>From: Jane Williams <janewilliams20_at_...>
>
>Sure, but I wasn't asking about improvising, only
>about the "using a skill that isn't really applicable"
>modifier. Not quite the same thing. If you have a
>spanner and need a hammer, you're not improvising a
>"hammer" skill, or altering the tool in hand, you're
>hitting a nail with a spanner. Probably better than
>nothing, but....
I'd allow a little leeway with this, sure, but not a lot. If a player wants to use a feat to heal that's not quite appropriate, I'll probably require them to improvise off of the affinity it comes from instead. It's like the myth is Chalana Arroy healing this sort of injury, and you're trying to heal another. Mythically you're probably calling on a more general myth that talks about her healing in general to be what you're emulating. Probably.
If you want a real answer, make them come up with the myth and see what fits best.
In any case, I wouldn't say that "hurt" and "injury" in the names of abilites are references to the mechanics, but in-game perceptions of these things. As such they have a bit greater breadth in all likelihood (though that could just be my interpretation, I could see the designers making the other decision in this case, potentially - certainly seems to be the case in HW). Any affinity that mentions more than one ability like this, I'd throw right out.
All of which means that, like Rory's response, I'd probably play it pretty much by ear in terms of how much to apply improv mods here. Rather, I'd hope that the character would have only one injury type healing ability, unless it were specific to the in-game type of injury. IOW, "Heal Injury" and "Heal Incapacitation" would be out the window, but I'd love to see, "Mend Rended Muscle" and "Set Broken Bone." Mending a broken bone would be impossible with the first ability, and I'd force the player who didn't have the second ability to, instead, refer to their affinity.
Yes, this makes direct use rarer, except that the narrator has the right to declare what the outcome of any contest is in terms of narrating the effects. So when a character is "injured" by another character with a sword, he can decide if it's a break or a cut.
More interesting is what happens when there's a cut and a break in this situation. In that case, I think that I'd give an improv penalty for only being able to deal with part of it, and then, if successful, I'd simply say that the muscle was not actually too terribly damaged in the process, and on failure say that setting the bone wasn't enough to really affect the penalty.
In any case, the solution to all of this is to treat the ability like any other in terms of it's in-game application, and then determine the outcome like any other contest. That is, I woundn't worry too much about the mechanical "level" of the penalty so much as the description of it.
What I find more interesting is using an ability like "Heal Hurt Feelings" or whatnot to repair less physical wounds using the same rules.
Mike
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