Heal Thy Self

[Supplement Four]

How do you guys handle a character with the Heal skill healing himself?

No problem?

Penalty to check?

Don't allow it?

Is there an official rule on this?

 

[Vambelte]

I guess it say the healer cant' heal himself, at least for the long term care...

 

[Supplement Four]

Here's how I decided to call it. This is an e-mail I sent out to my players:

First Aid - You can not treat yourself because the patient is unconscious.

First Aid is used when a character is in the negative hit points.



Long-Term Care - You can not treat yourself because it specifically says that you can't. This means you can't get double hit points returned to you over night, but if you stay up and tend to the other characters, they will get double hit points.

Long-Term Care is used when the characters spend an entire day or more doinging nothing but bed rest. This is like acting as their nurse or doctor, changing their bandages, applying new ointments and the like.



Short-term Care: I'll allow you to use short-term care on yourself if you can easily get to the wound. This means, mostly likely, you will be able to treat yourself after a fight if you can get to the wound. If you can't get to the wound, I'll allow you to talk to someone else and tell them what to do.

Short term care is used immediately (within 10 minutes) combats to clean and bind wounds, apply bandages, and that sort of thing.



Treat Poison: I'll allow you to treat poison on yourself if you're conscious, but you'll be operating at your wounded state.

Treat Disease: I'll allow you to treat disease on yourself if you're conscious, but you'll be operating at your wounded state.




Healing in the Game...

Healing in this game gives you many more hit points than what you got in AD&D. And, this is needed because, like Dragonlance, there is no magical healing.

Sleep a comfortable 8 hours? You get a number of hit points equal to: 3 + CON mod + Level

Bed rest for an entire 24 hours? You get double that base amount.

Bed rest for an entire 24 hours while under Long-Term care of a healer? You get four times your base amount if the Heal check is made.



The way I read Long-Term care, you can't use it just sleeping over night. You can only use it when an injured character is resting for an entire day.

Is that how you guys read it?

 

[Supplement Four]

You can use long term care on 8hr rest also S4, so that will double his hp: ie Lvl+Con +3 x2

It doesn't read that way to me. Have you got something more solid, or is this your opinion of what's written in the book?

The reason I don't think it's meant for an 8 hour sleep is because of the title "Long Term Care" (nursing someone for 8 hours while he sleeps doesn't sound like long term to me) and the comment about treating a wounded person for a day or more.

Of course, one could argue that the Natural Healing rule is meant for one entire day, too, since that's how it reads. But, if you do that, there ain't much difference in that and complete bed rest.

So, I'm guessing that Natural Healing occurs after 8 hours of comfortable rest, while double that can be regained if the character spends 24 hours doing nothing but resting.

 

[Supplement Four]

So, I'm guessing that Natural Healing occurs after 8 hours of comfortable rest, while double that can be regained if the character spends 24 hours doing nothing but resting.

No longer guessing. This is spelled out in the D&D 3.5 Rules Compendium. Natural Healing does occur after 8 hours, and complete bed rest for the full day of 24 hours yields double the points.

 

[Ichabod]

Looking back at this thread, a couple of things I noticed that could be clearer.

Just because a character is in negative hit points, it doesn't mean the character is unconscious. So, First Aid by any conscious character, including upon the healer, should work.

There's only one chance to Short Term Care after being wounded. There would be no rolling over and over again until getting a 15. This is why at least two party members should endeavor to have Heal bonuses of +14 or better, to autopass any healing attempts.

 

[Ichabod]

I should have been more specific. Diehard is a common feat to possess.