First, make the Heal check have potential repercussions for failing by 5 or more, and have the subject of the surgery take damage if the skill check is blown. Why, you ask? Because then you can take away the limitation of once per day, and eliminate some bookkeeping.
That's a neat idea which I like for it's own sake. I don't have a problem with a once per day limit in this case, since natural healing already functions on a per day basis. Although I agree with toyrobots that other time requirements also effectively limit the ability, just as making HP above some % non-deadly, not eligible to benefit from TDW (which maybe ought to be renamed if it functions above that %). The benefit might also be contingent on the character not moving around.
Next, set the DC to some variable amount – I’d recommend adding to the DC the number of hit points the character is reduced from maximum.
That doesn't scale, since it makes TDW for high level characters impossible. This has the same problem as the existing formula for not losing a spell when taking damage (DC 10 + spell level + damage taken). HP eventually dominate all other factors, whether spell level or skill ranks, making them irrelevant.
Lastly, I’d also advocate allowing Heal to revivify creatures that have died the round before. This was a clear win situation for the game when the Revivify spell was added in the Spell Compendium (and Pathfinder added Breath of Life). Adding this function to the Heal skill would increase the survivability of characters immensely.
This is the best part of your idea, I think, and hasn't gotten much attention in this thread. It certainly fits the name: TDW. I would extend it beyond one round, maybe increase the DC by 5 per round beyond the first.
I think toyrobots has the right idea that there is some room to play with without competing with magical healing abilities. Since this is a fantasy game, I'm even OK with the possibility of skills achieving some magical effects.
Inigo: He's dead. He can't talk.
Miracle Max: Hoo hoo hoo! Look who knows so much, heh? Well, it just so happens that your friend here is only mostly dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Please, open his mouth. Now, mostly dead is slightly alive. Now, all dead...well, with all dead, there's usually only one thing you can do.
Inigo: What's that?
Miracle Max: Go through his clothes and look for loose change.
Any improvement to the Heal Skill necessarily improves the Cleric as well. Until the skill is improved, it is largely a "flavor" class skill. I doubt as if many Clerics have actually blown their few skill points on a skill that their class abilities render obsolete.
If the Heal skill could return HP, albeit in a time-consuming manner, I imagine many Cleric players would gravitate toward it so that they could retain heal spells for emergency uses, and get more use out of their non-band-aid spells. Most importantly: this leaves the balance of the game largely unchanged, since the extra healing only comes between encounters. The significant increase is in how many encounters can be faced in one day, which we can all agree is a good thing. Especially if it doesn't make the characters more powerful during the encounters.
This means that if your fighter buddy that can get through the BBEG's DR drops in the middle of combat, sure, you'll use a heal spell. But for dealing with wounds after the BBEG is dealt with but you want to continue adventuring for the day (or survive the journey home), take an hour or so to restore HP the non-magical way.
The reason this makes sense is because HP don't make sense. Any argument you can conjure for why the Heal Skill shouldn't regenerate HP can be applied equally to the conventional means of regeneration.
HP are abstract, and we've all learned to love that, else we don't play this game. The heal skill represents the ability to restore well-being, HP are the only metric this game has for health, and the Heal skill goes unused because it doesn't behave (abstractly) in the way a new player would expect.
</rant>
Suggested Mechanic
The Heal Skill should be modeled after the Cure spells. I like to think that the Cure spells are "instantaneous medical treatment", and so the heal skill should be the same process on a longer timescale.
DC Wound Heal Amount
10 Light 1d8 + Heal Ranks (max 5)
15 Moderate 2d8 + Heal Ranks (max 10)
20 Serious 3d8 + Heal Ranks (max 15)
25 Critical 4d8 + Heal Ranks (max 20)
Failing the roll heals no HP, and the healer wastes 1/2 the healing time before finding the treatment is useless. Failing by 5 or more wastes twice that time, and deals 1d6 non-lethal damage.
Success by more than five points means the treatment takes half the time.
Treating wounds consumes 1 use of a healing kit per 1d8 healed. Healing without a kit incurs a -5 penalty to the roll. You may only treat a set of wounds once per day, and you must select the amount of healing before the treatment roll.
