Poison rework idea

[Dresan]

I want to suggest that poisoning should be more of a crafting skill that is separate from brewing cures.

The poison crafting skill should able to create poisoning items that anyone can use to apply poison to weapons, items or food with 'use' command. There should be more poison effects, and with different levels of effectiveness (weak, mild and strong), as well as the ability to mix 2 poisons together assuming you are willing to risk losing it all. Stronger levels of poison would require a mash or a couple more tablets to cure but otherwise recovery would remain the same. 

The effects of peraine and heramide should also be looked, their current strength is a bit toxic to the game. These two poisons as well as the method in which they are often aquired really promotes OOC information sharing and twinking.   

Grishen and heramide have the same outcome but no one complains about grishen. If grishen or general poison(bloodburn) were 2 stronger AND mixed together it would still be playable and not as toxic to the game as current heramide. Peraine effects should be changed to cause a 'before' delay for commands, reduction in ability to fight, and a small potential for certain commands to outright fail if the poison is strong enough. Of course with the strength of the effects increasing with strength of poison. Again potentially deadly but not the instant kill feeling of their current form.

What can be found in the wild, should remain but it should it should be lackluster to what can be crafted, mostly due to the fact the poison substance has not been prepared properly to be applied to items as effectively.

I believe these changes will keep poison as a very deadly tool while at the same time eliminating some of the negative aspects of poison to the game.

[Riev]

I disagree about the mixing portion of things, because I don't think that "good thing" + "good thing" necessarily = "better thing". Mixing bloodburn and grishen doesn't necessarily mean their effects would mixed.

I would like to see more of a reason to use something like grishen or bloodburn, but I have also noticed that bloodburn is particularly more nasty than it used to be, and skellebane has something about it that makes it rather worthwhile.

I am 100% down for there being varying levels of 'strength' of poison, but I don't know how our system would do it. Why would you ever make a mild poison, unless the recipe for "strong" poison was skill gated? I'd rather get a fail on strong poison and waste the materials than produce a useless mild form of the poison.

If it does not already, I would like to see crafted poison vials bypass the need for the poison skill, and simply apply to the blade or food that is targetted. Make vials more expensive, rare, or whatever needs to happen, but it would be great if an aide with no SKILL at poisoning nevertheless can acquire a dangerous poison and put it over your roasted tubers.

Heramide and Peraine are tauted as the 'best' poisons because their effects are instantaneous or nearly so, while the others require a small period before they go into effect. That small period allows an alert PC to run away, get to safety, and apply a cure with little RP involved. Being immediately paralyzed is no fun for anyone, but what would the point be of a paralytic that lets them run into their Clan Compound before it takes hold to begin with?

[Dresan]

The way this could work would be with you crafting a poison and depending on your skill level( and perhaps quality of materials used) you would have a chance to create weak, medium or strong poison. With higher skill(and/or materials) level increasing the chances of better poison.

The applicator would eventually decay, and the strength of the poison of the blade would slowly degrade with time if not used. I do mean slowly decay, enough that someone might find it useful to keep your blades coated even if you have no plans to use it. However this also means that if you are someone planning on assassination would need to put a bit more effort into their preparations. However, given the resources, skill levels and just the general situation, it might be worth settling for medium or even weak poison.

The current state of heramide and peraine impact the game negatively in more ways then one.  We shouldn't keep them as they are simply because they help bandage other bad aspects of the game like really safe compounds. Cure tablets are supposed to be much weaker than eating cure mash, but right now tablet seem to cure poison instantly if taken quickly enough. With different levels of poison, taking tablets could be changed to make recovery from poison a little less instant or perhaps just be able to tone down the poison potency.

[Dresan]

double post

[Dar]

I would love there being more poisons and lethal poisons to take a long long time to work.

There should still be heramide/peraine as they are the ultimate equalizers that once put in enough hands of lowly commoners, can bring down any ultimate champion of templar doom. It's the "piss off enough people and factions, they'll getcha!" mechanism that keeps everyone mortal and eventually dead.

They should just be extremely dangerous to procure. I still remember the horror of holding a bag full of 30 heramide poisons sold to me by a single PC rukkian. I dont know how long it took them to get it, but I hope to god it was a RL year.


I really wish there were more poisons that were less lethal and yet useful. Poisons that weaken people, poisons that make them move slower, poisons that make them sluggish. Probably a lot more ideas for poisons that are not lethal, still useful, and require that more then the tiny ounce of creativity that I currently have in my head.

[Dresan]

I would be okay with keeping Peraine the same.

