Full Version: Medical magic loss.
How do medics cause magic loss in mages? And how would they avoid it?
(SR3 rules follow, 4 may have something similar)
On the TN modifiers for medical treatment, there is a +2 for the subject being awakened (there's a big page of modifiers). The chance for magic loss occurs if the medic chooses not to accept that penalty and instead goes in the sloppy way that works fine for mundanes.
On the TN modifiers for medical treatment, there is a +2 for the subject being awakened (there's a big page of modifiers). The chance for magic loss occurs if the medic chooses not to accept that penalty and instead goes in the sloppy way that works fine for mundanes.
Then after the +2 modifer is ignored, it's a roll of 2d6, and if the result is less than the PC's magic rating, some magic is lost, IIRC. I don't have my books here at work, but I'm pretty sure it's less than and possibly equal to.
What's it like, flavor-wise?
It can be flavorful, but it is not a good system to use in the new rules, becuase you dont always have six magic so you can become weak very easy.
I think that the reasoning for it was that normal medical procedures use lots of very high powered drugs. While that's fine and dandy for most people, it can cause a shock to an awakened character's delicate magical self/physical self balance, similar to the magic loss due to deadly wounds.
Edit: As a GM, I've always thought that it tasted raspberries, but my players always said that it has a bitter flavor.
Edit: As a GM, I've always thought that it tasted raspberries, but my players always said that it has a bitter flavor.
| QUOTE (emo samurai) |
| What's it like, flavor-wise? |
It means that instead of using cutting edge medical leetness the medic uses outdated medical practices from today and it becomes less likely that the patient will pull through. Just make it seem medieval and stupid. Give the medic a civil war surgeon hacksaw and make him stuff random bundles of Chinese herbs in the bullet holes.
Here's a link from the Shadowrun Supplemental about Twisted Lemon's House Of Magic, which is run by a burned-out mage and former runner who lost his ability to astrally project after he got a'sploded in an accident; his fellow runners just slapped a trauma patch on him and ran away.
| QUOTE (Toshiaki) |
| I think that the reasoning for it was that normal medical procedures use lots of very high powered drugs. While that's fine and dandy for most people, it can cause a shock to an awakened character's delicate magical self/physical self balance, similar to the magic loss due to deadly wounds. |
Or drug abuse.
| QUOTE (Wounded Ronin) | ||
It means that instead of using cutting edge medical leetness the medic uses outdated medical practices from today and it becomes less likely that the patient will pull through. Just make it seem medieval and stupid. Give the medic a civil war surgeon hacksaw and make him stuff random bundles of Chinese herbs in the bullet holes. |
In Mr. Johnson's black book, the flavor text for the awakened medic says that the medical practices used on mages are much more delicate than those used on normal people. That contradicts what you just said.
...I've dispensed with the MA loss for surgery or straight out wounds unless things are really hosed (like the Shadow Doc really screws up or you lose a limb in combat.).
| QUOTE (Wounded Ronin) | ||
It means that instead of using cutting edge medical leetness the medic uses outdated medical practices from today and it becomes less likely that the patient will pull through. Just make it seem medieval and stupid. Give the medic a civil war surgeon hacksaw and make him stuff random bundles of Chinese herbs in the bullet holes. |
It is a shame that no one amputates like the used to. Today, an amputation is a major surgery that can last several hours and requires a team of surgeons. Back then, a single surgeon with a tourniquet and a hacksaw could get rid of a limb in less than a minute and amputate hundreds of soldiers per day. And we have power tool.
I think part of it is they'll use keyhole surgery on bullets rather than cut you open and stitch you up, things like that.
Man I was glad to see this go away in 4th edition. My mages used to act like pussies afraid of taking anything worse than a light wound.
| QUOTE (emo samurai) | ||||
In Mr. Johnson's black book, the flavor text for the awakened medic says that the medical practices used on mages are much more delicate than those used on normal people. That contradicts what you just said. |
What, the techniques are so "refined" that they make you more likely to die, when to not die all you generally have to do is clear the airway and stop bleeding? I'm sorry, but if that's the case, I call bullshit on the flavor text, because the flavor text makes no sense.
If you play in *my* SR3 game and you're awakened, the medic is jamming a dried tiger penis in your bullet hole and jamming a wad of uncooked collared greens under your tongue.
| QUOTE (HullBreach) |
| Man I was glad to see this go away in 4th edition. My mages used to act like pussies afraid of taking anything worse than a light wound. |
That's not too offensive IMO. I don't have any magical powers but I'd try pretty hard to avoid being shot by a .25 nevertheless.
Yeah, people are too willing to take wounds in RPG's; wound modifiers are way to easy.
I decided that TCM torture is now the official way that the magically active get treated in any campaigns I run in the future.
"The DocWagon medic runs over to Bobby the mage's unconscious D wounded figure, and, seeing his magically active DocWagon bracelet, proceeds to stop his bleeding by discharging an entire tube of Tiger Balm up Bobby's ass. Bobby, when you wake up you'll spend 40 minutes straight screaming and running around the room because that's worse than eating five orders of spicy wings from a specialty wing shop. He then crams a fistfull of dried tiger penises and rams them in the .50 cal sized hole which the Barrett put in Bobby's chest."
