Topic: Instant herbal cures

[MariusH]

How do you handle this spell? Do you still need to make a "prepare herbs skill", or is it a substitute for this skill? Does it make any herb take effect immidiately, without any preparation, or does it make the herbs effect instant after it is prepared?

[arakish]

Can you list where this spell is located?  I do not recall ever seeing it.

rmfr

[Ecthelion]

I always thought that this spell would not require a Prepare Herbs rolls beforehand.

[jdale]

Animist Base "Herb Mastery", level 4. "Allows caster to make any 1 herb capable of being instantly effective. When the herb is subsequently used, its benefits/dangers will be immediately felt. The herb will keep for 1 day per level of the caster."

I could see reading it either way. It does kind of imply that the herb is prepped for use by the casting, otherwise that last sentence should say the enchantment lasts for 1 day per level, not the herb.

Generally I feel like herbs are overcomplicated, too many separate skills involved in using them, and I would probably skip the Prepare Herbs step.

I note the spell is exactly the same in RMU (although there are fewer needed skills, generally just Herbalism or in some cases First Aid).

[markc]

  As jdale said above I could see this spell as doing either preping the herb to be used or just being applied to the base herb.


  If I had to rule in RMSS I would say it applies to the prepared herb or the herb in prepared form.
MDC

[Keen_Man]

Clarified Herb use / preparation rules would be great too see in the play test for sure

Some herbs seem to need no prep and just eaten in which case I let this spell preserve them.

Some herbs need to be brewed into a tea and so forth in which case I ruled that they are using this spell to speed up the process but they are still performing the "brewing" like toss the herb into the cup of water cast the spell and BOOM drinkable. and preserved on top of that

[arakish]

OK.  Read the spell.  Here is my interpretation.

Allows caster to make any 1 herb capable of being instantly effective.

This prepares the herb for application.  Basically this takes place of the Prepare Herbs skill.

When the herb is subsequently used, its benefits/dangers will be immediately felt.

This means that once the herb is applied, whether as a salve, drank, etc. the effects of the herb are instantaneous.  IMHO, this is much like having an I.V. and a medicine is inserted into the I.V.  Having been through surgeries in the past, medicines injected into an I.V. are literally instantaneous in their effects.  And if not instantaneous, they take only a few seconds (about 4 at most).

The herb will keep for 1 day per level of the caster.

I interpret this as meaning that the herb is the material component of the spell.  When the spell expires, so does the material component.  Thus, the herb is no longer effective.

But as said, that is my interpretation from past RPG sessions and does not mean it is the only one available.

rmfr

[MariusH]

Thanks for your replies! The spell becomes rather powerful if it substitutes the "prepare herbs", since this frees up lots of dev. points for an animist, as he doesn't need this skill with this spell. On the other hand, the spell is not very powerful otherwise, since there are very few herbs (there are some, especially if you include poisons) which is described as taking time to be effective. It's not "repairs bone in 1-3 days"; it's "repairs bone". Also, the herb will last much SHORTER than otherwise, as a herb USUALLY lasts longer than the effect described in the spell.

Other comments are more than welcome. Another question: Do you count plants that work as poisons as herbs? If so, this spell DOES have some value even if "prepare herbs" or "prepare poison" has to be used, since some poisons are slow in their effect.

[jdale]

Thanks for your replies! The spell becomes rather powerful if it substitutes the "prepare herbs", since this frees up lots of dev. points for an animist, as he doesn't need this skill with this spell. On the other hand, the spell is not very powerful otherwise, since there are very few herbs (there are some, especially if you include poisons) which is described as taking time to be effective. It's not "repairs bone in 1-3 days"; it's "repairs bone". Also, the herb will last much SHORTER than otherwise, as a herb USUALLY lasts longer than the effect described in the spell.

It does raise the question, what does it mean for the herb to take instant effect, if the effect is double healing rate? Does it make the healing instant as well? That would be pretty big, especially because the herbs listed this way tend to be the cheapest ones in each category....

Other comments are more than welcome. Another question: Do you count plants that work as poisons as herbs? If so, this spell DOES have some value even if "prepare herbs" or "prepare poison" has to be used, since some poisons are slow in their effect.

I wouldn't, that potentially is a pretty big power boost, could easily become problematic. There are spell lists for poisons, I would maintain the separation.

[VladD]

Usually there is at least some time before any outside application will take effect. Even intravenously introduced opiates will take a few seconds to take effect.
Poultices and compresses will probably have to stay applied for a few hours.
Ingested medicins start to work in about 30-45 mins.

Then there is the effect phase: bones don't pop together, wounds don't seal up in a round. even for high end magical effects, I would recommend a healing time akin to spells, so that is usually 1-10 hours.

One thing from herbal healing that does work like a herb is using pulverized pumice to seal bleeding wounds. it only works on small bleeding wounds (1-2 hits/ rnd).
Other herbal remedies are based on minor antiseptic properties, pain remedies, the placebo effect and charlatanry, so they tend to work as long as natural healing.
On a positive note: it seems that most medical remedies people came up with are based on above herbal cures and they simply work by supporting the natural healing systems...

[arakish]

I agree with everything else in your post.  I have never fully agreed with instantaneous herbal effects.  For the sake of magic though, I was willing to allow it.  However...

Ingested medicins start to work in about 30-45 mins.

Are you sure about this?  I take medications and usually within 15-20 minutes I can feel their effects.  I will agree that it would take 30-45 minutes for full effect, but usually effects will begin within 15-20 minutes.

But then that just may be me.

rmfr

[VladD]

I'm thinking 2 things here:

Either you take your meds on an empty stomach. Such treatment will certainly speed up the time it takes to get in to the blood stream,

Or they are some kind of fast acting meds, that don't take 30 mins for a sufficient amount of working stuff to get in the blood stream. Like cyanide poison, which kills in a few minutes.

Then again: 15-20 mins is still in the same ball park as 30-45 mins, if you look at the numbers as an average

[mtpnj]

This is an ongoing discussion in my group.   Generally if the herb does not set a time, except for the heal hp ones, it's effect is not instant.  Our theory is "Why would an herb work faster than the magic spell?".  Why would a mend bone spell like Gursamel work faster than all the fracture repair spells that take 1 day to heal.
We generally cut the time in half off the recovery table depending on what treatment the person has received.
We also use the herb list out of the old Character law as it is much more comprehensive than the RMSS book.

[MariusH]

I guess this should be considered if a new "Hands of the Healer" is written for RMU (which it SHOULD be). Recovery times should be included for all herbs. As well as how long the herb keeps it potency, both in raw and prepared form. Maybe even a time estimate for the process of preparing the herbs (when that is needed) would be useful.

We have always thought that unless otherwise stated, herbs are effective immidiately. Some herbs (like stun relief) are pretty useless otherwise, some have a much wider area for use that way (like herbs giving you "boosts"), and others, like healing bones/muscles and so on, are much more helpful this way. Also, just cutting the healing time in half seems very wrong, since there are several herbs that specifically does that. "Halves healing time for bone damage" should not be the same as "mends bone".

[markc]

+1 for new Hand of the Healer for any and all systems.
MDC

[arakish]

Another +1 for "Hands of the Healer" being system independent.

rmfr