|
| 7 people marked this as FAQ candidate. |
This seems to come up in games I play in about once a month or so. Given this thread HERE, I am guessing there are many people unclear on what is or is not a condition which must be cleared at the end of a scenario. Specifically,
Is ability damage (not drain, mind you) a condition which must be cleared at the end of a scenario?
|
|
Were you my GMs, this wouldn't be an issue.
The confusion comes from the guide which says that ALL conditions (except death, permanent negative levels, and ability drain) must be cleared or the character is reported as dead.
More than one GM has said to me that ability damage isn't the same as drain, and it is a condition so it must be cleared.
This is extremely frustrating to have this discussion with many different GMs over and over and over...
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Were you my GMs, this wouldn't be an issue.
The confusion comes from the guide which says that ALL conditions (except death, permanent negative levels, and ability drain) must be cleared or the character is reported as dead.
More than one GM has said to me that ability damage isn't the same as drain, and it is a condition so it must be cleared.
This is extremely frustrating to have this discussion with many different GMs over and over and over...
Ah. So you want a FAQ to confirm the fairly obvious answer. I can get behind that.
|
|
If you're an eidolon, it might be a condition because they do not ever heal ability damage without magic, but I think that clause doesn't apply to your eidolon anyway (I think you can be a summoner with a hideously cursed and permanently blinded and ability drained and energy drained eidolon and not be retired, even if your build focused on the eidolon as the real character and you're actually pretty crippled by this).
Owner - D20 Hobbies
|
Is ability damage (not drain, mind you) a condition which must be cleared at the end of a scenario?
If it will heal on it's own over the course of days, you are fine.
If it doesn't, then you need to pay to clear the condition.
More than one GM has said to me that ability damage isn't the same as drain, and it is a condition so it must be cleared.
Easy fix.
Next time, just say:
Ok, I take a vacation after the module. I spent 5 days on a wilderness hike.
I regain 5 points of ability damage.
I'm healed !!!!!
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yes it must be cleared.
Yes you can clear it by "we camp out at the dig-sight for three days, take in the sights, open a bottle of wine, make some nice sketches of what we see, meet the local fauna"
Or you can get a messageboard clarification and staple it to the GM's forehead.
...
... or maybe that's just me.
|
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
|
Hmmm. For the majority of scenarios, I agree, the player characters should be allowed time to recover, before the scenario is over.
But there are, as always, corner cases. I take a look at a couple of different scenario-series ("Before the Dawn", "Wonders in the Weave", or "Rats of Round Mountain") which expect the character to carry on from one scenario straight into the next, with various amounts of rules-waving and hand-wringing.
I can well imagine a GM saying "You want to spend seven days sitting around here [in the jungle while Consortium members are in hot pursuit] / [in an extra-dimensional space while Consortium members are stealing artifacts or making alliances]? All right, I'll note that on your Chronicle sheet for the next GM to adjudicate as appropriate. Incidentally, would you show me where you have seven days of rations?"
--
By the way, I'd never considered whether permanent effects on Eidolons and animal companions have to be cleared. I've never had a player sit down at my table and tell me that her tiger is still blind from the previous scenario. Do spells like that automatically end at the conclusion of a scenario, as if they were cast on a PC?
|
|
I've actually had someone come into a scenario with 2 ability damage of some sort on the eidolon. He said "Hey everyone. Last game there was no cleric to auto-clear these points. If we still don't have one, I'll grab a lesser resto at a temple for 60 gp if we think we need it. If we do have someone who could cast it for free, I'd appreciate it."
|
Yes it must be cleared.
Yes you can clear it by "we camp out at the dig-sight for three days, take in the sights, open a bottle of wine, make some nice sketches of what we see, meet the local fauna"
Or you can get a messageboard clarification and staple it to the GM's forehead.
The eartags were bad enough....
|
|
But there are, as always, corner cases. I take a look at a couple of different scenario-series ("Before the Dawn", "Wonders in the Weave", or "Rats of Round Mountain") which expect the character to carry on from one scenario straight into the next, with various amounts of rules-waving and hand-wringing.
Heh. "Fortunately, I'm going up to Irrisen for a three-parter at the con next weekend, and then returning to resume this chase scene next month at our next game day. So ..."
That said, you do make a good point: If we're going to handwave it as a result of verisimilitude ("I can go camping"), that raises new concerns. All the more reason to get the clarification, really--if it's something we're meant to handwave, let's do so based on rules, rather than setting.
|
Owner - D20 Hobbies
|
This could have been a problem for me, long ago I had a 10th level character Baleful Polymorphed into a Monkey.
It took a friendly PC Sorcerer 22 castings of Dispel Magic to clear the effect.
This means that for a great many effects, not making the required caster level check on the first attempt means you dead.
I don't think that is desired, intended, or fair. Just my opinion.
|
As mentioned, ability damage is not a condition, and will clear on its own over time. Of course, the situation that caused the ability damage needs to be resolved so that the healing can commence.
That can require a Remove Disease, Heal, or series of Heal checks/Fort saves to resolve, hopefully before you reach the 0 stat status...
And I just hand-waved the healing needed to restore the Str and Con points that my PCs lost during <redacted> a couple of days ago, as the cause of the ability damage, in both cases, was dead, so they could heal naturally (whatever, that is, was left after they got some lesser restorations in order to not face the rest of the module with one of their frontliners down 7 points of Strength...). At least, what damage was still there at the end of the game...
Ooh, look at the shiny. Now my rerolls are at +3 instead of +2. And I get to figure out what my shiny new third GM star replay is going to be...