Medicine reflects your ability to provide proper long-term medical care in controlled conditions. Unlike First Aid, which handles immediate stabilization and battlefield care, Medicine focuses on recovery, diagnosis, and improving healing outcomes. This skill is used when treating patients between battles—cleaning wounds, setting bones, preventing infection, and monitoring recovery.
When You Use It:
Medicine applies when:
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Providing daily medical care to speed healing
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Diagnosing injuries, diseases, or other medical conditions
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Treating patients in a clean, controlled setting with proper supplies
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Managing long-term recovery from serious wounds
Stat Used:
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Always Mind, representing knowledge, precision, and steady hands.
Mechanical Effects:
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Daily Healing:
Medicine may be rolled once per day per patient during rest and recovery. Success adds +1d10 HP to that day’s healing total. -
Critical Success (01):
The patient heals +1d10 HP as normal and removes one lingering effect (e.g., penalties from wounds or infections), subject to GM approval. -
Failure:
The patient heals at the normal rate with no bonus. -
Critical Failure (00):
May worsen the condition or cause setbacks—such as infection, re-injury, or reduced healing (GM discretion).
Interaction with First Aid:
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First Aid stabilizes and prevents death during or after combat.
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Medicine is used later, in safe conditions, to improve healing and recovery.
Situational Modifiers:
Apply the Difficulty Ladder based on conditions, tools, and patient state:
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+50%: Full infirmary, excellent tools, stable and healthy patient
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+40%: Clean home or camp, basic medical kit, cooperative patient
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+30%: Outdoor shelter, good weather, moderate injuries
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+20%: Safe campsite, simple tools, minor injuries
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+10%: Cramped space, basic field supplies, impatient patient
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0%: Average adventuring conditions, limited gear
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–10%: Poor conditions, unsanitary environment
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–20%: Working in haste or under pressure
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–30%: Dirty, infected, or heavily wounded patient
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–40%: Harsh environment, extreme weather, little gear
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–50%: Near-impossible conditions, no tools, gravely injured patient
Medicine is not battlefield care—use First Aid for that. Medicine improves healing after the danger has passed and is best applied during downtime. Skilled use means faster recovery and better chances to remove lingering penalties or avoid complications.
Untrained Use:
Medicine may be used untrained with a –10% penalty. However, complex care (e.g., surgeries or treating serious illnesses) may be impossible without proper training, at the GM’s discretion.
Narrative Examples:
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A healer sets broken bones and tends wounds, hastening recovery after a brutal battle.
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A village doctor carefully monitors a feverish patient and prevents complications.
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A druid uses natural poultices and steady care to speed a poisoned ally’s recovery.
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A cleric with medical knowledge cleans and stitches battlefield injuries during downtime.
Medicine ensures that recovery plays a role in pacing and narrative. Successful care can shorten downtime and ease the toll of long campaigns, while poor conditions or neglected treatment can create ongoing problems.
Make Medicine meaningful without making it mandatory by tying bonus healing to good decisions and safe environments.
Additionally, some damage cannot be healed by magic. Wounds inflicted by magical backlash, such as from Heroic Casting, resist magical restoration. Only time and natural healing—augmented by Medicine—can mend these injuries. This makes Medicine critical for supporting casters and managing the hidden cost of reckless magical power.
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File Created: 05/01/2025 Last Modified: 05/01/2025