Cure Disease, an alternate

[dsatow]

For my $0.02, I like the various way to cure disease.  My least favorite is Transform as it becomes too much of a catch all.

 

For the Life Support trick, there is a couple problems.  One if the disease is incurable, the person becomes a carrier and if the Life Support wears off, then they automatically reinfect themselves.  Think AIDS.  Once you are HIV infected you stay infected unless you happen to be a baby* (contrary to what Charlie Sheen has said, but who knows, he is a big baby).  So depending on the disease, this may or may not work.  Also, the Life Support would need to stay with the victim until their own body destroys the infection.

 

I like the Dispel idea but some forms of diseases can have fairly huge point costs.  Especially ones which induce huge drains.

 

Using Healing (and/or Regeneration), the problem is the mechanic.  Again, this may not be a problem but Healing is a damage removal device rather than effect removal device.  For instance, if someone is hit with an unc. con. KA, healing will reverse the damage done but not stop the KA.  In the effect of an sickness, I would see it as fixing the damaged cells of the body but not removing what caused the damage in the first place.  For diseases which have a survival rate even if low without help, healing would probably save the poor sod.

 

Lastly, there is always the tried and true standard PS: Pathologist 48-.  Louis Pasteur is a low grade idiot compared to this guy.

 

*Side note: Some HIV infected mother's new infants will be or become HIV free.  The current train of thought being the disease is weakened and/or filtered through the mother before it gets to the baby.

[Lucius]

Of course, this requires the basic principles that disease is caused by microflora etc rather than evil spirits or homunculi...

 

Why would the evil spirits or homonculi be immune to the same Killing Attack that kills microflora?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary now expects me to come up with a plague spreading villain named Mike Krowflora.

[Chris Goodwin]

 

If I build a disease as ½d6 drain CON, BOD, and END, Damage Over Time (5 increments, once every 5 hours), and give it the special effect disease, then someone gaining life support vs disease doesn't make that DOT stop or go away.  The power is still there, no matter if I'm immune to its effects or not.  There's nothing about drain or DOT that makes it suddenly stop functioning because someone has life support.  All that does is make them not suffer its effects as long as they have life support.  

 

I would have built that Power with Not Vs. Appropriate Life Support, myself, such that granting the target Life Support that included an immunity to that disease would stop it.  

 

I would also allow a Dispel to work on it.  

 

Neither of them would automatically heal the damage the Power has already caused, any more than Dispelling a Blast would heal the damage it caused.  

[Ninja-Bear]

Again, my problem with using dispel is how expensive it ends up for even a minor effect. It works for most applications of disease, but its very costly.

Then perhaps the problem then is the build of the diesese? I got to thinking (watchout I know), certain poisons are built as NND which the defense is LS poison. So why not add to the drain doesn't affect LS and if it ain't official make a custom limitation takes either x1 1/2 or x2 of dispel dice? Or is there an easy to dispel limitation?

[Cantriped]

I know there is a Difficult To Dispel Modifier (priced at +1/4 per doubling), so an Easy To Dispel (priced at -1/4 per halving) should be fair... but I can't recall ever seeing one in print. I'll consider adding that to my project.

[Cantriped]

I would have built that Power with Not Vs. Appropriate Life Support, myself, such that granting the target Life Support that included an immunity to that disease would stop it.  

 

I would also allow a Dispel to work on it.  

 

Neither of them would automatically heal the damage the Power has already caused, any more than Dispelling a Blast would heal the damage it caused.  

As has been mentioned above, Granting LS (Immune To Disease) is possible, and superficially it will function like curing the disease, but there are several mechanical problems with the construct.

The first being that having the appropriate defense doesn't actually deactivate the power, it simply prevents the target from suffering the effects of the power while they have the appropriate defense. Therefore you would have to be able to maintain the Granted Life Support for the entire duration of the Disease's activation to protect them from it, and Disease attacks tend to last much longer than other attacks. Further, in order to "cure" more than one disease at a time, your Life Support needs to be able to affect multiple recipients, can needs to not be broken by losing Line of Sight. In order to affect "Unwilling" targets (I.E. Unconscious or unaware targets), it also needs to be UAA instead of UBO. There is also the minor issue that this "Cure" power would make the target immune to other diseases while it was active unless the power took a Conditional Modifier stating otherwise.

