Adding abstractions

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by MikMod

To me, Proxy sounds most coherent. The others are a bit of a stretch I think! Note Long Distance Teleport isn't possible with 'only' a crystal ball view for instance.

Just seeing a small cult of IQ 16 wizard assassins (+ apprentices) who Trance for 'the Cardinals ring', immediately Astrally Project there, and then cast Death. Even if the first one dies, the next will succeed. And they could be located literally anywhere on the planet. Sounds a bit OP to me :)

Well, yes... as written, Astral Projection (and Summon Lesser Demon) are nightmares to try to deal with defensively.

And that is the trap of trying to allow "cool things" but then noticing that your world has opportunities for very horrifying uses of magic.

I'd tend to just have it be a book of versions of spells with side-effects. A wizard probably wrote down spells as he was researching and getting flawed versions of spells, or it was written by an incompetent, delinquent, and/or trickster wizard who messed with the instructions in ways the wizard knew would be chaoitic. Or a collection of students' mistakes that actually did something odd rather than not working, saved for later research to see if they stumbled onto anything useful to be researched into reliable practical spells, but then neglected, lost, sold or stolen, or just an obsolete archive of things that were hoarded and forgotten. Or maybe the book is actually PART of a spell research experiment by a cowardly wizard too afraid to try casting spells that have been mixed up like these. Scrying or a Proxy or Crystal Ball, or some other covert means, could be used just to see what happens.

[KevinJ]

Originally Posted by bat

TFT is such a mathematically sound game, very straightforward, how would one add an abstract idea?

For example, I would like to add an item from my OSR blog to a TFT game, namely, The Book of Miscast Spells. This is a cursed spellbook that has altered spells that put the caster (and potentially others) in danger. How should I approach this idea? If a wizard uses the book correctly things will go wrong for them, but that is the nature of the cursed item.

So here is my advice.
Add whatever you want, just make it work within the TFT mechanics.

For example, I've imported a lot of material I created for 2E AD&D, mostly magic items and concepts. But the mechanics for the new additions have been changed to fit in the framework of TFT while keeping the spirit of the magic from AD&D. I just place them in the Artifact category instead of the normal magic item or item lists.

The following is a quote from the Artifacts document I wrote for myself based on the Artifacts section from ITL. This was for me and based on the world in which it was written for. Other world might not have artifacts at all and other worlds might have no magic and only artifacts.
"Occasionally, characters will find items that can only be described as “It’s like nothing you ever seen before" – items from a more advanced or alien culture. These items are artifacts.
The overall technology on Goranth is medieval – it varies from Stone Age in many places to early Renaissance in a few. Goranth has a well advanced magic system as well, putting it on par with many magical worlds. Anything from a later time period, working on accepted scientific principles, is an artifact. Objects using more or less advanced magical principles are artifacts. Items of a mundane nature, but using materials or processes not available on Goranth are artifacts.
Goranth is also a nexus of activity. Several times in the past, Goranth has been the target of an ‘evil’ Being from another dimension and with each attempt at conquest, new people and new technology (both scientific and magical), has been brought to Goranth."

[bat]

Thank you again for the replies. I'm not trying to convert everything from this blog, but I am shortly running a game of TFT and The Book of Miscast Spells to be a focal point.