Aren't we missing a rule to detect / diagnose disease / poison ???

[Frencois]

There are skills/actions to treat/cure disease/poison, but I haven't seen anything to detect/diagnose disease/poison.

Did Paizo forget something?

[Ediwir]

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.
It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

[Frencois]

Wooow since Update 1.4 it's even worse!!!
We now have Analyze Forensics!!!

So if I want to know if my friends is ill, I have no available use of the Medicine skills to do that but I can:
- Kill him
- And then use Analyze Forensics to know if he is ill
- Treat disease on the body
- Then use a Hero Point and cry towards the GM so that he gets well again?

How did they include Analyze Forensics in Update 1.4 and forget Diagnose Disease and Diagnose Poison?

Vic, do something :-)

[shroudb]

I don't get the complain at all.

We have a very detailed DC table.

So, use a skill you think it's appropriate with a DC based on the level of the poison.

Do you people expect every single use of every single skill to somehow be printed material?

I mean "aren't we missing a rule to juggle pins using acrobatics???"

The DC tables ARE the rules for such an occasion.

[Matthew Downie]

shroudb wrote:

Do you people expect every single use of every single skill to somehow be printed material?

No, just the common ones that crop up routinely, such as in this situation.

[The Once and Future Kai]

Diagnose is a reasonable use of Medicine.

[shroudb]

Matthew Downie wrote:

shroudb wrote:

Do you people expect every single use of every single skill to somehow be printed material?

No, just the common ones that crop up routinely, such as in this situation.

but it's the common ones that actually don't need to have specific rules UNLESS they deviate from the base.

that's why they are common.

we can't have half the threads complaining about making the game too "gamist" and the other ones complaining that the common and obvious applications all need gaming rules pointed out.

I mean, knowing the material component of an arcane spell is easily a common Arcana skill check. Probably an easy DC based on spell level. Or maybe a hard DC for a rare spell, and etc. You don't need to have that pointed out by the rules, it's assumed that "all common uses of Arcana" are covered by Arcana without explicit rules for it.

Same for medicine.

If something is an obvious use of the skill, then there's no need to take page count and bloat the system even more, just use the basic rules for it.

Let specific rules be for out of the ordinary things, or things that need specific gaming mechanics (like how much HP you heal with medicine)

[Requielle]

shroudb wrote:

If something is an obvious use of the skill, then there's no need to take page count and bloat the system even more, just use the basic rules for it.

Well, detect poison was a cantrip, back in the good ol' PF1E days - so it wasn't unreasonable to assume you could find out that way. And then a heal check as a standard action against the poison's save DC to treat it. And hey, diagnose disease was a 1st-level spell. Heal check vs disease save DC and 10 minutes to treat.

All that means the ability to identify and treat both conditions was commonly available from level 1 in the previous edition. There isn't a magical way to identify those afflictions at level 1 anymore, and that is a fundamental change to the assumptions of what a beginning level party can do.

I dislike answers with 'probably' in them - those are great for telling me how *you* would manage a situation, and are actually pretty close to how I *did* manage the situation. But that doesn't mean I ran that part of DD according to the rules, because I still have no idea how (officially) non-magical identification of poison and disease work.

Obvious to you isn't obvious to everyone else... would the DC for the check to identify a poison be the same as to treat it? Or higher, because once identified you are more likely to know what to do, thus lowering the treat DC? Or lower, because figuring out someone has been bitten by a rattlesnake is a whole lot simpler than figuring out what to do about it?

[shroudb]

Requielle wrote:

shroudb wrote:

If something is an obvious use of the skill, then there's no need to take page count and bloat the system even more, just use the basic rules for it.

Well, detect poison was a cantrip, back in the good ol' PF1E days - so it wasn't unreasonable to assume you could find out that way. And then a heal check as a standard action against the poison's save DC to treat it. And hey, diagnose disease was a 1st-level spell. Heal check vs disease save DC and 10 minutes to treat.

All that means the ability to identify and treat both conditions was commonly available from level 1 in the previous edition. There isn't a magical way to identify those afflictions at level 1 anymore, and that is a fundamental change to the assumptions of what a beginning level party can do.

I dislike answers with 'probably' in them - those are great for telling me how *you* would manage a situation, and are actually pretty close to how I *did* manage the situation. But that doesn't mean I ran that part of DD according to the rules, because I still have no idea how (officially) non-magical identification of poison and disease work.

Obvious to you isn't obvious to everyone else... would the DC for the check to identify a poison be the same as to treat it? Or higher, because once identified you are more likely to know what to do, thus lowering the treat DC? Or lower, because figuring out someone has been bitten by a rattlesnake is a whole lot simpler than figuring out what to do about it?

