Revising the healing skill [Archive] - Wizards Community

Revising the healing skill [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
TarlSS
06-07-06, 01:44 AM The healing skill is completely useless in D&D, probably due to primitive technology limiting it's use. However, in campaigns with higher 'technological' standards, healing should be more effective. I'm proposing this along with introducing the concept of Doctors in the Eberron campaign. This is an effort to get Heal more in line with Treat Injury in the D20 Modern and Star Wars games.

I'd like to know if this is balanced mechanically. I don't see why it wouldn't be, as giving other characters the ability to heal outside of combat can be done easily with wands. Most clerics these days barely bother.

I would also like to know if you think it's more suitable to use the D20 Modern rules for Treat Injury instead. That said, I've made the revised heal skill a little more useful to D&D, where it has to compete with magical healing. I've reduced the effectiveness of treating stun, daze and nausea since those seem to be key debilitating effects in high level D&D spells.

Heal Skill Revision

Task DC
Longterm Care 15
Treat Disease See Below
Treat Poison See Below
Treat Daze 15
Treat Stun 15
Treat Nausea 15
Restore HP 15

New uses for the skill
Treat Disease, Poison and Longterm Care remain the same

Treat Stun: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of the stunned condition from a character.

Treat Nausea: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of a Nauseated character.

Treat Daze: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of a dazed character.

Restore HP: You may make a Heal check to restore a number of hitpoints equal to your heal check on the target character. This can only be done once every 24 hours. This process takes one hour. Healing a creature not of your type requires 5 ranks of a Knowledge skill pertaining to that creature.

Feat: Master Chirurgeon (sp?)
Prerequisite: Heal 4 Ranks, Knowledge(Nature) 4 ranks
Benefit:You can perform special actions with the heal skill using your medical knowledge
Task DC
Heal Injury: 30
Corrective Chirurgery 30

Heal Injury:Once every hour, you may restore a number of hitpoints equal to the target character's level. You make not take 10 or 20 on this check, and on a critical failure, the subject loses a number of hitpoints equal to the character's level.

Corrective Chirurgery: You can take 1 hour to restore 1 ability point from an injured character. You can restore no more than 4 points per day.
After using this ability, the target becomes fatigued for 24 hours, minus 2 hours for every point above the DC to acheive. This cannot reduce the fatigue to less than 6 hours.

Special Circumstances: You may not use this feat during combat, and you cannot restore more ability points or hitpoints than the character's full normal total. You must have the proper tools (Healer's kit or similiar items) and a sterile environment.

So, tighten up the language and give me feedback on balance. Don't give me genre issues please like 'it doesn't fit into X setting' because I fully realize it's not appropriate to your standard D&D dark age technology. Stipulation on 'proper tools' and 'sterile environment' is intentially ambigous to allow leeway for DMs.
Cifer
06-07-06, 07:39 AM Restore HP: DC 15 [...]
Restore HP: You may make a Heal check to restore a number of hitpoints equal to your heal check on the target character.

Why is there a DC when you heal equal to your healcheck? Is it not possible to heal less than 15 hp or do you count only [checkresult-15] hp, which would btw be how warforged repairing is handled?

and on a critical failure, the subject loses a number of hitpoints equal to the character's level.
There is no critical failure rule on checks... and think about how much problems a star surgeon would have if one in twenty operations failed.

After using this ability, the target becomes fatigued for two hours, minus 2 hours for every point above the DC to acheive. This cannot reduce the fatigue to less than 6 hours.
Read these sentences aloud and tell me where the failure is...
danielinthewolvesden
06-07-06, 11:48 AM If the healing skill is useless in your campaign, you're not playing it right. In the lower levels, tending folks overnite can make a huge difference. In later levles, a healer with maxed out Heal skill can make sure that no one ever suffers form secondary poison damage.

