THE APOTHECARIES OF ORLANTIA

Completely different from the alchemist and as far as the masses are concerned much more useful, the apothecaries of Orlantia are the lesser cousins of the alchemist. The study isn't nearly as complex or demanding as the alchemist's, and it tends to dwell on more mundane effects within the PMP (prime material plane).

Consulting with clerics, druids, alchemists, magic users, and sages, the apothecary learns their art. Even when they themselves do not resort to magic, the knowledge obtained through magical means is put to good use. (A minor angel of Athena known of Brother Cadfiel is the patron saint of Apothecaries. Apparently he had been an apothecary himself while he was alive all those centuries ago. It is through this connection that many non-worshipers of Athena still have at least a passing knowledge of Athena).

The apothecaries' art is essentially the healing and herbalism skills found in the Player's Hand Book. Through the use of plants, herbs, and minerals, the apothecary is able to do a wide range of useful things. For example, anti-headache powders, antacids, cold remedies, foot fungus salves, and all other manner of things your typical corner druggist might have as over the counter medicines may have their equivalents within the apothecary shops. Also, more serious prescription remedies for various diseases or disorders may be obtained, such as heart medicine, antibiotics, and others. All of this is has a more Eastern and holistic approach than traditional Western medicine, however.

Even more importantly, since these ingredients don't come from the bizarre and fantastic realms of the universe, they are quite affordable; the cost is easily measured in silver and electrum, and only occasionally in gold. It is these treatments and medicines that keep the masses healthy and happy. Even more serious maladies may require one to resort to magic for a permanent cure instead of using a continuous and costly supply of drugs. For example, though very expensive, a cure disease spell is a more practical course of action to take than a life long habit of taking a medicine to control the diseases' symptoms, not to mention the fact it is a better life free of the side-effects from the medicines themselves. So you could pay several hundred or several thousand sp/year to control your high blood pressure and put up with the side effects of the medicine to boot, or you may be able to come up with the 100,000 sp ($100,000 U.S. or 1,000 gp) for the spell that will cure you now and probably set you right for another decade or two. If you can't afford it, that's too bad. The rich will always have more options than the poor will and this is not the place to complain about that.

The apothecary shops are very aromatic and beautiful little places. A clerical Continual Light and the non-standard Continual Heat source makes large sections of them into a green house like affair where the herbs and plants are grown and harvested, even in the dead of winter. It is like visiting a nice little garden oasis whenever you don't feel quite right. Using the support of the empire's infrastructure, the apothecary is able to be open 24 hours a day. Each shop usually employs 3 main apothecaries (in three 8-hour shifts) and a dozen trainees. And, although these shops almost always make at least a small profit, the Alodarian Empire is willing to help out when necessary. In fact, the empire probably donated the CL and CH spells, as well as all the extra water required. (Actually, when the empire donates such things, what is really happening is that a temple is partially paying its taxes to the empire with services for the empire).

NOTE: Such places, as described here, are usually located in the major cites on the planet, but similar, though less elaborate, apothecary shops are scattered throughout the land. Also, spell casters frequently may visit such places to pick up material components for spells if such things are hard to find in the dead of winter (mostly things like plants or other herbs or spices). They may even "sponsor" a particular plant, thus paying the shop a small fee to maintain a certain plant they would find useful but the masses may not. This is usually not very expensive.

SOME CONSIDERATIONS ON BIRTH CONTROL

During the rise of the apothecaries' healing arts, it came to generally be known amongst them how one might concoct a brew that would cause a woman to miscarry. The herbs necessary were relatively easy to obtain. It is a sad truth the first uses of this abortive potion were prenatal assassination attempts during the 800-year period known as the Quadrasary war. Prophecy would declare such things as "The child of King Osserick, when born on the full moons, will crush your armies and destroy your family name." Well! We couldn't allow that, could we? Of course, killing the queen, since she would never be a combatant was actually considered wrong, but killing the baby would have been considered clever.

THE COUNCIL OF SENTRY, 444 A.E.

