Healing

[Unnamed Mercenary]

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

In general, instantaneous healing pretty much removes any real danger from most situations, and that's a bit inconsistent with how the setting is presented, where NPCs do indeed fear for their safety. So magic "poof, you're all better!" healing is probably very rare. In the Conjurer questlines, healing comes up many times, but it's never as simple as wiggling your fingers and suddenly someone's okay. It's usually trying, risky, and not always guaranteed to succeed.

 

Because character death is a thing. And if someone goes to the Grindstone hoping to have their character killed off from sustained injuries from one or more rounds, the other people may not be cool with that. It's a matter of consent.

 

Due to the Grindstone accepting basically all physical combat players regardless of where they fall onto the "realistic" "fantasy" RP meter, it would become an issue if borderline-WoL who has Inner Beast Darkside powering his massive sword-axe went on a mass killing spree at the Grindstone. In the same way, a player might just that "all it takes for my character to die is to get stabbed once." Maybe a little price from the end of Joe Nobody's dull sword was enough to do that. Of course, such was never communicated. And the general rule at Grindstone is "no killing." For an event that's becoming so large all the people can't render on the map in a single view, there's simply too much going on for serious injuries, "losing control", or death.

 

But at the same time, Grindstone is supposed to be about besting your opponent. I don't generally have Franz swinging for vitals or trying to impaled people. Stopping before and attack or tapping shows he -could- have finished the attack, but injuries are messy. We had a 2-3 hour long "I need all the healers focused on me" person once. And it made coordination incredibly difficult when there were other people who needed RP healing too.

[Warren Castille]

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

Basically what Franz said. It was a rule since before I took over, but I like it if only because it also cuts down on the "you beat me but you didn't REALLY beat me" bullshit that gets thrown around regardless. Too many people want to safe face by not losing even when they lose, and healing between rounds just removes one more convenient excuse to get your ass kicked.

 

It can really diminish the winner's fun by being told "Yeah, well this doesn't count anyway because X Y Z!"

[Hammersmith]

In REAL GRITTY RP TIMEz, instant healing bugs the shit out of me.  It's a sloppy 'instant' solution to what should be a serious problem.  It's a lazy coincidence solution.

 

Which is fine in SOME CASES.

 

But it removes impact, consequence, and strugger from stuff that needs weight.  Otherwise people would never die, ever, or ever get crippled, or hurt, or be sick.  These problems exist, it stands to reason that healing does not (most of the time) work like that.

 

In combat that's Not Grindstone?  Dulling pain, aetheric shields, stopping bleeding, forcing shallow cuts to scar over quickly, those sorts of things are cool, and combat-medicy.  It remains flashy without making it a regenerating limb syndrome or, gods help up, Pheonix Down Death Solutions. A good shield or bleed staunch is the difference between bleeding out or getting shot in the head. Getting an energy rush during an extended skirmish is, legitimately, game changing.

 

It makes Healers Active Support players in a combat situation and it's -awesome-.

[Larson]

I see healing as a means of repairing, perhaps increasing the rate of regeneration, but not creating tissue . So if someone broke a bone, then it would piece itself together. Though if something is missing, then there would be problems. 

 

Generally, when my char comes back from something like blood loss, that blood stays gone, and she's gonna be healing like death warmed over until her body catches up. If she's had some of her muscle tissue regenerated, she's gonna be sore, and very reluctant to move around. Healing in the game is miraculous, but coming back from a situation that should by all means leave someone in bed or a coffin should still linger around for a while longer.

The mustache got it right.

[Virella]

Makes me miss a system I've used in another roleplaying setting; If your character got crippled, well son, enjoy roleplaying your character crippled and heavily debuffed in game for 24 hours of real life time. Same if your character got slapped to execution state (and got saved somehow), you had to endure 72 hours of real life play time before he or she was back on her feet (and your massive debuffs gone). Of course GMs would allow things to happen, to speed up healing if you did a proper event for it and all that, but the general consent was you did something stupid, or someone struck down your character, you had to deal with the consequences.

 

And character dead was glorious as well; but rerolling another char was super easy as well, okay you might have lost your progression, but with a bit of luck, if you were clever enough to keep your gold not on your person, you could find a way to snatch it back, or else heh, see bandits running of with it (what was great fun as well, I absolutely loved thieves jumping onto me and stealing my currency if I were stupid enough to keep it all on my char). But to stop derailing; once more depends on the situation. Grindstone isn't the place to go lay down for hours, cry in pain due to the reasons people already pointed out above. Other roleplay? Make it as gritty as you want, as long both parties involved enjoy the roleplay.

