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Do you think that mundane healing can still be dramatic and impressive in a world where magical healing exists? Is emergency surgery as exciting when a CLW could fix it?
Do you find the Heal skill relevant in your games? At all levels?
Are there situations in which mundane healing is better than magical?
To what extent do you think mundane vs magical healing would be used in the world at large?
Mundane healing would likely still be the main form of healing. I mean, what is the ratio of commoners to PC classes in general? How many characters with CLW can there be in the world? There are just not enough healer to take care of everything everywhere. Many small towns might only have one cleric in them.
And while CLW can deal with immediate trauma and bleeding, there is a lot more to healing than mere regeneration. CLW seems to more speed up natural healing than actually fix problems. It can't deal with ability score damage (which represent larger problems with the body) or diseases. You need higher level casters to deal with that, and individuals with those skills are even rarer.
Even with healing magic, the heal skill is still important. One of my favorite takes on it was in the webcomic "Goblins," where a Lay on Hands on a broken arm meant the bones fused together the wrong way. A basic splint would have prevented that. Unfortunately, introducing such mechanics into your game might seem like a jerk move. This game was built around PC's gaining huge amounts of raw power that lets them defy any physics.
The thing is, you don't take any negative effects until you hit 0 hp. So, for most people, just bed rest would do the trick.
With untrained labor earning 1 sp a day and trained labor earning a mere 3 sp, the cost of a CLW spell by a 1st level caster (10 gp) would be outside of most people's capability (especially since a few days of bed rest would accomplish the same thing).
With things like critical hit charts or called shots, things become more interesting. In that case, the cost of a doctor or wisewoman with ranks in heal would be so much less than the magical equivalent, that it would be the norm. (Edit: Because many of those effects require heal checks that are effectively surgery to get rid of certain alignments)
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Unfortunately, introducing such mechanics into your game might seem like a jerk move. This game was built around PC's gaining huge amounts of raw power that lets them defy any physics.
No, it isn't. It's showing humanity it's place.
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Mundane healing is for poor people.
Unfortunately, introducing such mechanics into your game might seem like a jerk move. This game was built around PC's gaining huge amounts of raw power that lets them defy any physics.No, it isn't. It's showing humanity it's place.
Only if you tell your players this kind of thing happens in the game world and here are the mechanics for it before you start the campaign. Otherwise, yes, it would be a jerk move to make someone's class feature spontaneously not work as written.
Magical medical care is just one of those things you either have to hand-wave, or work around. Your local priest, if a spellcaster, gets 3-4 cures per day. In a village of 100-200 people, how many potentially fatal accidents are there wherein the victim is not killed instantly and the priest has time to get to them? Not super frequently. Therefore anytime someone is injured, but not instantly killed, there is a very good chance the healer will get to them, or they will get to the healer, in time. As for the old school answer of charging for healing, I find it hard to conceive of a priest not healing citizens in good standing while their relatives frantically running around trying to scrape up the cash. The priest has to live in that village too.
Only if you tell your players this kind of thing happens in the game world and here are the mechanics for it before you start the campaign. Otherwise, yes, it would be a jerk move to make someone's class feature spontaneously not work as written.Unfortunately, introducing such mechanics into your game might seem like a jerk move. This game was built around PC's gaining huge amounts of raw power that lets them defy any physics.No, it isn't. It's showing humanity it's place.
Nuh uh, you don't even know.
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The rules certainly don't include extended consequences (beyond HP damage) for most injuries, which might make the Heal skill more interesting.
I don't think that people capable of performing at least some magical healing would be all that rare. The settlement guidelines say that a "village" of 60-200 people typically has 3rd level spellcasting available, which makes Remove Disease a possibility. Any settlement with a 5th level spellcaster of any level will probably have at least a handful of 1st level adepts who are capable of casting CLW. Plague or other mass casualty events would probably still be overwhelming, and some injuries might be fatal before a caster could be found, and but I feel like a good fraction of maladies would be theoretically magically treatable. Spellcasting charges mean that most people wouldn't have access to this theoretical healing capacity, but...
