On my several years of doing healer RP, I’ve only encountered handful of people who prefer the more “low fantasy” approach in tending to wounds.
It’s always fascinating to see their creative ways of rejecting magical healing.
My most memorable one was some elf whose spirit supposedly rejected Toso’s chi healing.
Just don’t get hit.
Prevention beats intervention.
Skill beats the bill.
Smurty beats hurty.
Etc
The OP makes some interesting points, and there’ve been some excellent responses in the thread. There are definitely some questions of consistency regarding healing (and, indeed, resurrection) within WoW, and broader inconsistencies when it comes to large-scale RP events. These are inevitable - there are many different perspectives on how health, healing and convalescence work within WoW, and how they relate to the mechanics of the game, largely down to the inconsistencies in lore.
All of that said, there are a few things I try to keep in mind when doing healing RP (which I’ve been doing in WoW for over a decade now). The first is the perspective of the ‘healed’ character’s player. When it comes to an RP-PvP campaigns, this is particularly important. As others have said, the action is truncated - a wound which might normally put a character out of action from one weekly event to the next weekly event can mean missing the entirety of the campaign - and in my experience very few people want to go to the trouble of coming along to a campaign only to sit out the lion’s share of it. And then you have healers having to sit out of the same events the convalescing are missing, in order to RP checking in on them every once in a while.
And the decision isn’t taken in isolation. Someone knows that being wounded means they’re missing out on the rest of the week’s RP? Five gets you ten, they just won’t be wounded - or everything will be a flesh wound. The emoted combat which would previously have led to at least some healing RP no longer takes place at all, adversely impacting the experience of all concerned.
The other side of ‘time’ to keep in mind is that a lot of the triage healing takes place while actual healers are trying to spam mechanical abilities to keep people alive. If the best they can manage is a simple “By the Light, be healed!” inbetween ability spam, more power to them - the best I can manage for emotes when healing for realz is macros, and people get tired of the same emote every few seconds.
When given my choice, my approach to healing RP is not that dissimilar to yours - if it’s what the player of the person I’m healing wants. If my character’s a magic-focused healer, magic is for patchwork in the field, keeping people upright long enough to win the day. Afterwards, when there’s leisure to emote properly, there’s proper healing - surgery, application of disinfection unguents or poultices, potions and antitoxins, all that jazz. And when RPing someone who’s being healed/convalescing, I give the healing a reasonable amount of time to settle in (to be fair, I’ve done that to the best of my ability this campaign, missing out on one event due to being blown up by a noodle cart - thanks, Pandaren ‘freedom fighters’ - and emoting the character carrying wounds from previous days impacting her abilities the next day, etc).
But I’m not rich enough in alts to write out my character from a campaign I want to take part in. I don’t want to deny other RPers the chance to carve a chunk off my character in the field (since she’s sure as Uther’s right teste trying to carve a chunk off of them). And I don’t want someone who RPs a healer to feel they have to babysit the sick and injured throughout the campaign if they don’t wish to.
All of that said, if someone wants to RP that experience? Go for it! The differences between healing time and convalescing time between healer A and healer B can be as stark as the differences between Fetching Ingredients for This Here Potion and Wave the Light Around that we see in quests. Perhaps the blade that struck your ‘slow-healing patient’ was rusty or infected or touched by dark sorcery. Perhaps the person being healed just doesn’t react well to certain forms of healing magic, or the poison on the enemy’s blade is resistant to magical cleansing. Or perhaps they just got hit in just the wrong way, and everyone who was healed quickly was hit in just the right way.
Anyway, just my two cents.
I’ve had this as well.
I think people need to be open minded with magical healing. It doesn’t necessitate an emote essentially equal to “casts, vivify”. You can still be detailed as to exactly what is happening and how it is being focused. Imagination is required as obviously the heals lofewise don’t work in a way literally as they do mechanically. I mean our character sustain damage with no decrease in performance even when at 1% health, so it’s obvious you should take healing spells in a way beyond their literal mechanical presentation because the games depiction of injury is very crude.
