03-13-2018, 08:42 AM | #11 | |
Join Date: May 2013
Location: Tyler, Texas
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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Incredibly evocative to someone who loved Star Trek, war movies and what little military sci-fi existed in the mid-1970. Mainly Starship Troopers and an odd little pulp novel called “Siege of Earth” by Matthew Faucette. The next week, I had was in the local hobby store looking at model rockets when I blundered into the game section. There was Ogre, along with several issues of the Space Gamer magazine. I bought Ogre and two magazines. I eventually bought every Microgame, primarily because they were cheap. |
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03-13-2018, 12:41 PM | #12 |
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Arizona
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
Yeah Ty, I loved the microgames too. How could you go wrong? For $3 you were getting a fully playable game that you could play fairly quickly and multiple times. Even if it turned out to be a lousy game, you weren't out much, but most of them were pretty good and pretty much ALL of the early ones were superb. This compared with a $30 game that would require a ping pong table to set up and several months of your time to play...
Of course, nowadays, I guess they simply can't do it any more. Even a cheap microgame would probably cost $10 to $15, and I can tell you that those old "$30 games" now run you anywhere from $100 to $300 (and a couple of them, even $400). |
03-13-2018, 05:11 PM | #13 |
Join Date: Mar 2018
Location: Berkshire - UK
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
I'm not sure of the year - Probably 1981 - 1982. A new type of game shop opened in my home town Aldershot (UK). The shop has progressed since then to become a key UK games distributor (Esdevium Games). Up to that point there were either toy shops or model shops - and this place had stuff in I'd never seen before - Weird model figures by Citadel, and big boxed games that were beyond my budget, but they all looked so cool. Then there was a little rack of bagged games which I could afford - MicroGames. Melee looked like it woudl be a good choice, so that's the one I went for. Me and a couple of mates took to it straight away, so I went back the next week to get Wizard.
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03-13-2018, 08:17 PM | #14 |
Join Date: Jan 2006
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
I have in my garage a complete set of TFT rules in mint condition. This includes all the Metagaming magazines and all the post SJ modules.
I bought the game because it was cheap and had great cover art. Easy to create characters and I must have ran Death Test a thousand times - one of the best game modules ever published. Only RPG you could carry in your shirt pocket including miniatures. At the NTRPGCON an ex TSR employee says they played the game at night as their favorite game. He runs the game at NTRPGCON often. I have played in his games and that game runs very very well as is. I say republish it as close to the original as possible. |
03-13-2018, 11:01 PM | #15 |
Banned
Join Date: Mar 2018
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
Leader: "We will have Grabby, the thief, check for traps!; does he spot anything?" LOL!
Last edited by Jim Kane; 03-13-2018 at 11:02 PM. Reason: Typo |
03-14-2018, 11:36 AM | #16 | |
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Alsea, OR
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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I got started with TFT sophomore year in HS, 84-85... my buddy Dan had melee. We played the heck out of it, I bought melee and wizard, plus advanced melee and advanced wizard. It would be over a year before I met a copy of In The Labyrinth... ... but I had Dragons of Underearth and the 1981 Fantasy Master's Codex. So, I was able to work around the lack of ITL. Mostly, I used TFT to play solos. My favorite run was a Reptilite Knight through Grail Quest, with his riding lizard. |
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03-14-2018, 12:08 PM | #17 | |
Join Date: May 2013
Location: Tyler, Texas
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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RPGS: AD&D DM Guide $15 ($45) AD&D PHB and MM $12 each ($36 each) Runequest Rules $12 ($36) Runequest Boxed $20 ($60) Traveller boxed 3 book set $12 ($36) Metagaming Grailquest $4 ($12) TFT 3 books $16 ($48) Gear: TSR Polyhedral Dice Set - the crappy kind that eroded, with the d4 that could be used as caltrops - $3 ($9) Gamescience opaque polyhedral dice $0.90 each – ($2.70 each) Gamescience transparent polyhedral dice $1.50 each – ($4.50 each) 25mm Heritage man-sized miniatures $0.68 each ($2.04) The dice prices explain why only using d6s was attractive. Two sets of 5 polyhedrals could cost $24 to $45 in 2018 dollars. That was 50-100% of the cost of TFT and 25-50% of the cost of AD&D. Boardgames AH Squad Leader (average sized boardgame) $15 ($45) AH The Longest Day - monster game - $65 ($195) SPI The Next War - smaller monster game - $34 ($102) Yaquinto Armor $24 - large boardgame - $24 ($72) Conclusions Game books are MUCH cheaper today. The modern D&D books actually cost less than the AD&D books, but have twice as many pages and are in full color. Dice are MUCH cheaper - $2.40 to $4.50 versus 20 cents apiece in the “pound of dice” sets on Amazon. Boardgames are MORE expensive. The Next War had 3 mapsheets and 2400 counters and cost $102 in today’s dollars. Fall Blau by Compass Games has 3 mapsheets and 1000 counters and costs $140. Squad Leader had ~700 counters and a 22x28 map for $45. A similar product from Lock-n-Load (~700 counters, but twice the map area) is $85. Prices for boardgames vary tremendously today, of course, but it looks like modern board wargames cost an average of about 1.6 times their 1980 counterparts. The games are much more colorful; 4 color printing is ubiquitous. The rulebooks, player aids, maps and counters are often full color (and often horrid to look at, especially counters). These “improvements” seldom improve the game play much in my opinion. But I suspect the reason boardgames are more expensive is that they’re being produced in FAR smaller batches than in 1981. |
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03-14-2018, 12:10 PM | #18 | |
Join Date: May 2013
Location: Tyler, Texas
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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:D |
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03-14-2018, 04:50 PM | #19 | |
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Arizona
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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(I just did a price check -- they are selling the 2nd edition + expansion pack, for $450 now, which would be $150 in 1980 dollars). Can you imagine trying to come up with $150 for such a game back in the 1970's-'80's? I can't. That would have been like my parents' monthly mortgage payment back then...) |
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03-14-2018, 05:35 PM | #20 | |
Join Date: May 2013
Location: Tyler, Texas
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Re: The Obligatory “How Did You Get Started in TFT” Thread
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Last edited by tbeard1999; 03-14-2018 at 05:53 PM. |
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