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How is disease and its effects recorded?
When does the effects of the disease set in?
When and how often must a character save to shake off the ailment?
How is ability damage and recovery handled?
All af these questions depend on magical healing not being used.
Can the heal skill be used to fight disease in PFS?
Director of Brand Strategy
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How is disease and its effects recorded?
In the items sold/conditions gained section, the GM should list the diseases/curses/etc. which have not been removed at the end of the scenario.
When does the effects of the disease set in?
That depends on the disease. Since the amount of time between scenarios isn't clear, the number of times a PC gets hit with the effects may be hard to calculate. I would assume it's just a requirement that you pay to remove any afflictions at the end of a scenario or the beginning of the next, but this could be clarified by Josh on the boards on in the next version of the GtPFSOP.
When and how often must a character save to shake off the ailment?
This depends on the affliction, but see above about how to handle ailments that carry over from one scenario to the next.
How is ability damage and recovery handled?
Recovery of ability damage is assumed to take place between scenarios the same way hp are restored. You always start a scenario with full ability scores, though this assumption is based on being unafflicted by diseases at a scenario's start, so again, see above.
Can the heal skill be used to fight disease in PFS?
The Heal skill provides bonuses to saves against diseases as written in the Core Rulebook. Using skills to gain benefits outside of the constrains of a scenario are difficult to track though.
I assume these questions are related to my scenario, The Pallid Plague, or is it just a coincidence that so many disease questions should arise now?
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When does the effects of the disease set in?That depends on the disease. Since the amount of time between scenarios isn't clear, the number of times a PC gets hit with the effects may be hard to calculate. I would assume it's just a requirement that you pay to remove any afflictions at the end of a scenario or the beginning of the next, but this could be clarified by Josh on the boards on in the next version of the GtPFSOP.
Until I hear otherwise by Josh I would not assume that it is a requirement. A similar situation was discussed long ago in ability damage. Say I'm poisoned for 12 points of Strength damage. I do not have to pay for lesser restorations to gain that strength back between sessions (unless I want to during the scenario). Because there is a gap of time between scenarios that could range between days and months, Josh has stated that "riding out" the nightly regaining of stat damage is legitimate. In that case, the time would be 12 days (youch). I could see doing the same for a disease a completely legit option since it too is typically measured in daily increments. Now if said disease causes CON damage, I could see the DM simply stating "okay, let's see if you die then between sessions" and then rolling out the daily check to see if the CON loss kills them.
If I remember right from other threads on this, basically, if it is something that will heal naturally over time without the use of magic, then it is considered healed at the beginning of your next scenario.
Of course, now that there will be multi-part scenarios, we may have more of a connection in how much time passes in those cases. I do not remember the name of the arc right now, but the one I remember seeing mentioned has four parts, where you can play parts 1-3 in any order but you have to play all three of them before playing part 4. So if there is a set amount of game time passage between finishing the last of the first three and beginning the final part, then there might be some things natural healing will not take care of fully by the start of part 4. But this would require making exceptions to the normal rules just for these arcs, so I have a feeling that the time passage will still be vague enough between the parts that natural healing will still do it's thing for your character.
As for some of your other questions, since you did not specify during a scenario or in between scenarios for diseases, there are some that would set in before the end of the scenario, but incubation periods should already be in the rules for diseases. As for it being a requirement at the end of a scenario to pay to have diseases removed, on page 21 the Guide makes it sound like that is your choice to do this or not:
"After, and sometimes during, a scenario, you have the option of dealing with your character’s misfortune.
You may have spells cast on your character, subtracting the gold piece cost from your total."
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Director of Brand Strategy
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As for it being a requirement at the end of a scenario to pay to have diseases removed, on page 21 the Guide makes it sound like that is your choice to do this or not:
"After, and sometimes during, a scenario, you have the option of dealing with your character’s misfortune.
You may have spells cast on your character, subtracting the gold piece cost from your total."
Yes, but if you choose not to pay to have yourself healed, how do you determine how much ability damage your PC takes in the interim between scenarios? Does the disease simply go away if you don't deal with it? And if so, what's the danger of getting a disease, which usually has a much longer frequency than a poison?
A player whose PC dies in a scenario could, by this logic, wait an indefinite amount of time to resurrect or raise dead their character, but that's not the case. When you die, you either fork up the cash/prestige to get yourself raised or that's the end of that PC. I think disease should have a similar time limit.