[Caspar]

If you want to adjust healing effectiveness for drama, you coupd also have less time for the healer to concentrate or, if you wajt to expedite it, maybe a surfeit of released aether from combat could be repurposed? Not sure.

[Eses Fafa]

I see healing as a means of repairing, perhaps increasing the rate of regeneration, but not creating tissue . So if someone broke a bone, then it would piece itself together. Though if something is missing, then there would be problems. 

 

Generally, when my char comes back from something like blood loss, that blood stays gone, and she's gonna be healing like death warmed over until her body catches up. If she's had some of her muscle tissue regenerated, she's gonna be sore, and very reluctant to move around. Healing in the game is miraculous, but coming back from a situation that should by all means leave someone in bed or a coffin should still linger around for a while longer.

The mustache got it right.

The moustache is always right.

[Seren]

One of the things that people forget is that too much magic can be a bad thing. In the conjurer's quest line there's a lot of emphasis on the idea that nature lets you heal when nature wants, and that's not all the time. Plus over use can be a problem as well. It's one of my favorite ways to play up healers honestly. Though as a healer player also, there's the counterpoint where you want to be useful and do what you're skilled to do in roleplays at the same time. I personally enjoy playing up that reality a healer has to pick and choose in roleplay when to heal to make sure nature stays happy. 

 

For actual healing, I tend to think healing spells, like cure and psychik being more 'combat' ready spells. Hammersmith covered a lot of my opinion on it. There's ways to play a healer up in ways to help their team without completely autofixing problems or being nerfed. Healing deepest parts of wounds to help keep their team stable, healing openings that will scar over to stop bleeding. Their magic giving the target an energy rush. There's a lot of balancing ways to play it.

[FreelanceWizard]

I basically go with whatever the other person wants, honestly. It's their story; when L'yhta is using healing magic, she's a support character in that story, and so her level of success or failure is dependent primarily upon the needs of the other player's narrative. My metaphysical explanation for this is that healing puts a pattern back to "how it should be," which is largely how the person being healed believes it should be. The bigger the deviation being repaired, the harder it is to do, and long-term deviations (an old scar, a limb that's been missing for years, a birth defect) are not correctable at all. In this model, because healing isn't entirely under the metaphysical control of the healer, unexpected events can occur.

 

Beyond all of this, sometimes to get things to heal correctly, you may have to cause further injury (breaking a bone to get it to mend properly, cutting off septic or dead flesh, and so on). It might not be feasible to do that in the heat of the moment for a variety of reasons.

 

At any rate, I personally have no problem with instant healing, because there are many ways to make a story interesting even where serious physical injury isn't a particular threat. I may also have been exposed to far too many "medical dramas" in MMOs, though, to have much of a taste for them any more.

[LiadansWhisper]

One of the things that people forget is that too much magic can be a bad thing. In the conjurer's quest line there's a lot of emphasis on the idea that nature lets you heal when nature wants, and that's not all the time. Plus over use can be a problem as well. It's one of my favorite ways to play up healers honestly. Though as a healer player also, there's the counterpoint where you want to be useful and do what you're skilled to do in roleplays at the same time. I personally enjoy playing up that reality a healer has to pick and choose in roleplay when to heal to make sure nature stays happy. 

 

For actual healing, I tend to think healing spells, like cure and psychik being more 'combat' ready spells. Hammersmith covered a lot of my opinion on it. There's ways to play a healer up in ways to help their team without completely autofixing problems or being nerfed. Healing deepest parts of wounds to help keep their team stable, healing openings that will scar over to stop bleeding. Their magic giving the target an energy rush. There's a lot of balancing ways to play it.

 

That's...not really what the Conjurer quest line is saying.

 

Basically, Conjurers - like White Mages and, to an extent, like Black Mages - are channeling aether from their surroundings. From the land. So, the big emphasis in the Conjurer quest line (probably because the Padjal know what happened with Amdapor and the elementals remember what happened) is that what is taken MUST be returned.

 

It isn't that "nature will only let you heal sometimes." That's not at all accurate.  The elementals may tell a Hearer or a Padjal (who, by default, are also Hearers), "Hey, don't heal that jerk," but that doesn't mean you can't ACTUALLY heal them. It means you'll piss off the elementals  (and any Gridanians) as a result. Outside of the Shroud, there is nothing other than your own skill and the strength of the aether around you to prevent you from healing someone. 

