As we all know, drain cannot be healed with magic or first aid.

However, the new rules for stim patches might just include a way around this limitation. See, when applied it "Removes" its rating boxes of stun. Not heals, removes. Therefore, it bypasses the normal "Only natural healing" limitation on Drain/Fading.

Now after Rating X 10 minutes the patch deals (Rating + 1) stun to you, but this can be healed normally.

So, loophole that allows Drain damage to be dealt with, or FuelDrop missing something blindingly obvious (again!)?

The concept of the Stim patch is to reinvigorate you, thus shaking off the fatigue that Stun represents. Removing, in this sense means setting it aside, as it comes back after the effect expires plus hits you a bit on top.

I MIGHT allow it, if only because all the Stim Patch is doing is setting aside the effects temporarily. However I would include the caveat that any magical drain stun removed returns at the end of the effect and would still be healed by naturally healing only, though the + 1 part from the stim patch itself could be healed magically as it was not directly from drain.

You do not get to cheesemonkey magical stun into normal.

Seems legit.

Oh, I know perfectly well this is cheesemonkeydom. I'm just making sure that this RAW exploit gets attention so that it can be Errataed should that be the developers will it. Houserules and rules patches will fix it, but that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking if my reading of the rules is correct.

Gotta say, I totally agree with you on how munchkinny this is.

Well as far as is it RAW or not, since they didn't bother to really define the words better, it is open to interpretation.

Score another one for vague and inconsistent writing.

Yeah, just went and read the relevant section. Removes the stun, so that means it's gone. Never references the stun removal being temporary. Basically, it trades X stun now for R+1 stun later. I wonder if the author actually meant for this to be the way it works (I'd put money on no).

Fueldrop, while cheesemonkey in spirit, by the rules in the rulebook I'd say it's allowed. Not that I would allow it though

It was clearly changed for a reason. In SR4* stim patches give you High Pain Tolerance, which is "ignore boxes of stun."

I'm sure there was a reason, I'm just suspicious the reason was "oops".

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this exploit mean that over the last couple of editions Stimpatches have gone from 'torture mages by slowly draining their magic' to 'Mages' best friend'?

Spending all my TMs starting resources on stims.
I say, by strict interpretation, yes this beautifully cheesy use of stims would exchange it's rating of your drain stun for rating+1 heal enabled stun after the effect wears off.
I probably would use the rule that the original amount of drain/fading would still have to heal naturally, but since this game mechanic in no way favors Deckers and might even aid some other archetype, that it will get an immediate errata to verify that stims can't remove fading and probably drain will get added as collateral damage.

It must be it's wireless bonus.

Part of the problem is that several types of damage are all lumped into just two damage tracks.

I get shot by a heavy pistol and my armor blunts it. Now that damage isn't gone, its reduced to Stun which still hurt and I got some healthy bruising. Slapping a stim patch on it removes the immediate effects of that bruising, I don't feel it enough so it doesn't impact me, but that deep bruising is still there. It's not truly removed, I just don't feel it for a time and let it slow me down. I pay for it afterwards and this is where it is truly dangerous but not well reflected in that I only take +1 more damage afterwards. Without feeling that injury I could potentially aggrevate that even further..

Magic drain is even more muddled since the only natural healing implies it is a different type of damage, but still goes in the regular tracks.


Anyway, we will see what the errata says. I suspect I will stick with my original assessment of treating it as a temp removal and magic drain remains magical when the stim wears off.

Sigged!

I believe you are thinking of trauma patches.

Nope, Stim Patches used to be extremely damaging for mages.

Yup, like "You Might Lose Magic" damaging.

I think I would probably like to treat them along the lines of the Resist Pain Spell/High Pain Threshold. The text is squishy.

Pharmaceutical evolution.

I can guess that the reason they upgraded stim patches to 'remove' from 'ignore for wound modifiers' was that stim patches didn't actually help you stay in a fight longer, which is kinda what they're supposed to do. Popping a rating 6 stim patch at 9 out of 10 stun boxes filled was practically worthless. You'd get two dice back, but you'd still be taking a nap if someone brushed past you a little too hard, since a 10th damage would fill your track and knock you unconscious.

Removing the boxes means that you're still in the game for another 7 stun damage.

Mage-wise, keeping with the 'no non-natural healing' I'd say that it's pretty clear that stim patches are in the 'non-natural healing' category.

If you read the description of First Aid on p205, that even says:



So you can't really rules-lawyer your way around there being a distinction between "heals damage" and "removes damage" as the rules tend to use those two phrases interchangeably.

Thematically, mages are lucky they can use stim patches and trauma patches at all in this edition. Used to be that emergency first aid was a short bus ride into burnout land.

I think the reason is quite simply that this is how Stim Patches were worded pre-4th, and since 5th Editions took a lot of pages from that area, someone simply copied over the old rules. Which (AFAIK) had the same issue, but given the side effects the patches had back then, probably nobody though of using them to make Drain cureable. Only the unholy trinity of old wording, new magic compatibility, and dedicated rule lawyers finally revealed the flaw

Except it's not a flaw. It's clearly against the natural healing only rule.