Magical medical care is just one of those things you either have to hand-wave, or work around. Your local priest, if a spellcaster, gets 3-4 cures per day. In a village of 100-200 people, how many potentially fatal accidents are there wherein the victim is not killed instantly and the priest has time to get to them? Not super frequently. Therefore anytime someone is injured, but not instantly killed, there is a very good chance the healer will get to them, or they will get to the healer, in time. As for the old school answer of charging for healing, I find it hard to conceive of a priest not healing citizens in good standing while their relatives frantically running around trying to scrape up the cash. The priest has to live in that village too.
I find it particularly hard to believe that a good-aligned priest of a good-aligned deity would turn away people in need of healing. Abadar would charge, but Sarenrae?
And what if a powerful healer (say, a PC) walks into a small settlement and starts healing people all over the place? How significant an effect might they have?
As for the old school answer of charging for healing, I find it hard to conceive of a priest not healing citizens in good standing while their relatives frantically running around trying to scrape up the cash. The priest has to live in that village too.
This is a huge problem in the system, as I agree with you. But, you know, why wouldn't the good aligned temples just provide free healing (and other curative effects) to the PCs when the PCs are fighting against evil? Why wouldn't they provide similar free healing to their fellow clergy, paladins, inquisitors, etc.,?
What prevents a caster from undercutting the normal spellcasting rates to beat his competition, since casting requires so little effort?
Magical healing does require a huge suspension of disbelief.
I agree with weirdo, it's conceivable that clerics of neutral gods would charge for healing, but I just can't see a cleric of Sarenrae turning somebody away from healing just because they couldn't scrape together the funds. Especially since a cure spell costs the cleric exactly nothing.
To answer the questions posed in the OP though:
One way to make surgery more exciting would be to redefine exactly what the "cure" spells do. I've played under many GMs who have the understanding with their players that HP represents primarily stamina and your ability to keep fighting, rather than actual "health" in the traditional sense. Cure light wounds could restore your energy, but doesnt actually heal [img]damage[/img]. If you actually break your arm, and not just take some HP damage, you're going to need surgery. If your liver fails, you're going to need surgery. If your appendix burst, surgery.
Do I feel that the heal skill is relevant at higher levels? Actually, yes, it definitely can be. There are two ways I feel the heal skill is useful even at higher levels. The first is in its investigative function, you can use the heal skill to determine how a creature was killed. This can be very useful information to have. Most GMs would probably even let a high enough roll identify the creature type that was the killer, if the attack was done by natural weapons. A bite from a dragon presumably looks different than a bite from a dire wolf. The second way I use the heal skill is its treat poison function. While yes, even this is somewhat eclipsed by spells, using a treat poison to help an ally pass a fort save might save you from needing to use valuable spells like restoration later.
Are there situations where mundane healing is better than magical? And to what extent is non-magical healing used in the world? Well, if you allow Cure spells to heal actual damage and not "stamina", then probably not very much. Otherwise, it could be very important.
No, it isn't. It's showing humanity it's place.
...I want to use that line for my next big bad. Also, when the GM sounds like that outside of voicing an antagonist....there are problems.
Magical medical care is just one of those things you either have to hand-wave, or work around. Your local priest, if a spellcaster, gets 3-4 cures per day. In a village of 100-200 people, how many potentially fatal accidents are there wherein the victim is not killed instantly and the priest has time to get to them? Not super frequently. Therefore anytime someone is injured, but not instantly killed, there is a very good chance the healer will get to them, or they will get to the healer, in time. As for the old school answer of charging for healing, I find it hard to conceive of a priest not healing citizens in good standing while their relatives frantically running around trying to scrape up the cash. The priest has to live in that village too.
I think part of the problem of a more realistic system for healing is that even with just HP, there is about 2 hp difference between "I'm beat up, but I'll sleep it off" and "I am bleeding to death in the next two minutes." When I hear about death in premodern medicine, there are times where it often took days for people to actually pass on. Even Abraham Lincoln, who was shot in the head at point blank range, took about 9 hours to die. That could be 32 miles covered to get to a cleric in game.
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A la goblins, I've often considered house-ruling that damage from critical hits can't be completely cured through magical healing: i.e. having your arm broken means that just healing the damaged tissue won't set the bone correctly. First, make the proper heal check. Only then will the magic work. Only the highest level healing spell allow players to skip this process. Thus, the Heal skill actually has purpose.
