Healing Priorities

[Kiyaani]

The herbalists seem to get distracted. Yes, it was a child, yes they had wounds as bad as mine, but it was an NPC. Shouldn't players exhausted and bleeding out get priority somehow - at least for the bleeding wounds - or is that even possible? Not sure how the coding works.

The bandages on your chest have become too loose and fall off.

The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages your left arm and asks that you pay for the service as soon as possible.
Roundtime: 2 seconds.

You continue to bleed from your chest.

(energy -6)
A child just arrived.

A child lies down, awaiting medical attention.

The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages a child's back.

You continue to bleed from your chest.

(energy -6)
The bandages on your left hand have become too loose and fall off.

The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages a child's right foot.

You continue to bleed from your chest.

(energy -6)
The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages a child's neck.

You continue to bleed from your chest.

(energy -6)
The bandages on your left leg have become too loose and fall off.

stand
You stand up.
Roundtime: 1 second.

EWEng>
The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages a child's chest.

lay
You lie down.

EWpEng>
You continue to bleed from your chest and left leg.

(energy -11)
The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages a child's left leg.

You continue to bleed from your chest and left leg.

(energy -11)
The Herbalist Lynsie carefully bandages your chest and asks that you pay for the service as soon as possible.
Roundtime: 2 seconds.

[lin]

So, the healer should prioritize Kiyaani over the kid because Kiyaani is a PC and the kid is an NPC? That's a completely OOC reason. A mechanic like that would take away from immersion. I'm not sure I'd want that.

Though on the other hand, I don't know what happens when a player passes out in the infirmary. If the healer sees that happen, they really should rush over and prioritize the passed-out. How does that work right now?

[Drayla]

To me it sounded like Kiyaani's wounds were more serious. I understand that some NPCs go into the healer with serious wounds, but I think the algorithm needs tweaked a bit. From what she posted, it seems obvious that she had at least three wounds that were serious enough to be bleeding profusely, while none of the NPCs I've ever seen walk in were injured that badly on more than one body part. In my head, you would want to take care of the person who is injured in more places before the person who is injured in one or two places.

[Kiyaani]

I'm all for good RP and being IC, but let's be honest, we're here to play a game and if we make it to the infirmary we should be able to be healed expediently and not die or fall unconscious because several NPCs walk in while you're being treated and happen to have the same wound type you do. Old bandaging systems allowed you to have instant bandages. This was already changed for RP and to allow monks a chance to do their thing and I'm totally fine with that. However, I'm pretty sure in a hospital a healer wouldn't stop treating an openly bleeding wound to move to another person then come back to you when you're clearly closer to dying than the person who walked in.

Also, I wasn't on Kiya or I would have bandaged. I was on an alt with minimal first aid skill. I don't think actual new players would appreciate possibly dying so an NPC who isn't exhausted can get a bandage first.

[TwistedAkai]

While I wouldn't want to see the healer prioritizing PCs over NPCs in general, I do agree that healers could probably do with a bit of updating. I seem to recall having one fixing my moderate wounds before touching on a the severe one that could've killed me.

I'm thinking maybe when they start on a person with bleeding wounds, they should continue to work on that person (targetting only bleeding wounds) until either 1) There are no more bleeding wounds, or 2) someone ELSE falls unconscious, if the person they're working on is not unconscious. The latter gives priority according to a clear and obvious triage system, and the former simply makes sense (It would, realistically, take longer to treat everyone if you ran in a circle around the infirmary). For non-bleeding wounds, they could do the same and react to people coming in with bleeding wounds by switching.

[Rithiel]

While I wouldn't want to see the healer prioritizing PCs over NPCs in general, I do agree that healers could probably do with a bit of updating. I seem to recall having one fixing my moderate wounds before touching on a the severe one that could've killed me.

That would be a bug and should be reported.

In fact, what Kiyaani posted is also likely a bug (hence why it's posted here). Next time it happens (to anybody), please look at the NPC that is getting bandaged repeatedy before you are. It's certainly possible (although unlikely) that the child had that many bleeding wounds, and it's very difficult to track down bugs that cannot be easily replicated without details like that.

Other than fixing bugs like this, I don't really see us changing the priority that healers use. Is it slightly unrealistic for them to move from patient to patient? Yes, probably. But it's also pretty unrealistic for you to walk on a severely injured leg to get to the infirmary. Actually, now that I'm thinking about this, what I may end up doing is adding in some check of energy that would give a slight bump in priority if somebody is tired or worse.

[lin]

Actually, now that I'm thinking about this, what I may end up doing is adding in some check of energy that would give a slight bump in priority if somebody is tired or worse.

Would it be possible to make NPCs randomly come in tired, maybe? I know it probably sounds like a pretty unimportant change, but I like the idea of making it so that the player isn't always the most important person in the healer's mind, even if all bloody and exhausted.

I also don't think player death would be a very frequent occurence with that. It takes a while to bleed out when passed out, and once blacked-out, the healer would surely prioritize the player. There would be some tension and fright, though, which is always fun.