Fear and Loathing In TFT

[Chris Rice]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

You have two choices, basically: Either treat each such trait or ability as a Talent and roll vs. IQ, or add an additional set of attributes, a'la the Personality score option in ITL. Both are obviously 'workable' in the sense that it is easy to come up with versions that function well in play. So, the choice really has to do with your game design aesthetics.

If you are a minimalist then I'd say add a handful of relevant talents, accept that IQ is just a score that means 'how good I am at non-DX or ST based talents', and treat it as you would Charisma, Sex Appeal, New Followers or Diplomacy or any number of other talents that involve thoughts and emotions. The risk is that you go bananas and write 100 of these sorts of new talents, or make up a new sub system for each, and now you are playing something that looks casually like TFT but is much more bloated.

If you add new attributes it will be more aesthetically pleasing in the sense that things like bravery or piety can develop separately from other IQ based talents, and perhaps that seems more 'right' or true to human character. But of course now your character sheet has a half dozen attributes and lots of old material needs to get revised - it feels more like a significantly new edition or even new game.

No, I can't accept any correlation between IQ/INT and bravery, that just doesn't wash with me. There are brave stupid people and brave clever people, and the reverse. So either it's a talent or a new attribute. No other option I can see.