But as the memory of the war faded into history, and as the empire grew in strength and wisdom, there came a time when the cleric and candidate Gustov Sentry became very concerned with the continued use of the abortive potion. The council of Sentry, 444 A.E. made the following determinations:

In accordance with most beliefs, the soul enters the body at the earliest time possible. This is usually, but not always, at the point of conception.
Since point a), is of religious concern, it cannot be used as justification to make the abortive potion illegal. SEE point 07). The First Council of Generals. The Rise Of The Alodarian Empire And The First Council Of Generals (How Imperial Alodar Got Its Start)
Through the use of magic, a wizard can finish carrying a baby to term outside of its mother's womb if the baby is already sufficiently developed. Currently, as of 444 A.E., a human baby must be at least 4 months developed. (No significant research has been done to improve this figure, even though it has been over 300 years since then).
The sub council of magic users insists it is possible to further develop the external womb spells and techniques, pushing back the required minimum prenatal development time. It is speculated it may be possible to push it back to the point of conception, but impossible to go further.
It is the decision of this sub council that human life begins at conception due to non-religious considerations.
It is, therefore, the decision of The Council of Sentry, 444 A.E., that, upon the conception of her baby, a female citizen of the empire is responsible for the life of another citizen of the empire. That such a baby would be considered a citizen of the empire and therefore be entitled to the protection of the empire.
Therefore, any method of abortive potion used to terminate a citizen's life will be illegal. That, due to social pressures, any women who attempts such a thing is probably not wholly sane and rational at the time of the act and therefore not wholly responsible for her act of desperation. That such a women be stopped if possible and, failing that, that such a women should deliver the names of all known people involved in the procurement of the abortive potion. That any further action against her would, therefore, not be required or desired in the name of justice.
That anybody who aids a women in the procurement of an abortive potion with the intent of terminating the life of a citizen of the empire be held accountable for attempted murder if stopped in time, and murder if the citizen was indeed terminated.

The above lengthy aside concerning abortive potions was placed in the apothecary section because of its history within the apothecary art. For the sake of completeness, I'll finish this little jaunt on birth control even though it strays outside of the apothecary art. The apothecaries eventually developed several other potions to replace the abortive. They worked either by permanently sterilizing the woman, a one-time treatment for 50 GP ($5,000), or as a temporary suspension of a woman's natural menstrual cycle of 20 days. (Yes, 20. It happens about once every Scepter for the women of Orlantia but only for a short, 2-day period). Of course, such a treatment needs to be taken monthly. Its current cost is $50 a dose, $1,000 a year, or about 10 GP per year. And, it's not perfect. The success rate is approximately 98.5 % when taken properly (at least within 5 days after menstruation has stopped).

Since the last two methods of birth control prevent conception, the empire has no objections to it. In fact, it isn't really birth control so much as it is conception control. It takes a regeneration spell to reverse the effects of the permanent sterilization potion. The only other method of birth control is through the use of a cream pearl or simple castration, since the vasectomy isn't a known procedure on Orlantia. Some spells may be developed in the future, but so far none are in general use. Such spells, BTW, would almost certainly be clerical in nature, and not born of magic users. That is to say, the clerical versions would be easier, cheaper, and at lower levels than any mage's spell. At best, I think a 1st level clerical spell cast just before intercourse would do the trick, perhaps leaving the woman barren (by virtue of removing the ready egg), or the man unable to sire a child (by virtue of zapping his currently ready supply of sperm). I believe this may well be in the right power range for a WILLING recipient with a touch spell. Such a spell, would, of course, not affect a pre existing and developing fertilized ovum.

