Advice

[dustin]

I'm not succeeding at getting my question phrased right. I understand the process for creating and executing an extended test. What I am trying to ask is: what would the tests and TNs be for brewing poison?

Let's say that I wanted to brew a poison in one of your chronicles. You set it up, in this case, as an extended test. What would you make me do? How many steps involved? What are the TNs for a particular characteristic like type, onset time, stages, effects, treatment, etc?

I am just trying to get a rough idea of how some other Narrators would go about doing this. How do you have your PCs brew poisons?

dustin

[GandalfOfBorg]

The same as any other test. There is no need (that I know of) to have individual tests for the individual traits of the poison (unless you want to be that complex about it).

Depending on what the poison is and how powerful it is, I would determine a base TN for each time increment or stage in the process of its creation. Then create the extended test from that. You would need the proper ingredients and equipment and then I would have you roll Craft: Brewing (Poison) with possible bonuses from Lore: Poisons or Lore: Herbs, etc. If you succeed every time at each stage, your poison is created in the number of tests * time increment for each test. Superior success would grant a 25% time reduction for a stage and Extraordinary success would grant 50% time reduction. I may even throw in bonuses to the poison for numerous Extraordinary successes. For Complete failures would grant 25% time increase and Disastrous failures would grant 50% time increase with either a reduction in its power or complete ineffectiveness as a poison for numerous Disastrous failures.

[dustin]

Here is my idea for brewing poisons. Please tell me what you think.

A poison has six basic characteristics and each has several choices. Start with a base TN5 if the PC has the order ability "Brew Poisons" or TN10 if they don't, then add to that TN with each characteristic.

Type: Inhaled(+4), Contact(+3), Injury(+2), Ingested(+1)

Onset Time: Immediate(+4), 6 seconds(+3), 1 minute (+2), 20 min(+1), 1hour (+2)*, 6 hours(+3)*, 1 day(+4)* *[This, I figured, was a built-in delay to give the PC time to get away before the poison took effect, making it harder to brew.]

Potency: +0(+1), +5(+2), +10(+3), +15(+4), +20(+5)

Treatment: Same as Potency

Effect/Secondary: Reduce Vitality by 1/none(+1), Reduce Vitality by 1d6/ half loss(+2), Damage 1d6/none(+3), One full wound level/ half(+4), Paralysis 1d6 minutes/half(+5)

Stages: 1(+1), 1/2d6(+2), 1d6(+3), 2d6(+4), continuous(+5)

A character with the brew poison ability not only starts with a lower TN, but, according to the description, gets a number of free picks depending on how many times the ability was chosen. The poison stated in a previous post, a character with the ability could make it with a total TN10. One without the ability would need to make a total TN16 or 17, depending on type.

A character that does not have the ability gain "earn" it if he/she makes three poisons with an extraordinary success (11+). This is the "learning curve" and the PC can learn through trial and error.

Hope this makes sense. Any tips or suggestions are, of course, most welcome.

dustin