That said just because healing spells have a mechanical use it doesn’t mean they should be removed from healing rp because people assume their use is exactly as mechanical. That really shortens or cheapen healing options for many characters. Jinjo here, though not a skilled healer does not do so with things like wound dressings and stitches, that’s just not how his character works. He utilises his monk abilities and I dont like people denying him the ability to do this. He’s a monk, he does have “mystical powers”, that’s just how it is.
This said it doesn’t mean he can solve every problem, I don’t present his spells as they work via game mechanics in terms of effectiveness. Fortunately monk abilities are quite vague in some senses: “detox” for example makes not real mention of how exactly this detox works or what it involves so I can be creative.
Generally as an alchemist and brewmaster most of his healing is offered through Brews, potions and occasionally dietery recommendations. Kind of like an “alternative medical practitioner” nowadays. This said he can still use chi to give extra clout to what he’s doing, but doesn’t mean it always works.
As with all character-affecting RP, discuss with your partner and be clear on your acceptable outcomes. People ballbusting you without making it clear why is annoying as I. Your example Toso where somebody just “rejects” your healing without any details on how or why. All that does is make the healer look incompetent and feel kinda bummed, and it could have been resolved by the guy simply highlighting expectations first.
You can roleplay surgery and medicine with the players who want their injured characters to be mended with surgery and medicine. The players who want their injured characters back on the battlefield as soon as possible will accept the healing of their injured characters through magical, instantaneous means.
World of Warcraft is a setting full of contradictions and you have to accept that, rather than try to construct a headcanon of when magical healing can and can’t be used.
World of Warcraft doesn’t care about consistency, it cares about themes. Sometimes, the theme of realistic warfare where magic is treated as almost non-existent is prevalent, while at other times, it adheres to themes of high fantasy with characters being capable of bringing back an entire army from the brink of death with a single spell.
Both themes are acceptable in Warcraft, even if one can’t exist without invalidating the other. Blizzard couldn’t give a hoot. All you can do is pick the themes that you like out of all of the options that exist in Warcraft, and run with those. The rest, you’re free to mostly ignore, like Blizzard does most of the time.
I’m sure you’ll find people who enjoy your preferred type of healing roleplay as much as you do. Those who don’t should have the option of engaging in the other type of healing roleplay, even if you don’t enjoy it as much. It still exists in Warcraft after all.
After training as a paramedic in the army I lowkey wait for opportunities where I get to flex proper tourniquet etiquette in RP
Disclaimer: I am new to healing rp.
I’m trying to get into the habit, for that problem, to ask the other player in whisper if they have limitations, if they want something special, consequences, etc. More often than not I get “whatever” or “you’re the healer you decide”, but I think it’s a good habit to take for when I’ll fall on someone who do want something special.
Would it be nice if those people thought of whispering first? Sure, but I can still extend the gesture too.
Im a big supporter of various medical roleplay, my character is more attached to his field medical ways and somewhat still a novice when it comes to using the Light in order to mend wounds. With major or somewhat major injuries I always whisper the person how much creative control they allow me to have, maybe they want to leave a scar or they want to be right back into the battle. I never want someone to lose the oppertunity to properly “sell” the struggle they just went through IC as it makes their actions have meaning and it adds immersion, and Ive always had a positive reaction OOC from those I medically roleplayed with.
If people aren’t specific on who or what they want via “whatever”, imo they literally leave it to you, and then can’t be peeved if you RP put consequences beyond what they might expect. I’d stop clear of Death (bit dramatic), what I would do is whisper them something along the lines of what risks you conceive “may” happen so they need to be aware. They’ll either be more specific, or you’re given green light to do whatever.
For myself I always use rolls anyway. I set the success Internally based upon hwo difficult the procedure is for my character. So for something Jinjo is really good at doing, like getting rid of a naturally occurring venom like a snakebite or spider venom, his success threshold is rolling 95 or lower. When it comes to attempting to get rid of a curse or magical mind affecting spell, thresholds are much lower and not only that, but generally the healing would involve several success checks for me (like brewing the right tincture correctly would have a check, which would entail side effects if it fails, then a second check for successful administration which would look something like this:
1st check, tincture
50 or below, successful brew.
51 - 89: partially successful, introduce 1 side effect such as nausea for x days, headaches, drowsiness, lethargy, mood swings.
