OK so what exactly is a desease?

[indy523]

I notice when I asked the question how do you define a cure for deseases and poisons that it generated a lot of varying answers and what I got the sense was genuine internal conflict with exactly the best way to do this and I got to thinking that it might be that "desease" is a nebulous concept when it comes to game mechanics.

 

So maybe we can start with a general discussion of what a desease is and what a cure is.

 

Deseases from my college entry Biology class come in three flavors that we can talk about generically.  Cancers, bacterial born pathogens and viral pathogens.

 

Cancers are technically not a foreign body.  They are your cells gone haywire in their DNA coding.  Instead of transmuting into one of the necessary replacement cells for your body a cancer is a cell that basically screws up reading the code.  They don't perform a function but still take O2 and food from the bloodstream causing a drain on the body'resources.  When they start multiplying they create more cancer cells that form tumors in the body, masses of useless flesh.  When they overtake the normal cells of the body past a certain point we get sick and eventually die. 

 

Curing cancer which is difficult involves finding and killing and removing the cancer cells while leaving the body intact.

 

Bacteria are foreign bodies and they are in and of themselves seperate cells themselves albeit signle celled organisms.  As I understand it the way they work is the are smaller than our cells and they manage to enter one through its cell wall and start working inside the cell taking in nutrients and growing and dividing  until the cell becomes full of several bacteria which burst the cell wall open and then flood the bloodstream each new bacteria cell looking for more cells of our body to invade.  When they have killed enough of our cells we start to get sick and possibly we die.

 

Curing bacteria starts automatically when they enter the body.  White blood cells hunt them down and antibodies form chains that mimic their DNA patterns in reverse (not sure of remembering this correctly).  If the bodies immune system manages to create enough antibodies before the bacteria can replicate in enough numbers the body will be flooded enough with antibodies that the disease can never overcome and gets killed off before it can grow.  They are natural agents such as penicillin that can be introduced which essentially poison bacteria without harming our tissues.  Bacteria therefore are easier to kill.

 

A Virus is essentially just a string of RNA or DNA in a sugar cube packet.  It has no cell membrane and none of the mitochondria and other parts of a cell that are required for life to function.  One can argue that outside of a host cell a virus is not really alive.  What a virus does is to enter into a cell and the strand of DNA breaks apart to create RNA or the RNA strand itself enters the cells own mitochondria where it takes over these cellular factories and start replicating RNA and DNA of the Virus instead of the proteins necessary to fuel the functions of life.  When enough viruses are created in the cell it bursts open, dying as hundreds of new viruses flood the bloodstream.

 

So this is how a disease is defined at a high level in reality.  I'll reply to this post with game mechanic discussion possibilities.

[Christopher R Taylor]

In game terms it doesn't really matter what the medical definition is, since you're only interested in the effect.  A fast-working disease may not be any different from a slow-working poison or radiation poisoning in terms of the mechanics of how it takes effect.  Loss of stats and/or abilities (blindness, etc) at a certain rate.

 

The big divider for me is:

Diseases can be communicated, poison usually not

Diseases work slower than poisons in most cases

[Lucius]

 

Depending on the game setting, a disease could also be:

 

Possession by an evil spirit

 

A magical curse

 

Infestation by a parasitic alien life form

 

Any of several possibilities I didn't think of

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary cures the ham and heels the bread

[indy523]

Cancer:

So Game Mechanic wise a cancer is essentially a transform since this is what it is doing.  A cancer is cured when all of the thransformed parts (cancer cells) are removed from the body.  One can cut them out but that injures the body and might not get all the cancer.  Doctors and patients never know if they are successful and even if the patient recovers they can relapse and the desease comes back.

 

So the GM has to build this as  a power that transforms the character based on the amount of cancer cells in the body.  At a set point level of transform the character becomes sick and eventually dies.  The transform thus is built as a constant persistant power with no end.  It can be cut away, surgically removed, or it can be attacked with radiation and lasers.  This damage reduces the transform and wekens its effect.

 

So buy it as 1d6 transform with the limitation must have 1 body/point.  Then each point further tranformed adds to the number of transform dice.  Each further transfor creates more transform with the limitation physical manefestation -1/4L and the limitation AVAD from POW defense to PD or ED +1L.  The transform ends when it is physically cut out.  When the character has no body left he dies.  For really nasty cancers give it difficult to dispel to double the effective points to remove.  Each time it is removed the GM rolls a secret Medicine Skill roll to determine if and when it might come back or if it is cured.  RSR -1/2L  If no medical help use a Con roll.