 

[PhilFleischmann]

I agree that Dispel is the way to go.  It's expensive?  Compared to what?  Letting the disease kill you?  Health care is expensive and difficult in the real world, why shouldn't it be in Hero?

 

It really all depends on how the disease is built.  So how would you build the Common Cold?

[Christopher R Taylor]

having the appropriate defense doesn't actually deactivate the power, it simply prevents the target from suffering the effects of the power while they have the appropriate defense.

 

 

Which is actually a feature, it can allow a power to reduce the time and effect of a disease or poison, without negating it.  Thus, a less powerful shaman, for example, can help protect you from that kind of attack while not being quite mighty enough to eliminate it entirely.

 

I got to thinking (watchout I know), certain poisons are built as NND which the defense is LS poison. So why not add to the drain doesn't affect LS

 

 

That's how I built most of the poisons and disease effects in my bestiary; they were all kinds of different powers, but they have the limitation version of AVAD where it has no effect on people with the right life support.

[TheNaga]

I was looking Grimoire to see what it had on curing illness/disease and found the following  I found that Cure Illness spell under Divine Magic in the Grimoire uses Transform to cure the illness/disease. 

Major Transform 4d6 (sick person into well person)

[Deadman]

Again, my problem with using dispel is how expensive it ends up for even a minor effect.  It works for most applications of disease, but its very costly.

What am I missing here?  Dispel costs 3 points per die of effect and is much cheaper than attacks.  Even if you use Standard Effect you would essentially be dispelling the same points you spent on Dispel.  Additionally, as stated before, Cumulative makes Dispel very potent.  For the same 60 AP as a 20d6 Dispel you could have a Cumulative 10d6 Dispel that would wipe out a 240 Active Point Disease (built on Drain).  Sure this would take 8 Phases to accomplish but it can be done.  If you really want to make it powerful just add Constant to it (and probably Reduced END)

 

Here is a quick build that could handle most Diseases in a fairly short period of time.  This is of course if the GM is willing to allow an Uncontrolled power at 0 END.  Now whether or not it will be able to vanquish the disease before it really damages the target depends on how the Disease was constructed.

 

Cure Disease:  Dispel Drain 5d6 (standard effect: 15 points), Constant (+1/2), Uncontrolled (+1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Cumulative (120 points; +1) (52 Active Points)

 

Perhaps I misunderstood the issue you are talking about though..

[Christopher R Taylor]

Dispel costs 3 points per die of effect and is much cheaper than attacks. 

 

 

No, its the same price as the equivalent attack.  You'd have to buy cumulative to make it work, but that's not how Cure Disease works in any source material.  Mbasa the Witch Doctor doesn't use Cure Disease for 5 hours to get rid of the disease, he uses it once and the disease goes away.  See the problem here?  You're having to use a non-standard idea to get the effect because Dispel costs so much for the effect.

 

I use Transform for some effects like this, but it is even more expensive, requiring multiple casting to get the effect as well.

[Deadman]

No, its the same price as the equivalent attack.  You'd have to buy cumulative to make it work, but that's not how Cure Disease works in any source material.  Mbasa the Witch Doctor doesn't use Cure Disease for 5 hours to get rid of the disease, he uses it once and the disease goes away.  See the problem here?  You're having to use a non-standard idea to get the effect because Dispel costs so much for the effect.

 

I use Transform for some effects like this, but it is even more expensive, requiring multiple casting to get the effect as well.

I guess I still don't understand what you mean.  For 60 Points you can have a 20d6 Dispel which would provide, on average, more points of effect than it's cost.  With 3.5 being the average a 20d6 would come in at 70 points of effect.  If you want to make it easier you can just use Standard Effect for 60 points of effect which would essentially nullify any power of the same point cost (6d6 Drain, etc.).

 

Directly from 6eV1...

 

DISPEL

Type: Standard Power/Attack Power

Duration: Instant

Target: Target’s DCV

Range: 10m x Base Points

Costs END: Yes

Cost: 3 Character Points for every 1d6 of Dispel

[dsatow]

What am I missing here?  Dispel costs 3 points per die of effect and is much cheaper than attacks.  