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Toyrobots: I like and agree with your rant, but I disagree with your interpretation of the mechanic. The DCs are way to low for my tastes, and it encourages getting a certain # of ranks and then stopping, which I don't think is right for the heal skill, the heal skill is one of those skills that I think someone should always want to invest more SP in.
Toyrobots: I like and agree with your rant, but I disagree with your interpretation of the mechanic. The DCs are way to low for my tastes, and it encourages getting a certain # of ranks and then stopping, which I don't think is right for the heal skill, the heal skill is one of those skills that I think someone should always want to invest more SP in.
Like everything I suggest, it's intended to stimulate conversation rather than to work right out of the box. Many people on this board know the ins and outs of the system and think on a level I can only admire.
The idea was to show how the skill mechanic can mirror the familiar parts of healing magic. Margin of success/failure to augment time wasted is one of my favorite rules from Shadowrun (among other games) and it is a great balancing factor for skill rolls. The DCs might be a little low. I was viewing this as the primary function of the skill, and considering the risk of failure it seemed about right to me.
With those DCs, a class skill and +3 wisdom, only a level 20 character would have enough ranks to auto-pass on a critical roll. My reasoning might be flawed.
At any rate, the short form of what I would like to see is: Healing does the same thing as Cure Spells, takes a lot longer, and margin of success/failure modifies the time consumed. And any use of a healing kit should consume one charge, anything else is needlessly counter-intuitive. Change the price of a heal kit if need be.
The reason this makes sense is because HP don't make sense. Any argument you can conjure for why the Heal Skill shouldn't regenerate HP can be applied equally to the conventional means of regeneration.
Yes, and it's certainly no more absurd than the idea of spontaneous "healing surges" in 4e.
Failing the roll heals no HP, and the healer wastes 1/2 the healing time before finding the treatment is useless. Failing by 5 or more wastes twice that time, and deals 1d6 non-lethal damage.
It's nice that you preserved the OP's idea about failure harming the patient. What if the damage was non-lethal only when attempting to heal light wounds?
Light treatment takes 15 minutes.
Moderate treatment takes 30 minutes
Serious treatment takes 1 hour.
Critical treatment takes 2 hours.
Doubling the time for each additional d8 healed might discourage investing in this skill beyond a certain point, as pointed out by lastknightleft. Since the healing scales linearly, so should the time, I think. How about 15 minutes per d8, so it scales from 15 minutes for light wounds to 1 hour for critical wounds.
You could also raise the DCs by 5 so that cure critical wounds is not designed as an auto-pass at any level. Since First Aid (i.e. Stabilize) currently has a DC of 15, it doesn't seem way off to start at 15 for light wounds. You could add Stabilize to your progression at DC 10. If this seems too hard, other factors can help, such as a masterwork kit adding a +2 circumstance bonus, or a feat could add +5 to healing checks.
Like everything I suggest, it's intended to stimulate conversation rather than to work right out of the box. Many people on this board know the ins and outs of the system and think on a level I can only admire.
The idea was to show how the skill mechanic can mirror the familiar parts of healing magic.
Bravo, I think this is a terrific idea. What did you think about the OP's idea of restoring life to recently dead creatures, as per the Breath of Life spell? You could add that as the next stage in your progression, at DC 35, since that mirrors the progression in the spell list (Breath of Life heals 5d8 +1/caster level, max 25). However, I think it's a shame that this ability is denied to low level characters, who probably need it more. The spell, like the OP's suggestion, only works within one round of death, which I think is too limiting.
It's nice that you preserved the OP's idea about failure harming the patient. What if the damage was non-lethal only when attempting to heal light wounds?
I'd be fine with that, just a drop of additional complexity. If this were a suggestion for a houserule and not a mechanic intended for mass consumption, I would have PCs track the amount of damage dealt by each attack (and possibly its location), and use that to set the "level" of the healing effect. But alas, I think that's much too complicated.
Doubling the time for each additional d8 healed might discourage investing in this skill beyond a certain point, as pointed out by lastknightleft. Since the healing scales linearly, so should the time, I think. How about 15 minutes per d8, so it scales from 15 minutes for light wounds to 1 hour for critical wounds.You could also raise the DCs by 5 so that cure critical wounds is not designed as an auto-pass at any level. Since First Aid (i.e. Stabilize) currently has a DC of 15, it doesn't seem way off to start at 15 for light wounds. You could add Stabilize to your progression at DC 10. If this seems too hard, other factors can help, such as a masterwork kit adding a +2 circumstance bonus, or a feat could add +5 to healing checks.
