Advanced Combat Skills

[Skarg]

I think these are a lot closer to ok.

* It's good you can't start as a 32-point UC/Weapon Master now. You can still be a 32-point weapon Expert, though, and it might not be a bad choice. (I'm curious how ST 11 DX 11 IQ 10 weapon expert fares against plain 32-point warriors.)

* I want there to be Shield Expertise, but so far there's no limit/tradeoff to start with it. Maybe IQ 10 DX 11? But mainly I don't like it being a thing everyone can get from the start and should if they use a shield, especially if it depletes restricted IQ points for talents.

My main concerns at this point are:

* I don't know if the base UC damage goes above 1d-4 for ST as in AM, or not. Can't fully assess without that info.

* You still have large chunks of various abilities combined into talents that suddenly give a transformation of abilities when someone gains an expert/master talent compared to the day before when they lacked that talent - it's like gaining several attributes at once.

* I am not really liking that the trade-off seems to be IQ and reduced attribute focus to get expertise. The weapon/shield expertise and higher UC levels I sort of think should just not be allowed to start with (unless the character is supposed to be very experienced) and I'd like the way to get them to instead be actually needing exceptional levels of training and/or experience.

It feels unfortunately mechanical and gamey to me to have there be a heavy consideration/trade-off about whether to be stamped an Expert or Master and need to raise IQ, or to just raise ST & DX instead - that's hard for me to understand what it's supposed to represent.

So I'm thinking I'd probably lower the IQ requirements to maybe 9 for Expert, 11 for Master, and have guidelines in terms of how much actual training & experience time someone needs for it to make sense for someone to have those, and have them available for a pile of XP.

[RobW]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Weapon Expertise/Mastery does not preclude wearing armor, though with 40-point cap and the shrewd penalties, it makes it unclear what's the best combination, especially with the IQ 13 Master requirement. Also I think the use of Warrior/Veteran/Hardened and fine equipment could slide things around. Did you assume that people would always use shrewd attacks?

I agree, it is unclear what the best combination of weapons/armor/skills is. Which is a great improvement, I'm sure you agree. I've tried out a few of your suggestions below.

To clarify a few things, in the previous sim, the expert/master always did shrewd. Also, the sim is not sophisticated, it does model damage effects, but the two fighters just stand and deliver. Knock downs and standing up, but no defending, disengaging, conditional shrewding, nerve blows, throws, etc. No dropped or broken weapons (presumably that is about fatal but evens out). I'll leave out duels with pole weapons as that gets complicated quickly as we found out on the Brainiac list a while back.

Originally Posted by Skarg

I'd be curious about stats for several other designs / tactics, such as:

Here's a few of your suggestions:
Bas40 = ST13 DX19 IQ8, chain + s shield + shield expertise
Exp40 = ST13 DX17 IQ10, cloth + s shield + shield expertise (always shrewd) -- Bas40 and Exp40 same from last time
NoShr = the same as Exp40 but never uses shrewd
1119X = ST 11 DX 19 IQ 10, no armor, sword expert, s shield + shield expert - always using shrewd attacks
1116M = ST 11 DX 16 IQ 13, no armor, sword master, s shield + shield expert - always using shrewd attacks
1515X = ST 15, DX 15, IQ 10, chainmail, Veteran, battleaxe expert, never shrewd
1416X = ST 14, DX 16, IQ 10, fine plate, Veteran, sword expert, never shrewd
UCV = ST11 DX15 IQ14, no armor


..... Bas40 Exp40 NoShr 1119X 1116M 1515X 1416X UCV..
Bas40 ----- 0.423 0.719 0.324 0.451 0.398 0.100 0.618
Exp40 0.543 ----- 0.429 0.076 0.148 0.490 0.749 0.312
NoShr 0.272 0.586 ----- 0.394 0.534 0.399 0.090 0.524
1119X 0.636 0.929 0.604 ----- 0.751 0.935 0.971 0.504
1116M 0.562 0.880 0.448 0.266 ----- 0.865 0.933 0.392
1515X 0.571 0.481 0.572 0.061 0.152 ----- 0.393 0.496
1416X 0.881 0.246 0.910 0.031 0.061 0.572 ----- 0.726
UCV.. 0.393 0.670 0.478 0.533 0.587 0.534 0.278 -----



It seems like the picture is that yes equipment and skills are important, but nothing dominates, at least with the slug-it-out tactics here.

[Skarg]

Interesting, thanks! Particularly interesting how some of the matches are won so convincingly, and the difference between Exp40 and NoShrewd (the same adjDX 16 character).

