Quote:
Originally Posted by hcobb
TFT demons ain't from hell. They're monsters from the Id. Losing the contest of wills (against yourself) is suicide.
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The legacy version says the wizard can survive the demon's attack.
Skarg's points are good in with respect to the problems raised by the new framework but I think it's consistent with the overall softening of the system, especially since anyone can buy a lesser wish for 500XP.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skarg
Exactly. Steve realized he had reduced the expected IQ of wizards, and also seems to be a bit less severe than he was in the original edition, so he reduced Demon IQ AND softened these contests... but yeah, he didn't playtest them or analyze them enough to realize this allows relatively risk-free Wish generation by people with enough resources and preparations. Or he assumed that wasn't a problem, and/or would be handled by GMs who did think it was a problem.
And a GM who does see it as a problem can of course change whatever they want.
But yes, changes are needed.
The part about the pentagram not protecting in the contest of wills is left over from the original version, where losing the contest means you die, no combat, and get to roll another such contest to see if you can be revived, or if you're a pile of ash.
I would tend to either use the original system, or develop my own invention for how it works and what demons are really like and what their abilities really are. Because I want wishes to be very rare and special things, which don't get industrially produced and mostly don't ever come into actual play, because it risks a very rare and powerful wizard to have even a chance to produce one.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Skarg
The reduced IQ is just one of the issues, but yes, adjusting the IQ or effective IQ would help, and I like the idea of each demon having its own IQ which can vary, because it reduces the predictability.
Another main issue is that the new rules just say the demon attacks the wizard, which has at least three issues:
1) As mentioned, how that's going to work given the usual use of a pentagram, is not clear.
2) Even if you say the wizard has to be in the pentagram with the demon, it doesn't say you can't have prepared a small army and/or other wizards ready to take out the demon, which would be reasonable for an industrial wish-farming operation to do.
3) Even if you say the Demon gets to act before anyone else and the wizard must be attackable, it's just a 4d attack, and there are ways to survive, avoid, or recover from that which are worth investing in if you get to farm wishes.
The original rules avoided these by having the contest of wills result directly in death or being turned to ash, with no intervention possible.
This subject has been gone over before here, and we came up with several creative other ways to handle it. Some I liked included:
* Demons even more randomized with even more personality and varied abilities. Some are better at the contest of wills.
* Each demon has unpredictable types of things they can grant. Not all of them can grant wishes.
* On failure to control a demon, it may teleport away before you can respond, and do unpredictable mischief.
* Summoning a demon introduces you to a specific demon, who will remember you and develop a relationship with you that may become steadily more problematic over time, especially if you keep summoning demons.
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These are good considerations if you want to change what seems to be (to me at least) the current intent of the system.
My suggestion is just a fix for how a demon could arrange to attack the wizard while in a pentagram which is currently not possible with the RAW.