 

 

What you are missing is that the Dispel needs to roll at or higher than the active cost of the power its trying to dispel. This effect is an all or nothing effect, so if you don't get enough points it does nothing.  At 3 points per die, you get a 3.5 point average.  On 60 active points or 20d6 of dispel, that is 70 active or enough to dispel a single specific power.  If Dispel were 5 points per die, you would get enough to dispel 42 active, which would make it worthless.  You can add advantages to get rid of the all or nothing nature of dispel and make it versus any of the key set of mechanics but this ups the cost per die.

[Deadman]

What you are missing is that the Dispel needs to roll at or higher than the active cost of the power its trying to dispel. This effect is an all or nothing effect, so if you don't get enough points it does nothing.  At 3 points per die, you get a 3.5 point average.  On 60 active points or 20d6 of dispel, that is 70 active or enough to dispel a single specific power.  If Dispel were 5 points per die, you would get enough to dispel 42 active, which would make it worthless.  You can add advantages to get rid of the all or nothing nature of dispel and make it versus any of the key set of mechanics but this ups the cost per die.

I didn't miss that, it essentially sums up exactly what I have said.  Even if it has Standard Effect (to get rid of the random nature) it can dispel the same number of Active Points as it costs.

[Christopher R Taylor]

 Even if it has Standard Effect (to get rid of the random nature) it can dispel the same number of Active Points as it costs.

 

 

Hence, its not cheap, its as expensive as the attack.  Which seems to violate the basic concept of Hero (defenses cost less than attacks) and makes the power less useful than it should be.  Want to dispel magic?  Now it costs more than the attack.

[Deadman]

Hence, its not cheap, its as expensive as the attack.  Which seems to violate the basic concept of Hero (defenses cost less than attacks) and makes the power less useful than it should be.  Want to dispel magic?  Now it costs more than the attack.

Ya, but I think they kind of got away from that when they dropped the cost of Armor Piercing to +1/4 anyway.  Technically it is a bit cheaper since you do get a slightly higher average but then you have to deal with the random dice roll.  Personally I think it works pretty well all things considered.  Not cheap, as you mentioned, but I don't think it is really out of whack unless you let Diseases have ridiculous Active Points.

[Chris Goodwin]

No, its the same price as the equivalent attack.  You'd have to buy cumulative to make it work, but that's not how Cure Disease works in any source material.  Mbasa the Witch Doctor doesn't use Cure Disease for 5 hours to get rid of the disease, he uses it once and the disease goes away.  See the problem here?  You're having to use a non-standard idea to get the effect because Dispel costs so much for the effect.

 

 

I can probably point to some where they actually do have to use Cure Disease for hours, because it's a particularly tough disease, and they are left exhausted at the end.  Not off the top of my head, but this is not uncommon in source material.

[Ninja-Bear]

No, its the same price as the equivalent attack. You'd have to buy cumulative to make it work, but that's not how Cure Disease works in any source material. Mbasa the Witch Doctor doesn't use Cure Disease for 5 hours to get rid of the disease, he uses it once and the disease goes away. See the problem here? You're having to use a non-standard idea to get the effect because Dispel costs so much for the effect.

 

I use Transform for some effects like this, but it is even more expensive, requiring multiple casting to get the effect as well.

May sound odd but isn't Dispel considered an attack? Therefore it doesn't violate the meta rule?

 

Also couldn't you put a custom limit on the drain that they take x2 from Dispel?

[PhilFleischmann]

Hence, its not cheap, its as expensive as the attack.  Which seems to violate the basic concept of Hero (defenses cost less than attacks) and makes the power less useful than it should be.  Want to dispel magic?  Now it costs more than the attack.

Yes, defenses cost less than attacks.  But a cure is not a defense.  An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.  The defense that would have stopped you from getting the disease in the first place would have been cheaper.  Once you have the disease, the cure will be more expensive.  Just like with Healing.

[dsatow]

Defenses generally cost less than attacks but this mostly is from a special attack point of view, 1d6 flash is stopped by 2 points of flash defense.  But 1d6 blast/str damage takes 6 points of PD/ED to block completely.  Adjustment powers have always cost more than than their defenses.