The cream pearl, or fertility pearl, is worth about 20,000 GP. It houses a fertility spirit. The attuned individual, be they a man or a woman, can prevent, or guarantee conception during intercourse. The spirit will ensure the sperm and egg never meet, or ensure they will meet and the fertilized egg is implanted within the womb. The sexual partner of the attuned has no say in this. (The only known exception to this is when both partners are attuned to separate cream pearls; in such an instance of conflicting wishes, the woman has dominant control over her own body). Furthermore, it does not matter if one or both individuals are normally sterile. The spirit will temporarily correct any problems. Of course, if the female isn't healthy or young enough to carry the baby to term and the attuned insist on pregnancy, the spirit is forced to stay with the baby until its delivery. This may or may not kill the mother, but the baby should be fine. During such a time of the forced attention of the fertility spirit, the cream pearl will stop functioning since the spirit is busy elsewhere. Only upon the birth of the baby, or the death of the mother and baby, will the spirit return to the pearl where it will start working again. On the other end of the age scale, in those rare instances when the female isn't past the age of menstruation, the pearl has no effect.

You may be wondering why this lengthy treatise on fantasy abortion is even here. I guess, during the course of play, it was only natural such an emotionally charged issue among certain players find its expression in the game. Also, unlike many of the other normal bodily functions of our PCs that are ignored, this one has serious consequences for the female adventurer. So, even though it is true that most games I've been in ignore sex, reproduction, love, and other extremely intimate and possibly embarrassing situations, not all campaigns do. And when striving for a certain level of realism and completeness it became necessary to include it on my world.

A FINAL NOTE ON APOTHECARIES

The apothecaries are also skilled in other less medicinal healing arts. They may pull teeth, set broken bones, sew up serious wounds, cut out an inflamed appendix, remove tonsils, and perform other minor surgical procedures. They also double as midwives. They are quite aware of anesthetics and employ them when necessary. Finally, they are usually skilled enough to recognize when the patient is beyond their art and in need of a cleric. They may even inform the patient of the tremendous cost the clerics would likely require keeping them on this world by using supernatural means. If it turned out to be well beyond the patient's economic reach, the clerics would still be brought in, not to physically heal, but to help spiritually prepare them for the next life.

This hospice type arrangement is provided free of charge by the clerics. Insofar as they needn't bother their hierarchy, it is, in fact, something they are happy to do for free. In the final days of one's life, the attending cleric may help them make peace with their god or goddess. Naturally, depending on the religion or alignment, this may take some extremely different forms. Of course, this is a topic best left for another time.

While here, I will say one more thing. Suicide, or even assisted suicide, is only legal when it is determined the citizen is terminally ill and in great pain. Therefore, it is usually against the law to commit suicide; the penalty is death. Now don't laugh. That actually isn't a joke; at least, not in this context. You see, if a person commits suicide it is generally considered a waste of resources and an insult to one's deity to request a Raise Dead spell for such a person. So you see, the penalty IS death. There are, of course, certain, unusual exceptions.

And so, though the apothecaries of Orlantia are highly useful and very skilled in the healing arts, I would say their level of skill falls just short of modern medicine on Earth. The very idea of a heart transplant or other organ transplants is totally absent. Even a blood transfusion is unheard of. Keeping patients alive with machines just isn't going to happen. Still, I would also say that, because of the clerics, wide spread disease and plagues no longer are a serious threat in the empire. As a direct result of that, and the healthy living style taught to every citizen during their two years of compulsory service where exercise and healthy eating become habits, I would finally conclude that the general health of your average Alodarian citizen is better than your average U.S. citizen. Furthermore, the life span is also longer, being about 90 years for human males and 93 years for human females in the Alodarian Empire.

Naturally, the healing provided by the divine magic of a cleric is far above the level of any healing you could find on Earth. Of course, the cost of this magic is so prohibitive that most citizens couldn't afford it, even if most adventurers could.

Some Final Considerations On The Healing Arts

The level of the healing arts is rather high on Orlantia. This is mostly a natural consequence of being able to ask clerics for information, and even without the aid of magic, the dissemination of such accurate information can go a long way.

As far as the players are concerned this may be reflected in their characters if their PCs choose to learn a few extra healing arts. It is automatically assumed as part of their basic adventuring training that they have learned what I call First Aid 0 or Healing 0. This is the ability to bind the wounds of a fallen comrade, but I will describe that in greater detail below.

