Inspiration Strikes! #2

[jameson (ST)]

Inspiration Strikes!

Intro: I hate being sick. Like right now, I am so fed up with a running nose and the chills that I'd willingly brave the worst humid heat of Florida in summer as a trade off; and I despise humid heat. This'll be a quickie but hopefully worthwhile. So Without further ado...

[end_news_blurb]

Issue #2: I'm Sick of This!

Ah, sickness. Aside from children, who get out school, and people who hate their job, who get a day away without having to "kill" their fourth grandmother this year, I doubt anybody actually likes being sick. You feel bad, usually you try to not see other people, and often you have unfortunate substances of various colors and viscosities leaking, oozing, or otherwise escaping your person. Sometime violently. Ugh.

On the flip side, even if you weren't trying actively to avoid people, chances are pretty good that people are shunning you like you have the plague. Which you might. People on the bus move away from you, co-workers all but beg you to go home; basically you are treated as a pariah; unclean and outcast.

Where the hell am I going with this? Good question ... oh, right. Disease and sickness. In your games. In your player characters.

Being sick isn't something that everybody can "afford". Plenty of people have a livelihood riding on their daily work, if they are sick they have to "man up" and work through it. I doubt a farmer, a real, legit, hands in the dirt farmer one would see in a fantasy campaign is going to take a day off unless he's all but falling down, or if his wife tells him to rest. The same applies in fantasy games to all lines of work. Almost all; one expects the village healer to at least not be coughing up blood, if not outright healthy, he is the healer after all. Still, if you need want to infect your PCs with an illness look no further than, well .... just about anywhere. The barmaid, the weapon smith, the local alchemist who buys those girdles of masculinity/femininity off of the heroes cheap and then sells them at enormous markup to those kinky transvestite elves in the next forest over...

... woah, sorry about that, my rhino-virus addled brain got away from me ...

OK, so why get your character's sick? Well, you could do it as part of a larger game plot. Perhaps they really pissed off the wrong God. Or maybe they shouldn't have opened that long sealed tomb/facility/space pod. Maybe it's the end of times, the seals are being opens and the PCs, in their infinite stupidity, have decided to go mano-a-mano with Pestilence Himself.

Of maybe you want to be a dick. Admit it, when you act as the Storyteller/Gamemaster you sometimes just enjoy being a douche. Remember last session when one of your players laughed about how easy it was to clean out the Kobold caves and retrieve the MacGuffin of the week? They won't be laughing when they come down with the same debilitating illness that laid the Kobolds low. Then again maybe the opposite is true. A player with a racial hatred for Orcs comments on how Orcs never really pose a challenge because the group is much higher level than they were a dozen sessions (or more) back. Slap the PCs with something suitably nasty and debuff them some. Then tell them that the only cure can be found in the Orcish lands. Smile evilly when you do, they earned it.

Of course people aren't the only ones to get sick. Player's mounts and familiars could come down with a nasty case of "poops in your shoes". In a more modern day, or even a futuristic science fiction setting computer and technology viruses are fair game as well. Recall that Shadowrun data retrieval you did last week? If you do then you already know why your cyberdeck and cyberwear are all on the fritz. The alien artifact you found on Planet LV-426? Infected with an intelligent AI virus that is going to try to turn your ship, and your crew into its mindless slaves. Hard technology isn't the only target here. Biotechnology is just as susceptible to illness as we are, and magical items could easily far prey to a magical disease. Eww, why is my rune sword of demon slaying oozing green mucus? Never a good thing.

OK, in hindsight maybe being sick sucks, but you know what they say, "Misery loves company."

Previously On Inspiration Strikes!

• Issue #1: The Sun is a Mass of Incandescent Gas ...

[Dawn OOC]

I love the last image - I wish it were so easy! I bet various groups wouldn't demonfy condoms then!

That gives me an idea for a plot I'll toss out there for anyone to use. Someone does create a condom for your modem; it is 99% effective against viruses and other IRVs (internet transmitted viruses). But someone sees this cutting into their profits/plans and acts to remove this poor inventor.

Naturally, this would be best for a game where you have something like the internet, so modern, cyberpunk, space opera, etc.

