Need for a skill point term

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by JLV

In fact, to be totally honest, I think Steve should get rid of the term "IQ Points" as well -- simply state that when creating a new character, the character receives 500 x IQ XP and may spend on Talents/Spells as they like prior to the start of the game. The rules specify the cost of spells for non-magic users, and the cost of skills for magic users, so there's no difficulty there. Then none of this confusion would even crop up.

Or we could go back to the way IQ used to work. Same result, right?
;)

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by JLV

In fact, to be totally honest, I think Steve should get rid of the term "IQ Points" as well -- simply state that when creating a new character, the character receives 500 x IQ XP and may spend on Talents/Spells as they like prior to the start of the game. The rules specify the cost of spells for non-magic users, and the cost of skills for magic users, so there's no difficulty there. Then none of this confusion would even crop up.

TFT players frequently complain about arithmetic though - I think telling them to multiply IQ by 500 and then spend 500 per talent point, etc., seems liable to confuse people, while I don't think the lack of a consistent term for talent points is particularly confusing people.

Also, I think 500 XP per talent point is a crazy amount except for its intended purpose of pushing the abilities of very experienced characters. Saying they start with 0 XP, and can increase an attribute for 100 XP, but they start with 4000 to 8000 XP in talents, to me just shines a brighter light on how the game needs a non-XP way to learn talents.

[FireHorse]

Originally Posted by Skarg

… the game needs a non-XP way to learn talents.

Ayup. Or a clearer way to earn XP besides simply hoping for divine intervention from the GM.

[JLV]

Originally Posted by Skarg

TFT players frequently complain about arithmetic though - I think telling them to multiply IQ by 500 and then spend 500 per talent point, etc., seems liable to confuse people, while I don't think the lack of a consistent term for talent points is particularly confusing people.

It certainly HAS been confusing people, though -- especially since it is a term defined in different ways by different members of this board on different occasions.

Originally Posted by Skarg

Also, I think 500 XP per talent point is a crazy amount except for its intended purpose of pushing the abilities of very experienced characters. Saying they start with 0 XP, and can increase an attribute for 100 XP, but they start with 4000 to 8000 XP in talents, to me just shines a brighter light on how the game needs a non-XP way to learn talents.

I'll let you and hcobb fight over that, since that was his definition. An even simpler way to handle it is tell each Player they can pick four Talents (or whatever number you feel is most "realistic") or, if a Wizard, four Spells and/or Talents as their starting skills. You could also say they can pick one "mundane" skill (fishing, farming, candle-making, whatever) that they learned while growing up if you wanted to give them an opportunity for more roleplaying in the future. That would solve the conundrum of numbers nicely...

As far as XP rules go, create some! ;-) I use the old one and the new ones in combination and so far, everyone seems pretty happy. Basically you can get about 25 XP for a good fight in which you kill a roughly equal opponent, and you can pick up some extra by actually doing stuff (disarming traps, solving a puzzle, negotiating with the merchant, whatever seems worthy) when not fighting, so it's a pretty quick run to pull in 100 XP.

Really, all this devotion to written rules for everything seems a bit odd in what was always a pretty "rules-lite" kind of game...

[larsdangly]

I've been watching a campaign unfold for about 6 months now using the new experience and advancement rules, and I think they (perhaps miraculously!) got it just about perfect. My players put all their XP into stats up to about 36-37 total, just as you'd expect and then started looking around for other things they'd rather advance, at which point their options are pretty much infinite, but require them to make some tough choices because the rate of progress is only so fast. The wizard in the party started investing in staff power pretty early, and remains focused on that for the foreseeable future. The thief opted to start learning talents I wasn't expecting (most recently Tracking), because the player is more keen on evolving as a character than on getting another 10 % rise in chance of success with a missile weapon attack. We play about once a week, earning 100 or so per session, and each character gets a chance to change in some incremental way about once per month. Perhaps it would strike some as too slow, but I'm into it. The game is fun at this level in a way I don't think is true when everyone is maxed out on every stat, talent, spell and item they can think of.

[RVA_Grandpa]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

We play about once a week, earning 100 or so per session, and each character gets a chance to change in some incremental way about once per month. Perhaps it would strike some as too slow, but I'm into it. The game is fun at this level in a way I don't think is true when everyone is maxed out on every stat, talent, spell and item they can think of.

The game that I am in is running in the same manner.

Our wizard has been focusing on XP into mana for his staff. Our halfling physicker has decided to learn the bola talent after we encountered bola wielding adversaries.

My fighter character rose to 36 points over the past six months and now has spent 1000 XP to add toughness. As we gain XP we all have spent a good deal of time deciding what was the best use of our XP.

[hcobb]

The proper term is "IQ point cost". This is in the rulebook and is just as clear and straightforwards as "ST cost". I have replaced all such mentions on my site with only modest rewrites needed.