Poultices

[loseth]

With regard to plants as medicine, won't poultices that are applied to an open wound often result in infection? I thought poultices were mainly for wounds where the skin has not been broken.

[Jennifer]

With regard to plants as medicine, won't poultices that are applied to an open wound often result in infection? I thought poultices were mainly for wounds where the skin has not been broken.

Well, we're talking a lot of history here. We know a lot better now. Back then some herbs were considered "drawing." Hence the official warning right from the start. :D

EDIT: Because it was common practice, I'm stating that in hack & slashes, it'd be okay. If'n we got magic, then we can probably state for our characters' sakes that they'd get better from this sort of thing.

[loseth]

Well, we're talking a lot of history here. We know a lot better now. Back then some herbs were considered "drawing."

Ah, I see. I'm with you. With medieval fantasty, I figure that if medieval folk believed it, then it should be true in-game. Does the 'drawing' designation apply to all the plants you listed in the 'slashing wounds' section?

[Jennifer]

I supposed I could have said compress or even just bandage as well, now that I look back on it.

Basically most green plants are antiseptic and astringent. The antiseptic should prevent infection while the astringent properties should help reduce the bleeding. Most plants mashed up and thrown on should, in game terms, do this (unless a poisonous variety was picked by accident--then the wound heals while the poison affects the skin or internal organs; technically though, the wound STILL should stop bleeding and be "sterilized" despite the complication).

I would recommend to any gamemaster that they give their PCs a break and not give them infections from any wounds, unless it's vital to the game. The slashing injuries section should be considered emergency first aid for bleeding and PREVENTING infection, in case magic is sparse or not readily forthcoming for healing those sorts of injuries. Examples of this would be your healer is incapcitated, you don't have a healer, or the setting you're using keeps magic at a minimum.

I included a section below it one on herbs reducing infection. These would be the "drawing" herbs you'd use in an emergency. I would recommend that a GM only resort to infections like these in cases of NPCs they meet along the way. Festering wounds are not a good thing and poorly taken care of in most more primitive societies. Most PC travelers would not have the best equipment or herbs to deal with them, but most soldiers/fighters would have heard of some remedy or another while in training.

For example, in wetter sections of Europe, white willow bark was quite well known for reducing fevers in the real world, along with its aspirin-carrying relatives meadowsweet and birch, if I remember correctly. So they'd probably look for these to kill the fever and pain.

The GM can decide at that point whether the NPC lives or dies due to the PCs' help. If the NPC was meant to die and the characters don't use magic to knock out the infection, the PCs would have to be like everyone else and chalk it up to divine providence.