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Has anyone had poison deal ability damage instead of using SAGA's methods of poison use?  The idea would be that the poison (diseases can work the same way) makes an attack against the target's FORT and if successful lowers an ability score so many points.

In general I like SAGA's use of the condition track for many things but I did like how poisons worked by lowering actual ability scores.  This offered a greater range of effects (-1d6 DEX is very different from losing -1d6 WIS) which just aren't handled that well by the condition track.  I know that SAGA uses the condition track to unify a lot of different states from the previous edition but having a lowered ability score isn't really an altered state.
 

One of the points of using poison is that its effects could stick around a while.  Looking at the SAGA ones they stick around and "attack" until cured.  If they move you down the CT (and they all do) the condition in Persistent until cured or the attack misses; note that a missed attack may remove the Persistent Condition but it does NOT stop the next attack which could bring the Persistent Condition right back into effect.

I do need to brush up on my RCR/3.5 poison durations but the ability reductions should stick around a while unless cured using Treat Injury.  I guess the question would then become "how fast is ability damage recovered after the poison is treated?" 

Greetings!

I haven't used so much poisons but yes, I use some kind of mixture between old systems and the new one.

I like the Saga system (more o less) but sometimes I like a more "accurated" effecte. I use it for Poisons/Drugs.

Depending on the case I prefer to apply the X "damage stat" before the - X to CT. Always the effect that I want to get.

Take care!