Lefty X,
If you're a congregation member in good standing (this is to say, you tithe your income to your particular church or equivalent thereof), a lot of faiths will heal you without charge for a lot of things, if they're within the ability of their local talent. If not, you'll probably have to pay full retail.
Sure, presuming a tithing of 10% and an income of around 1GP per month, you are kicking 1.2GP back to the church every year. CLW from a 1st level caster is 10GP. Your family's tithe for 8.5 years to pay for 1 CLW? I agree and reiterate, a local priest casting spells with no expensive components would heal free of charge unless they were unscrupulous, or they had some other motivating factor to charge their patients, like they really needed to fund a civic project and the recipients appeared flush with cash, and/or were jerks.
And what if a powerful healer (say, a PC) walks into a small settlement and starts healing people all over the place? How significant an effect might they have?
That PC would wreck any selfishly motivated healer price-fixing going on and would be targeted to be dealt with either by conversion, threat, or violence.
This is a huge problem in the system, as I agree with you. But, you know, why wouldn't the good aligned temples just provide free healing (and other curative effects) to the PCs when the PCs are fighting against evil? Why wouldn't they provide similar free healing to their fellow clergy, paladins, inquisitors, etc.,?What prevents a caster from undercutting the normal spellcasting rates to beat his competition, since casting requires so little effort?
Magical healing does require a huge suspension of disbelief.
The system was not designed with the whole world in mind, as you well know. It was designed around the idea of the personal power of 4-6 people taking on far greater power than their own, with little help from the "supporting cast" of typical NPCs. Both the magic system and economy shatter if you try and make them "real." Which is a reason why I like Eberron. That world makes those two aspects a little closer to believable while still remaining playable.
If the PCs are openly battling evil, heck yeah the local churches should be supporting them with free spellcasting, if available. Forcing them to pay a casting tax of a few paltry gold (not counting component heavy spells) when it makes more plot since to make it free during their crusade seems silly.
Nothing prevents them from undercutting. But setting up shop for day-in, day-out patching and mending the locals is not why your PC got into adventuring.
I think part of the problem of a more realistic system for healing is that even with just HP, there is about 2 hp difference between "I'm beat up, but I'll sleep it off" and "I am bleeding to death in the next two minutes." When I hear about death in premodern medicine, there are times where it often took days for people to actually pass on. Even Abraham Lincoln, who was shot in the head at point blank range, took about 9 hours to die. That could be 32 miles covered to get to a cleric in game.
"High Priest Frank, here is the Curative Twig." the acolyte blurted as he ran up to the alter, nimbly dodging around the moaning forms, evidence of last nights terrible gnoll assault.
Frank quickly grabbed the offered item and used a charge to bind together a vicious sword gash along a young lady's right rib line. She might need two, but he didn't want to be wasteful. This was the last wand.
"How many did that group of sell-swords need after I left you at the vestibule?" he asked his assistant.
"36 charges." the acolyte replied promptly.
"... What do you mean 36 charges?!?" Frank demanded. "How badly could they have been hurt?"
"Mostly scratches." the student priest replied. "But, the fighter also said he wasn't "nearly as tired or unable to continu combat, anymore."
Oh, well, thought Frank. I can always pawn off some of the candelabra and head into Greyberg next month for the components to build a replacement.
Lefty X,
A poor family is probably making 6 gp/month if you assume both parents work at 1 sp/day (unskilled) and that their children have no economic contribution. So their tithes are closer to the order of 7.2 gp per year, not far from 'list price' on CLW.
If they're a middle class family (skilled), they might be making 33 gp or so a month (assumes one is skilled and the other is making unskilled wages,) or even 60 gp/month. Tithes on them might range from 36-72 gp per year.