 

 

 

 

 

[Doc Democracy]

Yeah, there is a reason that disease is vague. Even in the real world you are missing fungal disease, protozoan disease and what they are now calling prion diseases.

 

I am not sure that looking to the real world will be useful. What is necessary for deciding on disease resistance or curing is for the GM to decide on a hook that can be placed on all builds defined as a disease which will allow for those effects to be corralled in defences.

 

Doc

[indy523]

Other Diseases:

 

This can be as simple as a blast or RKA bought with a physical manifestation and damage over time.  You can set the length of the disease with a trigger and charges.  When the last charge runs out if the character survives they are now immune to the disease.

 

So Healing such a character long enough can cure the disease. 

 

One can also attack the disease, it will have an ED however you have to use a damaging effect that won't kill the host so you need medicine, etc.  Remove the disease through damage and the next charge will trigger but keep damaging it with more medicine and you can beat it.

 

Bacteria have normal ED while a Virus has resistant ED.

 

A supernatural disease might use power defense instead.

[indy523]

I am not sure that looking to the real world will be useful. What is necessary for deciding on disease resistance or curing is for the GM to decide on a hook that can be placed on all builds defined as a disease which will allow for those effects to be corralled in defences.

 

Doc

 

The reason for this exercise was that in the discussion on how to make that adventure hook which defines the cure for diseases there was a lot of skepticism about defining it right.  So I decided to try and use the real world definition to understand it.  IT may vary well be that a separate power Disease needs to be created and defined.  Perhaps it is a hole in the game.

[DasBroot]

I have always just defined them, and all medical ailments, as drains against different stats with delayed return rate on them for non-lethal ones and NND that do body over long time increments for terminal illnesses.

 

I'm tinkering with other ways because it will play a plot point in my current game and I'm not sure I want it resolved as easily as a wizard saying 'I've got this' and using his VPP to create Heal (whatever attributes are being affected) and calling it a day (or DIspel for the damage over time.  "Dispel Cancer") so I'm interested in where this thread may go.

[DasBroot]

Hmm.. Interesting and cute.

 

I don't feel well:  Drain BODY 1d6 (standard effect: 3 points), Persistent (+1/4), Inherent (+1/4), Constant (+1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Expanded Effect (x2 Characteristics or Powers simultaneously) (Body, Con; +1/2), Uncontrolled (+1/2), Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Week; +2 1/2) (60 Active Points); One Use At A Time (-1), Attack Versus Alternate Defense (Life Support (Immune to spefiic or all disease); All Or Nothing; -1/2)

 

That would drain 1 body (3 halved rounded in favour of character targeted) and con for a week and couldn't be positively or negatively adjusted (inherrent).  It targets disease immunity instead of power defense, and can only affect a character once (instead of whenever the attacker feels like due to constant/attacking on its own (Uncontrolled)).

 

All for the low low cost of 60 AP to mildly annoy someone. 

 

(And it's probably not rules legal - just because the builder LET me build it doesn't mean it works how I planned it...)

[Doc Democracy]

I'm tinkering with other ways because it will play a plot point in my current game and I'm not sure I want it resolved as easily as a wizard saying 'I've got this' and using his VPP to create Heal (whatever attributes are being affected) and calling it a day (or DIspel for the damage over time.  "Dispel Cancer") so I'm interested in where this thread may go.

There are precedents in the literature for arcane magic being poor at dealing with disease and healing etc.

 

You might put that down as a campaign +0 limitation, arcane magic is of limited value in curing disease etc. The reasons for that might be related to your plot...

[Christopher R Taylor]

Yeah typically wizards aren't much good at cures and healing, in most genre examples at least.

[dsatow]

Most magical cures do not make you immune.  They remove everything about the sickness allowing you to be reinfected.  Pathfinder follows this idea and its probably a good idea for most magical cures.

 

In general, unless defined as a special effect, most diseases in HERO are actually just a role playing situation and does not need to be stat-ed out.  But being HERO fans, we stat out everything, including refridgerators, electric razors, and slushies (1pip AVALD life support cold - brain freeze > ).  Whether a power actually affects the disease is up to the GM.  To be honest, I think that's probably the best way to deal with diseases in HERO.

 

If its the power of the a PC/NPC, then its however they want to stat out the disease within power balance of the game.

