[0.9] Disease: Too Strong?

Graham Wolsey

Graham Wolsey

Scholar
Marshal
Currently as it is written, the Disease effect has very strong effects against low level players. It almost garuntees a resurrection when cast if the target is knocked into bleedout.

I personally love that Necromancy is getting a big power boost, but I don't like how this effects new players so strongly. I'd suggest to counter this that the first aid skill work to stabilize any player in bleed out even under the effects of Disease. This would breath life into a totally unused skill while also giving low level players an acceptable but incomplete answer to a 4th level spell they could easily encounter before they have answers to it.
 
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Hmm... I actually really like this idea, although I do have a couple of questions:
  • Since First Aid now stabilizes the target at 0 Body for 1 minute, should treating Disease with First Aid extend this timer or keep it the same?
    • If it extends the timer, by how much should it extend it? Until the Disease effect wears off (10 minutes)?
    • If it doesn't, does that indicate Disease should be moved to a lower spell level or stay at level 4?
 
Sage of Legaia said:
Hmm... I actually really like this idea, although I do have a couple of questions:
  • Since First Aid now stabilizes the target at 0 Body for 1 minute, should treating Disease with First Aid extend this timer or keep it the same?
    • If it extends the timer, by how much should it extend it? Until the Disease effect wears off (10 minutes)?
    • If it doesn't, does that indicate Disease should be moved to a lower spell level or stay at level 4?
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I would allow the individual to be stabilized, but the effects of Disease would remain for the full 10 minutes so they would remain unconscious for that time (unless the Disease effect is removed).

While it sucks to be down for that long it's no different than Confine, Paralysis, Enfeeble, or any other take out.
 
Graham Wolsey said:
I would allow the individual to be stabilized, but the effects of Disease would remain for the full 10 minutes so they would remain unconscious for that time (unless the Disease effect is removed).

While it sucks to be down for that long it's no different than Confine, Paralysis, Enfeeble, or any other take out.
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I concur.
 
While I'd like to see increased use for First Aid, there were some issues we saw regarding simple identification via Healing Arts rather than First Aid -- Namely, starting First Aid requires an immediate 'no effect', when appropriate, resulting in a number of effects that are faster to "just try first aid" with, rather than use the ability intended for it.

That said: I feel that First Aid stabilization should 100% be a valid approach (Read: Stabilization vs Healing). If nothing else, this helps prevent complete party wipes or panicked NPC 'monster stabilize' introductions when a Plot member running a mod sees a complete party wipe in process, due to a few low level spells hitting specific targets. This shouldn't impact ultimate outcomes of success/fail, just reduce needlessly high resurrection counts off a low-level spell.
 
My interpretation here could be wrong, but I think First Aid still works to prevent death, even when someone is diseased.

First Aid has two specific benefits. The first benefit is to stop the bleed out count for the duration of the First Aid. The second benefit is to heal 1 body point after 1 minute if the target had exactly -1 body.

As far as I can tell, only the second effect is healing, as per the definition of Disease. The current wording of Disease needs work, in my opinion. It uses the phrase "affected by an effect that would heal them." That is unspecific. Specific would be "affected by an effect that would heal body points." Because as currently written, a reasonable interpretation is that it would prevent any effect from the healing effect group.

I am positive that the intention here is that Disease prevents the target from recovering body points. And, assuming that is the intention, First Aid still prevents a character from dying, if it is used continuously throughout the duration of the Disease effect (basically, you need a 10 minute First Aid instead of a 1 minute First Aid... arguably 11 minutes when all is said and done). It just doesn't heal the target to 0 body at any point during that time.

-MS
 
The presented rule in 0.9 is (emphasis added for your reply):

Cure Disease / Disease: This effect renders the target unable to be healed from any source When affected by any effect which would heal them (such as Healing or First Aid for most living creatures) the target must call No Effect. Like most Earth/Chaos spells, Cure Disease will remove a Disease on a living target or inflict one upon an Undead, while Disease will remove a Disease effect on an Undead.

This would tell me that the current rule-as-written would have no effect to First Aid whilst bleeding out.
 
Graham Wolsey said:
Currently as it is written, the Disease effect has very strong effects against low level players. It almost garuntees a resurrection when cast if the target is knocked into bleedout.
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I wouldn't say resurrection. I believe that disease is removed upon needing a life spell. I could be wrong as I am in my phone and did not recheck .9 rules
 
To clarify - As currently written in the Playtest Packet, First Aid has no effect on a Diseased person.

Or, to put it another way, if you're Diseased and taken to -1 Body, here's what can save you:

- Cure Disease, then healing
- Purify, then healing
- Dispel, then healing
- Death, then Life

Fortunately for low-level PCs, a Cure Disease potion can be made with 2 levels of Potion Crafting, 2 Silvers (for the production point cost), and a workshop :) It is supposed to be a scary effect - and with this (and some other changes in 2.0) we expect crafters to get a boost as a side effect. Right now, many chapters just rely on zillions of Purify per-day Magic Items to get around anything like this.