In a pseudo-middle ages society, they won't both work. The wife might have a side cottage industry, but might not. I am not talking about middle class, I mean peasants, i.e. most of the populace. 1SP/day is what the PCs are expected to pay for unskilled labor, not necessarily what a farmer or day laborer makes if you take his yearly income and divide by 365. I know we are arguing semantics and real vs. fantastical really, but I don't visualize most commoners walking around with a lot of clink in their pocket. The prices for food, board, and services in the books is, again in my opinion, what people charge wealthy middle class chump adventurers, not what the average person might get. If we are talking the cost of a low-average quality meal, for instance, coins of precious metal shouldn't even be in the mix. Let's say you go to nice restaurant and pay $50.00 for your meal. That would be high quality (presumably.) That might cost a GP in most Pathfinder games. One Pathfinder GP today is worth $428.00 U.S. (1/3 of an ounce at $1285.00 per ounce.)
TL:DR, The game economy is pretty borked if you look too hard.
Lefty X,
She works, producing value, she just probably works at your home. She probably tends his garden, cooks, washes his clothes, cares for their children, and does all the million things that made homemaking a full time job before the advent of massively labor saving devices. Most of the wages of peasants though aren't in coin, the 1sp/day is just the equivalent value of what they get.
Okay, but taking that one step further, and assuming something ridiculous, like 1SP for a sweater she knits. Her efforts haven't probably produced an actual SP. It has produced an SP worth of goods that the family values, like eggs for a fortnight, or something. Either way, those commoners don't actually have more money, they have more subsistence goods.
Sure, and that's why in the game it's tidy little sums, like "That'll be 3 gold for the room and meals for you and your friends each night." PCs of any decent level won't even notice that kind of money leaving their purses. However, if you try and look at it from a normal person's perspective, you'll stop and think "Wait a second. This jack-wagon wants AN OUNCE OF GOLD for some meals and a roof to sleep under?"
Edited for bad math.
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A poor family is probably making 6 gp/month if you assume both parents work at 1 sp/day (unskilled) and that their children have no economic contribution. So their tithes are closer to the order of 7.2 gp per year, not far from 'list price' on CLW.
If they're a middle class family (skilled), they might be making 33 gp or so a month (assumes one is skilled and the other is making unskilled wages,) or even 60 gp/month. Tithes on them might range from 36-72 gp per year.
And what if they need a Lesser Restoration, or even a Remove Disease? I think it makes plenty of sense to say that some amount of spellcasting is provided free to tihing members of a local church, but in most cases it won't actually cover the spellcasting costs listed.
Based on the above comments, it seems like magical healing would have a pretty big impact on the community unless spellcasting costs are enforced on a per-spell basis for everyone (not just PCs and other outsiders) or unless the number of available spellcasters is significantly lower than the settlement guidelines would suggest.
I think it might be interesting to introduce a stamina/wounds distinction and say that surgery or very powerful magic is required to heal the latter, or to introduce specific types of injuries like crits that need Heal checks to fix. I'm starting a new campaign soon so it wouldn't be too hard to introduce. (The new campaign is part of why I posted this - the setting is more in-depth than I've previously used so I'm working extra-hard on versimilitude.)
awp832 - thanks for reminding me about the autopsy use, that's a good one.
I just restrict the caster level of healing magicks to the character's ranks in Heal. This dovetails excellently with the Remove Disease mechanics. If you don't know how to heal, your Cure spells either suck or you can't cast them at all. Guess you're relying on channels!
As for Lesser Restoration and the like, what else is the village cleric going to be doing with his spells every day? Him being productive is him casting magic to benefit the villagers around him, who in turn support the god with their faith and belief, and to a lesser extent their donations.
Keep in mind that a fall from a horse or getting kicked in the head can be fatal for a peasant. With a Cure Light Wounds, poof, injury gone.
It's outsiders coming in who get to pay market rates...unless they happen to be faithful as well, and their injuries come from opposing the enemy, in which case they should also be supported. Such folk, however, will also be generous on the tithing anyways, and make up for the generosity of the church with their own, in a real world.
==Aelryinth
I would love to have some good non-magical healing in the game. It would lessen the 'someone gets stuck playing the cleric' and 'HP=GP' issues.
One d20 spinoff game I have lets you treat someone's wounds with Heal once per day*, healing (your result)-15 HP (minimum zero; you can't kill someone with this). That would at least be something.
*As in, each person can receive a Heal treatment once per day.