15 minutes per d8 sounds fine. To find the happy medium it must take enough time to be doubled on a margin of failure, or halved on a margin of success.
Setting DCs is more art than science. If the consensus is that it should be higher, I won't argue.
Bravo, I think this is a terrific idea. What did you think about the OP's idea of restoring life to recently dead creatures, as per the Breath of Life spell? You could add that as the next stage in your progression, at DC 35, since that mirrors the progression in the spell list (Breath of Life heals 5d8 +1/caster level, max 25). However, I think it's a shame that this ability is denied to low level characters, who probably need it more. The spell, like the OP's suggestion, only works within one round of death, which I think is too limiting.
Restoring life to dead creatures is the province of miracle, not medicine. I think that would be going too far with the heal skill, which is supposed to be "non-magical" (though there are "magical" skills). Healers can save people who have dropped to negative HP, but I believe when the soul departs the body in D&D metaphysics, then you need a spell to bring it back.
As much as I love the film and novel The Princess Bride, I don't see it as a model for game rules. That's how we ended up with Weapon Swap!
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Bravo, I think this is a terrific idea. What did you think about the OP's idea of restoring life to recently dead creatures, as per the Breath of Life spell? You could add that as the next stage in your progression, at DC 35, since that mirrors the progression in the spell list (Breath of Life heals 5d8 +1/caster level, max 25). However, I think it's a shame that this ability is denied to low level characters, who probably need it more. The spell, like the OP's suggestion, only works within one round of death, which I think is too limiting.
Hmm lets see, 1 rank, plus class skill plus 18 wisdom
1+3+4=8
Skill focus and the +2 feat, also healers kit for an additional +2
8+3+2+2=15
Aid another +2
15+2= 17
35-17=18
Actually if a player wanted to play a dedicated healer, a DC 35 is within the realm of posibility for a level one character.
Actually if a player wanted to play a dedicated healer, a DC 35 is within the realm of posibility for a level one character.
That example has a large number of requirements, though. I'd say if they take two feats, spend money on a kit, and have a buddy helping them, let them have the 10% chance. They'll just heal more HP than they have.
For that matter, wouldn't PCs maxing out the Heal skill be a sign that we've got a working mechanic? It is still inferior to a Cure spell on multiple accounts, but now worth taking! That is a good thing!
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I don't mind the idea of converting lethal to nonlethal damage. Here's what I suggest:
- time should still be 1 hour (to prevent competition with magical healing)
- allow conversion of 1d4 + Wis modifier hit points to nonlethal damage.
- don't regulate times per day it can be used (bookkeeping attempts on various players is a bad idea)
- each use uses up 1/5 of a healing kit (50 gp), and nothing from a masterwork healing kit (a new item worth 500 gp)
Ta da!
I am going to bring this to my co-DMs attention for house-ruling, modified only by increasing the DC by 5(?) for each subsequent successful healing attempt.
Provides a reason to continue to improve your characters healing skill and represent that only so much can be done with short term care and a healing kit.
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Actually if a player wanted to play a dedicated healer, a DC 35 is within the realm of posibility for a level one character.That example has a large number of requirements, though. I'd say if they take two feats, spend money on a kit, and have a buddy helping them, let them have the 10% chance. They'll just heal more HP than they have.
For that matter, wouldn't PCs maxing out the Heal skill be a sign that we've got a working mechanic? It is still inferior to a Cure spell on multiple accounts, but now worth taking! That is a good thing!
Um where did me saying it was possible turn into me saying it's bad? I actually think I would like the DC to bring someone back from the dead to be high, but I wasn't saying that, I was just adressing him saying that it wasn't in the realm of first level characters
I understand your concern, but right now I have to go along with certain base-line assumptions about the game, such as:
- Parties have access to magic healing
- Magic healing is a finite resource that helps control the flow of the gameOpening up the heal skill to be a general use replacement for healing really alters some dynamics that I am concerned about changing, not just to individual groups, but to the game as a whole.
I think that if you are running a low magic or cleric/paladin free game, there are a number of adjustments you already need to make, and altering the Heal skill is one simple one to make. I am not trying to be dismissive here (as this is something I have actually thought about quite a bit), but I am hesitant to open up this skill use too much.
