Cannot Heal Magically (+??)

[Jkeown]

How would you model damage that cannot be healed with Healing? The target would have to rely on his REC instead of drugs, spells or paladin Good Touch effects.

 

A simple +1 seems too expensive. I was thinking about something like Penetrating, where 1 pip per die couldn't be Healed.

 

Maybe model it on Difficult to Dispel, requiring extra healing to be used against it? Arrgh!

[Cantriped]

Honestly, I can't think of any existing legal modifier for making the damage from an attack resistant/immune to Healing. If you haven't already, I think you should ask Steven Long, he might know of something published in an obscure source which achieves the result you desire...

 

Now, in terms of house ruling such a modifier into existence, the Advantage value should be very, very high because you are restricting the target to healing at the very, very slow natural rate of their REC per Month. If we assume for a moment a High-Magic kind of setting (like Golarion or the Forgotten Realms) than there are fairly common "Potions of Healing". which are built as one or more dice of Simplified Healing, Decreased Re-Use Duration (1 Turn; +1 1/2) (25 APs per 1d6); OAF (-1), 1 Charge Which Never Recovers (-4). Cost: ~4.16 points per 1d6.

Since true "Reverse-Normal Damage" is worth about 25 APs per DC, an attack power which causes Normal Damage which cannot be healed with a power needs to cost at least as much per DC, or more. Ergo:  Can Only Heal Naturally (+5)

[Ndreare]

You could add a Transform to your attack. The transform would be to exact same target with the Complication: X Wounds cannot be healed. Make it a total Complication and you are good.

But like all good things in Hero there is a counter as someone could remove the transform.

[Wardsman]

How would you model damage that cannot be healed with Healing? The target would have to rely on his REC instead of drugs, spells or paladin Good Touch effects.

 

A simple +1 seems too expensive. I was thinking about something like Penetrating, where 1 pip per die couldn't be Healed.

 

Maybe model it on Difficult to Dispel, requiring extra healing to be used against it? Arrgh!

Build with suppress effect.

[MrKinister]

How about a long-term BOD drain that heals naturally at the character's REC rate? You can add it as a secondary (linked) power to the whatever weapon was being used.

[Lucius]

Accursed Wounds of the Blades of Tharex: (Total: 65 Active Cost, 18 Real Cost) Drain BODY & REC & Regeneration & Healing 1d6, Attack Versus Alternate Defense (Being already accursed, undead, demonic, or unholy; All Or Nothing; +0), Area Of Effect (4m Radius; +1/4), Difficult To Dispel (x2 Active Points; +1/4), Trigger (Activating the Trigger requires a Zero Phase Action, Trigger resets automatically, immediately after it activates, Trigger can expire (it has a time limit); +1/2), Cumulative (12 points; +3/4), Expanded Effect (x4 Characteristics or Powers simultaneously) (+1 1/2), Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Day; +2 1/4) (65 Active Points); OAF (Specially cursed weapon; -1), No Range (-1/2), Conditional Power Must do BOD with weapon attack to set Trigger (-1/2), Requires A Roll (Attack roll, -1 per 20 Active Points modifier; -1/4), Incantations (-1/4) (Real Cost: 18)

 

Those fearlessly evil enough to court the dangerous attention of Tharex, God of Curses, have been known to use this horrifying curse. First a weapon is ritually cursed to prepare it. If the weilder manages to 1) Make a to-hit roll by at least 3, and 2) inflict BODy damage, and 3) utter the appropriate malediction, then the wounded victim is afflicted with the curse, which will manifest when the victim is subject to magical healing, whether self administered, applied by an ally, or the effect of a magical item, potion, blessed place, etc. The victim, and everyone else within four meters, which usually includes the healer, loses 1 to 3 pts of BOD, REC, and Regeneration (1d6 halved because these are defensive abilities) and 1 to 6 pts of Healing. The Trigger automatically resets, so further healing activates the curse again, and it is Cumulative up to 12 pts. Hapless bystanders suffer apparent wounds mimicking the one originally inflicted on the main victim. Lost points return at the rate of 5 per day. The curse is Difficult to Dispel, but fortunately wears off with time; how much time depends on the power of the cursor.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary says I should use this in my game now; my players will HATE it.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Honestly, I can't think of any existing legal modifier for making the damage from an attack resistant/immune to Healing.

 

Yeah this is one of those gaps in the Hero system that are really tough to model.  A lot of curse-like effects fall into this area, usually "solved" with transformation.  Probably a modifier based on how common and accessible magical healing is in your campaign is best.  I wouldn't think its worth more than -½ unless magical healing is super common.

[Cantriped]

The Original Poster asked for a method of making the damage from a specific source Unhealable (except naturally); Drain and Suppress can both be countered by Healing powers affecting the same Game Element, and draining/suppressing REC produces entirely the wrong effect.