 

But, what is taken must be returned if you care at all about the land's health.

[Iex]

If we go by the Astro quest line (really isn't spoilery since you know... you are a healer class) a lot of the quests involve you healing folks... rather instantly, and I mean instantly. The characters are astonished how their wounds disappear before their eyes. Now, if we take it with a grain of investigation, most of the injuries are not life threatening, but if not treated quickly some could result in debilitation of the NPC if left to heal naturally. 

 

A lot of NPCs we see around in different cities are not actually injured physically as often as we see NPCs who are sick. Physical injury seems to be a far less common affair (mutilation and dismemberment aside). NPCs in the story that are 'physically' defeated seem to be fine the next time we meet them, implying that the physical wounds are easy to tend to by healers. However, when NPC is sick... they remain sick for some time. Often diseases and other illnesses are when a more alchemical or medicinal method is applied more reminiscent of modern day/historical medical practices. This could infer that aetheric healing is really good at restoring the physical back norm, but on a physiological and pathological plane it is not as effective.  Better at putting things back together rather than taking things out.

 

Now, full disclosure, I am of the mind set that physical injury does not necessarily make character development or the lack of it being a sign of an overpowered character. Bruises and bumps can be just as effective of a tool as getting skewered because it is not the injury that defines the development but the way the character deals with the aftermath. It could be limping around for a while or just the character reacting differently the next time they encounter the source of their bruise. (Aka guarding that side more, or having some hesitation toward a beast that gave them the bruise).

 

As for healing a player character, I have healed Grindstone and other characters... many many times. I agree there has to be communication 100% of the time between the characters (in the case of Grindstone... don't be a stubborn bastard with your injury /cough/). If the wounded character wants to play the injury they need to make it clear otherwise they are not really giving credit to the skill of the healer. The character may have just gotten slashed across the chest by dragon they slew, but the healer character also may be slaying their dragons of injuries. Basically, it is a give and take... if your take too much your rob credence from the other character's ability or gravity of the situation. 

 

That being said. A good middle ground might be the non-physical (muscles skin bone) being the problem rather than lingering physical injuries. Play up the physiological and pathological. The wound might be gone but the character lost a lot of blood and the body is recovering from shock of the injury. Blasted by a fireball? Burns healed but you own personal aether is disrupted by the aether of the fireball. Infection from the dirty claws of dragon that tore your flesh. Since Aether is in every living thing, if the healing is intense enough, it means a lot of aether got used to fix your body, which could leave you weak and drained. All of those sorts of things could require longer healing times or far more than... "WHOOSH YOU BE HEALED!"

 

In closing... uh just talk to your healer and discuss how you want to use the injury and how they would like to treat it within their character's ability. I am sure if you talk about it... you can come to a good solution that respects both players and characters, because there is nothing more annoying when playing a healer when your character is treated almost like a medkit from Left for Dead (aka heals you some but not all the way) every time. Everything above this paragraph can be ignored if you like!

[Sigil.9054]

I tend to favor the idea of magic having a cost. It's the physicist in me. You know: energy is neither created nor destroyed. That kind of thing. This has a huge impact on how I view healing magic.

 

I tend to be pretty flexible as far as receiving healing, whispering the healer OOCly to coordinate what we both want/expect out of the interaction. Seldi will respond with appreciation or amazement (or, perhaps, suspicion) depending on how things went.

 

When my character is the patient, my goal is to keep the gears of RP flowing smoothly.

 

When my character is the healer, though, things are a little different, and I tend to put a lot of thought into my healing:

 

 

 

To heal a body with magic, I figure you need energy (Aether in FF14) to do the work of the spell and materials to work with. Let's face it: this is a physical body you're repairing here. Raw energy will only plug holes until the energy dissipates. That might work for a dedicated mage, but probably isn't going to work for the person you're trying to heal. For a permanent fix, you'll need nutrients, fibers, water, and things like that.

 

So whenever healing magic comes up in roleplay, I ask two questions right off the bat: Where are the materials coming from? Where is the energy coming from? Materials, I figure, can be fabricated from the energies of the spell, but this will both increase the energy required to cast the spell and the complexity of the spell itself. Materials could really come from anywhere, come to think of it. The energy can also really come from anywhere, but I tend to prefer life-related things for poetic reasons.

