Topic: Do you use poisons much? What about deadly poison?

[Druss_the_Legend]

How deadly is poison in your campaign? it seems powerful at the extreme ends of herbs listed. they are rare and expensive i guess.
had a post a while back about using poison on weapons. i allow this with certain paste/liquid forms but a critical result is needed for it to take effect.

I have a pc that has taken a critical from a poisoned assassin's blade. I havent decided how harmless the poison will be yet but was thinking of a slow acting poison that inflicts damage that cannot be healed easily/without specialist care/high level healing but also has some long term 'weakening effect' on his strength/constitution. I haven t seen anything that does that so i was going to just create something. my goal is to hamper the pc and have some reduction in their ability to fight/perform actions. Annoying but not daedly and keeps him in the action without putting him in a coma.

thoughts?

[jdale]

Long-term minor detriment + quest seems like a good solution.

As a GM, I tend to only use it as a monster ability. I don't have a good sense of how to make it available to players while limiting the quantities to a level that is appropriate for their power level. How rare should rare be? The druid has some skill in the area so it's more a question of what they can forage rather than how big is their budget.

On the player side, my character has some ranks but I've tended not to use it. We have captured some from enemies in the past, but it's mostly been the low-level stuff that just does extra hits.

[Druss_the_Legend]

Long-term minor detriment + quest seems like a good solution.

As a GM, I tend to only use it as a monster ability. I don't have a good sense of how to make it available to players while limiting the quantities to a level that is appropriate for their power level. How rare should rare be? The druid has some skill in the area so it's more a question of what they can forage rather than how big is their budget.

On the player side, my character has some ranks but I've tended not to use it. We have captured some from enemies in the past, but it's mostly been the low-level stuff that just does extra hits.

my view is deadly poisons should be used rarely, as in virtually never or made so expensive that its out of pcs reach.
they r a catch 22. if pcs have access to them, then so to npcs and vice-vera. limiting the poisons deadliness seems like the best approach imo... annoying as hell and hard to remove (need to cough up cash to a priest or a quest for an antidote).
Even an assassin rich setting such as they one im running needs safeguards against every blade having lethal poison on it.

[Druss_the_Legend]

​ok this is what ive come up with. its pretty annoying but not as bad as many of the poisons iv seen in the rules...

The poisons effect is slow acting but debilitating
... the poison is called 'White Lotus' - a colourless paste made from the leaves of a very rare white flower. It is slowly debilitating and eventually fatal if not cured.
​The effects of this poison are as followings...
​​1) The wound is 'damaging' and causes loss of hits equal to damage done by the poison when used on a weapon to inflict damage (those hits will not heal)
​2) The wound is considered 'festering' hits dealt by the poison cannot be healed by standard healing
​3) the poison causes nausea, dizziness and blurred vision ​(feeling unwell and wanting to vomit, -20 to all actions). Person is unable to eat much of anything and constant vomiting results in 'weakness' [explained below]
3) The poison causes 'weakness' ​resulting in Loss of 5 temporary CON and 5 temporary STR points per day unless a CON 101+ check is made (add CON mod) after the second day... making check reduces these stats by 1 point not 5 pts. This initial loss of 5 CON/STR is automatic.
4) The poison is debilitating and adds a cumulative -10 to all actions is added for each week the poison is in the persons bloodstream (max of -50)
​5) If CON reaches zero the character dies

thoughts?

[Druss_the_Legend]

Too much? or suitably annoying?

[Witchking20k]

I usually give PCs access to some poisons at low levels to help them level the playing field.  A neat trick I have found is to make poisons more effective against certain foes- so, for example you could have a poison that is -10 to action per 10 failure; or -10 per 5 failure vs. Orcs.  I have the suitable names of Orcsbane, Trollsbane etc firmly etched into my game world.  They are generally easy to find and prepare- making them a perfect low level mission.....

[Druss_the_Legend]

I usually give PCs access to some poisons at low levels to help them level the playing field.  A neat trick I have found is to make poisons more effective against certain foes- so, for example you could have a poison that is -10 to action per 10 failure; or -10 per 5 failure vs. Orcs.  I have the suitable names of Orcsbane, Trollsbane etc firmly etched into my game world.  They are generally easy to find and prepare- making them a perfect low level mission.....

nice, thanks for sharing. i like this concept. as GM u need to tweek the setting to your tastes and the style you want. you have done just that. bravo.

[vector]

How deadly is poison in your campaign? it seems powerful at the extreme ends of herbs listed. they are rare and expensive i guess.
had a post a while back about using poison on weapons. i allow this with certain paste/liquid forms but a critical result is needed for it to take effect.

I have a pc that has taken a critical from a poisoned assassin's blade. I havent decided how harmless the poison will be yet but was thinking of a slow acting poison that inflicts damage that cannot be healed easily/without specialist care/high level healing but also has some long term 'weakening effect' on his strength/constitution. I haven t seen anything that does that so i was going to just create something. my goal is to hamper the pc and have some reduction in their ability to fight/perform actions. Annoying but not daedly and keeps him in the action without putting him in a coma.

thoughts?