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Yes, but if you choose not to pay to have yourself healed, how do you determine how much ability damage your PC takes in the interim between scenarios? Does the disease simply go away if you don't deal with it? And if so, what's the danger of getting a disease, which usually has a much longer frequency than a poison?
You don't. All ability damage heals between scenarios, period. Whether it's by disease, poison, or a shadow, it doesn't matter if you've taken 1 point of strength damage or 17 points, you heal it all between scenarios. If you're going to start assuming that time is important, then it would need to be important for everything from disease to poison to straight up strength loss (again, compare that 17 days to heal you from 1 strength to 17 strength to something as mild as Filth Fever).
The key here is healing DURING a scenario (a scenario that's particularly tough and spans a day or so can be devastating to somebody with a bad disease. I could see a ruling that for particularly nasty diseases the DM should have the player "roll it out" to see if they need to use a remove disease in the downtime, but I don't think that as a rule one should be required to have it cast.
If Josh says otherwise then that's the ruling, but until then, I'll be running my games where Disease is cured between scenarios.
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I know the rules for diseases in the PRPG perfectly well, and am thus only concerned with the handling of disease and its effects in PFS.
I have two examples from an event I GMed this last weekend.
One was with filth fever. True in time most characters will shake it off. But Is that what we are expected to assume. The damage done by the disease cannot be recovered by normal rest since the disease damages at a faster rate than can be recovered by sleep. This COULD be severely debilitating to a 1st lvl character.
The other example is of a character contracting ghoul fever on his first adventure. He has no magical means with which to remove it, and the afliction is potentially lethel and would thus be wrong to ignore.
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If Josh says otherwise then that's the ruling, but until then, I'll be running my games where Disease is cured between scenarios.If that ends up being the case, what's the point of having a "conditions gained" box on the chronicle sheet?
Negative Levels is a condition, blindness is a condition, deafness is a condition. There are lots of conditions that don't go away between scenarios.
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The rules stipulate that if you end the scenario with an unresolved condition, you must note it on your sheet. The quote below is written from the perspective of what the GM must do or insure happens.
At the end of a scenario, a PC may have been afflicted with any number of possible conditions. If these conditions are resolved before the table breaks up, then you [the GM] have nothing to worry about. However, if the player is unable to resolve a condition before moving on to the next scenario, you [the GM] will need to write the condition in the Items Sold / Conditions Gained box and initial next to what you wrote. Please write clearly and legibly at all times, but it’s specifically important that you note their conditions legibly as it could cause problems down the line. Later, when the condition is resolved, another GM will list the condition as cleared under Items Bought / Conditions Cleared on the chronicle sheet for the scenario in which the condition was cleared. If the PC purchased the casting of a spell to clear the condition, the GM will need to make sure the player wrote that in the Items Bought / Conditions Cleared box at the bottom of the chronicle. If another PC cleared the condition by casting a spell, it should still be listed in the Items Bought / Conditions Cleared box, but with a 0 gp value and the casting character’s full Pathfinder Society number (XXXX-XX) written in next to the spell’s name.
Even if it's a disease that does ability damage, you still have to roll it out and resolve it. If a disease does, say, 1d6 Dex damage per day and you need 2 consecutive saves to cure it, then you (as the GM) need to make sure the players roll it out and resolve the disease. They can simply just have cure disease cast on them instead of rolling it out.
Now, if they've resolved the disease, have ability damage, and survived the ability damage, then (because it's damage and not drain) it heals before the beginning of their next scenario. If it's drain, they need to resolve it eventually through magic and if it's not resolved by the end of the scenario, it needs to be noted in Conditions Gained.
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Even if it's a disease that does ability damage, you still have to roll it out and resolve it. If a disease does, say, 1d6 Dex damage per day and you need 2 consecutive saves to cure it, then you (as the GM) need to make sure the players roll it out and resolve the disease. They can simply just have cure disease cast on them instead of rolling it out.
Now, if they've resolved the disease, have ability damage, and survived the ability damage, then (because it's damage and not drain) it heals before the beginning of their next scenario. If it's drain, they need to resolve it eventually through magic and if it's not resolved by the end of the scenario, it needs to be noted in Conditions Gained.
I think it is odd, but then some things have to be in OP.
But must diseases become inconsequential this way (even for 1st lvl characters). Since onset time for most days is 1 day+ the effect will never have any impact on the game or character. Likewise some diseases such as ghoul fever might bring a very sudden death to low level characters. Considering a character has no ability to counter the disease between scenarios, if he does not have the gp or PA to remove it.
