Whether you were a tribal witch-doctor, a medicine-man, a holy healer, a military field medic, or a genuine medical professional from some unusually enlightened society, you specialize in the treatment of suffering. You have seen injury, disease, poison, and death, and still you have defied it all, fighting to save that every last soul. As a medical professional, you have sworn a Hippocratic oath, (code of ethics). You have pledged your life to protect life, that all who suffer are your patient, to support other doctors as family, to train any who swear the oath, to practice to the best of your ability, to always improve upon the art, to practice only your specialization, to practice not for your own gain, to practice within the law, and to keep all of your patients' secrets. Why did you turn away from the medical profession? Or if you haven't, what was it that drew you into the life of the adventurer? And what do you think of the oath, or other doctors?
- Skill Proficiencies: Medicine, Nature, Investigation
- Tool Proficiencies: Herbalism kit, Healers kit
- Languages: One of your choice
- Equipment: Herbalism kit, a Healer's kit, 2-man tent, bedroll, blanket, Book (About anatomy, disease, apothecary, and surgery), common clothes, five bars of soap, a belt pouch containing 5 gp.
Each doctor must choose a field of specialization to practice within the broader art of medicine.
| d6 | Specialist |
|---|---|
| 1 | Diagnostics |
| 2 | Apothecary |
| 3 | Surgery |
| 4 | Bone Setting |
| 5 | Therapy |
| 6 | Research |
Due to your vow, you are expected to cure the ill, regardless of morals or prejudice, even if they are your enemy. It is considered a horrid evil to intentionally kill a doctor for no reason. As such, intelligent enemies are less likely to target you, (Provided they are not frighteningly evil in a manner that would be inappropriate for younger audiences) and even your enemy patients will at least not attack immediately while under your care. What happens after they leave your care...? Well you can't decide their fate. Restored individuals may be grateful, or feel some form of life-debt to you. Enemies may repay you by specifically choosing not to kill you, or they may give free information, or a scout you once saved may turn a blind eye to your presence.
Provided you stay true to your vow, (as best as you can) you can make use of any hospital or medical facility, (typically located in churches, noble estates, universities, and other places of higher learning) as temporary residence for yourself, your patient(s), and your companions if there is room for them. Doctors will put you up at a lifestyle one step below their own if you can maintain a good relationship with them.
However, if ever you are proven to have broken your vow, you will be fully and publicly discredited as a doctor, and other doctors who pay attention to medical society will recognize you as such. You and all who are with you will be turned away from mundane medicine and the places it is provided. Because you swore on your life, breaking your vow is technically a personal death sentence, though no doctor true to his vows is free to enact it upon you. Even so, more enlightened nations are likely to have laws regarding the treatment of doctors and their vows, and enlightened does not necessarily mean "kind" or "gentle".
Suggested Characteristics
Doctors may come from many walks of life, but all became enrolled in some place of higher learning, or tutored by a renowned doctor, and eventually swore an oath- and that oath is not a light load to bear. Doctors are often studious, intense, passionate, clinical, intellectual, or unusually calm under extreme stress. Many are troubled by harrowing events they bore witness to. Some are shockingly pragmatic, with an "it may not be pretty, but you'll live" approach to problems. Many are seemingly tireless, hard-working individuals. Some can be inspiring souls, with a deep appreciation, not only for life, but for the person who is alive as well. There is much debate among doctors as to just what the oath means, and what tenets have priority in any given situation.
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