I wonder if Sarenrae supports single payer.
Look at Evil Lincoln's thread about using the Strain/Injury variant rule he's developed. It makes a good point about economics, healing and HP in general. In that system most damage sustained becomes Strain: paper cuts and bruises, muscle fatigue; twisted backs and such. Healing these wounds then becomes simply sitting and resting for a couple minutes (called a Rest and Refit).
Some wounds are more serious though; his system calls these wounds Injury. They are sustained when the PC is taken unawares, taken below their HP threshold or there are extenuating circumstances.
Gygax flat out admitted that the game was modeled after California's Gold Rush economy that was endemic to the various gold rush boom towns in which people DID pay ounces of gold ore for basic necessities as they had no choice in the matter. He said he did it that way because he wanted the flavor of adventurers obtaining and spending gold like free flowing water. He flat out didn't care that this would cause a dissonance with anything even resembling a midieval economy.
There was a comic that lampshaded this disconnect. (Might have been Order of the Stick) You'd see the various shops which would advertise a normal midieval level of economy. Then a young boy comes running in Paul Revere style shouting "Adventurers are Coming!" Like magic the signs would flip where prices that were described in copper or silver pieces became gold instead.
This is pretty much my reply to anyone who thinks that for a second, that any incarnation of D20 from D+D to Pathfinder was rooted in economic simulation.
It was, in fact, Order of the Stick. Like I have said before, no one can look at the economics and think they are based on a real model. Gygax did say that thing about the Gold Rush style market, and he and Arneson created the basis for our hobby, but that was 40 years ago. I don't want to go to the trouble of creating a realistic economic model and maintaining it in play anymore than you do, but with all due respect, I think saying, "But, Gary Gygax said X" is a little like like saying "Sure Sammy Sosa hit a lot of home runs, but so did Babe Ruth!." Ruth did hit a lot of home runs. While playing a much more archaic form of the sport... Also, while on cocaine. ;)
I wonder if Sarenrae supports single payer.
I think it's "single prayer."
The point that I'm making is that the player economic model for the game is still based on Gygaxian's Gold Rush model which was designed to separate players from their gold quickly in order to motivate them to loot the next dungeon. That focus hasn't changed in Ultimate Campaign. The economy...
Sorry, but, no one has denied your point. Also, who has said we should change it?
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...so we mostly agree that the spellcasting costs are inflated and thus not a realistic limiter on the amount of magical healing the average community member has access to?
Food for thought
Yes, I enjoyed that thread.
I just restrict the caster level of healing magicks to the character's ranks in Heal. This dovetails excellently with the Remove Disease mechanics. If you don't know how to heal, your Cure spells either suck or you can't cast them at all. Guess you're relying on channels!
That seems like a straightforward enough option, but I personally am more interested in making the Heal skill thematically interesting rather than just necessary - giving it its own role rather than making it a prerequisite for effective use of Cure spells.
So far it seems like the best options are either separating strain and injury, requiring mundane healing for the latter, or having certain injuries like crits or called shots require heal checks to resolve properly.
The point that I'm making is that the player economic model for the game is still based on Gygaxian's Gold Rush model which was designed to separate players from their gold quickly in order to motivate them to loot the next dungeon. That focus hasn't changed in Ultimate Campaign. The economy...Sorry, but, no one has denied your point. Also, who has said we should change it?
Well, I would. I prefer treasure-gathering to be more of an incidental thing versus plot and character development and such.
But then, I'm evidently a heretic.
I have to admit, as a GM, I just assumed that in both Good and nice/non-mercenary temples, clerics would just cure people for free (or, more generally, channel positive energy to heal them at times). For a non-adventuring cleric, channeled energy is a free resource, so I don't see why it wouldn't be spent fairly freely (you could see it generating good will, faith, and devotion itself, rather than requiring it to be bought with tributes). It would seem roughly as counterproductive to 'charge' for healing as it would be for a tavern to charge for seats, to me.
