Traits are always spelled out. # of Hands and Tools are not Traits.As has been pointed out repeatedly in this thread and others, the rules themselves are extremely explicit about what actions a healer's tools is used for and Battle Medicine is not one of those actions.And a lot of people think they left this out by accident. Mistakes happen.Except that until errata comes out, the text is not there, and other text tells us that requirements (such as hands or tools) are always spelled out, so the lack of such a requirement means that there are in fact, no requirements.
That is, you're inserting requirements where none exist.
The only way you (the reader) can convince me that those requirements do exist is either:
a) I am a player and you are a GM at your table. This is called a "house rule."
b) You show me an errata document indicating that the text has changedIn the absence of both A and B, you can't convince me that hands or tools are required.
What evidence is there that tool requirements are not spelled out? Every action that requires them says so.
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Has anyone considered the possibility that battle medicine requires MORE than two hands? That may be fertile ground for novel consideration.
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I don't know how restating the same thing over and over again helps the discussion?
With the lack of FAQ button it at least keeps it on the front page and not buried. At least until the new book hits then down the slide it shall go.
I was just looking over the errata today for other reasons, and realized that they did errata the Battle Medicine feat, and chose not to add in any wording about requiring healer's tools.
This makes it pretty clear that the developers chose to exclude the healer's tools as a requirement and didn't just accidentally leave them off, because if the feat was supposed to require them and work as is, that would have been a very easy fix that would have happened at the same time. Pretending that RAW is not: no healer's tools is clearly stretching what is written to fit what you expect.
Without requiring tools, and without calling out the need for a free hand, Battle Medicine is intended to work as a manipulate action that requires flexible appendages, but not that those appendages are unoccupied. This is the only logical reading of the rules as written and what can be implied without stretching any existing definitions of terms. If it is not RAI, then the developers need to say so, even if they don't know what the exact wording of a change would be.
For reference the errata text is:
Page 258: In Battle Medicine, change the second sentence
to “Attempt a Medicine check with the same DC as for
Treat Wounds, and restore a corresponding amount of Hit
Points; this does not remove the wounded condition.”
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I was just looking over the errata today for other reasons, and realized that they did errata the Battle Medicine feat, and chose not to add in any wording about requiring healer's tools.
This makes it pretty clear that the developers chose to exclude the healer's tools as a requirement and didn't just accidentally leave them off, because if the feat was supposed to require them and work as is, that would have been a very easy fix that would have happened at the same time.
To be fair, one could also just as easily reasonably surmise from this that they were not ready to take an official position on the matter.
Thus, this does not strike me as evidencing either "side" of the issue, leaving us back to the original debate at hand.
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leaving us back to the original debate at hand.
How many?
I was just looking over the errata today for other reasons, and realized that they did errata the Battle Medicine feat, and chose not to add in any wording about requiring healer's tools.
This makes it pretty clear that the developers chose to exclude the healer's tools as a requirement and didn't just accidentally leave them off, because if the feat was supposed to require them and work as is, that would have been a very easy fix that would have happened at the same time.
To be fair, one could also just as easily reasonably surmise from this that they were not ready to take an official position on the matter.
Thus, this does not strike me as evidencing either "side" of the issue, leaving us back to the original debate at hand.
I offered this up though as a counter to people who think the exclusion of text stating it requires healer's tools was a mistake in the first place. If it was just a mistake, and the wording should have specified that it did require them, and nothing else about the ability was going to be subject to change, then certainly they would have already added that text to the feat, because they made one simple change to it already.
Clearly they were willing to make a change to establish clarity that the ability did not remove the wounded condition, that doesn't seem like any simpler change then, "oh yeah, this ability is supposed to require healer's tools and we forgot to mention that."
It is possible that they are waiting to make some other change to the ability, but it seems pretty clear that the wording of this feat is deliberately different from other uses of the medicine skill, and the absence of a line requiring healer's tools was not a simple error.
@Kainite, agreed. I think the rules as written are very clear at this point and there are just those who don't like them hoping to hear that they are going to be changed.
