[Ralf]

 I've been playing shadowrun for a while now and I've finally made time to actually read the book instead of just listening what the other tell me.

However something about the natural healing was unclear to me. I've asked my GM and he said he didn't know, so I though I ask it here.

Make a Body x 2 (1 day) Extended Test. Each hit heals 1 box of Physical damage.

A first glance it look simple enough, but then I noticed it was an extended test. If I understand the rules correctly that mean each consecutieve roll has one dice less. This raises the question: what happens when you run out of dice?

Then there is the "Full Deck" example on page 207.

He rolls Body 2 + Willpower 4 and gets 6, 5, 4, 3, 3, 2 for 2 hits. That’s 2 boxes of Stun damage healed in the first hour. He keeps making  the  same  roll  each  hour  with  his  6  dice  and  gets 1,  1,  2,  and  3  hits  over  the  next  four  hours.

But he was injured. Should he receive injury modifiers? Also, he never removed dice in consecutieve rolls, making the same roll with his 6 dice.

This leaves me with the following questions:

1. Do injury modifiers apply to natural healing?
2. Do extended remove a die after each roll?
3. If yes to 2, what ahppens when you no longer have a dicepool to heal?

Which interpretation is correct? my reading of the rules or the example?

[RickDeckard]

1: No
2: No

Healing rolls are exempted from those rules in that they are not Skill rolls.

[Smogg]

1. Yes, "Wound modifiers are applied to all tests not about reducing the number of boxes you’re about to take on your Condition Monitor such as damage resistance, resisting direct combat spells, toxin resistance, and so on." p 170
2. Yes, Thats how extended tests work.
3. Then you are out of luck. However you might use the rules for trying again if the GM allows. GM might reward you with easy recovery if you invested in docwagon. It might also be a case where the GM may want to introduce a negative quality. Some people with poor health and massive damage, might just never fully recover. In any case, chances are you will  be wounded again at some point and be allowed to get a some new healing/recovery rolls.

[Reaver]

There is some argument to the extended test, as the "Natural Recovery" is not a skill linked test. However, a RAW reading would mean that you would subtract one die from every roll.

Wound modifiers apply to everything EXCEPT damage resistance tests (stun, toxic, physical, magical), so yes, they would apply to the Natural recovery test as well.

Now this could easily mean that a character with a low body score, and a serious enough wound could never heal the damage (especially after the other modifiers on page 208 of the CRB are included).

Well, this is where the Autodoc drone, a good medkit, the medicine skill, or the hospitalized lifestyle come into play. All these options give bonus dice to healing tests (all sorts) to help over come life's daily lead poisonings...


The only issue that you could have is the hospitalized lifestyle doesn't list the bonuses in the book for its daily expenditure. But if you go by older versions and translate up to 5e, basically you get 6 bonus dice for "hospitalized" at $500/day. And with ICU you get 1 auto success per day for $1000/day.   (Not sure if Hospitalized was covered in another book....lifestyles book maybe?)

[mcv]

3. Then you are out of luck. However you might use the rules for trying again if the GM allows. GM might reward you with easy recovery if you invested in docwagon. It might also be a case where the GM may want to introduce a negative quality. Some people with poor health and massive damage, might just never fully recover. In any case, chances are you will  be wounded again at some point and be allowed to get a some new healing/recovery rolls.

I guess seeing it as a permanent disability is the only way to make sense of this rule. If healing is an Extended Test, then that means it can fail. Then what do you do? Retry again? So then you heal a bit worse every day, until you finally hit the reset and can heal using the full dice pool again. That would be silly. The only other option is that you can't retry, which means you'll be permanently damaged from that point. Or maybe the only way to retry is to visit a hospital?

The most obvious interpretation is simply that the writer didn't really consider the implications of making it an Extended Test, and that it simply should not be an extended test at all.

Also, quite clearly the example is at odds with the RAW, both in terms of extended test, and in that it ignores the wound modifier. I'd say the wound modifier is a matter of taste. If you want serious consequences in your game for being badly hurt, counting wound modifiers will seriously slow down recovery, which is certainly realistic (natural healing is ridiculously fast otherwise), but some groups may prefer to just get on with the game and have easier healing. There's a good case to be made for sticking entirely to the example and not the questionable rule.

[Smogg]

The most obvious interpretation is simply that the writer didn't really consider the implications of making it an Extended Test, and that it simply should not be an extended test at all.

Worth to note that in 6e it is no longer an extended test, so likely something they felt did not work right.