Using Sandpoint for example, most of the clerics at the Cathedral will just flat out provide positive energy healing in my game. They generally expect villagers and travelers with non-life threatening boo-boos to show up at a daily sermon, so they can heal a bunch of them at once, but Zantus and the others keep some channelling (and a swapped 'cure' spell) available for emergencies and the like. If somebody gets badly hurt, either the townsfolk rush them to the Cathedral, or somebody cries out to fetch a priest.
For me, this meant that the adventurers could basically count on being 'back to normal' in a few days, even without using their own curative resources, provided that they made it back to town and provided that there wasn't a disaster. At least in my game, the heroes were the "heroes of Sandpoint", and it didn't make any sense in the game for the local clergy to charge them for healing when they had incurred their injuries defending the town, or ridding the countryside of goblin pests or undead monsters. My players are also reasonably savvy, and don't generally worry about healing up every last hit point when they know that they can recover enough of them with a night of rest, so a little 'topping off' with channeled energy is often all they would expect anyway.
It also meant that, in town, you might have a severe injury (a maiming or something) or a sudden death, but not really any significant amount of low level injuries floating around. Of course, if a crisis (say, goblins or giants attacking the town) happened, the limited resources of Sandpoint would be stretched or exhausted, but not otherwise.
Non-magical healing was really limited (in my game) to doing things like treating poisons, disease, sickness, and stabilizing people until a cleric could help them. That didn't make it useless, by any means, since very few people in Sandpoint could Neutralize Poison or Remove Disease, but it meant that non-magical healing was more for ailments than injuries, in general.
...so we mostly agree that the spellcasting costs are inflated and thus not a realistic limiter on the amount of magical healing the average community member has access to?
Food for thoughtYes, I enjoyed that thread.
I just restrict the caster level of healing magicks to the character's ranks in Heal. This dovetails excellently with the Remove Disease mechanics. If you don't know how to heal, your Cure spells either suck or you can't cast them at all. Guess you're relying on channels!That seems like a straightforward enough option, but I personally am more interested in making the Heal skill thematically interesting rather than just necessary - giving it its own role rather than making it a prerequisite for effective use of Cure spells.
So far it seems like the best options are either separating strain and injury, requiring mundane healing for the latter, or having certain injuries like crits or called shots require heal checks to resolve properly.
Which reminds me that at some point I need to get back to seeing if the prices of spellcasting turns out to actually be supported by the functional economy as it is currently presented.
Yes functional, despite the claims of some in this thread the numbers actually continue to bear out that it does work, even if it doesn't display what they want it to.
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For purposes of this discussion I actually don't care whether spellcasting prices (or prices in general) are realistic in a functional economy. I'm just trying to figure out whether the average person will have access to at least a little magical healing on a regular basis, whether because they are able to afford the casting costs or because members of the local church get free or steeply discounted healing. The amount of magical healing the average person has access to determines the role of mundane healing in the world.
For purposes of this discussion I actually don't care whether spellcasting prices (or prices in general) are realistic in a functional economy. I'm just trying to figure out whether the average person will have access to at least a little magical healing on a regular basis, whether because they are able to afford the casting costs or because members of the local church get free or steeply discounted healing. The amount of magical healing the average person has access to determines the role of mundane healing in the world.
Through payment, absolutely not. Average people make 1-3 sp, so even a casting of CLW at CL 1 is a waste (as it only heals damage that would heal naturally anyway).
As for free healing, this is completely up to the DM.
For purposes of this discussion I actually don't care whether spellcasting prices (or prices in general) are realistic in a functional economy. I'm just trying to figure out whether the average person will have access to at least a little magical healing on a regular basis, whether because they are able to afford the casting costs or because members of the local church get free or steeply discounted healing. The amount of magical healing the average person has access to determines the role of mundane healing in the world.
Yes the average person can afford magical healing. See my thread above.
With that said in the thread I point out why the average person would still seek mundane healing first.
I may be jumping to a conclusion here (since I didn't read the entire thread) but I get the feeling that you don't like the chaining of the wand of CLW as the de facto healing tool in whatever setting you may spin?
Another game I play, Legend, has magic and magical consummables for healing, but has souped up skills in general to work by rule of cool. Characters with Vigor can heal themselves by being so dang tough, while characters with Medicine can heal others. And these options are competitive.
I wouldn't mind skills getting a similar treatment in PF.