Experience Points

[Rick_Smith]

Originally Posted by Steve Jackson

And if the GM wants to stay within printed rules while still having characters at 50 or whatever, he need merely be generous with magic items. It's the GM's game.

Hi Steve, everyone.
I hope that the attribute adders go away. I would far prefer that the attribute adders are dumped (which is potentially 15 extra attributes), and the attribute limit from experience went to 42 (only 2 extra attributes).

And there are wishes. Hopefully they will still be limited to improving attributes less than 16.

Warm regards, Rick.

[Steve Jackson]

Not sure I understand. Actually, I'm sure I don't. "Attribute adders" what?

[Rick_Smith]

Originally Posted by Steve Jackson

Not sure I understand. Actually, I'm sure I don't. "Attribute adders" what?

Hi Steve,
On page 28 of Advance Wizard, about 3/4 of the way down the table is the entry:

"Increase one attribute (+1).... $2,000..... Note A...... Weeks to make 3..... fST / day 75.......... Cost / Week of ingredients: $0 ...... (No notes.)"

These are called "Attribute Adder" items in the Brainiac TFT forums.

Since they are an 'A' type enchantment, they can get a maximum of 5 levels, doubling in cost each time. (So $2K, 4K, 8K, 16K, 32K.)

So for $32,000 you can get a +5 DX ring. For $96,000 you can get +15 attributes from 3 magic items.

LOTS of people didn't like these. They were boring and they made attribute bloat far worse.

Early on, I just said they were illegal in my TFT campaign, and refunded the money of anyone who had bought them.

***

So I was saying, I would far prefer that the new TFT has an attribute limit of 42 (which could be earned with experience) than leaving the attribute adders in.

Warm regards, Rick.

[zot]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

It is definitely a bold move on SJ's part to impose such a modest cap on character advancement. I dig it, as I love games that make you work within defined limits. It's like, you only get one queen on your side in chess. Why can't you have 3 if you really, really want them? Because you only get one. Now deal with that and figure out how to actually play the game instead of 'grade inflating' your way to victory with ridiculous advantages. A 40 point character can be extremely good at a few things, or really good at a few more, or sort of good at everything. But he or she will always have to make tough, tough choices and run across situations where those choices bite you on the can. That's good for a game.

Personally, I'm hoping for a ton of new talents and spells so that characters can still have the option of steady progression when their attributes get high. I think there's a LOT of room for more talents. We can easily double the size of the list and I'll be posting a small piece of mechanics soon that I think could help greatly with this.

[David Bofinger]

I have ambivalent feelings about both the attribute adders and damage adders for weapons and armour. It's more fun to say that a weapon does extra damage because it is on fire, or has a lightning bolt trapped in it, than to say it does extra damage because it's magic. So I'd tend to favour magic items that reflect magic spells over items that just give bonuses. On the other hand the idea of a magic sword that isn't visibly magical is probably something the game wants. The attribute adders probably don't have that excuse.

[tbeard1999]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

I have ambivalent feelings about both the attribute adders and damage adders for weapons and armour. It's more fun to say that a weapon does extra damage because it is on fire, or has a lightning bolt trapped in it, than to say it does extra damage because it's magic. So I'd tend to favour magic items that reflect magic spells over items that just give bonuses. On the other hand the idea of a magic sword that isn't visibly magical is probably something the game wants. The attribute adders probably don't have that excuse.

I think that the “plus whatever” magic weapon is so ingrained in fantasy roleplaying that its absence would be as jarring as having no healing spells :D

At least TFT keeps them limited by treating each bonus as a damage or “to hit” bonus, but not both.

I generally outlawed attribute increasing items, including armor that provided DX bonuses.

[Skarg]

We too almost entirely didn't use attribute adder enchantments (or charms). With the new EP system having a cap, they would naturally be very attractive to people with the means to get them, and noble/rich warriors would be remiss not to try to get them.

We DID allow Weapon/Armor enchantment, and Stone Flesh (Iron too, though the 14-hex dragon skin requirement nicely limits the possibility of those existing to the number of 14-hex dragons who existed and were killed. 14-hex dragons being extremely rare, high-IQ, and also in the market for Spell Shield, Stone Flesh, and/or Reverse Missiles items, tended to mean almost no Iron Flesh items were available...). However, we were very aware that these spells, especially beyond a couple of points, were huge (huge... huge...) balance changers and again it was a bit er... antithetical to what we liked, to have ability so overpowered by magic item ownership.