No "fix" is needed, the skill is fine that way it is.
TarlSS
06-07-06, 12:55 PM Addressing Daniel:
That's the point. I'm trying to address a more modern state of affairs in terms of medical technology. Heal is fine if you're playing in the dark ages, however it's rather worthless and there's little reason to keep it so underpowered in games with higher technology levels.

Perhaps the way you play the game is different from mine, that doesn't mean it's wrong. The purpose of the fix is to provide meaningful downtime healing without having to resort to something cheesey like millions of CLW wands.
Heal in it's current state is useless after level 5; there's no particular reason to take in in lieu of lesser restoration or neutralize poison.

Treat Injury works fine in other systems, there's no reason it wouldn't in D&D.

The question is not whether Heal 'is fine' as is. It is, for normal D&D. I'm asking if changing it to be more like Treat Injury breaks anything.

Addressing Cifer:
-Fixed the fatigue mistake.

-And yes, I suppose you can only restore 15 hitpoints or more. After all, the process takes an hour along with the proper facilities, and can be done only once per day. There's a DC so if anyone else does it, it's risky because it can be a waste of time. This is the way it works in SWD20, and I chose to do it that way since it's a more 'cinematic' game than D20 Modern.

-As to critical failures, I think there should be some kind of risk associated with performing churgery (Distinctively -not- surgery) on someone because I'm looking to simulate something close to Revolutionary/Civil War practices rather than modern. Additionally, most players would probably use this skill on the field.

And yes, there is a critical failure clause in Use Magic Device, if you're looking for precedent.
00_Whupass
06-07-06, 01:01 PM You realize that your Restore HP action has made heal more effective than its d20 modern analog Treat injury, which resores either 1d4 or 1d6, I can't remember which at the moment. Thats much less than a minimum of 15. If you wan't to make heal more like treat injury why not just use treat injury.
Cheza
06-07-06, 01:55 PM If the healing skill is useless in your campaign, you're not playing it right. In the lower levels, tending folks overnite can make a huge difference. In later levles, a healer with maxed out Heal skill can make sure that no one ever suffers form secondary poison damage.

No "fix" is needed, the skill is fine that way it is.
You are right. But two things
First: To give long term care, you need the healer to be awake the whole time. If he is an elf, this means at least a 12 hour rest per day. Since the healer can't give long term care to himself, this could increase the time to heal a party (especially a non-divine casters group) to rest for a long time.

Second: I'm not a fan of fixed skill checks. It's the same with tumble checks. Roll a 15 to tumble past your opponents without AoO makes it easy - even against the most spectacular foe.

In our group we added the take-10 and the take-20 options, so rolling a 15 for a long term care seems to be quite unreasonable. No character needs to max. it up. Even against poison or desease effects, 5 ranks in this skill is enough. With your attribute modifier you can handle almost any poison. Only a few have a DC greater than 18. (see poisons on page 297 @ DMG 3.5). If you add masterwork tools or other favorable conditions, it gets quite simple.
TarlSS
06-07-06, 04:54 PM I actually wanted Heal to be more like Treat Injury from Star Wars, where it does exactly what I proposed. The text is pretty much blanket ripped from the book.

I feel that Star Wars is more appropriate in terms of 'power level' to D&D where people generally around labelled as adventures and do crazy things. In D20 Modern things generally go for a realistic bent, I'm looking for something fantastic in scale.

That said, I also chose it so it would be a decent alternative to magical healing.

I'm looking to see whether it particularly -breaks- anything in terms of mechanics. I'm fully aware that it's an unneccessary modification.
00_Whupass
06-07-06, 05:00 PM One thing to consider is that almost all the classes that have Heal as a class skill are divine casters with access to magical healing, thereby mitigating the effect his will have on the game.

Also, Starwars uses the Wounds/Vitality system by default, and IIRC the heal skill only restores vitality at the rate of check result. In D&D where there is no distinction between wounds and vitality it blurs this line, not sure the effect that will have but it bears consideration.