90+: passable success, incur 1 minor side effect as above and 1 major side effect such as: hallucinations for x days, temporary loss of hearing, temporary visual impairment.
2nd check, administration:
50 or lower: ailment clears after x days of bed rest.
51-89: ailment clears after 3x days of bed rest.
90+: ailment does not clear even after sustained rest.
Just for example.
If people don’t have a preference I inform them I use a basic “roll for varying success” system and given an example of some of the worst outcomes to let them know what may happen and generally ppl are cool with that. I always let them see my rolls as well so they know I’m not pulling a fast one when I whisper them what the outcome was. I have a macro whisper which is a very general version of the above template where I just use generic terms like “minor side effect” and “major side effect” then tell them which I’ve picked. I always make sure fails are not permanent so people aren’t put out totally (unless they want to be) and my character will advise of ways he thinks the mistake can be remedied.
I´ve seen people who RP surgeons and medics use this argument all the time and it´s weird how they never apply it to themselves.
Powerful cosmic magic has its limitations, but cutting person open is always bound to fix the issue, right? People who RP healing with magic should have their characters educated in surgery and conventional way of healing, but that guy with scalpel does not have to learn alchemy or visit Cathedral of the Light every once in a while to pray to the Light so he could one day use it to heal wounds.
No, it´s always the priest/druid/monk whose way of healing has limits, not the person using methods that even in reality, in controlled environment of modern hospitals, with all the technological marvels of modern era, done after long preparation by team of people, fail to save the person´s life and in some cases even cause the death.
You just want to hurt your patients whilst saving them, you sadist.
It won’t? When was this decided? Is this another “only druids can fix broken bones” type thing?
I think this is a really good point.
The way I see it both fields have their realms of operation. If you’re trying to clear an infected wound, both are appropriate. Reattaching a severed finger? Probably best to go the anatomy route tbh. If you’ve been cursed by a warlock or charred by felfire I’m not sure non magical means will really be able to do much and you might need to call in someone with magical powers to take it down a notch before applying traditional burn treatments both have a place, and both can fail and its about accepting that as healers and patients that makes it good RP.
Issue is there’s this block that sees anyone trying to use “magic” as trying to Mary sue all problems when that’s not true. It’s perfectly plausible to roleplay out magic not going the way as intended due to skill etc. Where this doesn’t happen that’s a player issue not a problem of the method chosen.as you point out rather well you have exactly the same with people with bonesaws and swabs who seem to be able to remedy ANY problem without fail which is equally an issue in my eyes, perhaps more so because whoslt magic is unexplained in what it can or can’t do, we have no frame of reference for whether applying empirical medical treatments would help someone who is cursed or burned by demonic fire, so to suggest it can requires a bit more reach for me than using magic.
At a meeting where no one else was invited but OP’s friends.
Also, what about Time, because they say Time heals all wounds, that sounds OP to me.
Nozdormu is an OP healer. He managed to maintain the blue flight via egg theft.
It’s not that bad unless the guy applying a tourniquet by your groin happens to slip his hand mid-pull and you get a fist to your 
t. personal experience
I mean - to cut off arterial bleeding you have to get that tourniquet on TIGHT. And that’s painful.
Ofcourse 
is no joy either.
Sounds spicy. Tell us more of meatball fisting.
If you still have feeling in your leg, the tourniquet isn’t tight enough. Once your blood flow is actually cut off from the limb, it went numb surprisingly fast
My partner had bad grip on the leash and for some reason he position himself on my left side while applying the tourniquet on my right leg meaning that when he lost his grip, his hand caught civilian casualties.
wait till you hear about cABC procedure
That server lore always bothered me.
Were humans just screwed if they broke a bone before they met Night Elves then? I strongly doubt it.
OT: Magic healing is fine so long as it generates RP and isn’t fixing everything in a single handwaving emote, which generates no RP and only happens to make the healer look good. I’ve had far more encounters with people who point blank ignore any and all magical healers and only respond when their guildmate shows up to ampurate the leg with a rusted saw coated in acid.
I do find it funny how someone can staunchly reject that magic can heal them fully, or at all, but as soon as their character might suffer a permanent consequence suddenly they’re all up for a druid growing back the leg that got chopped off.