 

The next questions I ask are: How much energy will this take? How complicated should the spell be? The amount of energy is largely going to be hand-waved (particularly if you're drawing from the planet or the elements), but I do tend to factor in the severity of the wound, and whether or not materials are being converted.

 

Finally, I approach the complexity of the spell with the idea that a spell is like a computer script for the cosmos. A "healing script" that takes advantage of the target's natural healing, for example, will be simpler than one that does the repairs manually. Likewise, a spell that simply moves natural materials around will be simpler than one that converts them or creates them from scratch.

 

All this is considered before casting any given RP healing spell.

 

In the case of Seldi, as a scholar, she draws from her own Aether to heal. I draw inspiration from the spells available to the class when deciding how she heals.

 

She has three styles of healing: Preventative, First Aid, and Complete. Preventative spells are mostly shield spells designed to negate or mitigate incoming damage. First Aid spells are spells designed to do little more than hold a body together until proper care can be rendered. Both Preventative and First Aid spells can be cast with relative ease, but are very temporary, and don't do any actual healing.

 

The actual healing spells ("Complete") require time, study of the patient, and concentration. They can also take a lot out of her, depending on how much needs to be repaired, as, again, she draws from her own Aether to heal. (In fact, she's likely to nap after she's done).

 

 

[Dravus]

Whenever my character sustains an injury during role-play then I prefer it to be something meaningful rather than something that is resolved with a matter of minutes. Instantaneous healing may technically be a thing that the lore supports but...I just find it very boring and a bit of a cop out.

 

It's much more fun for me to have my character be forced to retreat due to an injury or fight on despite being hurt in an attempt to overcome overwhelming odds. It's also pretty cool when my character loses and ends up being out of action for a while. It serves to give the more combat orientated characters a chance to wander through a settlement - and if an emote suggests that they're wrapped up in bandages then that's a pretty solid hook for other role-players to latch onto and approach.

 

In short: healing is usually something I embrace sparingly and I don't generally have it solve things immediately. I tend to favour more personal and character driven events rather than large and chaotic gatherings so there's never really been a need for me to rush through the healing process.

[Leggerless]

If you don't let yourself be healed quickly at a public event, then you're causing a problem for every other person involved in the RP around you, especially if said event incorporates logistics operations.

 

Other places? Do whatever does not break lore I suppose.

[Kaiz]

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

Basically what Franz said. It was a rule since before I took over, but I like it if only because it also cuts down on the "you beat me but you didn't REALLY beat me" bullshit that gets thrown around regardless. Too many people want to safe face by not losing even when they lose, and healing between rounds just removes one more convenient excuse to get your ass kicked.

 

It can really diminish the winner's fun by being told "Yeah, well this doesn't count anyway because X Y Z!"

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

In general, instantaneous healing pretty much removes any real danger from most situations, and that's a bit inconsistent with how the setting is presented, where NPCs do indeed fear for their safety. So magic "poof, you're all better!" healing is probably very rare. In the Conjurer questlines, healing comes up many times, but it's never as simple as wiggling your fingers and suddenly someone's okay. It's usually trying, risky, and not always guaranteed to succeed.

 

Because character death is a thing. And if someone goes to the Grindstone hoping to have their character killed off from sustained injuries from one or more rounds, the other people may not be cool with that. It's a matter of consent. 

 

Due to the Grindstone accepting basically all physical combat players regardless of where they fall onto the "realistic" <-> "fantasy" RP meter, it would become an issue if borderline-WoL who has Inner Beast Darkside powering his massive sword-axe went on a mass killing spree at the Grindstone.  In the same way, a player might just that "all it takes for my character to die is to get stabbed once." Maybe a little price from the end of Joe Nobody's dull sword was enough to do that. Of course, such was never communicated. And the general rule at Grindstone is "no killing." For an event that's becoming so large all the people can't render on the map in a single view, there's simply too much going on for serious injuries, "losing control", or death. 

 

But at the same time, Grindstone is supposed to be about besting your opponent. I don't generally have Franz swinging for vitals or trying to impaled people. Stopping before and attack or tapping shows he -could- have finished the attack, but injuries are messy. We had a 2-3 hour long "I need all the healers focused on me" person once. And it made coordination incredibly difficult when there were other people who needed RP healing too.

 

I'm not even sure how one is even dependent on the other. 