Aside from that I don't like your proposed house rule, but thats a style issue, from a mechanical perspective no I don't see it breaking any aspects of the game no.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
TarlSS 06-07-06, 01:44 AM	The healing skill is completely useless in D&D, probably due to primitive technology limiting it's use. However, in campaigns with higher 'technological' standards, healing should be more effective. I'm proposing this along with introducing the concept of Doctors in the Eberron campaign. This is an effort to get Heal more in line with Treat Injury in the D20 Modern and Star Wars games. I'd like to know if this is balanced mechanically. I don't see why it wouldn't be, as giving other characters the ability to heal outside of combat can be done easily with wands. Most clerics these days barely bother. I would also like to know if you think it's more suitable to use the D20 Modern rules for Treat Injury instead. That said, I've made the revised heal skill a little more useful to D&D, where it has to compete with magical healing. I've reduced the effectiveness of treating stun, daze and nausea since those seem to be key debilitating effects in high level D&D spells. Heal Skill Revision Task DC Longterm Care 15 Treat Disease See Below Treat Poison See Below Treat Daze 15 Treat Stun 15 Treat Nausea 15 Restore HP 15 New uses for the skill Treat Disease, Poison and Longterm Care remain the same Treat Stun: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of the stunned condition from a character. Treat Nausea: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of a Nauseated character. Treat Daze: This is an attack action, you can use Heal to remove one round from the duration of a dazed character. Restore HP: You may make a Heal check to restore a number of hitpoints equal to your heal check on the target character. This can only be done once every 24 hours. This process takes one hour. Healing a creature not of your type requires 5 ranks of a Knowledge skill pertaining to that creature. Feat: Master Chirurgeon (sp?) Prerequisite: Heal 4 Ranks, Knowledge(Nature) 4 ranks Benefit:You can perform special actions with the heal skill using your medical knowledge Task DC Heal Injury: 30 Corrective Chirurgery 30 Heal Injury:Once every hour, you may restore a number of hitpoints equal to the target character's level. You make not take 10 or 20 on this check, and on a critical failure, the subject loses a number of hitpoints equal to the character's level. Corrective Chirurgery: You can take 1 hour to restore 1 ability point from an injured character. You can restore no more than 4 points per day. After using this ability, the target becomes fatigued for 24 hours, minus 2 hours for every point above the DC to acheive. This cannot reduce the fatigue to less than 6 hours. Special Circumstances: You may not use this feat during combat, and you cannot restore more ability points or hitpoints than the character's full normal total. You must have the proper tools (Healer's kit or similiar items) and a sterile environment. So, tighten up the language and give me feedback on balance. Don't give me genre issues please like 'it doesn't fit into X setting' because I fully realize it's not appropriate to your standard D&D dark age technology. Stipulation on 'proper tools' and 'sterile environment' is intentially ambigous to allow leeway for DMs.
Cifer 06-07-06, 07:39 AM	Restore HP: DC 15 [...] Restore HP: You may make a Heal check to restore a number of hitpoints equal to your heal check on the target character. Why is there a DC when you heal equal to your healcheck? Is it not possible to heal less than 15 hp or do you count only [checkresult-15] hp, which would btw be how warforged repairing is handled? and on a critical failure, the subject loses a number of hitpoints equal to the character's level. There is no critical failure rule on checks... and think about how much problems a star surgeon would have if one in twenty operations failed. After using this ability, the target becomes fatigued for two hours, minus 2 hours for every point above the DC to acheive. This cannot reduce the fatigue to less than 6 hours. Read these sentences aloud and tell me where the failure is...
danielinthewolvesden 06-07-06, 11:48 AM	If the healing skill is useless in your campaign, you're not playing it right. In the lower levels, tending folks overnite can make a huge difference. In later levles, a healer with maxed out Heal skill can make sure that no one ever suffers form secondary poison damage. No "fix" is needed, the skill is fine that way it is.
