One spell to end all healing

Discussion on playing Earthdawn. Experiences, stories, and questions related to being a player.
Tattered Rags
Posts:374
Joined:Mon Nov 28, 2016 12:04 am
Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by Tattered Rags » Sat Dec 31, 2016 12:20 am

Out of curiosity, what is the in-game rationale for Grove Renewal providing +5 in combat and +1 outside combat? Adrenaline? Proximity of openly hostile Patterns (it knows)?

And, can you just pick a fight with some wimps so GR gets a bump in healing? Just don't let the GM know why you're attacking the school age children, of course.
Adventure I'm running:
Under the Stars

Adventure GM post-mortem:
Under the Stars Postmortem

Tattered Rags
Posts:374
Joined:Mon Nov 28, 2016 12:04 am

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by Tattered Rags » Sat Dec 31, 2016 12:20 am

MetalBoar wrote:
Someone in your group should learn Alchemy (as a Talent preferably) so you can start making your own healing potions.
What are the options for learning Alchemy (or any skill that doesn't have a corresponding talent) as a talent? I think I must have missed the rules for that...

Thanks!
I wondered the same thing.

I will point out that questing for ingredients can lead to good adventures, whether you're doing it for your own party member who has the skill or looking to get a discount at the local alchemist.
Adventure I'm running:
Under the Stars

Adventure GM post-mortem:
Under the Stars Postmortem

User avatar
The Undying
Posts:696
Joined:Sun Nov 27, 2016 11:25 pm

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by The Undying » Sat Dec 31, 2016 1:09 am

MetalBoar wrote:
Someone in your group should learn Alchemy (as a Talent preferably) so you can start making your own healing potions.
What are the options for learning Alchemy (or any skill that doesn't have a corresponding talent) as a talent? I think I must have missed the rules for that...

Thanks!
There is no way to learn a Skill-only skill as a Talent. My bad on the Alchemy - thought it was a Talent learnable as skill, with Wizard having it as a Talent. I was thinking of Research, though.

User avatar
The Undying
Posts:696
Joined:Sun Nov 27, 2016 11:25 pm

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by The Undying » Sat Dec 31, 2016 1:15 am

Tattered Rags wrote:Out of curiosity, what is the in-game rationale for Grove Renewal providing +5 in combat and +1 outside combat? Adrenaline? Proximity of openly hostile Patterns (it knows)?

And, can you just pick a fight with some wimps so GR gets a bump in healing? Just don't let the GM know why you're attacking the school age children, of course.
I don't think there's an IN-GAME rationale for it. If you hop over toe Panda's Gaming Grove, he talks about the spell, and the only mention for why it gets bumped down out of combat is SPECIFICALLY to keep it from being better than all other healing. I'm sure we crafty folks could come up for a meaningful justification, though.

As for 'picking an artificial fight to get the bump', I think the only thing preventing it is the GM (rightfully) saying no. Comes back to that justification thing. Whatever the in-universe reason, it needs to prevent players from saying things like "ok, we'll spare, then, which is combat, which activates it, and I'll just pull my punches the entire time."

User avatar
etherial
Posts:964
Joined:Sun Nov 27, 2016 11:04 pm
Location:Berlin, Massachusetts
Contact:

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by etherial » Sat Dec 31, 2016 1:28 am

The Undying wrote:As for 'picking an artificial fight to get the bump', I think the only thing preventing it is the GM (rightfully) saying no. Comes back to that justification thing. Whatever the in-universe reason, it needs to prevent players from saying things like "ok, we'll spare, then, which is combat, which activates it, and I'll just pull my punches the entire time."
I've been playing Earthdawn for 15 years and that's exactly how we've handled Fireblood the whole time.

User avatar
The Undying
Posts:696
Joined:Sun Nov 27, 2016 11:25 pm

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by The Undying » Sat Dec 31, 2016 1:35 am

To each their own, that just seems incredibly weak and unfulfilling to me. ESPECIALLY for Fire Blood. Fire Blood has a very definite flavor of intensity to it, and I cannot see how a player could reasonably justify stoking that fervor if they're just mock-fighting.

User avatar
Loba
Posts:34
Joined:Sun Jan 01, 2017 5:47 pm

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by Loba » Wed Jan 04, 2017 4:28 am

The Undying wrote:Where are you getting "x2"?
Grove Renewal (Player's Guide, pg 282) wrote:Outside of combat, healing is reduced to 1 damage per round and is not affected by additional threads.
Now, let's take one of the many Disciplines that has the karma ability that can be used on recovery test, and lets assume a Step 6 for Toughness. We have:
- 6, base Toughness
- 8, Heat Food
- 8, Booster Potion
- 4, Karma

We are ALREADY at 26, beating out Grove Renewal. Even if the GM imposed Rule of Three, that Adept can still stack an extra bonus on there, likely for a ~6, bring them to Step ~32.
Plus, you are forgetting one of my favorites: A good Rank 5 Physician can add +5 [Physician Rank] to that roll and I think that is only for 25 silver. That brings your magic number to 37. I have a player with precisely this combination. Still - it is sad when you get several 1's and 2's in your roll. :oops:

User avatar
The Undying
Posts:696
Joined:Sun Nov 27, 2016 11:25 pm

Re: One spell to end all healing

Post by The Undying » Wed Jan 04, 2017 8:56 am

Long live the Physician! I think there are some great Skill-only or available-as-Skill capabilities that have a great deal of value, Physician being one of them. The amount of time, and the silver cost, seems to turn some people off. I think part of it is also a PERCEIVED tempo loss with the required downtime in training - but if you're not one of the short-lived races (ork, troll; arguably human, T'skrang, and drawf), then whats a month or two between adventures rounding out your characters, training skills, or just doing life-in-the-times stuff versus "oh sh*t oh sh*t oh sh*t gotta rush the next checkpoint run run RUNNNNNN!"

Post Reply