A change that might still happen if enough people put up a stink about it, but hopefully, if it does happen, it happens within the context of rebalancing the feat to remain a useful alternative to magical healing in combat.
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There are abilities, rules, and feats that interact with treat deadly wounds that the developers didn't want to interact with Battle Medicine. That's why it is worded the way it is.
@Unicorne: There were enough that insisted the *original* wording required the use of Healer's Tools. I don't agree with that at all, but still... it was clearly something that, even though I thought was pretty clear-cut RAW, was not clear-cut for all, and that was obvious.
That leads us back to rainzax's statement. For those in that camp, it's a justification that *they* were correct.
Not really as someone stated up thread that would require every action/feat that didn't use a tool but was similar to something that did to now either require it or have text stating it didn't
I know this is just a game about imaginary things. There aren't many things in PF2 that break my sense of verisimilitude to the point it bothers me, but healing people (using mundane techniques) in the middle of combat (in two seconds) without using any hands or bandages strains things beyond my comfort level. I don't see any way to picture or narrate that as a GM. What is actually happening? Two seconds isn't even enough time to call it a warlordy "pep talk." I may just house rule this feat away because it seems so silly and improbable. One thing I like about Pathfinder 1 and 2 is that, while certainly not "realistic," they at least usually make an attempt to be a bit more simulationist (which I like) compared to other games. Battle Medicine comes across as "we want mundane healing during combat for reasons but don't have a good way to explain it so we won't even try." I'm sure its inclusion was well-intended but do hope it gets some kind of errata.
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I know this is just a game about imaginary things. There aren't many things in PF2 that break my sense of verisimilitude to the point it bothers me, but healing people (using mundane techniques) in the middle of combat (in two seconds) without using any hands or bandages strains things beyond my comfort level. I don't see any way to picture or narrate that as a GM. What is actually happening? Two seconds isn't even enough time to call it a warlordy "pep talk." I may just house rule this feat away because it seems so silly and improbable. One thing I like about Pathfinder 1 and 2 is that, while certainly not "realistic," they at least usually make an attempt to be a bit more simulationist (which I like) compared to other games. Battle Medicine comes across as "we want mundane healing during combat for reasons but don't have a good way to explain it so we won't even try." I'm sure its inclusion was well-intended but do hope it gets some kind of errata.
I think this really is the underlying issue and I think house ruling it out if it interferes with your fiction is 100% the right call. The point of the feat is very clearly outside the realm of anything possible (healing in seconds) and requires you either to see HP as something very abstract and not related to taking serious injuries, or else accept that the heroes of this world have radical different physiognomies and are capable of many miraculous things that planet earth humans are not. If that isn't for you, then the feat is probably not for you regardless of how many hands or tools it takes. I think everyone in this thread agrees that you should play the game in the way that makes it most fun for you.
For me, it is relatively easy to separate characters from any pretense of needing to exist in a real world, and accept that the physics/metaphysics of recovering battle readiness can happen quickly and it is far more fun for that not to be limited to essentially one class to competently happen. That seems to be the intention of the rule, which is why the mechanics of it, as written, make sense to me, even if the narrative of how it works is so abstract. Overall, I think the codification of hand usage in Pathfinder 2 is probably a little overboard and excessively restrictive, but I understand that it all balances around having given characters 3 actions a round which can be used for anything, and some limitations needed to strengthened to prevent abuse. I just don't see how battle medicine as a feat, as written, possibly falls into the same category as making it too easy to make 3 attacks a round with a two handed weapon. (Which is where I think the wonkiness and excessive rule arbitration really stem from).
The point of the feat is very clearly outside the realm of anything possible (healing in seconds) and requires you either to see HP as something very abstract and not related to taking serious injuries, or else accept that the heroes of this world have radical different physiognomies and are capable of many miraculous things that planet earth humans are not.
Exactly while healing someone without tools in 2 seconds is stretching belief would someone actually applying any form of use from tools in that same time make it better? I mean once you get into needing a kit you now are not only healing wounds but doing so with bandages, salve, or something similar in 2 seconds.
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I think this really is the underlying issue and I think house ruling it out if it interferes with your fiction is 100% the right call.