[RickDeckard]

3. Then you are out of luck. However you might use the rules for trying again if the GM allows. GM might reward you with easy recovery if you invested in docwagon. It might also be a case where the GM may want to introduce a negative quality. Some people with poor health and massive damage, might just never fully recover. In any case, chances are you will  be wounded again at some point and be allowed to get a some new healing/recovery rolls.

I guess seeing it as a permanent disability is the only way to make sense of this rule. If healing is an Extended Test, then that means it can fail. Then what do you do? Retry again? So then you heal a bit worse every day, until you finally hit the reset and can heal using the full dice pool again. That would be silly. The only other option is that you can't retry, which means you'll be permanently damaged from that point. Or maybe the only way to retry is to visit a hospital?

The most obvious interpretation is simply that the writer didn't really consider the implications of making it an Extended Test, and that it simply should not be an extended test at all.

Also, quite clearly the example is at odds with the RAW, both in terms of extended test, and in that it ignores the wound modifier. I'd say the wound modifier is a matter of taste. If you want serious consequences in your game for being badly hurt, counting wound modifiers will seriously slow down recovery, which is certainly realistic (natural healing is ridiculously fast otherwise), but some groups may prefer to just get on with the game and have easier healing. There's a good case to be made for sticking entirely to the example and not the questionable rule.

I do like that serious wounds has consequences, so in that light I might actually change how we play it. I've been missing a critical hit table, which I'm surprised a rule intense game like SR doesn't actually have. It would make sense to have that since cyberlimbs are readily available, and losing an arm isn't actually that big a deal.

Tightening up the natural healing process would also force runner to make use of otherwise unused healing assists like hospitals and autodocs. Good input man! =)

[Reaver]

Wellllll...... if you realllllllyyy want optional damage rules.....


The old 3e runners companion book came with optional damage rules that included limb, brain, and organ damage rules.

Which, if you really fucked up on the resistance test, could lead to early retirement, even if you survived.

"Ok Tim, last game you took a deadly wound right? (10 boxes), Ok, roll bodyx2 Vs a target number of 10... oh no successes? Ok tim, roll 3 dice, tell me the numbers. Great news! You lived! You just have a blown off left leg, a blown off right arm, no eyes, and moderate cognative imparement! Don't worry through! For 4 essence, and $750,000 you'll be good as new! Oh you're a mage...."


Its all fun and games.... until you end up blind and missing a liver....

[RickDeckard]

Wellllll...... if you realllllllyyy want optional damage rules.....


The old 3e runners companion book came with optional damage rules that included limb, brain, and organ damage rules.

Which, if you really fucked up on the resistance test, could lead to early retirement, even if you survived.

"Ok Tim, last game you took a deadly wound right? (10 boxes), Ok, roll bodyx2 Vs a target number of 10... oh no successes? Ok tim, roll 3 dice, tell me the numbers. Great news! You lived! You just have a blown off left leg, a blown off right arm, no eyes, and moderate cognative imparement! Don't worry through! For 4 essence, and $750,000 you'll be good as new! Oh you're a mage...."


Its all fun and games.... until you end up blind and missing a liver....

Well, that leaves us at the beginning of Count Zero, doesn't it? =)

I wouldn't cheat my players of such a delightful piece of prose.

[mcv]

I guess seeing it as a permanent disability is the only way to make sense of this rule. If healing is an Extended Test, then that means it can fail. Then what do you do? Retry again? So then you heal a bit worse every day, until you finally hit the reset and can heal using the full dice pool again. That would be silly. The only other option is that you can't retry, which means you'll be permanently damaged from that point. Or maybe the only way to retry is to visit a hospital?

I do like that serious wounds has consequences, so in that light I might actually change how we play it. I've been missing a critical hit table, which I'm surprised a rule intense game like SR doesn't actually have. It would make sense to have that since cyberlimbs are readily available, and losing an arm isn't actually that big a deal.

Tightening up the natural healing process would also force runner to make use of otherwise unused healing assists like hospitals and autodocs. Good input man! =)

I've got to admit, I do like this as a house rule. Maybe if you have damage left after the extended test, remaining points of damage can be traded for various disabilities, missing limbs, etc. Give the player some agency in what limbs exactly they lose:

GM: "Okay, so after the test, you still have 3 points of damage left. You can make them permanent and always have a -1 wound modifier to everything, not to mention earlier death, or maybe you want to exchange one point for an eye, or two points for an arm?"

Player: "Well, I was thinking about a cyberarm anyway, and I've got some money saved up, so take my arm, I guess."

[Shaidar]

Bullets & Bandages which was printed under 4e said it could be used as printed for 5e also.