Some time ago I made poisons much more deadly in my campaign. I've tried to balance that by keeping the more deadly poison's ingredients rare and hard to find. That makes them very expensive or a significant time sink for player herbalists who want to hunt for ingredients on their own.

Also, life experiences do not make someone more resistant to poison. Everyone resists poison attacks as if they were 1st level. I've adjusted all my poisons attack level accordingly to maintain balance. I have made many poisons act quicker. Until these changes were made poisons and creature venom were a joke easily handled by the party cleric long before any of the poisons effects could even be felt.

Since I've made poisons expensive and rare for the PCs, I have the NPC's use them sparingly. I don't see any problem with PCs getting a hold of deadly poisons if they've paid the price in time and money.

Rolemaster lets PC Magicians get Sleep V (1st level spell on the Spirit Mastery spell list) at level 1, which is nearly an instant kill spell in very common circumstances.

Step 1 - Cast Sleep V, one or more opponents fail their RR.
Step 2 - You or a friend slit their throats during the first two rounds of magical sleep.
Step 3 - Profit.

I don't see why a PC taking out an opponent with a deadly poison is an issue. This isn't to say that some professions/religions/cultures wouldn't take a dim view of poison use.

[vector]

I usually give PCs access to some poisons at low levels to help them level the playing field.  A neat trick I have found is to make poisons more effective against certain foes- so, for example you could have a poison that is -10 to action per 10 failure; or -10 per 5 failure vs. Orcs.  I have the suitable names of Orcsbane, Trollsbane etc firmly etched into my game world.  They are generally easy to find and prepare- making them a perfect low level mission.....

Great idea! I hadn't thought to do that. I'll need to update my poison lists with the addition of monster specific poisons.

[Jengada]

I've got a range of poisons in my campaign. Some are very slight, others severe. Any poison comes with some challenges, either procuring it or legal consequences or both. Each poison has a level, and just like magic items, higher level poison is harder to get and much more expensive. Players are much more likely to get poisoned by a plant or animal they encounter, than by an NPC unless they're close to 10th level.

Your post prompted me to go back and review a few of the poisons I've put in my campaign, and while I was going to say the mechanic you outlined looked involved, my poisons are no better. The consequences may be straight forward (dizziness, death, loss of color vision, etc.) but some have delayed effects that are more complex. One stays in the system for weeks and only activates after strenuous physical exertion. Another actually makes the person with the poison into the delivery agent whose bodily fluids can trigger internal bleeding in anyone who contacts them.

[gog]

on the control of them, there is also the "use/remove" skill, thus the skill for handling safely is another limit.

[Witchking20k]

Time & carry capacity.  I usually say it takes 1 hour per potency level to prepare a poison.  And then you have to have a way to carry it and apply it.  That usually keeps it reasonable.  Particularly if you rule that a "torso" critical has a % chance of striking a readied dose.

[Mordrig]

Poisons are available, they are listed as herbs, so if you manage to find the proper source, then the poison is available.  Still picking # 930 Acaana is a level 10 instant kill poison.  If the enemy achieves a critical on you with a blade coated with this poison you must make a resistance roll, I am not going to instantly kill you.  if you fail, but it is a close fail, you take the effects of a mild poison, slowly growing to extreme effects (Death).  If you save I may also give you some of the effects if you barely passed.  Poison is scary, and should be, additionally Everyone should have a chance to survive a dose no matter how slim.

[Spectre771]

How deadly is poison in your campaign? it seems powerful at the extreme ends of herbs listed. they are rare and expensive i guess.

There are a lot of good posts in this thread with good ideas for addressing this.  Which flavor of RM are you using?  There Core books and the Companions for RM2 have all of the information that you are asking and we've always followed the stats given; potency, Addiction Factor, difficulty in finding, how it needs to be prepared (brew, powder, oil, ingested, etc.), cost, and so on.

The limiters you listed were the limiters we had for finding or obtaining the poison.  The more extreme ones were extremely difficult to find or were very costly.  If searching for them, the player needed Herb Lore, Region Lore, Flora/Fauna Lore, which ever was most appropriate, sometimes combinations of those skills.

Next the player needed the proper means to prepare the poison.  Sometimes we used Cooking if it was a brew or a paste to make.

Finally, we have Use/Remove Poison skill.  It's one thing to have the poison, but if you have anthrax powder and pop the top off your phial and accidentally inhale spores, then you really have anthrax!  If you forget that you only have 20 minutes before the paste dries up and is useless, then you're stuck with a crust coated blade.  It was also important to know how to clean up your tools and area once you were done with making the poison.

It seems like a lot to read out, but in roleplaying it, it's not that bad.  What type of poison is the person looking for?  Roll Herb Lore to see I the player pulls from memory a poison that has the effects he wants.  Region Lore to see if he can locate the environment that will give him the best chances to find the ingredients and the GM checks to see what the difficulty in finding the herb is.

Prepping; roll Cooking or Use/Remove Poison, or both.

Deliver the poison by blade or brew. 

Buying a pre-made poison from a guild is a different set of circumstances.  As the GM, you can just decide if that guild, that member, has access to that particular poison to sell in the first place.