Originally Posted by Jim Kane
You make a good proposition and very good supporting argument.
Food-for-Thought:
As one who has LONG play-tested this "unconscious at 0, dead when ST goes fully negative" adapted for TFT - having lifted it from 1st. Ed. Hero System; Peterson/MacDonald, 1981 - there is a counter-balance effect on the TFT game; which is not present in the game-system that rule was specifically designed for.
Consider this:
At the end of a battle In The Labyrinth, what does your party do NOW?
Does the party now spike or barricade the doors and begin hacking to pieces all the fallen enemies you have just bested?
After all, they are not "fully dead" yet, so you might want to begin head-chopping after the battle as S.O.P. from now on; which is great for Barbarians, BUT what if someone or you play one of the Chivalrous Hero types?
Same thing goes for "Just slit their throats,.. nice as quick!"
Okay, but did your Leader send Sir Goody-2-Shoes outside to "watch the tunnel" while this operation was in progress? Is he out there alone, all by himself?
Oh, you have TWO Sir-Goody-2-Shoes in your party to protect each other out in the tunnel? Well, that means double-duty for the 2 "fixers" left in your party, and the whole operation just ate up some extra turns due to being short-handed,... and what if some THING uninvited shows up in the murder-room while your party is split?
Uh oh.
You might simply set their bodies ablaze with some Molotail Oil; but that's going to make a lot of smoke and smell - never a good thing to have when sneaking around in the underground with few natural air-channels to the surface-world above. And don't forget to mark-off those used Molotails on your Character Sheets; that way they won't be there when you need them most.
Hmm,...
"Leave 'em for the Slimes!" You say? Okay, but what if their buddies and THEIR Physicker finds these dying guys before the slimes do, and then, starts pumping them full of Healing Potions?
That labyrinth tunnel-complex is going to become VERY FULL of a very hostile and ever-growing mob of healed enemies - on the search for YOU.
No, you HAVE to kill them, FULLY.
Also, if your GM is NOT the type who readily announces: "Okay, the Ogre's ST was 20, and now he is at ST minus 13.": How would you know when it is safe to leave heavily wounded enemies behind for "dead" (which is RARELY a good idea in a confined combat environment).
How would you know if those enemies are dead, or "just dying"?
Again, you HAVE to kill them - FULLY.
Return to paragraph #2: "What does your party do NOW?"
I am sure you see the potential dilemma in changing this rule. It works great provided your GM is only giving it to YOUR SIDE, and does not play the labyrinth as a living, reactive entity onto itself, and treats the enemies as puppets, not NPC's.
Either way, the dynamic change to the GAME - beyond the direct benefit to a player-character - means a party would now have to take TIME, and make NOISE, and expend RESOURCES to fully slaughter all enemies who did not escape.
Sure, you say again, you can just slit ALL their swarthy throats, but that still takes extra time by using an extra turn(s),... and if your GM is a good one, he is marking-off EVERY turn, and advancing the Labyrinth and it's occupants one turn closer to you as they react to the noise from your underground battle.
Need to finish-off 4 fallen enemies, AND heal your party?
Well, that's a lot of TIME, and before you know it,.. DING, DONG, TROLLS AT THE DOOR, and they aren't delivering from Domino's!
Time constriction plays a large role in TFT:ITL. Time is a RESOURCE, which works AGAINST a party in the labyrinth; much like in a Casino, the more you hang-around, the faster the Law-of-Large-Numbers and the Diminishing Returns of a Negative-Expectation game will eat you up!
Also, doing things like chopping up your foes not only makes extra NOISE, but extends the DURATION of noise when in the labyrinth, which is like ringing a dinner-bell for the Trolls.
TIME, NOISE, RESOURCES, YOUR ST, YOUR ENEMIES ST, FOOD, WATER, AIR - it's all part of a bigger system; change one of those and you may imbalance the game in way not foreseen when tested on a Melee map ONLY, or only in your head.
In sum: All that extra life-extension the "Unconscious at 0, Dead at fully negative ST" rule creates, also has other affects on the TFT game as a whole; because it applies to everyone and every thing - or it SHOULD.
So I ask you once again, "Now that your enemies are fallen and unconscious, but not DEAD-DEAD, what does your party do NOW?"
Hmmm?
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