I sorta feel the opposite. Stripping out meaningful playstyles and feats just because they're a little bit thematically strange seems like the worst possible call. But that's just me.
I sorta feel the opposite. Stripping out meaningful playstyles and feats just because they're a little bit thematically strange seems like the worst possible call. But that's just me.
I think this really is the underlying issue and I think house ruling it out if it interferes with your fiction is 100% the right call.
I mean, I agree that I am fine with it at my table/prefer it the way it is, but I'd also probably be fine playing without it at my table too as long as everyone agreed before making characters. Even as is its not that a great an alternative to magical healing.
We played fall of plaguestone with it as the only combat healing and it was rough because the character with it was a rogue with a wisdom of 10. Our GM is running Age of Ashes next, and I volunteered to play a Cleric right away to be the party healer, and I have no intention of wasting time with that feat.
I sorta feel the opposite. Stripping out meaningful playstyles and feats just because they're a little bit thematically strange seems like the worst possible call. But that's just me.
I think this really is the underlying issue and I think house ruling it out if it interferes with your fiction is 100% the right call.
That's also a call that will most certainly raise the mortality rate of PCs.
I for one love it when my friend's dwarf uses the feat. He usually says something like "Rub some dirt in it you big baby!"
Its fantasy, in a game with magic missiles and dragons and elder gods people are concerned with the realism of Battle Medicine?.
I think Paizo wanted it in for play/build reasons, its a great balancing feat reducing the 'must have healer/screwed if healer goes down' problem with playing the game. It allows non magic types to still save someone in combat. Its a nice game mechanic for clutch situations.
I think they purposely didn't make it hard to use with tons of requirements because that would defeat the purpose it fills.
Arguably maybe they haven't provided clarification because they are still feeling the balance/play aspects of it.
I reckon handwave it to be a semi mystical ability and move on. Don't worry too much about the how. We don't question how for most of the other actions characters can take, like legendary jumps, carrying dozens of weapons etc. While I like a semi-realistic/consistent game I am more interested in a good consistent engaging story, great exciting combats rather than focusing on whether its realistic to stop someone bleeding out in 4 seconds using no hands or heal kit.
Its fantasy, in a game with magic missiles and dragons and elder gods people are concerned with the realism of Battle Medicine?.
The fact that some people prefer a little more verisimilitude with mundane actions isn't #badwrongfun. I do agree, however, that GMs can just house rule away anything we find too silly or improbable in our own games. I just wish I understood a little better why Paizo made Battle Medicine the way they did.
I just wish I understood a little better why Paizo made Battle Medicine the way they did.
To give nonmagical healers a way to restore health in a combat situation.
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I just wish I understood a little better why Paizo made Battle Medicine the way they did.To give nonmagical healers a way to restore health in a combat situation.
I don't mean the reason why it exists. I mean the execution why. For example, why include training in Medicine as a prerequisite or Manipulate as a trait if this is just someone shouting "get up you big baby" or some unexplained form of mysticism? Not a big deal, I'd just like to better understand their thought process on the way they executed it.
If I ever finish my own D20 system, it will probably say, "Don't worry about finding free hands for drinking potions or applying bandages or picking up your allies to carry them off the battlefield during a retreat. Assume you can juggle, or hold your sword in your teeth while you work, or something like that."
Paizo didn't go this way. All kinds of things are made inconvenient by having to use actions to change your grip and so on.
It does seem odd to have this as an exception.
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I just wish things like "you need one hand free" would never get nailed down, because if Paizo ever prints a hand-less ancestry (say, blobs of sentient plasma that manipulate things using a very limited TK or whatever with tentacles) people will go up in their
*wait for it*
arms
*I regret nothing*
about such ancestry not being able to do something because the "hands" component is missing.
Doubly so because in PF2 you no longer need to worry about ancestries with multiple appendages being OP due to one hand = one attack paradigm of PF1 no longer being a thing.
This is where the overall system elegance of PF2 broke down a little between playtest conception and final execution. Initially all things manipulate trait did require a free hand and that initial design had a hard line about requiring a free hand to do almost anything.