Thanks,
-Bryan
 
I've played games I'm both Southern Minnesota and Chicago where a similar effect called plague which I think was also a 4th level effect though I can't remember for sure. The key difference that I remember is that first aid still worked. I remember it being a nerve wracking thing to play around but far from impossible and I don't remember anyone resurrecting due to it. I don't imagine the removal of the effectiveness of first aid will be too terrible. I also agree with the idea that it'll put a higher value of production which I think is healthy.
 
Thinking that new players are going to have the foresight to seek out an individual selling Cure Disease potions prior to being hit with that effect seems highly unlikely to me.

Thinking they will spend 50% of their total liquid currency (or more in some cases) on an extremely narrow effect strains believability for me.

Have you had a lot of new players locally looking to purchase Restore potions for example?
 
Ragnarok said:
I've played games I'm both Southern Minnesota and Chicago where a similar effect called plague which I think was also a 4th level effect though I can't remember for sure. The key difference that I remember is that first aid still worked. I remember it being a nerve wracking thing to play around but far from impossible and I don't remember anyone resurrecting due to it. I don't imagine the removal of the effectiveness of first aid will be too terrible. I also agree with the idea that it'll put a higher value of production which I think is healthy.
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I don't know, Sid. I can remember a couple fights where we had multiple people down first aided due to plague who, under these rules, would have all resurrected. Turning moderate-level Undead with disease carriers into essentially ensured resurrections for anyone without a well-diversified healer or a really good pocket of potions is a pretty large change.
 
If people are really strongly against allowing First Aid to work for some reason, another solution could be moving this spell up in level probably Earth 7 is about fair for an effect like this. I'm just concerned about starting characters fighting 25 build Necromancers that will create a negative play experience with them.
 
Muir said:
I don't know, Sid. I can remember a couple fights where we had multiple people down first aided due to plague who, under these rules, would have all resurrected. Turning moderate-level Undead with disease carriers into essentially ensured resurrections for anyone without a well-diversified healer or a really good pocket of potions is a pretty large change.
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Maybe my memory isn't that great then :confused:

Even so I would expect local plot teams to
not flood a mod with plague effects. I also wouldn't mind if first aid was effective on diseased individuals. My hesitancy on wanting it to be moved to a higher level would be based in production where smaller players in a high APL game might not have the same resources that higher level players have.
 
Yeah. I would much rather have it simply interact with First Aid by keeping the character unconscious for the duration of the Disease rather than preventing it from working at all, personally.

Low level effects shouldn't be likely to outright cause resurrections. In a low APL game a few necromancer encounters could easily result in town wipes if this version of Disease was handled anything but very carefully.
 
Could the First Aid be exempt from the Disease? IE, someone goes down due to damage while diseased, but can be first aided normally, with the currently proposed durations, but once up continues their disease timer? It functionally means that every tier of the game now has a usage for First Aid, and disease becomes somewhat less lethal, but still troublesome, as anyone affected is functionally stuck playing the one body game.
 
Let's be honest here.

Disease, as is, will only kill lowbies.

This is not positive for the game. I don't mind lowbies taking a death because they made an error, but a 4th level spell is 13 build, plus 7 build in pre-reqs. Nearly every basic NPC earth spellcaster villain will have access to it. It's power means you have to pigeonhole the lowbie earth caster in the group into memorizing a Cure Disease, just on the off-chance you run into one. A lowbie group might not have the resources to spend on 4th level potions immediately, and there might not even be Potionmakers in the chapter.

I hate the pigeonholing that already exists; we shouldn't incorporate effects that encourage it more.
 
Draven said:
Let's be honest here.

Disease, as is, will only kill lowbies.

This is not positive for the game. I don't mind lowbies taking a death because they made an error, but a 4th level spell is 13 build, plus 7 build in pre-reqs. Nearly every basic NPC earth spellcaster villain will have access to it. It's power means you have to pigeonhole the lowbie earth caster in the group into memorizing a Cure Disease, just on the off-chance you run into one. A lowbie group might not have the resources to spend on 4th level potions immediately, and there might not even be Potionmakers in the chapter.

I hate the pigeonholing that already exists; we shouldn't incorporate effects that encourage it more.
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And this is assuming that the lowbies have planned this far in advance. I almost rezzed one game because the lowbies that I escorted on a mod didn't know how life/death worked. Nothing against them, but Disease just seems like another confusing thing for them to learn when they are new to the game.
 
Draven said:
Let's be honest here.

Disease, as is, will only kill lowbies.

This is not positive for the game. I don't mind lowbies taking a death because they made an error, but a 4th level spell is 13 build, plus 7 build in pre-reqs. Nearly every basic NPC earth spellcaster villain will have access to it. It's power means you have to pigeonhole the lowbie earth caster in the group into memorizing a Cure Disease, just on the off-chance you run into one. A lowbie group might not have the resources to spend on 4th level potions immediately, and there might not even be Potionmakers in the chapter.

I hate the pigeonholing that already exists; we shouldn't incorporate effects that encourage it more.
Click to expand...

I really agree with this point. I would prefer Disease "as is" and that it remain with the Status Quo design.
 
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