Again, it's impossible to list every single use of a skill.

What YOU think is important and should be listed isn't what another thinks is important and should be listed.

The only way to fully define what one can and can't do is to limit him to "you can only do what's written".

And then you no longer have a pnp RPG, you have a board game.

Freedom of "doing stuff" outside of written rules is what 100% define a pnp game.

You all guys want to remove that.

You want to have everything you can do clearly defined.

Well, that's impossible.

So, what seems like a common thing TO YOUR GM is a common thing IN YOUR SETTING.

That's the rule that covers all.

And yes, in some settings, diagnose might be impossible without magic, because it is a medieval science (aka mostly guesswork). And in some others it may be common, perhaps the medicine is much more advanced.

[Tridus]

So I'm just supposed to assume that I can use a certain skill to identify that someone has a magical affliction that is showing no symptoms, but it's up to me to figure out which one it is because spelling things out like they did in 1e is too much to ask now?

Sigh.

[Matthew Downie]

Tridus wrote:

So I'm just supposed to assume that I can use a certain skill to identify that someone has a magical affliction that is showing no symptoms

Nah, just roll a dice behind a screen, then tell them what you want them to know. (Assuming you're GM. If you're a player, it's out of your control.)

[Quandary]

I support having a rule for Diagnose DC. I mean, as of now some GMs could set it as the same as Cure DC, but it could very easily be easier just to recognize it. Some Diseases could harder to recognize than treat (although these probably should have specific note to that effect, modifying the normal Diagnose DC - but it helps to have a normal rule first to do that).

I do over-all want alot more specifics on DCs. I think Paizo has indicated more would be in the works, and they de-emphasized them in playtest modules simply for testing. Or I mean, they probably want to get generic DC curves correct before setting fixed DC/modifiers which in a sense can be judged against the curve. There is so many incidental skill checks not actually planned as difficulty test for encounter, but treating them as non-check because of that seems un-satisfying, yet likewise treating them as having difficulty matching over-all encounter also feels wrong (and can increase total encounter difficulty (if encounter difficulty is 65%, yet any and everything that you think to do is also given that, then encounter can become more difficult... some activities if given the same 65% could make encounter EASIER, if passing makes encounter auto-win).

[Themetricsystem]

Just make it simple, the Diagnose/Identify DC = Effect Save DC + Item Level.

[Tokageko]

I figured diagnosis was intended to be part of the process of the Treat Disease and Treat Poison skill uses. Then, that's also me assuming that the process of diagnosis and treatment is not something people want to spend a lot of time on in game. In most of the games I've played, it wouldn't have really served the story. That said, there's no reason to think you couldn't use Medicine to Recall Knowledge in a case where it *does* make a difference to the story.

[Matthew Downie]

Players like consistent rules for common situations. It reduces incidences of the GM saying, "Sorry, you have no idea that your PC has a disease, because the expert medic rolled low, and now you can't cure it without metagaming."

And it's a nice little timesaver for the GM if, say, monster has an AC in its statblock, instead of making us choose an appropriate AC based on CR.

In my first D&D 5e campaign the party were trying to climb a wall with a rope & grappling hook. I couldn't see any relevant climb DC in the rulebook so I pulled a number out of my head. Inexperienced, I chose what was probably too high a number, and the party spent the next 15 minutes trying and failing to overcome their own rope.

If I change that number next time, I break internal consistency. If I keep it, the party stays incompetent.

A little guidance is nice sometimes.

[shroudb]

Matthew Downie wrote:

Players like consistent rules for common situations. It reduces incidences of the GM saying, "Sorry, you have no idea that your PC has a disease, because the expert medic rolled low, and now you can't cure it without metagaming."

And it's a nice little timesaver for the GM if, say, monster has an AC in its statblock, instead of making us choose an appropriate AC based on CR.

In my first D&D 5e campaign the party were trying to climb a wall with a rope & grappling hook. I couldn't see any relevant climb DC in the rulebook so I pulled a number out of my head. Inexperienced, I chose what was probably too high a number, and the party spent the next 15 minutes trying and failing to overcome their own rope.

If I change that number next time, I break internal consistency. If I keep it, the party stays incompetent.

A little guidance is nice sometimes.

Yes, but if mundane medicine is developed enough to actually diagnose what poison is afflicting you (almost impossible in medieval times normally) is 100% setting dependant.

Treating symptoms, or even finding cause of death post mortem, is in fact easier most of the times than a live diagnosis.