[jameson (ST)]

Originally Posted By: Dawn, OOC

I love the last image - I wish it were so easy!

I searched Google Images for "computer virus" ...it was by far the most entertaining picture, if not the most accurate.
Also great idea, I could see that working well for a Cyberpunk 2020 or Shadowrun game!

[SalmonMax]

Just want to throw in here on this.

In my experience, it's very rare for adventurers in RPG to have "real person problems," like disease and environmental difficulties. In a lot of cases I think that's for a good reason, which is that it deflects gaming time from the monsters, treasure and quip-trading with villains that most RPG sessions revolve around.

And yet...it can't be like that ALL the time, right?

I think an occaional 'mortality call' is a good thing, even for high levelers. One thing to watch out for is prep time. Adventurers who KNOW they have to cross the Great Sand Sea will be sure to pack lots of water into their bags of holding, because they're not stupid.

But what if the airship they commissioned to take them over the Sand Sea crashes? Or the teleport spell fails for some reason? Not every battle has to be against dragons...battling the elements can be fun too!

Disease is tricky in fantasy games, since the pesky cleric usually has a spell of disease-ending handy, and you really ought to save your magic-resistant plagues for special occasions. How to make your PC's sick? Some thoughts:

1) Cleric spells come from gods, and gods can be persnicketty.

Remember that time Bob the Fighter peed in the holy water when no one was looking? Well...someone was looking. And while it's not a smite-worthy offense, should Bob come down with the mumps our friendly cleric might just get a little mental 'post-it' from his god when he tries to cure it. The post-it reads, "Tell him to try peeing somewhere else next time."

2) Clerics are wise dudes, and wisdom says that not EVERY disease should get magicked away.

Even back in the middle ages, people had some idea that they had natural abilities to fight disease off. They also knew the principle of Use It Or Lose It. The result is clear - if you cure all diseases, even non-life-threatening ones, then folks gradually lose their ability to resist diseases any other way. Use the magic with care.

3) Magic-resistant plague. Had to be on the list.

4) You're not House (or are you?). One other big problem with divine magic cures is that there's no diagnostics. But what if someone's sickness isn't caused by a disease? Could be some other kind of infection. Fungal. Parasitic. Some foreign body thats causing an immune overreaction. Weird things like prions. Point being that there's lots of possible reasons for illness...and a spell is only as broad in scope as the plot lets it be. The PC's may have to do some work, and understand the nature of the illness, before a cure becomes clear.

[jameson (ST)]

Excellent points all around Max. I'm not prone to having a PC need a potty break (though in a light tone humorous game I might) nor am I advocating turning your RPG into this Pandemic. Which is a VERY fun board game and all, but I don't see many people signing on to play an RPG version.

Especially good points on avoiding the ol' "I'm magic be healed!" plot diffusion. Now if only I could go to a church and get this head cold ousted, maybe I'd start reading the bible again.

[Sonja Bahaar]

Heh, we're actually playing D&D 4th edition now, and diseases are pretty rough on us. We don't have anyone who can cast Rituals, so no Remove Disease. And you make Endurance Checks to resist diseases, and the DCs and really high. I have one of the best checks in our group and I only have a 45% to get better. Our poor tank needs a natural 20. And right now, we're facing frostbite as we trying to get back to our holding in the North.

(The setting is supposedly a low-magic, Norse one, but the only ones with low magic are us, and it's not particularly Norse either, with the Pseudo-Christian nation using Doppelgangers to incite a war between our nation and the Jotunlanders north and east of us).

Unfortunately, he modeled Frostbite as a disease, using the stats for Mummy Rot, except it can't kill. Only takes away all our Healing Surges and prevents us from regaining hit points (at the 3rd phase of the disease anyway). I wouldn't have much problems with that (I guess), except we told we'd hold up in a cave to get warm, and yet we still have to roll against the 'disease' or risk getting worse, cause you know, apparently Frostbite is tenacious that way.

And I don't want to hear about Frostbite able to cost you limbs and such - this is 4th edition D&D, an extended rest, and you're fully healed, any missing limbs completely restored.