[mrinku]

For the most part, chronic diseases are handled as Physical Complications and aren't meant to be solved with powers but bought off using experience points with GM permission.

 

Curing it, or even treating it, lies in the realm of Noncombat. SS: Medicine, PS: Oncologist and KS: Cancer are going to be what you use, not an AoE vs Cancer Cells. Even a Transform cure for such things needs to be handled with care (Transforming lesser illnesses that don't rate a Physical Complication is not so much of an issue).

[zslane]

I have always just defined them, and all medical ailments, as drains against different stats with delayed return rate on them for non-lethal ones and NND that do body over long time increments for terminal illnesses.

 

I'm tinkering with other ways because it will play a plot point in my current game and I'm not sure I want it resolved as easily as a wizard saying 'I've got this' and using his VPP to create Heal (whatever attributes are being affected) and calling it a day (or DIspel for the damage over time.  "Dispel Cancer") so I'm interested in where this thread may go.

 

You could require that healing spells be defined a little more specifically, sort of the way D&D differentiates between spells that affect Wounds (Cure Light Wounds), Diseases (Cure Disease), and Curses (Remove Curse). However, if you allow wizards to whip up any spell they like by virtue of having a VPP, then you sort of have to allow them to whip up "Cure Cancer" as a spell, regardless of how cancer is represented in game terms in your campaign. I mean, even if you decide that cancer is a Major Cumulative Transform, the Cure Cancer spell is still just an instantiation of Heal, and every bit as available in a wizard's VPP as Cure Light Wounds.

[zslane]

For the most part, chronic diseases are handled as Physical Complications and aren't meant to be solved with powers but bought off using experience points with GM permission.

 

Curing it, or even treating it, lies in the realm of Noncombat. SS: Medicine, PS: Oncologist and KS: Cancer are going to be what you use, not an AoE vs Cancer Cells. Even a Transform cure for such things needs to be handled with care (Transforming lesser illnesses that don't rate a Physical Complication is not so much of an issue).

 

I would say that diseases you start the campaign with might be represented by Complications, but not diseases in general. Otherwise it makes it difficult to have villains who can Cause Disease, you know, as a power. AFAIK, there is no power that lets you add a Complication to a character unless you allow Transform to do that (in which case, you sort of have to allow Heal to help take care of it instead of experience points).

[mrinku]

Villains with those sorts of powers tend to use them as the special effect of combat powers (i.e. drains, transforms etc.) and that situation does generally need to be dealt with using the rules for those, as you say.

 

Much depends on the setting. A typical superhero campaign should just use drains and damage effects (often NND). After all, the disease powers themselves are unrealistic, so it doesn't matter much if the recovery from them is as well.

 

"Hah! You fools! My mighty Mega-Tumor power has given you all six to eighteen months to live!!!"

 

"Well, that sucks. Better call Angel of Mercy tomorrow and book an appointment to see if she has a mystic cure or something. You won't mind if we curb stomp you now, Cancer Man?"

 

"Err... guess I don't have much of a choice..." BAM! SMASH! PUMMEL! POW!

[Lucius]

Affliction: (Total: 131 Active Cost, 17 Real Cost) Killing Attack - Ranged 2d6+1, Personal Immunity (+1/4), Invisible Power Effects (Inobvious to [one Sense Group], effects of Power are Inobvious to target; +1/2), Attack Versus Alternate Defense (Immunity to Disease; All Or Nothing; +1), Does BODY (+1) (131 Active Points); Damage Over Time, Lock out (cannot be applied multiple times) (17-32 damage increments, damage occurs every 1 Day, -3), Limited Power Does not do damage; only counts for Impairing/Disabling (-1 1/2), Extra Time (1 Turn (Post-Segment 12), Only to Activate, -3/4), No Range (-1/2), Increased Endurance Cost (x4 END; Only In Certain Circumstances (target Immune) Uncommon; -1/2), Incantations (-1/4) (Real Cost: 17) End cost: 13 (plus 39 sometimes, see notes)

 

The curser must approach within arm's reach of the victim and utter a ranting malediction, expending 13 from their Mana Pool (END Reserve.) The curse has no immediate effect, but for each day for the next full turning of the moon roll an attack against the victim of 2d6+1 on a random location. No BOD or STUN is marked off by the attack, but check the BOD rolled for Impairing and Disabling.

