TFT: Battle - Playtesters Sought

[Chris Rice]

Hi Shad. PM sent.

[ParadoxGames]

If you can't send a PM to Shadekeep here, you can join the TFT Discord server (the link is below), and send the PM to either Shadekeep, or, if you can't, Tollenkar. A channel is opening up on Discord for playtesting, so if you join, you're ahead of the game.

[Shadekeep]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hackard

Edited to add: This is a good reason not to rely solely on PMs for this sort of thing, BTW. Shadekeep, do you have an alternate contact method for the new posters?

Yes, a number of them have contacted me directly on the Discord, so it looks like folks who are interested are finding a way. Thanks, Andrew!

[Shadekeep]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

Will your 'game within a game' be resolved on a hex map, like Melee?

Will it occur at the same or larger scale (i.e., compared to Melee)?

Yes, it's on a hex map. The rules are written to utilise TFT's "village map" scale, but there are guidelines for taking it up or down to other scales.

Thanks to comments on the Discord, I just added a quick section on taking it down to Melee scale level, where each unit represents an individual. This is in case you want huge Lord Of The Rings dungeon brawls that don't take forever to play out.

[larsdangly]

That is great; I think it is important that a system like this 'work', in a self-similar fashion, at both individual scales and at 1:5, 1:10, etc. scales. I.e., ideally, it would fill the roles of both a fast-play skirmish table top game (1:1) and as TFT's equivalent of Squad Leader.

By the way, if you are still mulling over design elements, the house rules I drew up on this topic are heavily inspired by the Panzer Grenadier system (Avalanche Press), which has an outstanding system for initiative, command and control. It has a very creative solution to the challenges that arise in hex and chit battle games where you have each side do a ton of things all at once.

Another useful (and more accessible) thing to consider is to look at Chainmail and think about the way its core mass combat system would work if you used it for both the intended 1:20 and for 1:1 scale (or things in between). I've done this for many years (I even distributed a fantasy 'heart breaker' game, called Platemail, that lays out how it works), and it is surprisingly easy and effective.

[Shadekeep]

I'm very much hoping that playtesting will bring exactly these kinds of ideas and improvements to Battle. As it stands it is designed in vacuo by one person and limited to just what he (me) knows and thinks of. Hopefully by synthesis we all together will build a much better end product, one worthy of players' time and the TFT name.

My current design leans very heavily on TFT mechanics, so that it won't be utterly alien to RPG players who've never played a wargame, but at the same time is operationally distinct. Whether I've successfully created a transition from TFT attributes to Battle stats will be one of the big questions that playtesting will uncover. Another will be how well or poorly the map system works.

I've gotten a lot of responses already, many from people I had hoped would volunteer, and I'm really looking forward to getting this into your hands soon!

[larsdangly]

I totally agree on that point; it is essential that a module like this feels like it is seamlessly integrated with the core rules.

Another really important thing about skirmish- and larger scale combat is that it be capable of resolving outcomes without paperwork.

When I drew up rules of this sort for TFT, my first thought was to discretize the outcomes of attack rolls into several basic things:
- Nothing, or a minor wound not worth tracking
- Minor wound (you are not knocked down, but have effectiveness impacted on next turn).
- Major wound (you are knocked down. lose next action, and must stand before acting again)
- Dead

The way I thought this progression of outcomes should be addressed was through comparison with other good hex and chit games involving combat at this scale: You have a marker with a couple of attributes that indicates the capabilities of that unit. If the unit takes a 'minor wound' (or whatever phrase you want to use for units), it is marked with a temporary marker indicating it is disrupted or in some other way reduced in capabilities until the marker is removed. If the unit takes a 'major wound' it is flipped over, revealing the reduced capabilities of the badly degraded version of that unit. This is often referred to as a 'step loss' in such games. If the unit is killed/wiped out, it is removed from play (or possibly replaced with a marker if it takes up a meaningful amount of space at the scale of play).

The next thing to consider is how a TFT character's core stats, gear and talents should be abstracted into basic unit traits (like, an offensive score, defensive score and movement rate). My approach was to have the Offensive score be based on the expected damage value of the figure's average attack and the Defensive score be equal to armor (possibly tweaked for special talents when appropriate). Movement score is just MA (where turn time is set in proportion to hex scale so this is sensible).

[Shadekeep]

As you will see, we are on the same page regarding a lot of this. I don't want to disclose too much while it's in development status, but I suspect you are going to see some very strong similarities in my approach. Even in regards to terminology. As would be expected when you have two grognards working on the same goal. ^_^

[LusitanianBarbarian]

Looking forward to testing this out!

[FireHorse]

I'm hoping that this system also works well for 'Skirmishes' — fights involving just a few too many participants to handle normally, but not quite so many that you'd call it a large-scale 'Battle'.

I am working on an adventure that includes some action on the deck of a ship, where the map must (by necessity) be at normal combat hex scale, with only a few dozen combatants in total. I had been toying with ways to handle it quickly and easily, mostly centered on combining many of the non-PCs into groups that roll as one… but I'm quite new to TFT, and I doubt that my solution is properly balanced or comprehensive.

So, lead the way, Shadekeep!