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing
What about adding additional healing magic items that require (or at least function better) when used by characters trained in the heal skill?
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What about adding additional healing magic items that require (or at least function better) when used by characters trained in the heal skill?I understand your concern, but right now I have to go along with certain base-line assumptions about the game, such as:
- Parties have access to magic healing
- Magic healing is a finite resource that helps control the flow of the gameOpening up the heal skill to be a general use replacement for healing really alters some dynamics that I am concerned about changing, not just to individual groups, but to the game as a whole.
I think that if you are running a low magic or cleric/paladin free game, there are a number of adjustments you already need to make, and altering the Heal skill is one simple one to make. I am not trying to be dismissive here (as this is something I have actually thought about quite a bit), but I am hesitant to open up this skill use too much.
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing
I just personally hate having magic items for everything, I'd like to actually use my own skills and class features and have them do something without having to turn to magic items every time I stub my toe or fight a bug-bladder beast.
Here is a random thought for consideration:
Treat Deadly Wounds can only restore a character to 1/2 his normal HP total. That would be in addition to the hour needed for treatment, and the 1d4 hp healed per attempt. This is a very easy mechanic to track. Is the fighter above half hp, yes, then no TDW for you big guy.
On the DC increases based on damage taken, why not turn that around? Increase the amount of health gained for a higher check. Standard healing is 1d4hp per attempt (hour), with every increment of 5 over the DC adding an extra 1d4 (up to the subjects HD).
Treating a 5th level fighter could only restored 5d4 hp per hour of treatment at best (+20 DC). Assuming he around 56 hp, only up to 28 could be restored through TDW. If he was at 0 hp it could take a very good mundane healer as quick as an hour to get him back on his feet at 20hp. It'll likely take longer then that and cost a great deal, 2 hours on average if treated by our dedicated mundane healer (who is also around 5th level).
Restoring life to dead creatures is the province of miracle, not medicine. I think that would be going too far with the heal skill, which is supposed to be "non-magical" (though there are "magical" skills). Healers can save people who have dropped to negative HP, but I believe when the soul departs the body in D&D metaphysics, then you need a spell to bring it back...
Nah, death sucks, let's give the players more ways to avoid it if they're in time and if they're willing to spend the skill points. If the DC went up by 5 every round after "death", that would be a terrific incentive to max out the healing skill at every level. Who cares about metaphysics and how do you know the soul is in such a hurry to leave? Character death is such a fun-killer, why not give continued fun a little extra chance?
I think the best application for skill-based healing is to make it just powerful enough to increase survivability of 1st-3rd level characters, but always significantly weaker than magical healing. Design it so it can heal a maximum of 10 points or so. It's the low level characters who need skill-based healing; higher level characters can rely on their party cleric or whatever potions they have stockpiled.
But that goes against the believability you just said is so important. At first level, 10 hp represents a grievous injury. Scale that to higher levels, and the amounts of healing proposed in this thread are not even a big deal. Do you think that a fighter with 120hp hit for 30 damage was just "ripped open"? But a 1st level character with 10hp hit for 10 damage, maybe. As toyrobots pointed out, hp are abstract. That's why some in this thread proposed capping skill-based healing at some percent of max hp, which makes more sense.
If you want to increase survivability at 1st-3rd levels, I think you would like the idea of restoring recently dead creatures, as suggested by the OP. But why make it pointless and undesirable to invest skill points in Heal at higher levels? That doesn't do anything to solve the problem posed by the OP.
I think it is important to remember a couple of things about the way hit points work and what they represent. First, that higher-level characters do not have more hit points because they grow brick walls under their skin. The hit-point mechanic represents a combat-hardened individual's ability to react to injury better than the layman. A peasant takes the sword lunge in the gut and dies, while the swordsman twists and deflects the blow with his own blade, receiving only a scratch. Same amount of damage, but experience helps. This is one of the problems I personally have with the hit-point system, but there it is.
My other big point actually has nothing to do with game rules, but more to do with real-world medicine. When a person receives an injury, much of the danger is not the wound itself, but shock. This is why first aid is so important.
Many of the ideas I've had for heal and first-aid actually complicate the rules, and therefore I won't include them. Complicating things sucks. However, I think that the healing received from the skill should reflect on the damage done, the healer's skill, and the injured character's level.