We didn’t like it. We wanted paladins with swords and shields doing paladin things and not being massively punished for it, especially because it cost an action to raise the shield anyway. But apparently, handedness still needed to matter for using a two handed weapon for over all balance issues, or else the two-handed weapon play style had too big of an advantage over the sword and shield, or 1 handed weapon fighting style because they could free action a spare hand open when ever they wanted. I am not sure if all the feats they created to make different combat styles feel different from each other work if they can’t separate weapons into groups to have 2 handed weapon fighting, sword and board, and free hand fighting be different things.
So the question comes back to why make exceptions for healing?
I think the answer is that spending actions on healing your allies already feels like a fun reducer for many players. The more actions it costs, the more players generally will want to not heal in combat and just save all healing for after the battle is over.
Although spell casting as a whole got quite a boost from this change, I think spell casting was in a place during the playtest where players were happy to see it get that boost.
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I just wish things like "you need one hand free" would never get nailed down, because if Paizo ever prints a hand-less ancestry (say, blobs of sentient plasma that manipulate things using a very limited TK or whatever with tentacles) people will go up in their
*wait for it*
arms
*I regret nothing*
about such ancestry not being able to do something because the "hands" component is missing.
Doubly so because in PF2 you no longer need to worry about ancestries with multiple appendages being OP due to one hand = one attack paradigm of PF1 no longer being a thing.
Sir you don't have a leg to stand on after that.
I just wish things like "you need one hand free" would never get nailed down, because if Paizo ever prints a hand-less ancestry (say, blobs of sentient plasma that manipulate things using a very limited TK or whatever with tentacles) people will go up in their
*wait for it*
arms
*I regret nothing*
about such ancestry not being able to do something because the "hands" component is missing.
Doubly so because in PF2 you no longer need to worry about ancestries with multiple appendages being OP due to one hand = one attack paradigm of PF1 no longer being a thing.
Maybe the real answer is how many Metaphysical hands do we need to use something. And a clarification of what can and cant be used as a metaphysical hand.
God I hated PF1's metaphysical hands unwritten rules.
God I hated PF1's metaphysical hands unwritten rules.
Sadly the way some of this thread leads is sorta heading that way with the insistence that Manipulate requires hands that may or not may be related to the task at hand.
I just watched episode 6 (season-2) of Knights of Everflame, Gm'd by Jason Bulmahn.
One of the characters used battle medicine, and there was no mention of healers tools or any sort of tools needed. And no mention of needing 2 hands free either.
When I finally get to GM pf2, I'll be running it this way, just like the guy who wrote the rules.
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I sorta feel the opposite. Stripping out meaningful playstyles and feats just because they're a little bit thematically strange seems like the worst possible call. But that's just me.
I think this really is the underlying issue and I think house ruling it out if it interferes with your fiction is 100% the right call.That's also a call that will most certainly raise the mortality rate of PCs.
I for one love it when my friend's dwarf uses the feat. He usually says something like "Rub some dirt in it you big baby!"
It is still probably better for GMs that don't like its implementation in PF2 to rule it out from the beginning, so players know better than to think it will be useful, than it is to house rule that it requires x number of hands and tools, and then have someone choose it and end up playing much less effectively at the table because they thought the idea of being a non-magical healer sounded cool, but didn't realize that the feat was balanced around not taking up all of their actions in a turn to use.
At least if you just bar it from your table, then everyone knows that magical healing is required.
I just watched episode 6 (season-2) of Knights of Everflame, Gm'd by Jason Bulmahn.
One of the characters used battle medicine, and there was no mention of healers tools or any sort of tools needed. And no mention of needing 2 hands free either.
When I finally get to GM pf2, I'll be running it this way, just like the guy who wrote the rules.
That's fair! I'll probably rule it this way as well until an errata comes out that does any clarification. But thank you for letting us know!
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Ah. Yes. The instance where two different Developers run the same mechanic differently. Classic Paizo.
Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.