 

For starters, I'm talking about how players choose to receive their injuries, not how another player inflicts them. Whether I choose to have Kaiz really beat up or not has nothing to do with my opponent. The way Grindstone is structured, if my opponent stabs at me and lands a sucessful hit, it's my call if they just glanced off my armor and winded me (and that'll make me less effective), or stabbed me right through my chest (but I'll be fine). 

 

Additionally, I don't see how the healing obligation controls any of what you're saying anyways. Players can still say "you beat me but not really" and decide the nature of their defeat. Whether healing is enforced or not has no bearing on any of that. Ultimately it doesn't matter anyways, since the winning and losing is dictated by dice, not roleplay, so even if someone claims that none of their injuries really hurt them, if they lost, they lost. The loser can say whatever they want to make themselves feel better, but they still lost.

 

I can understand why Grindstone has 'super-healing' between battles to make the event manageable, but I don't see why it's forced upon the player. If someone really cared that much about 'saving face', they don't lack for ways to do it even with enforced healing. 

 

I guess overall I don't see how it prevents any of the aforementioned problems, but I do see it interfering with how a player fluffs out their participation in the event. If they want to move through each round with a 'souvenir' of their last fight, and use their injuries as part of the roleplay, they can't.

 

edit: PS - This is actually a minor quibble. Grindstone and runestone are a fantastic events overall. I've just never really understood why the healing was rigidly-enforced as opposed to simply being an option.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

Basically what Franz said. It was a rule since before I took over, but I like it if only because it also cuts down on the "you beat me but you didn't REALLY beat me" bullshit that gets thrown around regardless. Too many people want to safe face by not losing even when they lose, and healing between rounds just removes one more convenient excuse to get your ass kicked.

 

It can really diminish the winner's fun by being told "Yeah, well this doesn't count anyway because X Y Z!"

I'm not sure why Grindstone insists on healing, personally. If someone wants to trudge through the event bruised and bloodied, what difference does it make?

 

In general, instantaneous healing pretty much removes any real danger from most situations, and that's a bit inconsistent with how the setting is presented, where NPCs do indeed fear for their safety. So magic "poof, you're all better!" healing is probably very rare. In the Conjurer questlines, healing comes up many times, but it's never as simple as wiggling your fingers and suddenly someone's okay. It's usually trying, risky, and not always guaranteed to succeed.

 

Because character death is a thing. And if someone goes to the Grindstone hoping to have their character killed off from sustained injuries from one or more rounds, the other people may not be cool with that. It's a matter of consent. 

 

Due to the Grindstone accepting basically all physical combat players regardless of where they fall onto the "realistic" "fantasy" RP meter, it would become an issue if borderline-WoL who has Inner Beast Darkside powering his massive sword-axe went on a mass killing spree at the Grindstone.  In the same way, a player might just that "all it takes for my character to die is to get stabbed once." Maybe a little price from the end of Joe Nobody's dull sword was enough to do that. Of course, such was never communicated. And the general rule at Grindstone is "no killing." For an event that's becoming so large all the people can't render on the map in a single view, there's simply too much going on for serious injuries, "losing control", or death. 

 

But at the same time, Grindstone is supposed to be about besting your opponent. I don't generally have Franz swinging for vitals or trying to impaled people. Stopping before and attack or tapping shows he -could- have finished the attack, but injuries are messy. We had a 2-3 hour long "I need all the healers focused on me" person once. And it made coordination incredibly difficult when there were other people who needed RP healing too.

 

I'm not even sure how one is even dependent on the other. 

 

For starters, I'm talking about how players choose to receive their injuries, not how another player inflicts them. Whether I choose to have Kaiz really beat up or not has nothing to do with my opponent. The way Grindstone is structured, if my opponent stabs at me and lands a sucessful hit, it's my call if they just glanced off my armor and winded me (and that'll make me less effective), or stabbed me right through my chest (but I'll be fine). 

 

Additionally, I don't see how the healing obligation controls any of what you're saying anyways. Players can still say "you beat me but not really" and decide the nature of their defeat. Whether healing is enforced or not has no bearing on any of that. Ultimately it doesn't matter anyways, since the winning and losing is dictated by dice, not roleplay, so even if someone claims that none of their injuries really hurt them, if they lost, they lost. The loser can say whatever they want to make themselves feel better, but they still lost.

