Healing Magic
Healing magic is fairly common, and relatively affordable, at least for the simple spells and alchemy.
The more complex spells, such as Restoration and Resurrection, are much more rare (and typically require a casting circle). A mage with Restoration could likely be found in a large city, but unless you get lucky and the mage is traveling from one city to another, you won’t find one in a town or village.
Restoration costs 15 mana to cast. It’s a very hard spell near the end of a prerequisite chain, so few mages will know it very well. So it will likely require a 5pt powerstone or larger. Instant Restoration is a 50 point spell, so it will require a casting circle and a ritual spell. This will be prohibitively expensive; most crippled people will accept the time required to recover. But it they are really in a hurry…. They will need to gather enough mages who know the spell well enough to account for the penalties to skill that the casting circle adds to the difficulty. They will also need to make sure that the circle is equipped with enough power stones to power the spell.
Regeneration (required to actually replace a lost limb) costs 20 points, and the limb will be useful in a month. See Restoration, above, but the powerstone needed will need to be larger. Instant Regeneration costs 80 points to cast, so it is also a ritual circle spell. Again, most will accept that their lost limb will grow back in a month, and be happy they will get their limb back at all.
Resurrection spell is known to exist, but is very, very rare, and very very expensive. It is, in effect, a monopoly, and the mages can name their price. Only the very extremely wealthy can afford to have someone resurrected, and it takes knowing some connections to get in contact with a mage circle that knows the spell. Resurrection costs 300 points to cast. To get this amount of power requires a mage circle, each mage having a big honking’ powerstone. Spells are cast at -1 skill for each additional person in the circle; and Resurrection is cast at an additional -1 for each day the victim has been dead. So a caster needs to have a huge skill level to even have a chance at successfully casting it. It can only be tried once on a particular person. So it will likely never be a sure thing; after all of the effort to gather the circle/participants, paying the exorbitant fees, supplying the handful of huge power stones…it may still fail. Since it's a very rare spell, there aren't usually groups of people who all know it in the same area. So travel times for the circle to get together will have to be accounted for. This will further reduce the effective skill, unless the person knows that the death will happen in the future, and gets the group together before it happens. It's also possible that the local ruler may cultivate a circle and keep them handy; likely due to either paranoia or because they are unpopular and likely to be attacked.
Example: Caster has a 21 skill in Resurrection, and eight assistants who can fully help cast it. This reduces the effective skill to 13. The body has been dead for two days (it took time to get the dead body to the mage). That makes the effective skill 11. Each mage needs to contribute 33 points of mana. Each (for simplicity’s sake) has 11 mana points they can provide, which means they each need a 22pt powerstone (the primary caster has a 25pt stone to make the math work out; each of these power stones cost upwards of $12000 each). There are a few other things to consider. The mages could burn into their HT in addition to their FT. They could also get a crowd of people to help power the spell, which might work if the deceased was well-loved by the local populace. This, in turn, would likely require a well-known reputation for being a great person. Remember, the crowd has to sincerely want the spell to succeed; a person not loved by the crowd will not get the benefit of the extra power, and people that have gripes about the deceased can really hamper the spell.
This has some ramifications. Most deaths will be permanent, especially deaths of people who were not well-liked. However, assassins who are thinking about killing a rich politician who is popular has to take it into account. In some cases, killing the victim only to have the victim up and about again in the future might be a message enough to justify the death. But if they want the death permanent, they will either need to A) reduce the body to -10xHT damage to make the body unrecognizable and unresurrectable; or B) keep the body hidden for long enough to ensure that the spell fails. This will require either putting the body in a container that is protected from Seeker spells, or to keep the body moving around from place to place to spoof Seeker. And even if the Resurrection is cast and is successful, the cost will be in the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. The mages can basically name their price.
Alchemy is another pathway. While rare, there is an alchemical recipe that can resurrect. It only works on the recently dead, however: one hour or less since death. It costs $25000, when you can find it. It won't be just sitting on a shelf; it's value is too high. It will be something hidden, so as not to be stolen. An alchemist may never even admit that they have one in stock; or even that they know the recipe. Any that know it will likely be kidnapped to make Persephone potions for the rest of their lives. Or they work for someone who will protect them, and they have friends in high places.
Regeneration ointment is a bit more common, costing only $5000. It also won't just be sitting on a shelf, as per above. But alchemists who know how to make them are also less rare than those that know how to make resurrection potions.
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