 

If the target is immune, the would be curser also loses 39 from personal END which may easily mean having to burn STUN as END. Sometimes a witch has been known to shout imprecations at someone only to fall to the ground foaming at the mouth.

 

But if successful, one of those 28 chances to afflict will roll 10 pts against the Vitals and a poor victim will come down with a debilitating cancer that prevents them from taking Post 12 Recoveries, or against the Head and the victim will have a stroke and lose use of one side of the body...

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary wants to buy Immunity to Curses

[mrinku]

Yup. That's a good nasty superpower/spell one. Loaded with "GM's Discretion" flags and it needs hit locations and wound effects to be in play, so it's not something that can just be pulled out of a VPP by any player who feels like it.

 

"Sorry, Fred. That's out of line I'm afraid, but I'll let you redefine the damage as an AVLD REC Drain with a long recovery timeframe."

 

Hmm... maybe the only thing we've needed all along to deal with this is the Can Heal Limbs Adder, which allows Healing or Regeneration to repair Disabling and Impairing wounds. Despite the name, it does appear to be the only thing in CC that covers that. I'd be happy to allow it vs the above attack (with suitable special effects, but a healing counter-curse should be possible).

[indy523]

Hmm.. Interesting and cute.

 

I don't feel well:  Drain BODY 1d6 (standard effect: 3 points), Persistent (+1/4), Inherent (+1/4), Constant (+1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Expanded Effect (x2 Characteristics or Powers simultaneously) (Body, Con; +1/2), Uncontrolled (+1/2), Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Week; +2 1/2) (60 Active Points); One Use At A Time (-1), Attack Versus Alternate Defense (Life Support (Immune to spefiic or all disease); All Or Nothing; -1/2)

 

That would drain 1 body (3 halved rounded in favour of character targeted) and con for a week and couldn't be positively or negatively adjusted (inherrent).  It targets disease immunity instead of power defense, and can only affect a character once (instead of whenever the attacker feels like due to constant/attacking on its own (Uncontrolled)).

 

All for the low low cost of 60 AP to mildly annoy someone. 

 

(And it's probably not rules legal - just because the builder LET me build it doesn't mean it works how I planned it...)

 

You forgot to add Sticky

[indy523]

Most magical cures do not make you immune.  They remove everything about the sickness allowing you to be reinfected.  Pathfinder follows this idea and its probably a good idea for most magical cures.

 

 

That is true however I would state that this is typical Tolkien/DND Fantasy and not Modern Fantasy.  The reason I brought this up is that I am making a superhero character based on New Orleans' Voodoo who has associations with various Lwa including Baron Samedi who grants healing.  I am trying to create a healing spell that creates a poultice placed over the sick individual that will cure diseases be they magical or mundane.  This would take time and essentially not cure the disease so much as keep the individual alive until the body beats the disease.

 

I started to find that defining the power was not as easy as I thought.  I like a lot of the suggestions here but I am more and more inclined to think a new set of attack powers and defenses needs to be created.

 

A disease power would in my mind be similar to entangle cost say 10 points for 1d6 body and have 1 Def per die.  The disease would stay in the body and over a timeframe one hour to 24 hours each roll a d6 for each 10 points or die of Body of the disease to generate an illness effect.  At less than Con the individual gets better by one step, heal 1d6 of the Body of the disease and normal stun, Bod or Con and the disease loses a die of effect..  At Con+0 or greater the individual is ill -2 to all rolls other than resisting the disease.  At COn+10 or more the target takes 1d6 normal damage and body with no defense which may be healed back by other powers.  At Con+20 or more the individual randomly drain 1 point of Con or Bod or 2 points of Stun that are not healed until the disease is ended and is at -4 to all actions, At Con +30 the drain is 1 point from each of the three Stats (2 from Stun) and at Con+40 or more the individual dies from the disease.  The default disease is a bacteria that is resisted with normal ED.  A virus must be resisted with internal resistant ED.  This is normal ED bought resistant and not exterior armor even if not a focus.  Some drugs can make the person normal ED resistant to disease for a period of time.  Bacteria would be unable to infect such a target.  A supernatural disease uses Pow Defense and attacks to heal must be vs Pow defense or the disease is unaffected.

 

Once a disease is cured the target is immune to it so the effect if a magical curse or power would have to be able to mutate.

 

Thus you could dispel such a disease or use drugs or spells designed to destroy it from the body. I am not sure about any of this but.....