 

I can understand why Grindstone has 'super-healing' between battles to make the event manageable, but I don't see why it's forced upon the player. If someone really cared that much about 'saving face', they don't lack for ways to do it even with enforced healing. 

 

I guess overall I don't see how it prevents any of the aforementioned problems, but I do see it interfering with how a player fluffs out their participation in the event. If they want to move through each round with a 'souvenir' of their last fight, and use their injuries as part of the roleplay, they can't.

 

edit: PS - This is actually a minor quibble. Grindstone and runestone are a fantastic events overall. I've just never really understood why the healing was rigidly-enforced as opposed to simply being an option.

 

Because like I said, let's say your character attacked one of mine. And I'm in a shitty mood that day and decide that the gentle graze of your character's weapon was "just enough" to kill mine. Your character's now broken a rule of the Grindstone because I "felt like killing my character". I've technically godmodded death from your attack, and assuming I was really being a shitty person, made a huge fit out of it "just because."

 

...where does that leave you?

 

--

 

Or in another instance, let's say my character was injured. Nothing too serious [for him], just an arm that's completely useless if no medical attention is received. But my character's pride is too much. He'd -never- let a filthy healer try to fix an injury he's received. So he continues fighting until he's basically just an armless, legless, stump. Oh, but he INSISTS on still fighting in the Grindstone and somehow wins his rolls. Now we've got a logistical issue.

 

--

 

Or in perhaps the most realistic of the examples. My character takes damage. He's visibly injured and presses on anyways during a Grindstone. Someone else uses that injury to their advantage and now I have some form of a critical injury on my character. Because I'm ultra-realism (in this example), I blame the Grindstone for my character's injuries and have a generally bad time while arguing with all the healers that "they should know" when my character needs healing because he wasn't asking for it and was otherwise outright refusing it. I'm upset at the lack of OOC organization of the event because the coordinators didn't accommodate me the way I wanted and I go and rant in all my linkshells.

 

--

 

Simply put, if a character has visible and/or obvious injury from a GRindstone, they're gonna get healed because it's a liability on the people helping make the event go smoothly. When there's 40+ people running around fighting each other, any number of spectators, and the organizers, the chat scroll gets messy. There's generally a healer shortage for at least the first two rounds. And healers simply don't have the time to RP out bandages or to listen to a person wail on about their injury for too long. It's basically a job. And it only takes one character throwing a fit to turn a fun event into a hassle, hence the few, but important rules.

 

A character with a bump, minor bruise, or scratch? Probably won't get healed if they don't complain about it. A character with significant blood loss from a nearly severed limb who happened to win the round? We're obligated to make sure that person is healed enough to continue fighting without dying. We've ultimately got nothing on what types of injuries a person incurs. We have to trust that the participants follow the rules and don't go overboard.

[Dis]

I tend to go down a middle path with things.  For example, if a character breaks a bone, it takes the bone being set with normal methods, before magical healing can begin to accelerate the healing process.  And in most RP's I've been in, accelerating the process is all that magical healing does.  Minor cuts and scrapes and stuff?  Sure, instant healing.  Deep and grievous wounds, those usually take time. 

 

I've never done the 'instant' healing thing, and when it comes to being on the receiving end, I usually go with whatever the healer prefers.  I've never been really keen on the whole 'instant healing of a deep and lasting wound', and I've always played it out that in these situations, the magical healing goes a long way toward helping, but never fixes things one hundred percent. 

 

When Glioca got the scar on her face, for example, she used Conjury to heal her face, which prevented the scar from being worse than it could have been, and her eyesight wasn't hindered because thankfully she jerked back enough that the claw scraped her face and not her eye itself, otherwise she likely would have gone blind in that eye. 

 

She has a few other scars, minor ones that I need to document at some point, but a lot of minor wounds heal because of the condition of her body.  And I do mean minor ones.  She never needs to worry about papercuts!  When it comes to anyone else though, if it seems like a wound would naturally leave a scar, something that's deep, and may not heal well, or in the event like with Liviana where they couldn't afford healing due to finances and such, those scars linger.  Some characters will have ritual scars that have nothing to do with injury, and those are left to worsen before being healed, or are 'seared' with magic to make them permanent. 

