I've got a question about the Heal spell (SR4, p. 200). It's drain value is listed as (Damage Value) - 2. Is this the number of damage boxes the target has sustained, or the damage value of what caused the original damage?

Depends on what you allow the heal spell to do. I think the simplest way to word it is, it is the amount of damage you could theoretically heal at that time if you cast at a high enough force and got enough hits.

It's the number of actual damage boxes the target has sustained.

Wish I could check my book to check this...
Even if they can't be magically healed?

Say Joe Runner was injured in a fight and magically healed, but it still dragging around 2 boxes of damage.
He gets in another fight and sustains 3 more boxes of damage.
He now has 5 wound boxes, two of which can't be healed.
Sally Shaman casts Heal, scoring 4 hits, removing 3 boxes of Joe's damage.

The drain for the spell is (DV-2).
Does Sally resist DV1 (based on current, healable wounds) or DV3 (based on total wounds, including unhealable ones)?

-paws

The book doesn't specify, but I assume it would be 1 DV. It doesn't make sense to me that you'd suffer extra Drain due to wounds that you aren't even trying to heal (and can't heal).

I agree.

Alternately, a case can be made that the more wounded the target, the harder it is to actually accomplish the task, therefore the Drain is higher even though some of those wounds are not eligible for healing via magic.

That's why you patch them up with your medkit first then heal them. And I think I'd lean more towards Fortune's 'case' than the other simply because it is crazy easy to heal any which way in the new system.

I thought you couldn't stack first aid with heal?

Hmmm... Thinking about it does it say you can't use first aid after using heal, but you can use heal after using first aid? I've not got my book to hand.

Actually, I'd be interested to hear Dumpshockers views of how Heal works with Augmentation's optional critical wound rules.

Yep. First Aid -> Healspell is okay. Healspell -> First Aid doesn't help...

I have another question though.

If you are forced to drop the sustaining of a Heal spell before its gone permanent, can you try again on the whole lot? Say you Heal 3 of your victimpatient's 4 wounds but then a frag grenade breaks your concentration and tags another 2 wounds on the patient, can you gtry again on the 4, then on the 2, or is it now a "6 wound" or is it a 3 and a 2 or a 4 with a cap of 3 hits and a 2 or a 6 with a cap of 5...?

Since the Heal never actually took hold... Hmm. There's wording in the description of permanent spells that implies that the target of the spell reverts to normal (original state?) if the spell isn't sustained long enough. Don't have my book right now to quote the passage.

I suspect that, like drain calculation, this falls into the realm of "how mean/gritty is the GM?"

-paws

I would compromise and say that, while the prior attempt was ultimately unsuccessful, any further attempt would have to take into account the extra 2 boxes in the 'set of wounds', and would therefore count as a '6 wound'. Unless the fresh boxes of damage are cleared up with First Aid beforehand, of course.

Mm. I think I'd agree that if the sustain-to-permanent gets dropped, it's like the Heal never happened: knitted flesh peels open, clotted blood spurts, mended bones fracture. I think this would also mean that First Aid would once again be applicable, and any additional wounds sustained would count as "wounds since last Magically Healed", as you say.