Some optional rules ideas that can help:

* We added limiting magic item breakdown rules, making it safe to use magic items for a turn or two when you need it, but riskier the longer you use them without letting them cool down, which we rather liked but were somewhat complex for some TFT players.

* Extending the "lightning destroys magic items" rules to not require killing the victim (add a chance that damage shorts into magic items first, which also nicely lets interesting people survive deadly blasts but likely having lost some magic items), and possibly to include other spell effects (e.g. blast trap, staff explosions, hammertouch, any wizard's wrath, shock shield, and magic backlash damage including critical spell failures).

* Have weapon enchantment only be able to do what Fine craftsmanship can do (q.v. Advanced Melee, +2 damage, +1 adjDX max), and not stack with fine weapon effects. Similarly limit armor enchantment to +2, and/or removing the DX penalties of wearing the armor.

[Rick_Smith]

Originally Posted by Skarg

We too almost entirely didn't use attribute adder enchantments (or charms). ...

We DID allow Weapon/Armor enchantment, and Stone Flesh ... However, we were very aware that these spells, especially beyond a couple of points, were huge (huge... huge...) balance changers and again it was a bit er... antithetical to what we liked, to have ability so overpowered by magic item ownership.

Some optional rules ideas that can help:

* We added limiting magic item breakdown rules, making it safe to use magic items for a turn or two when you need it, ...

That is actually a very interesting idea. I have modifiers to magic items which make them stronger or weaker than normal (with a proportional increase or decrease in a cost multiplier). I'm tempted to make this a modifier... item can be made cheaper, but if they are used for more than 2 turns in a row, they risk break down.

Originally Posted by Skarg

* Extending the "lightning destroys magic items" rules to not require killing the victim (add a chance that damage shorts into magic items first, which also nicely lets interesting people survive deadly blasts but likely having lost some magic items), and possibly to include other spell effects (e.g. blast trap, staff explosions, hammertouch, any wizard's wrath, shock shield, and magic backlash damage including critical spell failures).

I like this. I like this a lot. Saying that the Lightning Bolt had to kill the target before the item was effected always seemed strange to me.

Originally Posted by Skarg

* Have weapon enchantment only be able to do what Fine craftsmanship can do (q.v. Advanced Melee, +2 damage, +1 adjDX max), and not stack with fine weapon effects. Similarly limit armor enchantment to +2, and/or removing the DX penalties of wearing the armor.

These bonuses CAN'T stack with fine weapon bonuses? Wow. That seems very strange to me. Is there logic that explains this ruling in game?

Limiting w/a e armor bonus to 2 hits stopped, certainly helps to make magic armor less powerful. (Which I think is a good thing.) A long time ago, with magic people were getting ~ 10 points of armor easily. I've gradually made magic hit protection harder, and now wolves are scary again.

When magic armor was common, people only took light armor (cloth or leather basically), then worked on getting magic protection. Then I said that the weapon / armour enchantment, (armor item), could only DOUBLE the protection of the base armour. So if you had Leather that stopped two, w/a e could stop two. If you had scale mail stopping 4, then w/a e could stop 4.

This made heavy armor (with DX and Movement penalties), more popular.

Warm regards, Rick.

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by Rick_Smith

That is actually a very interesting idea. I have modifiers to magic items which make them stronger or weaker than normal (with a proportional increase or decrease in a cost multiplier). I'm tempted to make this a modifier... item can be made cheaper, but if they are used for more than 2 turns in a row, they risk break down.

Sure. Our (crunchy/detailed) system had each item have a breakdown rating that started with the creator's IQ (max 18) but could erode with excessive use (as it was one of the possible results of overusing an item) - a natural tradeoff would be enchantment time versus item reliability. Each turn of consecutive use would added a modifier to the roll (and some of the results added to that modifier, so players weren't sure what their current modifier really was after a few turns' use), and it was a "fun" table with safe low-end results but possibly bad high-end results which you'd only get to from over-use. (The rules were crunch overkill, but fun crunch overkill.) ;-)

Originally Posted by Rick_Smith

I like this. I like this a lot. Saying that the Lightning Bolt had to kill the target before the item was effected always seemed strange to me.