 

I'm pretty carefree when it comes to magical healing though.  I usually ask whoever I'm healing how they prefer to do things, and on the opposite side, will ask whoever is healing me which method they'd rather use.  If it's a quick contact RP and I'm not likely to be in touch with that particular healer again, the wound will have lasting effects later in further RP, even if they'd have preferred an 'instant fix'.  In the Grindstone, I'd probably go with an instant fix, but after the end of it all, oh dear lord would whatever character had participated be hurting.  'Fixing' a wound doesn't mean it won't leave lasting effects, after all.  

 

Human/etc body be complicated, yo'.

[Kaiz]

 

Because like I said, let's say your character attacked one of mine. And I'm in a shitty mood that day and decide that the gentle graze of your character's weapon was "just enough" to kill mine. Your character's now broken a rule of the Grindstone because I "felt like killing my character". I've technically godmodded death from your attack, and assuming I was really being a shitty person, made a huge fit out of it "just because."

 

...where does that leave you?

 

--

 

Or in another instance, let's say my character was injured. Nothing too serious [for him], just an arm that's completely useless if no medical attention is received. But my character's pride is too much. He'd -never- let a filthy healer try to fix an injury he's received. So he continues fighting until he's basically just an armless, legless, stump. Oh, but he INSISTS on still fighting in the Grindstone and somehow wins his rolls. Now we've got a logistical issue.

 

--

 

Or in perhaps the most realistic of the examples. My character takes damage. He's visibly injured and presses on anyways during a Grindstone. Someone else uses that injury to their advantage and now I have some form of a critical injury on my character. Because I'm ultra-realism (in this example), I blame the Grindstone for my character's injuries and have a generally bad time while arguing with all the healers that "they should know" when my character needs healing because he wasn't asking for it and was otherwise outright refusing it. I'm upset at the lack of OOC organization of the event because the coordinators didn't accommodate me the way I wanted and I go and rant in all my linkshells.

 

--

 

Simply put, if a character has visible and/or obvious injury from a GRindstone, they're gonna get healed because it's a liability on the people helping make the event go smoothly. When there's 40+ people running around fighting each other, any number of spectators, and the organizers, the chat scroll gets messy. There's generally a healer shortage for at least the first two rounds. And healers simply don't have the time to RP out bandages or to listen to a person wail on about their injury for too long. It's basically a job. And it only takes one character throwing a fit to turn a fun event into a hassle, hence the few, but important rules.

 

A character with a bump, minor bruise, or scratch? Probably won't get healed if they don't complain about it. A character with significant blood loss from a nearly severed limb who happened to win the round? We're obligated to make sure that person is healed enough to continue fighting without dying. We've ultimately got nothing on what types of injuries a person incurs. We have to trust that the participants follow the rules and don't go overboard.

 

 

All of these examples are, frankly, pretty absurd. If someone was that desperate to be a nuisance or spontaneously ruin their own character, healing wouldn't make a difference. They can just insist that the healing wasn't effective, or that they succumb to their injuries before they can be healed. 

 

The more I hear the reasoning behind this, the more silly it sounds. If someone arbitrarily decides they want to suddenly kill off their character suddenly, they can kill themselves off on the deathblow long before the healer gets to them.

 

And a logical issue? So a one-armed person winning is a logical issue, but a Lalafell champion makes sense? It's final fantasy. How is that more of a logical issue than countless other things that can happen? The setting doesn't exactly pretend at realism.

 

And how would someone use your injury to their advantage to force a critical injury on you? The nature of the injury is on the player who was hit. If anything it's the other way around, having an existing injury is a convenient hook to justify how a hit was landed or why a character lost. 

 

I'm sure it's entirely possible that all these examples are actual people, but you can't honestly expect that this is going to be a regular occurrence, or that this rule would have actually stopped such people from creating a problem anyways. These are all examples of people who are either so woefully-misguided that they genuinely don't realize the problem they are causing, or they are people who are intentionally-antagonistic and looking to start a problem. Either way they'd still be a problem, with or without healing restrictions. Not everyone plays well with others, rules or no.

[Jana]

The only thing I say when healing at Grindstone IC is that we have an obligation to see the winning fighters move on to their next fights at top strength and the losing fighters return to their own lives in good health. Are we really "obligated"? No, but Jana thinks it makes her seem important.

 

As for RPing the actual healing itself, I treat skills like Physick as a sort of acceleration of the body's own processes and will have people hold their broken limbs in place and such so everything is closed and put together the right way. It's not quite "instant" outside of the Grindstone, but it's also not a bandaid. After any particularly tough combat where Jana is the only healer available, she will still tell people to make sure they see a real healer or chirugeon.