[Durzan Malakim]

Based on @indy523's disease type descriptions, I think diseases can be modeled by one of two game effects:

 

• Damaging agent: Something, usually a foreign body, causes damage by slowly consuming you. The typical example is a bacteria or plasmid. You cure such diseases by destroying the thing which is consuming you. This is what our immune system does with fevers and white blood cells.
• Draining agent: Something transforms part of your body into a glitchy competitor for resources that drains you over time. The typical example is cancer, but this applies to weird things like prions as well. In the real world, you cure such diseases by destroying the transformed tissues and hoping the patient has enough healthy tissue remaining to survive the experience. With access to powers you could literally transform someone back to normal, or alternatively ensure the person survives the rigors of removing the draining agent.

In both cases, a typical heal of BODY and CON is just treating the symptoms and not the cause.

 

Identifying the disease agent is usually a non-trivial task in actual medicine and is why there is a science of epidemiology. Most games could rightly hand-wave identifying common or known disease pathogens, but identifying the disease agent of the zombie plague should probably require actual effort. Are zombies the result of the T-virus, a rogue nanobot swarm, or a magical curse? Your cure will vary based on the source, and the cure for one disease agent will have no effect on another.

[indy523]

Based on @indy523's disease type descriptions, I think diseases can be modeled by one of two game effects:

 

• Damaging agent: Something, usually a foreign body, causes damage by slowly consuming you. The typical example is a bacteria or plasmid. You cure such diseases by destroying the thing which is consuming you. This is what our immune system does with fevers and white blood cells.
• Draining agent: Something transforms part of your body into a glitchy competitor for resources that drains you over time. The typical example is cancer, but this applies to weird things like prions as well. In the real world, you cure such diseases by destroying the transformed tissues and hoping the patient has enough healthy tissue remaining to survive the experience. With access to powers you could literally transform someone back to normal, or alternatively ensure the person survives the rigors of removing the draining agent.

In both cases, a typical heal of BODY and CON is just treating the symptoms and not the cause.

 

Identifying the disease agent is usually a non-trivial task in actual medicine and is why there is a science of epidemiology. Most games could rightly hand-wave identifying common or known disease pathogens, but identifying the disease agent of the zombie plague should probably require actual effort. Are zombies the result of the T-virus, a rogue nanobot swarm, or a magical curse? Your cure will vary based on the source, and the cure for one disease agent will have no effect on another.

 

Ok Durzan I think you are on the right track

 

We can define the damaging agent disease as an attack (Blast, KA or Drain) which damages over time and has the limitation Physical Manifestation (the disease is inside you and can be hurt) and is bought with inobvious with Invisible effects IPE you need a microscope to see it but the patient shows signs of illness when full bore.  It also should be bought as desolid vs PD to account for the swarm like nature of the agent inside the patient.

 

A cure then has two elements a healing of lost body, stats to full health and a drain vs the disease itself that is AVAD to ED and has an advantage of selective to not affect the patient tissues.

 

So to make a more potent resistant disease one gives the disease resistant ED.  To make a magical cursed disease one gives It Pow Defense and defines it such that only an attack that is built to affect the defense or better can harm it.  KA or AVAD rED or better for the first and AVAD POW def or even rPOW def for the later.

 

Similar builds could be made for the Draining effect.

[mrinku]

That is true however I would state that this is typical Tolkien/DND Fantasy and not Modern Fantasy.  The reason I brought this up is that I am making a superhero character based on New Orleans' Voodoo who has associations with various Lwa including Baron Samedi who grants healing.  I am trying to create a healing spell that creates a poultice placed over the sick individual that will cure diseases be they magical or mundane.  This would take time and essentially not cure the disease so much as keep the individual alive until the body beats the disease.

 

 

You could also just go with normal Healing (special effect divine Voudun blessing). GMs should generally be flexible about "special effect tricks", especially when the powers aren't "real world" ones like guns, armour, first aid kits and such. A fantasy priest may have the same base Healing power as the Herbalist down the road, but the former may have a chance of curing leprosy if they're devout enough, while the latter can be as sinful as they like without it affecting their cures.

 

Some skill rolls would probably be in order too - PS:Voodoo Priest, KS:Herbal Medicine; KS:Voodoo etc. Maybe build the Lwa as powerful Contacts (you probably already thought of that one) and actually persuade them to help instead of abstracting it as powers.

 

But I do like your thinking, and there's nothing wrong with developing good house rules.