First Aid N or Healing N

Naturally, as part of every adventurer's normal training, they have the binding skill that is quite remarkable at stabilizing a patient (this is automatically gained and does not cost extra non-weapon proficiency slots for adventurers). But a secondary or tertiary skill of First Aid 1, 2, or 3 (also called Healing 1, 2, or 3, same thing, just a different name) may be picked up as well. These are based on an average of DEX, INT, and WIS and a PC may consult the table of secondary skills to see what % they may start at.

An Explanation Of The Secondary And Tertiary Table Of Skills (A New Revision Of The Secondary Skills System For AD&D)

First Aid 0 (Healing 0): An emergency procedure, this skill will bind the wounds and stabilize a fallen comrade or injured party member, start their heart if necessary, resuscitate them if they have stopped breathing, and in all other ways stabilize a patient and prevent them from bleeding to death. It takes one entire round to do this and the administrator may do nothing else during that round (not even properly defend themselves, so they receive no dexterity bonuses to their AC while doing this). For you bookkeepers, this cost about 10 SP in clean, sterile bandages, but I usually assume adventurers either carry such things or can find quick, suitable substitutes.

First Aid 1 (Healing 1): If you begin the round after an injury was just inflicted, and you spend 3 rounds administrating to the wound, and if you then make your First Aid roll, you may heal a patient for 1D4 damage (not to exceed the damage done by the last injuries in the last round). The numbers may be slightly different, but First Aid 1 would be similar to having both the healing and herbalism skills.

First Aid 2 (Healing 2): Similar to First Aid 1, but you must spend 5 rounds tending the wound, but you may start within a turn (10 rounds) of any and all injuries. If the PC's roll succeeds, they will heal the patient for up 1D8 points (not to exceed the damage done by the all injuries in the last turn).

First Aid 3 (Healing 3): This is more like surgery and requires special equipment (that can be purchased for 100 gp and weighs 10 lbs. and comes in a little black bag) and takes 1D4 hours to perform, but any unhealed (normal) injuries may be treated and if the roll succeeds they will heal the patient for 2d8 damage (not to exceed all remaining damage) OR 1D4 damage for each injury (not to exceed the damage for each separate wound). As some of this basic equipment is alcohol, and the PCs know about germs and how to combat them, infections are not generally a problem. In fact, the very best that can be hoped for is to bring someone back to maximum hit points - 1 for a single injury, or -1d4 for multiple injuries. A small amount of damage must remain somewhere as this is more realistic, still takes some recovery time, and will leave scars. If you need better than this, then you'll have to resort to actual magic. Of course, for people like you and me (the masses) one hit point or 1d4 hit points is a lot, and the recovery time can be measured in days or weeks, but typical adventurers may just walk it off due to superior constitutions and a greater attunement to the universe and the powers that be (part of the justification of their hit points).

The Justification Of The Hit Point System (Are Hit Points Realistic Or What?)

All of this, for your average PC, is still just a degree of emergency measures. A quick Cure Light Wounds will do wonders for warding off infections and preventing scarring (and even replacing lost blood, so magic is pretty cool stuff). In fact, any form of magical healing surpasses all these skills and makes their application no longer possible (as it is too late since magic does take care of the easiest stuff first). But then, this is usually not a problem as even a Cure Light Wounds will stabilize a patient, prevent further bleeding, start them breathing and/or start their heart, etc.

Naturally, one must have First Aid 1 before 2 and have First Aid 2 before 3. Furthermore, a PC's highest first aid skill level's % may not exceed the lower ones. For example, if the First Aid 1 skill is 60% the First Aid 2 may not be more than 60%. If the First Aid 2 skill is 37%, the First Aid 3 skill may not be more than 37%.

Again, I mention this not simply in passing, but because it is also the case that the Primary Apothecary of any given shop would be a man or women who possessed all four First Aid Skills at or above 90% in skill level.