However, heramide should be brought down to the level of grishen/general poison but at the same time become more common with well known cures. Additionally all poison potency should at least double. Though a poison crafting skill that double their effect would be awesome to see in game I admit it would take quite a bit more effort to put in place.

Only cure mush should work instantly to remove poison, tablets should take just a bit longer to work. Not too long, but enough that even macro'ing swallowing a tablet doesn't immediately solve your problem.

[Hauwke]

I would be okay with keeping Peraine the same.

However, heramide should be brought down to the level of grishen/general poison but at the same time become more common with well known cures. Additionally all poison potency should at least double. Though a poison crafting skill that double their effect would be awesome to see in game I admit it would take quite a bit more effort to put in place.

Only cure mush should work instantly to remove poison, tablets should take just a bit longer to work. Not too long, but enough that even macro'ing swallowing a tablet doesn't immediately solve your problem.

Macro'ing that is against the rules, isn't it?

[Dresan]

Macro'ing that is against the rules, isn't it?

I believe scripting is against the rules.

Pretty sure most people at least have 'draw weapon' macro'd  to a key or at the very least aliased.

[Hauwke]

I have change hands aliased, and in years of playing combat pcs it hasn't mattered.

[Riev]

Macro-eating a tablet isn't the isssue, really. But Dresan hits on a good point here:

What if mashes were instant cures with a percentage success rate, tablet cures were cures over time with a higher success, and vials were a long-form cure with near guaranteed results?

So if you got hit with general poison, your blood is now burning.

• You eat a mash. Near instantly, you feel the effects of your burning blood dissipate, or not.
• You take a tablet, and you go into Poison Recovery where you do not take further damage, but if it fails, the poison resumes course.
• You take a vial, poison effects cease, you go into poison recovery, and it is very unlikely to fail.

Then, if mashes rot quicker, so be it. You're going across the desert, better take a couple mashes with you because you EXPECT to be poisoned. As well as always carrying that vial or two in case something happens you werent expecting.

With chance applied, mashes would be cheap and vials absurdly expensive. It would rework the economy a little bit, I think, and is an interesting avenue to explore.

[Dresan]

@Riev

I like your ideas. I actually think this matches the original intent with mush and tablets.

I would suggest the following though:

Mush- decays mush quick, but as you mentioned is instant.
tablet/vials- would not be instantaneous, they would take time to work allowing the poison to hurt you for a little while. Both would last a lot longer(or not decay at all since people have problems with decay) .

The thing with vials it a that they are useful because you can use them on other people, but we should not be replacing tablets with vials which will happen if vials become better then tablets

The above idea also further enforces the value of having a trained medic on the team.

Editted to add: I don't agree with the chance of failure, that is mostly likely going to get people killed in frustrating ways or worse make people need to carry 10 pills just in case.

[NinjaFruitSalad]

Yeah I do agree, somewhat.  An appropriate chance of failure out in the field when it really matters would apply when, for instance, bandaging someone if your skill isn't maxed. But the chance for failure for the cures should, in all honesty, be rolled when creating them.

On the surface, this means that like with all crafting, we clearly know when we succeed or fail, depending on if the item is successfully created or not.  But if you all want an added sense of realism, I suppose we could still have a small chance the item still fails (and I do mean a small chance) based on the crafter's skill, and perhaps, how close the item is to decaying. At least this means masters would not only be reliably creating the items, but they will also reliably work, as at that point I don't think their items should have any failure chance normally.

[Krombat]

Yeah I do agree, somewhat.  An appropriate chance of failure out in the field when it really matters would apply when, for instance, bandaging someone if your skill isn't maxed. But the chance for failure for the cures should, in all honesty, be rolled when creating them.

On the surface, this means that like with all crafting, we clearly know when we succeed or fail, depending on if the item is successfully created or not.  But if you all want an added sense of realism, I suppose we could still have a small chance the item still fails (and I do mean a small chance) based on the crafter's skill, and perhaps, how close the item is to decaying. At least this means masters would not only be reliably creating the items, but they will also reliably work, as at that point I don't think their items should have any failure chance normally.

Agreed, the successfulness of any cure should be rolled on creation and relative to the player creating it's skill if this is implemented.

[Dresan]

I rather avoid having players be forced to hold 3 or 4 tablets of each cure in case of failure.

Additionally store bought tablets are already superior in almost every way especially in terms of unique look(really wish this would change).

Unless their failure rate is made the worse possible, it'll be another reason to use store bought tablets over player ones.