[Aaron]

If its anything less than a broken bone or collapsed organ.

 

Magically heal dat ish. If not, i like to drag it out.

[Lucius Ignatius]

If its anything less than a broken bone or collapsed organ.

 

Magically heal dat ish. If not, i like to drag it out.

 

Pretty much this. If I were healing, I prefer using bandages with ointments, or anything that would be slow acting/realistic. It depends on the wound and what the characters have available. I like to play out injuries. However, for me, I prefer not to die. If the person I heal decides to, that is up to them, as long as it makes sense. I dont wanna see me heal someone and they bleed out by a flesh wound uncontrollably.

 

I haven't yet taken part in Grindstone, but I may eventually.

[Warren Castille]

snip

 

I don't disagree that it's on the person being hit to sell damage, but folks love a dramatic comeback and victory, and they want to look like it took a lot of effort to put them down. It's just part of the Fantasy part of the Final Fantasy thing and that's fine.

 

The healing stuff was in place before I got around to standing on the rock, and I don't like changing rules! It's just a helpful deterrent from potential OOC problems: While I don't get as much stuff relayed to me in /tells about logistics now there was a point where I'd get two or three complaints a night about how they lost / how their opponent won / is this cheating / that wasn't good natured / and so on and so on. Anything that removes a portion of it ("I lost to someone who only had one arm and three broken ribs! That makes no sense!" -strawman, 2015) is helpful in my book.

[Garalona]

With Garalona, her background is that she was a traditional chirugeon first and then moved on to studying conjuring after she got out of prison for forging her medical credentials (whoops). The way she figured it, once you get the elements to listen to you; there's no worry of little details like licenses and actually having attended college.

 

Even so, magic isn't her first art, and she prefers not to use it unless someone is actively in danger of dying. At an event like the Grindstone she'd probably just usual traditional methods to patch someone up and then slap them with a touch of Regeneration so they're at full strength by the time the next bout is up.

 

To her, magical healing is a lot of effort and energy, and besides that Elementals freak her out. ALL magic does, actually, white magic just happens to be "safest" in her books, comparatively speaking. She'll gladly do an old fashioned surgery, getting herself covered in blood and taking twice as long, just so it means she doesn't have to deal with all that.

 

I personally really like coming up with characters who have different views on healing and how easy it is/how often it should be done. If someone were to ask her why she can't just cast Cure over them and call it a day, she'd kick them in the shins, tell them to remember that ache, and walk away. She's already done it once before.

[LiadansWhisper]

With Garalona, her background is that she was a traditional chirugeon first and then moved on to studying conjuring after she got out of prison for forging her medical credentials (whoops). The way she figured it, once you get the elements to listen to you; there's no worry of little details like licenses and actually having attended college.

 

Even so, magic isn't her first art, and she prefers not to use it unless someone is actively in danger of dying. At an event like the Grindstone she'd probably just usual traditional methods to patch someone up and then slap them with a touch of Regeneration so they're at full strength by the time the next bout is up.

 

To her, magical healing is a lot of effort and energy, and besides that Elementals freak her out. ALL magic does, actually, white magic just happens to be "safest" in her books, comparatively speaking. She'll gladly do an old fashioned surgery, getting herself covered in blood and taking twice as long, just so it means she doesn't have to deal with all that.

 

I personally really like coming up with characters who have different views on healing and how easy it is/how often it should be done. If someone were to ask her why she can't just cast Cure over them and call it a day, she'd kick them in the shins, tell them to remember that ache, and walk away. She's already done it once before.

 

Well, Cure's not White Magic anyway.    It's Conjury!  

 

Your character's viewpoint is amusing when juxtaposed with my own character's viewpoint - she sees things like "surgery" (or whatever crazy way it's spelled in the game) as barbaric.  Why would you cut someone when you can mend what's wrong without effectively stabbing them?

 

Perhaps the two will meet one day.  

[Nebbs]

I tend to take an approach similar to not god modding. that is the player being healed gets to decide the effect. As healer I RP the healing I do but not the outcome, and if there is time this can be quite detailed. As the character being healed I respond to the quality of the RP healing and the overall RP.

 

So where there is positive RP to be gained from healing in RP I will play it out, where this would disrupt RP I tend to down play it and accept some wound but carry on. 

 

For RP where healing is the focus then these can last days, with convoluted journeys, quests and such.