I feel that changing an amount of damage to non-lethal is not only excellent from a gameplay perspective, but also from a realistic one. To maintain that realism, however, the healing should not completely erase the damage done. Also for realism, it should only be an option within minutes of the injury's occurrence.
There seems to be an aversion among gamers to spending the time to heal grievous wounds. I don't understand this. If you take a ogre's greatclub to the face, you're going to spend some time in traction. If you want to get up and keep eating bark, there are magical fixes for just that purpose. Personally, I feel that healing is just too simple. Just my style, though.
Edit - I would also encourage everyone to consider when someone actually dies. If a character doesn't actually die when they hit that final hit point, converting damage to non-lethal would technically bring them back from the dead, without magically popping them out of the dirt like a daisy. Just a thought, something would need worked out. Sorry for the length of this post, BTW.
Arguments of realism are not available when discussing HP.
They are highly abstract, and part of what makes the game a game.
That said, since healing is highly abstract and the only measure of health in the game, why should the Heal skill not be able to restore abstract health?
Realism is already off the table. Even-handedness would have medical treatment conceptually healing as much or better than rest. Heck, I would go as far as to have food restore HP, so as to make that equipment purchase worth recording!
Heck, I would go as far as to have food restore HP, so as to make that equipment purchase worth recording!
Clearly you've played too many video games ;-)
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I feel that changing an amount of damage to non-lethal is not only excellent from a gameplay perspective, but also from a realistic one. To maintain that realism, however, the healing should not completely erase the damage done. Also for realism, it should only be an option within minutes of the injury's occurrence.
Completely tossing the 'realism' argument aside, this is actually an *awesome* idea. Some of the ideas in this thread have seemed a bit over the top (a skill equalling higher level curative magic at *any* level doesn't really work for me, and I'd prefer d4s or 1 hp / HD or something), but allowing the Heal skill to only turn lethal damage into nonlethal damage totally works for me.
You get bandaged up and, after an hour or so, feel like new.
Very cool.
Everyone always comes down on me for my desire for realism. Must just be me. Still, I think the idea is a sound one.
How would the "nonletal conversion" work with someone a negative hp? There is no negative nonlethal damage.
Perhaps the negative hp damage would require the natural healing method (1 hp per level), while normal hp lost can be converted. This leaves gravely injured individuals to recover through rest (an perhaps under supervision) until they can be treated.
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Everyone always comes down on me for my desire for realism. Must just be me. Still, I think the idea is a sound one.
I have no problem with wanting a sense of versimilitude in a game, so that it 'feels real' (at least consistently to it's own fantastic reality, in any event) to the players.
But the word 'realism' (regarding a fantasy game constructed from many 'unrealistic' elements) is just catnip for trolls and semanticist nitpickers, so I was trying to discuss the merits of your idea without tempting them to crap all over your idea by dragging the focus instead to your choice of terminology, instead of the idea itself.
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How would the "nonletal conversion" work with someone a negative hp? There is no negative nonlethal damage.
Perhaps the negative hp damage would require the natural healing method (1 hp per level), while normal hp lost can be converted. This leaves gravely injured individuals to recover through rest (an perhaps under supervision) until they can be treated.
being in negative hp is just because you took more lethal damage than you have hp, the damage type isn't any different. the check would turn the damage you received to non-lethal, If you converted enough lethal damage into non-lethal damage then the person who was in negatives is no longer in the negatives. There is no need to make alterations for Negative HP damage, because it isn't something different from normal damage. Remember that this skill takes an hour to preform, so it won't replace making a check to stabilize a fallen character which is a standard action.
If someone was in the negatives and got a portion of their damage converted to non-lethal, they wouldn't wake up because they still had more non-lethal damage than their current HP total so they still need to rest until that amount of damage was healed naturally at a rate of 1hp/level an hour. There is nothing special that needs to be done.
so they still need to rest until that amount of damage was healed naturally at a rate of 1hp/level an hour.
When I read this, I thought I must be really out of it and missed some big change. But no, I still read in Pathfinder that natural healing is daily, 1 hp/level after a full night's rest (double that for full bed rest all day). Am I missing the point?
EDIT: Sorry, I answered my own question. Non-lethal damage heals at the per hour rate. Now I get it.