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In my experience, streamed games whose purpose is entertainment and not explicitly teaching the rules tend to run with Rule of Cool. (Probably also Rule of Not Sweating the Small Stuff.) I'm a fan of Acquisitions Incorporated , which is currently being DMed by the guy in charge of 5E rules, and I'd say fast and loose is the name of the game during the live play. This is in stark contrast to his ability to answer rules questions on twitter and whatnot.
tl;dr I'd avoid reading too much into rulings from entertainment-based actual plays.
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Ah. Yes. The instance where two different Developers run the same mechanic differently. Classic Paizo.Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.
I disagree, in the instance that the Community is terribly divided on an issue and nothing either side says will budge the discussion. An "off the cuff" ruling, whether it be a Forum post, podcast response, Facebook post or what-have-you, can help move that discussion out of the gutter.
But a contradictory comment from another Designer can toss the whole thing back in the fire.
Ah. Yes. The instance where two different Developers run the same mechanic differently. Classic Paizo.Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.I disagree, in the instance that the Community is terribly divided on an issue and nothing either side says will budge the discussion. An "off the cuff" ruling, whether it be a Forum post, podcast response, Facebook post or what-have-you, can help move that discussion out of the gutter.
But a contradictory comment from another Designer can toss the whole thing back in the fire.
But we never actually had a designer way in. We hand second hand heaersay that we don’t know if it came from playtest rulings ( which would have required a free hand). Jason is actually pretty good when he is live streaming about admiring when he is stretching orunsure of a ruling. He would have helped the players built their characters and talked to them about that feat early on so they knew how it worked.
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But we never actually had a designer way in.
Usually a designer gives their input when a thread goes for an exorbitant amount of posts. (On the PF1 forums, it was typically 1,000 posts.)
If we get 1,000 posts arguing this, then maybe they will give us, at the very least, a guideline and explanation for what the intent of the ability is.
It's also our only feasible route for "official clarification" until they implement a FAQ system.
So we need just about 700 more posts along the lines of "it's perfectly clear to me what the rules are, how could you possibly not agree with me?"
I mean, we could also try to work out an amicable compromise that would make everyone happy... but nah, this is the internet! I'd rather just disagree with you!
Really running Battle Medicine with one, two or no hands required and with or without healing tool laden bandoliers isn't that big of a deal. At the end of the day, until Errata comes from on high and proves us foolish, what makes sense to you may not make sense to me.
I would allow my Druid party member to use Nature with battle medicine because he has Natural Medicine. Do the rules support this specifically? Not at all. Does that stop us from giggling when he decides his downed ally should really try his edibles (Made bite size for in battle application)? Not at all.
Ah. Yes. The instance where two different Developers run the same mechanic differently. Classic Paizo.Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.I disagree, in the instance that the Community is terribly divided on an issue and nothing either side says will budge the discussion. An "off the cuff" ruling, whether it be a Forum post, podcast response, Facebook post or what-have-you, can help move that discussion out of the gutter.
But a contradictory comment from another Designer can toss the whole thing back in the fire.
And taking that off the cuff ruling as how it should be run especially coming from a podcast that may or may not have been heard means you going to get issues where 2 similar groups in PFS end up running an adventure with 2 different GMs and one group loses a character and the other doesn't because someone couldn't heal without dropping everything they where holding in one game and didn't have the actions to get there in time.
Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.I disagree [...]
But a contradictory comment from another Designer can toss the whole thing back in the fire.
So wait, you disagree about [not taking off the cuff rulings] but then completely agree with [the reason WHY]?
I don't get it.
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Wow. This thread is still dangling.
"Stern glance" battle medicine is the RAW. Meaning no free hands or tools to "patch" somebody up required. Until such time as errata appears. There's really no way to logic our way out of this.
Personally, I would like to see errata requiring healing tools and one or two free hands. But my personal feeling has no bearing on the RAW.
Stern glance it is.
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Which of course is the whole reason that we typically don't take off the cuff rulings as rulings.I disagree [...]
But a contradictory comment from another Designer can toss the whole thing back in the fire.
So wait, you disagree about [not taking off the cuff rulings] but then completely agree with [the reason WHY]?
I don't get it.
Well, when you cut out the bulk of any post, it's bound to lose context.