UC V seems to be better than armed weapon masters even without disarming them or tossing them into HTH (not good, IMO*) but not as good against armored weapon masters.

(* Even in kung fu films, unarmed masters tend to be cautious of weapon masters and disarm them before beating them up.)

[JLV]

Now I'm wondering if Missile Weapons isn't a little "underpriced" at this point. Maybe it should still be (3)? That seems like it would be more in keeping with the spirit of these new talents.

I like these new talents, and I think the new descriptions are MUCH closer to being balanced than the old ones are.

However, I think Skarg has a valid point on the bare-hands damage thing -- if it's now 1d-4 regardless of your strength, then these skills may now actually be somewhat underpowered (for the cost) instead of overpowered! If we just keep the regular bare-hands damage table (AM 21), then I think we're about there with the UC talents.

I'm really liking the advanced weapons talents (though I'm assuming the new version of the Main Gauche is the operative one here).

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by JLV

Now I'm wondering if Missile Weapons isn't a little "underpriced" at this point. Maybe it should still be (3)? That seems like it would be more in keeping with the spirit of these new talents.

They are still (3) for +3 - they're just now available at (1) for +1 or (2) for +2, too (non-stacking).

Originally Posted by JLV

However, I think Skarg has a valid point on the bare-hands damage thing -- if it's now 1d-4 regardless of your strength, then these skills may now actually be somewhat underpowered (for the cost) instead of overpowered! If we just keep the regular bare-hands damage table (AM 21), then I think we're about there with the UC talents.

I'm waiting to analyze until after finding out what the numbers are.

[JLV]

Originally Posted by Skarg

They are still (3) for +3 - they're just now available at (1) for +1 or (2) for +2, too (non-stacking).

Okay I went back and re-read the Talent description. I see that I was missing the additive nature of the skill. However, Skarg, from the description:

Originally Posted by Steve Jackson

Missile Weapons (1): A high degree of skill with whatever missile weapons the figure has the talent for, attained by constant practice. May also be used with missile spells which the figure knows. This talent gives the user a +1 DX on all missile weapons (and spells!) that he knows. This DX counts toward speed of fire for bows, as well as accuracy. Missile Weapons talent can be chosen two or even three times, for a +2 or +3 bonus.
(I can argue that it might be allowable up to 5 times, if you like Robin Hood or Agincourt.)

it seems to me that they ARE stacking. I spend the necessary XP (100, if I understand the XP rules correctly) to buy Missile Weapons +1. Then I spend another 100 XP to buy Missile Weapons +2. I do it again for Missile Weapons +3 (and possibly again two more times for +4 and +5, if we believe Steve's parenthetical comment).

So now I'm confused. Why do you say they aren't stacking?

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by JLV

So now I'm confused. Why do you say they aren't stacking?

Sorry. I was trying to clarify that I didn't mean there was a 1, 2, and 3 version that could be combined up to +6.

(And Steve's saying maybe up to +5.)

[JLV]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Sorry. I was trying to clarify that I didn't mean there was a 1, 2, and 3 version that could be combined up to +6.

(And Steve's saying maybe up to +5.)

Okay, I went back and re-read everything, and have reached the conclusion that, once again, I failed my reading comprehension IQ roll.

My apologies for confusing the issue here unnecessarily!

[Skarg]

Speaking of complicating things, I wonder if anyone has any experience with bow & crossbow marksmanship enough to offer an opinion:

Should Missile Weapons be broken down into Bow versus Crossbow? Seems to me that if we're doing that for Weapon Mastery, from my limited but not-non-existent experience, it seems like maybe it should be broken down into Bow, Crossbow, Sling, Spells. Or maybe just a note that GMs who want more detail might want to do that.

I guess it's just a fiddly detail, though. I've seen hundreds and hundreds of TFT characters with Missile Weapons, and I don't remember off-hand more than one or two examples of anyone with it using more than one type of missile, anyway.

[Skarg]

[HOWITZER]
Speaking of complicating things, I wonder if anyone has any experience with bow & crossbow marksmanship enough to offer an opinion:

Should Missile Weapons be broken down into Bow versus Crossbow? Seems to me that if we're doing that for Weapon Mastery, from my limited but not-non-existent experience, it seems like maybe it should be broken down into Bow, Crossbow, Sling, Spells. Or maybe just a note that GMs who want more detail might want to do that.

I guess it's just a fiddly detail, though. I've seen hundreds and hundreds of TFT characters with Missile Weapons, and I don't remember off-hand more than one or two examples of anyone with it using more than one type of missile, anyway.
[/HOWITZER]