Yeah, I'd rather tend to see items destroyed than characters. It also means people might carry some magic items for possible life-saving, rather than selling them off, meaning also less wealth- & magic-item- bloat.

Originally Posted by Rick_Smith

These bonuses CAN'T stack with fine weapon bonuses? Wow. That seems very strange to me. Is there logic that explains this ruling in game?

It's mainly just an idea to nerf the ability to have weapons that make people better than others who are more skilled than they are.

The thematic idea is that the magic does something specific - it makes the weapon effectively sharper and more balanced, but there's a limit established for how much of an effect that can have in the fine weapon rules.

Originally Posted by Rick_Smith

Limiting w/a e armor bonus to 2 hits stopped, certainly helps to make magic armor less powerful. (Which I think is a good thing.) A long time ago, with magic people were getting ~ 10 points of armor easily. I've gradually made magic hit protection harder, and now wolves are scary again.

When magic armor was common, people only took light armor (cloth or leather basically), then worked on getting magic protection. Then I said that the weapon / armour enchantment, (armor item), could only DOUBLE the protection of the base armour. So if you had Leather that stopped two, w/a e could stop two. If you had scale mail stopping 4, then w/a e could stop 4.

This made heavy armor (with DX and Movement penalties), more popular.

Yep. When armor gets up around 8-10 or more (and only for those with magic equipment), some humans with weapons also start being unlikely to ever hurt people, which removes the risk and interest from fighting normal people.

And yep, we also noticed that enchanting lighter armor was often a good thing.

Limiting armor enchantment to that of the intrinsic armor is another nice thematic way to do it.

Another is to use some form of Damage to Armor (you can enchant light armor but it won't last long), though the record-keeping for that can be tricky (tends to either be a pain to track, or so simple it's artificial), and it also encourage enchanting heavier armor which means higher armor ratings and less penetrations so it may last a LONG time, and if it's allowed to be repaired indefinitely, then it could just become a record-keeping chore.

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by tbeard1999

I think it will take between 4400 and 6600 xp for a human to reach 40 attribute points. At an average of ~100 xp per session, it will take about a year of weekly game sessions to get there. If characters have a 98% chance of surviving each session (an insultingly high survival rate for my campaigns), only about 1/3 of them will make it to 40 points.

I ran through the numbers for some examples, listed below. I list the EP for just the attributes, followed by estimates including EP for getting Staff up to IQ, and an approximation of what talents/spells I think a PC rising through those stats might likely want from the existing lists. Of course the way PCs get EP is now up to the GM, so how long it takes depends on how much EP the GM gives out. Nevertheless I also ran a comparison with some long-term-surviving actual old PCs in our campaigns.

A wizard going from IQ 16 to IQ 24 would need 26,000 EP (28,400 EP with Staff 24, 31,000 EP with +26 spells).

A dwarf going from DX 6 to DX 14 would need 2,900 EP.

A human going from ST 8 to ST 16 would need 4,700 EP.

A wizard going from 10/11/11 to 11/13/16 would need 5,300 EP (6,900 EP with Staff 16, 9,100 EP with +22 spells).

A warrior going from 12/12/8 to 16/14/9 would need 4,800 EP (6,000 EP with +12 in talents).

A hero going from 11/12/9 to 13/14/13 would need 4,200 EP (6.400 with +22 in talents).

A hero going from 11/12/9 to 12/18/10 would need 7,600 EP (9,800 EP with +22 in talents).

A wizard going from 8/12/12 to 8/12/20 would need 12,300 EP (14,300 EP with Staff 20, 17,300 EP with +30 spells).

An actual TFT character I played from 32 to 42 points, took 3,500 EP in the old rules. In the new rules, would take 6,200 EP for the attributes, 6,600 EP for the talents.

An actual TFT character a friend played in my campaign from 32 to 46 points, took 9,500 EP in the old rules. In the new rules, would take 11,800 EP for the attributes, 12,700 EP for the talents, actually 13,000+ including talents learned & erased by the Wizard's guild to make room for more....