I suggest a fixed down time be implemented in PFS. A period that might not reflect the real time elapsed between scenarios, but is rather an administrative unit.
If down time is set to 5 days that would mean a diseased or cursed character might need to make 5 saves to resist the given condition. Like wise a player hireing a henchman/servant would need to pay 5 times the daily salary. Other situations where downtime would be relevant to consider will no doubt arise at some point or another.
Being an administrative unit, downtime will not in anyway affect usage of magic items or special abilities (as already stated in the 2.1 such powers/abilities are reset and ready to use when a new scenario starts.
One effect of downtime would be that a 1st lvl character afflicted with ghoul touch could go on an adventure (even if debilitated) in an attempt to raise funds or find other PCs which can help him/her be rid of the disease.
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Another problem with the current rules is that only diseases that do Con damage, or permanent ability drain, have any consequence for the pc. A disease that does Con damage can kill you, but a disease that does, say, Dex damage, can only, in the worst case scenario, bring you down to 0 Dex, thus sending you into a coma. But as soon as the next scenario starts, all ability damage is removed, and the disease becomes inconsequential. Is that how it's supposed to work?
And a question: In 3.0 and 3.5, Remove Disease just removed the disease, but in Pathfinder, you have to succeed on a caster level check. Does this apply when you buy spellcasting services between scenarios? Do you have to roll to see if the spell cast by some random cleric spell vendor works, and do you have to pay for it, even if it doesn't work?
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And a question: In 3.0 and 3.5, Remove Disease just removed the disease, but in Pathfinder, you have to succeed on a caster level check. Does this apply when you buy spellcasting services between scenarios? Do you have to roll to see if the spell cast by some random cleric spell vendor works, and do you have to pay for it, even if it doesn't work?
It certainly does. I had a very very unfortunate player who had to have remove disease cast on her about 5 times before she was cured of it.
Another problem with the current rules is that only diseases that do Con damage, or permanent ability drain, have any consequence for the pc. A disease that does Con damage can kill you, but a disease that does, say, Dex damage, can only, in the worst case scenario, bring you down to 0 Dex, thus sending you into a coma. But as soon as the next scenario starts, all ability damage is removed, and the disease becomes inconsequential. Is that how it's supposed to work?
And a question: In 3.0 and 3.5, Remove Disease just removed the disease, but in Pathfinder, you have to succeed on a caster level check. Does this apply when you buy spellcasting services between scenarios? Do you have to roll to see if the spell cast by some random cleric spell vendor works, and do you have to pay for it, even if it doesn't work?
If you have cancer and you get Chemotherapy and it doesn't get all of the cancer... Do you still have to pay the medical bills?
Does this apply when you buy spellcasting services between scenarios? Do you have to roll to see if the spell cast by some random cleric spell vendor works, and do you have to pay for it, even if it doesn't work?
Yes because you're paying the cleric for his time and the use of one of his spell slots. It's certainly different from 3.5, but this change was so that diseases, poisons, and some hazards weren't effectively removed from the game at a certain level. We wanted those things to be hazardous throughout all levels.
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Does this apply when you buy spellcasting services between scenarios? Do you have to roll to see if the spell cast by some random cleric spell vendor works, and do you have to pay for it, even if it doesn't work?Yes because you're paying the cleric for his time and the use of one of his spell slots. It's certainly different from 3.5, but this change was so that diseases, poisons, and some hazards weren't effectively removed from the game at a certain level. We wanted those things to be hazardous throughout all levels.
In that case I find it very strange that diseases have been nerfed this mutch in PFS.
I assume CL should be minimum for any casting services when determining success and failure of remove disease or other similar spells?
Yep.
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Since it's been implied but not asked directly I just want to make sure the following scenario is true.
Let's say I get hit with a disease that only causes CHA damage. In these instances there's really no reason to "roll out" the outcome of the disease because in the end, I'll recover eventually and since CHA damage won't kill me, I do not need a remove disease. The resulting coma of dropping to 0 CHA has not adverse effect other than I can tell other players that I had a pretty bad case of the crabs?
Correct?
Also, to the detractors of this ruling, has non-CON damage disease really been that significant a factor in the society games you've played? I was under the impression that disease was pretty rare in scenario games anyway.
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*places fingers firmly in ears*
LALALALALALALALALALALALALALALALA!