Everyone always comes down on me for my desire for realism. Must just be me. Still, I think the idea is a sound one.I have no problem with wanting a sense of versimilitude in a game, so that it 'feels real' (at least consistently to it's own fantastic reality, in any event) to the players.
But the word 'realism' (regarding a fantasy game constructed from many 'unrealistic' elements) is just catnip for trolls and semanticist nitpickers, so I was trying to discuss the merits of your idea without tempting them to crap all over your idea by dragging the focus instead to your choice of terminology, instead of the idea itself.
I don't know what you're talking about. Are you referring to something that happened in another thread? Anyway, realism isn't just a word. It's a design goal that I think everyone posting in this thread cares about, but there are trade-offs with other goals, and realism isn't always easily achievable, even when making sacrifices somewhere else. Also, I don't see that realism is a primary goal in the original post. I do see the OP asking for usefulness, scaling, and elimination of bookkeeping.
I haven't said anything until now about the idea of converting lethal damage into non-lethal damage, but that's only because I've never liked the idea of two kinds of damage. Even in 1e, I never had any use for "subdual" damage. I think subdual can be achieved with rider effects like stun or stagger. However, I'm aware that non-lethal damage is part of the game, and I agree it's another way to make the healing non-instantaneous, just like the time requirement for the TDW proposal that mirrors familiar healing spells. I could live with either, so long as the skill becomes useful, but I think mirroring familiar healing spells is more intuitive and more fun. I'll concede that the non-lethal approach has the upper hand in realism, in the sense that it takes the character longer to resume functioning at higher HP. If you don't mind shutting down the adventure for the day, it may be the better way to go.
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But the word 'realism' is just catnip for trolls and semanticist nitpickers, so I was trying to discuss the merits of your idea without tempting them to crap all over your idea by dragging the focus instead to your choice of terminology, instead of the idea itself.I don't know what you're talking about. Are you referring to something that happened in another thread?
In an attempt to keep discussion confined to the merits of the nonlethal conversion idea, and *NOT* to the merits of the word 'realism,' I have somehow epically failed and gotten people talking about realism.
I'll go shoot myself now.
But the word 'realism' is just catnip for trolls and semanticist nitpickers, so I was trying to discuss the merits of your idea without tempting them to crap all over your idea by dragging the focus instead to your choice of terminology, instead of the idea itself.I don't know what you're talking about. Are you referring to something that happened in another thread?In an attempt to keep discussion confined to the merits of the nonlethal conversion idea, and *NOT* to the merits of the word 'realism,' I have somehow epically failed and gotten people talking about realism.
I'll go shoot myself now.
Please don't do that. I tried to discuss the merits of the nonlethal conversion idea, but you can see I'm weak on experience with nonlethal damage in actual game play. Someone else used the word "elegant" so apparently some like the idea for its simplicity as well.
I wasn't clear specifically what other merits you were claiming for the idea. You suggested that with nonlethal conversion "You get bandaged up and, after an hour or so, feel like new." That's not true, unless I'm missing the point again. A 1st level character with 10 hp taking 10 damage would require 10 hours to recover fully if you converted all the damage. I just thought that if the character is going to be feeling like new in the same day anyway, you might as well let the characters get back to adventuring after some more reasonable time period, like an hour.
Everyone always comes down on me for my desire for realism. Must just be me. Still, I think the idea is a sound one.
Don't get me wrong Dthunder! I could fill an entire supplement with my realistic healing treatments. The crucial first step is to not abstract individual wounds, track the points dealt by each hit.
In my scratchbuild campaigns, HP is the first thing to change— but I don't think High Fantasy and Pathfinder in particular call for it. I play a lot of games, and some are more realistic about this than others.
HP are HP. They are an abstract measure of health. Trying to make HP "make sense" only leads to problems.
Both skills and spells are mechanics for a character to contribute to an adventure; the Heal Skill and Cure Spells are conceptually there to restore health to a character. Cure spells are miracles, and should be better than Skill use. But if the Heal skill can't directly effect the abstract measure of health, it will never be worth taking.
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You suggested that with nonlethal conversion "You get bandaged up and, after an hour or so, feel like new." That's not true, unless I'm missing the point again. A 1st level character with 10 hp taking 10 damage would require 10 hours to recover fully if you converted all the damage.
