In your Tome, you find a list of a few hundred people through which you can receive first aid if you get a paper cut, or take a tumble off a step stool. All the names have dates next to them, written in different formats, using different scripts and tools. All the names are crossed out. At the bottom, a subheading reads 'Trial no. XXXXVI'. There are, as yet, no names beneath it.
If a player character gets seriously injured, they will be given a choice between two Skills they possess. The player can choose which Skill they would like to cap. Once a Skill is capped, you can no longer use the highest level that you possess in that Skill, and you cannot purchase higher levels of that Skill. You can still use any lower levels of that Skill. For example, if you chose to cap Visual Thinker, for which you had unlocked level 2, you would now only be able to use the level 1 ability of that Skill, and you could not level it up to level 3.
When a character is healed, one of their Skills become uncapped, and they can once again use the highest purchased level of that Skill. They may also upgrade that Skill to higher levels as normal.
A player character or NPC can undo another player's injuries. For players, you can heal an injured player if you have the Physician, Botanist, Tinkerer or Spiritualist at its highest tier, and only if the injury seems appropriate to be healed by that skill. Both the player being healed and the healer must put in a Major Action to be healed.
Examples of injuries/ailments that different skills may heal include:
| Skill | Injury or Ailment Description |
|---|---|
| Physician | Remove a lodged bullet from a body, amputate a limb, patch up a broken limb |
| Botanist | Cure infections and produce poison antidotes |
| Tinkerer | Make a splint or prosthetic (as well as install it), can also work with non-humanoid NPCs |
| Spiritualist | Treat ailments that cause emotional stress, fatigue and nausea |
In One Last Fire, we would like the choice to heal someone to be deliberate. Helping someone else in this significant way involves a sacrifice of time and resources, which is why both parties need to Major Action any healing that takes place. GMs are also happy to run surgery/healing linears in uptime if it seems narratively appropriate.
Through this process, we will ensure both the healer and the patient receive satisfying and plot driven write ups that hopefully bring them closer together, rather than healing being a passive action. We advise players that generate healing driven characters to be open to learning about the motivations and secrets of other characters in the game.
We do not expect injury to be frequent. To gain an injury, the player would have to put themselves in great danger, the kind of danger that would have been heavily signposted to them beforehand. So there is likely to not be any unexpected injuries.
Of course, there also exists an option to not cure/fix your injuries. Learning to manage with a handicap can be a fulfilling character arc so long as it complies with our Conduct and Themes Policy.