The closest legal construct for stopping a target from being healed would require that the target be subjected to an Attack power linked to a Suppress (Healing & Regeneration) power which:

1) lasted as long as the damage it was preventing from being healed (so likely Uncontrolled), and...

2) was limited to only suppressing healing effects targeting the damage from the linked power...

3) could affect Healing powers used on the target (including by the target) at any distance, regardless of what the Attacker was doing, and yet doesn't affect anybody else's ability to be healed.

Any way you slice it that is going to be a headache of a power construct to read and construct... If the OP is the GM, I suggest just writing it as a single custom Advantage instead, and giving it the appropriately high value such an effect deserves, and even then it should be considered a brightly flashing STOP sign modifier, with some neon trim or something... If the OP is not the GM... they might want to consider giving up on that particular concept...

[Lucius]

 

Create a Triggered Attack, probably a Drain, that resets automatically and goes off whenever the original wound is healed and is Limited to the same damage.

 

If you take damage identical the original wound every time it's healed, that's the same as the Healing not working.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary says that's deja vu all over again.

[massey]

Power Defense, usable as attack.

[Cantriped]

Power Defense, usable as attack.

Well, Healing is an adjustment power... so yeah, that should work!

[Surrealone]

I'm not so sure that should work, as it implies that simply having Power Defense impedes the ability to be healed.  I say this because I strongly suspect that is not how most GMs address Healing someone who happens to have Power Defense.

 

I think Ndreare's idea of a linked Transformation attack that adds a total complication that prevents X wounds from being magically healed ... is the cleanest approach.

[massey]

I'm not so sure that should work, as it implies that simply having Power Defense impedes the ability to be healed.  I say this because I strongly suspect that is not how most GMs address Healing someone who happens to have Power Defense.

 

I think Ndreare's idea of a linked Transformation attack that adds a total complication that prevents X wounds from being magically healed ... is the cleanest approach.

 

Since it's usable as attack, the attacker controls when the Power Defense is active.

 

6th edition, page 232, says that Power Defense doesn't interfere with Healing unless the recipient of the healing wants it to.  But that assumes it's his own Power Defense to control.  If it's under the control of someone else, then it should work.

[Beast]

it the attack based on a sword of wounding effect or the character cannot be heal by magic?
if it a sword of wounding effect then add a transform(10pts per die hard to dispel)

If it is the character then it is a Physical lim

[MrKinister]

Well, I think in the end, you, as the GM, can just create a special house rule that says (something like) this:

"Advantage: Damage cannot be healed by magical means - +1"

 

This may double the cost of your weapon attacks, but you can always just say only a fraction of the attack works this way.

 

"Making rules up: the Ultimate GM prerogative!"  =D

[Steve]

This also depends on how common magical healing is. If it's as common as most dungeon adventure games have it, then +1 seems pretty good.

 

However, I think the Difficult To Dispel suggestion could work well. Since it increases the Active Cost of a power, using it could model a power that creates wounds which soak up more magical healing than they normally would. For each +1/4 in Difficult To Dispel Advantage, magical Healing would offer 1/2 as much effect, so for a +1/2 Advantage, healing is reduced pretty significantly.

 

If you are also using the Bleeding rules, this would be really bad news.

[Lucius]

Healers Bane Wound: (Total: 9 Active Cost, 5 Real Cost) Power Defense (3 points), Trigger (Activating the Trigger requires a Zero Phase Action, Trigger requires a Turn or more to reset; +1/4), Uncontrolled (+1/2), Cumulative up to 18 (+1/2), Usable As Attack (+3/4), Grantor can only grant the power to others (9 Active Points); Only Works Against Common "attack" - Healing (-1/2), Incantations (-1/4) (Real Cost: 5)

 

Trigger condition is doing BOD damage. A second attack roll is needed to place the curse on the target.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary points out that a very simple Remove Curse will eliminate this bane.

[Christopher R Taylor]

The problem with damage to negate healing is you'd need some limits such as "cannot stun", "does not cause bleeding", "cannot impair or disable", and even "does no knockback" so it won't have any secondary effects.  Pus to make it actually harm the target reliably, it would have to deal AVAD damage so it doesn't get resisted.  And max damage of the wound healing.

[Steve]

Another possibility would an adder to an attack power. The adder is for a form of power defense that only resists healing a wound caused by the base power. If you make it a point or two per point of healing resistance you build into the base power using such an adder, it would probably work pretty well.

[bigdamnhero]

I assume this is an NPC villain power, rather than something the PCs will be using?

 

The only RAW precedent I can think of is certain types of Healing that don't work on certain types of damage based on sfx, such as a werewolf's Healing that doesn't work against damage from silver weapons, or demons that can't heal damage from holy weapons. Doing it from the other direction is trickier.