That's my bad, for some reason I thought it was 10 minutes to heal 1 hp of nonlethal. We've used some recently in a game (attack by press gang using saps in one encounter, and by a life-draining outsider that knocks people out and possesses them in the next), and since it healed back 'free' with magical curing at a 1 for 1 rate, I got used to seeing it completely gone soon after combat because of after-combat magical healing.
Even at 1 hour per point, it's still a decent option for the party with limited healing resources, such as a Bard or Druid or Paladin as 'main healer.' The Heal skill could turn some of the damage to nonlethal, and then the limited healing magic ends up healing twice as much after combat.
Another thing to keep in mind here, when dealing with non-lethal damage, is that it heals at one point per level per hour. That is regardless of what else you are doing. You could tow an eighteen wheeler through the dungeon with you, and still recover those non-lethal points. I like to house rule the healing up by half for actual rest, but that is just a house rule.
As to the actual roll, what about a Heal (15) check that converted one point of lethal damage per level of the target to non-lethal? Then increment it by adding one point to that per five points you beat the dc by, capping it at one-half the targets maximum hit points?
Even at 1 hour per point, it's still a decent option for the party with limited healing resources, such as a Bard or Druid or Paladin as 'main healer.' The Heal skill could turn some of the damage to nonlethal, and then the limited healing magic ends up healing twice as much after combat.
That's a good observation. I wasn't familiar with that rule until now. I could go with this, as long as the amount of damage converted for each 5 DC scales well enough to be worth investing skill points at high levels. This skill could easily be a lot more cool without going anywhere near replacing magical healing.
I'd also like an option to bring characters back from death, say DC 20 one round after death plus DC 5 each additional round, even if you have to cripple the character for a day with status effects, so the skill really treats "deadly" wounds (sure it's better than existing spells at equivalent levels, but that's just because spells are stingy in this regard, and this could be one way skill differs from magic). I don't know if that's in line with what dthunder asked us to consider (it certainly doesn't pop the character out of the ground "like a daisy").
I'd also like an option to bring characters back from death, say DC 20 one round after death plus DC 5 each additional round, even if you have to cripple the character for a day with status effects, so the skill really treats "deadly" wounds (sure it's better than existing spells at equivalent levels, but that's just because spells are stingy in this regard, and this could be one way skill differs from magic). I don't know if that's in line with what dthunder asked us to consider (it certainly doesn't pop the character out of the ground "like a daisy").
You could use the Heal mechanic I'm suggesting for this. Use the rule as suggested, but add 5 to the dc (bringing it to dc 20) for a newly dead character. Then just add 5 to the dc each round thereafter. Converting some of the lethal damage the character has taken to non-lethal should bring them back to life, but they'd still have to heal that damage before they could get back up. If the damage converted by the Heal check failed to bring them back above death, the check fails and the character is still dead. Hell, you could even let them continue to try the next round at the higher dc to bring their buddy back.
I'd also like an option to bring characters back from death, say DC 20 one round after death plus DC 5 each additional round, even if you have to cripple the character for a day with status effects, so the skill really treats "deadly" wounds (sure it's better than existing spells at equivalent levels, but that's just because spells are stingy in this regard, and this could be one way skill differs from magic). I don't know if that's in line with what dthunder asked us to consider (it certainly doesn't pop the character out of the ground "like a daisy").You could use the Heal mechanic I'm suggesting for this. Use the rule as suggested, but add 5 to the dc (bringing it to dc 20) for a newly dead character. Then just add 5 to the dc each round thereafter. Converting some of the lethal damage the character has taken to non-lethal should bring them back to life, but they'd still have to heal that damage before they could get back up. If the damage converted by the Heal check failed to bring them back above death, the check fails and the character is still dead. Hell, you could even let them continue to try the next round at the higher dc to bring their buddy back.
I like it! I also see no reason not to allow retries, since +5 DC per retry is limiting enough. You can just imagine the other characters stepping in at some point to tell the healer it's over, nothing more can be done. But every now and then something unexpected happens...
I like it! I also see no reason not to allow retries, since +5 DC per retry is limiting enough. You can just imagine the other characters stepping in at some point to tell the healer it's over, nothing more can be done. But every now and then something unexpected happens...
I'm liking the idea of the party drawing up a defensive formation mid-combat and trying to protect the healer while he tries to save a party member who just dropped.