Later...
Sammie: "I taunt Bobby because he's injured!"
Bobby: "I rip out a tiger's penis, which should be all wet and reconstituted with my blood, and fling it at the sammie!"
GM: "Uh, okay, make your thrown weapons test...sammie, you're too shocked and horrified to dodge. Lose a point of sanity. Bobby, since you just ripped out the magic-supporting tiger's penis, you give yourself another wound."
Bobby: "Oh no!"
GM: "Don't worry, the medic is here with another tube of Tiger Balm and a suppository nozzle cap."
"The DocWagon medic runs over to Bobby the mage's unconscious D wounded figure, and, seeing his magically active DocWagon bracelet, proceeds to stop his bleeding by discharging an entire tube of Tiger Balm up Bobby's ass. Bobby, when you wake up you'll spend 40 minutes straight screaming and running around the room because that's worse than eating five orders of spicy wings from a specialty wing shop. He then crams a fistfull of dried tiger penises and rams them in the .50 cal sized hole which the Barrett put in Bobby's chest."
Later...
Sammie: "I taunt Bobby because he's injured!"
Bobby: "I rip out a tiger's penis, which should be all wet and reconstituted with my blood, and fling it at the sammie!"
GM: "Uh, okay, make your thrown weapons test...sammie, you're too shocked and horrified to dodge. Lose a point of sanity. Bobby, since you just ripped out the magic-supporting tiger's penis, you give yourself another wound."
Bobby: "Oh no!"
GM: "Don't worry, the medic is here with another tube of Tiger Balm and a suppository nozzle cap."
| QUOTE (Wounded Ronin @ Aug 28 2006, 04:36 PM) |
| What, the techniques are so "refined" that they make you more likely to die, when to not die all you generally have to do is clear the airway and stop bleeding? |
Clearing the airway and stopping external bleeding for a serious gunshot or stab wound is not always enough to prevent dying. You may well keep them from dying immediately, but if the patient has internal bleeding, collapsing lungs, or the gunshot went through organs or the GI tract, things like sepsis, blood loss, or lack of oxygen can kill hours later. My main issue with the say that SR handles (now and in the past) becoming injured is that the model for medium-term effects (the next 6-72 hours) is pretty bad.
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While working the Harborview ER in Seattle (Harborview being the regional Level 1 trauma center, in addition to one of the main outpatient psych departments downtown), I got to see someone come in after a motorcycle accident. He'd been knocked unconcious by the impact, had a broken forearm, and had a few nasty looking (superficial) cuts that had been bandaged and clotted. During the 12 hours or so he lived after the accident, he had roughly twice his blood volume replaced via IV. The angiogram showed that one of the impacts he'd suffered had broken one of the lesser arteries running inside of his pelvis, and he bled to death internally.
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The problem is, SR doesn't have a way to simulate something of this nature. The actual injury was fairly small, it just happened to be in a critical location. Characters who are assumed to be "dying" do so quite quickly, and usually are unconcious the whole time. The game doesn't model blood loss over time, or the risk of re-injuring yourself if you don't take the time to recover from a wound (say, if you pull a Man on Fire and go after a kidnapping ring 36 hours after you're put in the hospital for MGSW). I'd like to have some kind of (optional) mechanic written out to handle wounds, not just some abstract chart of "damage" that remove the occasional die from your pool. First aid (mundane or magical) might be enough to reduce the effect of a wound to simply being something that slows you down... or it might not, depending on the wound. We've abstracted damage (no hit locations, etc), and so this would be abstract, as well... but it'd be nice to have.
| QUOTE (Shrike30) |
| The problem is, SR doesn't have a way to simulate something of this nature. The actual injury was fairly small, it just happened to be in a critical location. Characters who are assumed to be "dying" do so quite quickly, and usually are unconcious the whole time. |
..another case in point of even a smaller injury was Ben Rothlensberger (QB of the Pittsburgh Steelers) who was in a motorcycle crash earlier this summer. Were it not for an astute EMT, Big Ben might have died due to too much blood in his stomach from a small artery in his mouth that was cut.
One way to simulate slow bleeding and the potential for re-injury is to expand upon the wound effects in Man and Machine.
Slow bleeding would be easy to do. Just allow stress points to be applied to the condition moniter. For every stress point the condition moniter has the character takes an unresistable light wound every hour (or other period of time). Both the stun and physical monitors can take stress seperatly. If the monitor fails a stress test then it is filled and the damage cannot be healed untill the condition monitor is repaired. Overflow damage can still be healed according to normal rules but trauma patches do not provide automatic stabilization in a physical condition monitor fails due to stress. Instead, a character will have to heal the overflow damage as it comes using first aid or magic.
Slow bleeding would be easy to do. Just allow stress points to be applied to the condition moniter. For every stress point the condition moniter has the character takes an unresistable light wound every hour (or other period of time). Both the stun and physical monitors can take stress seperatly. If the monitor fails a stress test then it is filled and the damage cannot be healed untill the condition monitor is repaired. Overflow damage can still be healed according to normal rules but trauma patches do not provide automatic stabilization in a physical condition monitor fails due to stress. Instead, a character will have to heal the overflow damage as it comes using first aid or magic.
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