 

If it were me, I agree with those suggesting just using a custom Advantage or Adder. How much should that be worth? Well, one way to look at it would be to compare it to Delayed Return Rate. If magical Healing is common enough in your game that it's normally available in a Turn or two, that's comparable to the standard return rate for Adjustment Powers. Whereas natural Healing (assuming normal-heroic REC scores) is closer to 5 points per Month, which is a +2 1/2 Advantage. I'm not sure I'd go quite that high, but it really makes the suggested +1 seem much more reasonable, no?

 

I was thinking about something like Penetrating, where 1 pip per die couldn't be Healed.

I like this idea. (And it's probably much less likely to get you lynched by your players - gamers expect their magical healz dammit!) In that case, the Adv only applies to 1/3 or 1/4 of the damage on average, which would be a -1 1/2 Limited Power Limitation but instead of a separate Limitation you use that to reduce the value of the Advantage. Which knocks that +2 1/2 down to +1?

[Netzilla]

I am very much in the 'keep it simple' camp of must making it a custom Advantage.  Easy to read on the character sheet and clear in what it's purpose actually is.  The most annoying part is going to be tracking those wounds separately from other wounds without the Advantage.

 

As for how much its worth, as others have pointed out, it really depends on how common and quick unnatural healing is in your campaign.  If you're running something like Game of Thrones, where magical healing is practically non-existent, it wouldn't be worth much at all.  If it's like Lord of the Rings, where some magical cures/healing aides exist but aren't super quick or powerful, maybe worth a +1/4 or +1/2.  If it's like most D&D games, where spells, potions and scrolls abound, then a +1 seems fair.

[Chris Goodwin]

I would pull out Usable On Others with Differing Modifiers myself.  

 

Build a Power something like this: 

 

RKA, 3d6, Trigger: When Artificially Healed, Trigger Automatically Instantly Resets, 0 END, Persistent, No Range, Self Only, Only Up To Amount Rolled On Healing.  

 

Season to taste.  You could do it with Standard Effect at 1 pip per DC and enough DCs to match the largest Healing you're likely to see in the campaign.  

 

As with all Differing Modifiers abilities, you don't buy that construction with points.  Instead, you buy the ability to "grant" it, by using the Real Cost of the above as the Base Cost of the other ability.  Make Usable As Attack, Linked to HKA, OAF: Sword, Must Do BODY Damage With HKA.  Once you've "granted" it, you've "given" the target the ability to damage himself only, whenever he is Healed.

 

You'd need to define a condition under which it ends.  It could be the wound healing naturally, or through the character having to achieve some task or break a curse or whatever.

 

Edited to add:  You could also do it with Transform: Target to Target with Physical Complication: Wound That Never Heals.  Reversal condition is achieving the task or breaking the curse, &c.

[eepjr24]

I favor keeping it simple, but see that as staying within the rules as published. Power Defense UAA fits the bill and does not violate the basic precept of Hero that nothing is absolute and everything has a defense. If you want it to be near absolute, just make the PowerD high enough that there is no healing in the game that can exceed it. While you are at it, make it difficult to dispel and add a few levels of Hardened and Impenetrable. 

 

For defenses, if you want it absolute you set the defense versus some effect (Psych Lim: Holy Warrior, Priest of Good, etc) or if not absolute you use Power Defense or a Divine skill roll or the like as a defense. 

 

The points are already balanced, so you don't have to worry about guessing the value of an advantage or custom adder.

 

- E

[eepjr24]

I would pull out Usable On Others with Differing Modifiers myself.  

 

Build a Power something like this: 

 

RKA, 3d6, Trigger: When Artificially Healed, Trigger Automatically Instantly Resets, 0 END, Persistent, No Range, Self Only, Only Up To Amount Rolled On Healing.  

 

Season to taste.  You could do it with Standard Effect at 1 pip per DC and enough DCs to match the largest Healing you're likely to see in the campaign.  

 

As with all Differing Modifiers abilities, you don't buy that construction with points.  Instead, you buy the ability to "grant" it, by using the Real Cost of the above as the Base Cost of the other ability.  Make Usable As Attack, Linked to HKA, OAF: Sword, Must Do BODY Damage With HKA.  Once you've "granted" it, you've "given" the target the ability to damage himself only, whenever he is Healed.

 

You'd need to define a condition under which it ends.  It could be the wound healing naturally, or through the character having to achieve some task or break a curse or whatever.

The limitations (Self only, etc) would be -0 (6e1, 358). Other than that I like it, although it is probably more expensive than the UAA PowerD.

 

- E

[Chris Goodwin]

Yeah, the Power Defense Usable As Attack is probably a lot simpler and less expensive and as you mentioned is rules legal.