[psycho]

OK so ive got an Ex-Surgeon character, and part of his fluff is that hes a drug addict.
but i want him to be addicted to Morphine, or the 40k equivalent.
so could someone give me rules for this?
i want him to be injecting into his eye (as in Pitch Black style) so that theres no track marks......

Help???

kerby

[Serge]

The addiction should be roleplayed.

The injection can take d6 actions or so.

The effect, at best, should be stunned for at least 10+d100 turns or something.

[TheNephew]

Seems excessive...
Since he'll be taking it under combat conditions, I'd assume he had the sense to be taking a 'get you by' amount, rather than 'dancing in the clouds' amount.
The dose takes two actions to prepare, then a further action to inject.
Injecting is a risky action. If it goes wrong, he stabs himself in the eye and is at -25 to all vision based tests from now on, and -15 to Bs (assume he injects in his non-aiming eye).
Take a toughness (or Wp?) test (at half toughness?), and for every X points by which it is failed, he takes one less action per turn, which can take him down to and below 0 actions, in which case he counts as stunned.
He may take a toughness test in each recovery phase to regain one action per turn, and keep doing so until he is above 0 actions, and continue until he is back up to his normal number of actions.
While under the influence... Pick an appropriate Hallucinogen table result?
Pinning tests, or actually anything relating to Ld, Sg, Wp or Nv should be harder.
Apart from that I'm under experienced in drugs in games to provide much more of use.

[MarcoSkoll]

Personally, I tend to work addictions of any type (as well as fears) with a rule that means that if the character is suffering from withdrawal (or fear), they take a Wp test (Nv in the case of fear) at the start of each turn, and if they fail, they're at -20% to all stats except S & T for that turn due to the addiction/fear affecting them.

So, if the character is withdrawn, then I'd use a rule like that. How to decide if they're withdrawn is another matter. Personally I'd do it off their action rolls (which saves on extra dice rolls). All the dice coming up as 1, two/three "Risky Action" turns in a row, or something. You don't want the effect to be too common.

Obviously, to end the withdrawal, then he has to take the drugs (after he's taken them, I wouldn't then test for withdrawal in the same game.)

Injection... I really have little idea. TheNephew's rules sound like they'd be up to scratch though.

For the effects, I might simply use (part of) the rules for the "Analgesia Infuser" from the Istvaanian sourcebook. +1 bonus to recovery rolls for the rest of the game, but -10 Initiative because of reduced reaction time.

Alternatively, when under the effects of the drugs, the "Pain is Nothing" rule I give to one of my characters may be appropriate - their consciousness value is 3/4 (rather than 1/2) their toughness, and a system shock result simply stuns them for D3 turns.
This is however the character from my collection who has thus far proven to be impossible to (permanently) kill - being a very powerful regenerator. Having "died" three times and been subjected to just about every weapon known to the Imperium as well, pain doesn't mean a whole lot to him any more.

I'd definitely layer "Pain is Nothing" with some kind of penalty though, probably -20% to Initiative. It is not a rule to be taken lightly.

[precinctomega]

I actually wrote an article that included suggested rules for drug addiction amongst a number of other potential "drawbacks" in INQ, for Dark Magenta.  I think it was in issue 2, but my memory could be playing with me.  It was called "A Curse On't".  Generally speaking, I suggested that such drawbacks should involve a characteristic test at the start of the game, with certain effects coming into play depending upon the results of the test.

R.