TarlSS 06-07-06, 12:55 PM	Addressing Daniel: That's the point. I'm trying to address a more modern state of affairs in terms of medical technology. Heal is fine if you're playing in the dark ages, however it's rather worthless and there's little reason to keep it so underpowered in games with higher technology levels. Perhaps the way you play the game is different from mine, that doesn't mean it's wrong. The purpose of the fix is to provide meaningful downtime healing without having to resort to something cheesey like millions of CLW wands. Heal in it's current state is useless after level 5; there's no particular reason to take in in lieu of lesser restoration or neutralize poison. Treat Injury works fine in other systems, there's no reason it wouldn't in D&D. The question is not whether Heal 'is fine' as is. It is, for normal D&D. I'm asking if changing it to be more like Treat Injury breaks anything. Addressing Cifer: -Fixed the fatigue mistake. -And yes, I suppose you can only restore 15 hitpoints or more. After all, the process takes an hour along with the proper facilities, and can be done only once per day. There's a DC so if anyone else does it, it's risky because it can be a waste of time. This is the way it works in SWD20, and I chose to do it that way since it's a more 'cinematic' game than D20 Modern. -As to critical failures, I think there should be some kind of risk associated with performing churgery (Distinctively -not- surgery) on someone because I'm looking to simulate something close to Revolutionary/Civil War practices rather than modern. Additionally, most players would probably use this skill on the field. And yes, there is a critical failure clause in Use Magic Device, if you're looking for precedent.
00_Whupass 06-07-06, 01:01 PM	You realize that your Restore HP action has made heal more effective than its d20 modern analog Treat injury, which resores either 1d4 or 1d6, I can't remember which at the moment. Thats much less than a minimum of 15. If you wan't to make heal more like treat injury why not just use treat injury.
Cheza 06-07-06, 01:55 PM	If the healing skill is useless in your campaign, you're not playing it right. In the lower levels, tending folks overnite can make a huge difference. In later levles, a healer with maxed out Heal skill can make sure that no one ever suffers form secondary poison damage. No "fix" is needed, the skill is fine that way it is. You are right. But two things First: To give long term care, you need the healer to be awake the whole time. If he is an elf, this means at least a 12 hour rest per day. Since the healer can't give long term care to himself, this could increase the time to heal a party (especially a non-divine casters group) to rest for a long time. Second: I'm not a fan of fixed skill checks. It's the same with tumble checks. Roll a 15 to tumble past your opponents without AoO makes it easy - even against the most spectacular foe. In our group we added the take-10 and the take-20 options, so rolling a 15 for a long term care seems to be quite unreasonable. No character needs to max. it up. Even against poison or desease effects, 5 ranks in this skill is enough. With your attribute modifier you can handle almost any poison. Only a few have a DC greater than 18. (see poisons on page 297 @ DMG 3.5). If you add masterwork tools or other favorable conditions, it gets quite simple.
TarlSS 06-07-06, 04:54 PM	I actually wanted Heal to be more like Treat Injury from Star Wars, where it does exactly what I proposed. The text is pretty much blanket ripped from the book. I feel that Star Wars is more appropriate in terms of 'power level' to D&D where people generally around labelled as adventures and do crazy things. In D20 Modern things generally go for a realistic bent, I'm looking for something fantastic in scale. That said, I also chose it so it would be a decent alternative to magical healing. I'm looking to see whether it particularly -breaks- anything in terms of mechanics. I'm fully aware that it's an unneccessary modification.
00_Whupass 06-07-06, 05:00 PM	One thing to consider is that almost all the classes that have Heal as a class skill are divine casters with access to magical healing, thereby mitigating the effect his will have on the game. Also, Starwars uses the Wounds/Vitality system by default, and IIRC the heal skill only restores vitality at the rate of check result. In D&D where there is no distinction between wounds and vitality it blurs this line, not sure the effect that will have but it bears consideration. Aside from that I don't like your proposed house rule, but thats a style issue, from a mechanical perspective no I don't see it breaking any aspects of the game no.