BM says "Attempt a Medicine check with the same DC as for Treat Wounds and restore the corresponding amount of HP..." while Treat Eounds says "Critical Failure The target takes 1d8 damage."
Does this mean you can potentially deal damage with BM? Or do we ignore that since BM explicitly states "restore?" If it's ignored, do we also ignore the Critical Success line?
Corresponding refers to the success conditions. So yes, if you critically fail you damage someone for 1d8. if you critically succeed you can restore double the dice and double the dice rolled. You'll notice the bonus healing from Expert/Master/Legendary DCs isn't doubled (something I see mistaken a lot).
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I think its another ambiguity so expect table variation. In my games, we treat Battle Medicine exactly like Treat Wounds except for the explicitly listed differences (one action vs ten minutes, does not clear the Wounded condition, etc).
A strict reading I think you can make an argument that it only does healing since there is a lack of damage text. Though since it says "corresponding amount of healing," I think the critical success is still applicable.
Practically speaking, damage due to a critical failure never actually occurs in my games. On the rare occurrence that a medic critically fails the check, they use a Hero Point to reroll it, every time without exception. YMMV
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A strict reading I think you can make an argument that it only does healing since there is a lack of damage text.
Treat Wounds doesn't have damage text either. It even uses the word "regained" to describe its effect on HP. I don't think that really holds water.
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Treat Wounds doesn't have damage text either
Perhaps, but the language is a bit ambiguous so I would be slow to dismiss an argument in good faith. I can see it either way so I would defer to the GM.
Investing in a Crying Angel pendant also helps.
I thought so too, until the actual language was pointed out to me. The trigger for a Crying Angel Pendant is "You critically fail to Administer First Aid." That is a specific action in the Medicine tree so a strict reading of the talisman would not apply to Treat Wounds or Battle Medicine.
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Investing in a Crying Angel pendant also helps.I thought so too, until the actual language was pointed out to me. The trigger for a Crying Angel Pendant is "You critically fail to Administer First Aid." That is a specific action in the Medicine tree so a strict reading of the talisman would not apply to Treat Wounds or Battle Medicine.
Interesting. I hadn’t noticed that before.
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Yep, significantly reduces interest in the pendant
Yep. I was especially unhappy about it because I purchased a lesser Talisman cord and 2 of the crying angel pendants to give out to healers. Then it was pointed out how it does work and that gold was a waste. There are no other necromancy pendants that I have found to use instead.
But to answer the original question, yes you can do damage on crit fail with Battle Medicine.
Talismans just keep getting worse, don't they? At least it can still help if you're trying to remove the bleed condition (or stabilize for those rare instances, though I don't know that I've seen that use of Medicine very often given how many people just have a healing potion on hand).
Specific ones yes, others retain value.
Also advanced first aid sees a character using it at my table. Sickened and Frightened are pretty nasty when applied in larger amounts.
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Talismans just keep getting worse, don't they? At least it can still help if you're trying to remove the bleed condition (or stabilize for those rare instances, though I don't know that I've seen that use of Medicine very often given how many people just have a healing potion on hand).Specific ones yes, others retain value.
Also advanced first aid sees a character using it at my table. Sickened and Frightened are pretty nasty when applied in larger amounts.
Advanced First Aid does not appear to have a critical failure effect. So improving a critical failure to a failure doesn’t do anything except cost you 7gp for using up the pendant.
Treat Condition or Holistic Care from Medic are not administering first aid, so neither would appear to be helped by the pendant either.
The fewer talismans that are useful, the worse talismans are overall. They seem like they are helpful, but then are so situational in most cases as to not really be worth it. For example, there’s a PFS scenario that gives an Emerald Grasshopper to 1st level characters. It seems like it would be a great solution to one of the problems encountered. Except that it requires Expert in Athletics, which no 1st level character will have (there might be some exception somewhere), and requires succeeding on the DC 30 high jump check, which is only going to happen on a nat-20 for a 1st level character even if they are somehow expert. That’s an author being fooled into thinking a talisman does more than it does, otherwise there’s no reason to put it in the scenario at all.
Advanced First Aid does not appear to have a critical failure effect. So improving a critical failure to a failure doesn’t do anything except cost you 7gp for using up the pendant.
It has this:
Critical Failure If you were trying to stabilize, the creature’s dying value increases by 1. If you were trying to stop bleeding, it immediately takes an amount of damage equal to its persistent bleed damage.
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Advanced First Aid does not appear to have a critical failure effect. So improving a critical failure to a failure doesn’t do anything except cost you 7gp for using up the pendant.It has this:
Critical Failure If you were trying to stabilize, the creature’s dying value increases by 1. If you were trying to stop bleeding, it immediately takes an amount of damage equal to its persistent bleed damage.
Those are the critical failure conditions for First Aid. You are not trying to do either of those things when you are trying to reduce their frightened condition or their sickened condition.
My mistake, didn't realize you were referring to the feat. Yeah you're right, the talisman does nothing there.