That's why I think that leaving the DC and the kind of check to the GM, in this case, is better.

After all, the "I have the antidote right here, obey me to give it to you" is such a classic trope exactly due to that.

[Dragonriderje]

I don’t think we need a separate action listing for Diagnose. Perhaps a simple line or two under the Medicine skill description that says something like “The DC for determining if a person is diseased or poisoned, and diagnosing that affliction is usually the Hard DC of the level of creature or item that inflicted the disease or poison. Certain circumstances, such as the presence or absence of obvious symptoms or the rarity of the source may increase or decrease the DCs difficulty.”

[David knott 242]

Ediwir wrote:

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.

It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

I am surprised that Detect Poison is an uncommon spell. I have seldom seen anyone prepare that spell even when it was freely available, so I am at a loss as to why any barriers would be put up to anyone using that spell.

[shroudb]

David knott 242 wrote:

Ediwir wrote:

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.

It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

I am surprised that Detect Poison is an uncommon spell. I have seldom seen anyone prepare that spell even when it was freely available, so I am at a loss as to why any barriers would be put up to anyone using that spell.

because the rarity doesn't translates to "spell power" but to "can this potentially thwart the design of an adventure"

although "detect poison" is ndeed marginally used, in cases like poisoning a king/important person, it does make it impossible (from an npc perspective, characters would rarely shrug at such a "threat")

[Requielle]

David knott 242 wrote:

Ediwir wrote:

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.

It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

I am surprised that Detect Poison is an uncommon spell. I have seldom seen anyone prepare that spell even when it was freely available, so I am at a loss as to why any barriers would be put up to anyone using that spell.

It didn't happen in my games, but I've heard rumor that in some games people had the cantrip and used it constantly, in a very meta-game way, to detect poison on all. the. things. Instead of just on things that might be suspected to be poisonous or on someone who is showing symptoms of being poisoned.

Think of it as the detect evil of inanimate objects.

[Alyran]

Requielle wrote:

David knott 242 wrote:

Ediwir wrote:

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.

It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

I am surprised that Detect Poison is an uncommon spell. I have seldom seen anyone prepare that spell even when it was freely available, so I am at a loss as to why any barriers would be put up to anyone using that spell.

It didn't happen in my games, but I've heard rumor that in some games people had the cantrip and used it constantly, in a very meta-game way, to detect poison on all. the. things. Instead of just on things that might be suspected to be poisonous or on someone who is showing symptoms of being poisoned.

Think of it as the detect evil of inanimate objects.

I have a friend that would do exactly that. Same with detect magic and the one time he was a paladin (maybe inquisitor?), he'd detect evil literally everything. The changes to these 3 spells makes me so happy.

[Requielle]

Alyran wrote:

Requielle wrote:

David knott 242 wrote:

Ediwir wrote:

Detect Poison is a lv2 Uncommon spell.

It seems like there should be a Medicine use to determine it, however, at least after it started affecting someone. It feels off.

I am surprised that Detect Poison is an uncommon spell. I have seldom seen anyone prepare that spell even when it was freely available, so I am at a loss as to why any barriers would be put up to anyone using that spell.

It didn't happen in my games, but I've heard rumor that in some games people had the cantrip and used it constantly, in a very meta-game way, to detect poison on all. the. things. Instead of just on things that might be suspected to be poisonous or on someone who is showing symptoms of being poisoned.

Think of it as the detect evil of inanimate objects.

I have a friend that would do exactly that. Same with detect magic and the one time he was a paladin (maybe inquisitor?), he'd detect evil literally everything. The changes to these 3 spells makes me so happy.

We had that problem with detect evil, too. Until we pointed out that your average person doesn't have spellcraft, and they probably don't trust someone wandering around constantly casting some mysterious spell. Who knows what it could be? Maybe you are mind-controlling them all!

And those that have spellcraft? Oh, they are just offended. Feel free to offend the local priest. I'm sure he won't hold it against you when you need his help.

[Matthew Downie]

shroudb wrote:

Yes, but if mundane medicine is developed enough to actually diagnose what poison is afflicting you (almost impossible in medieval times normally) is 100% setting dependant.

On that basis, the rules should leave out every use of mundane medicine, since there's no guarantee that they will have any practical knowledge of how to treat wounds, poisons or diseases. (Most 19th century doctors and surgeons didn't even bother washing their hands between treating patients, so were as likely to kill you as cure you.)

And they should leave out crossbows, since not all settings would have the technology to invent crossbows. And plate mail, and so on...