use it on women anyways" and 100% of the time. Unless it's literally "Flip a coin, heads it doesn't work this time" kind of limitations.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Bruno

Unless it's literally "Flip a coin, heads it doesn't work this time" kind of limitations.

And, notably, Unreliable, which basically is this, gives -20% for what's effectively 62% of the time. So, yeah, "truly random activation" is worth more than simple "50% of the time, measured objectively" would be.