IQ rise and talents

[JLV]

Originally Posted by the1weasel

So is it possible for me to unlearn my Staff to Snake spell, now that my Staff is way to formidable and valuable for me to risk by turning it into a lowly snake to fight for me until it’s killed? And can I get some XP or a spell slot back for that?

Why would you need to? Under the new system, there is no effective limit on how many spells you can learn, so if you happen to know that particular one, and make the command decision to not use it, it doesn't impair your character's future learning in any way. The only downside is that you learned it in the first place, thus "wasting" either a slot (at the time of character creation) or some time and effort (in terms of the XP) you spent to learn the spell.

Honestly, I wouldn't give anyone any XP back for "unlearning" something; it's not like you can go back in time and "undo" an action in the game. You chose to learn it in the first place without anyone twisting your arm; if you later decide you made a bad choice, well, choose more wisely next time. I know that sounds harsh, but, it's the way I'd run it. No "do overs" in the game. (And, canonically speaking, that policy is fully implied by the "if you do or say it, so does your character" rule, which also doesn't allow you to "I take it back, I didn't mean it"...)

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by JLV

Why would you need to? ...

You wouldn't logically need to forget the old spell, or gain re-usable XP for it, you're right, that doesn't make a lot of sense.

But by removing the old system for learning talents completely, and replacing it only with a system balanced for 36-37+ point very experienced people squeezing in more and more talents and spells, it also removed the ability of low-attribute characters (like most non-PCs, given the average NPC human is 30 points) to learn any new spells or talents without using as much XP as the preview PDF table shows it takes to become a notably above-average character.

Mr. 29-points: "Hmm, I finally have 500 XP and could learn how to swim, ride a horse, brawl or carouse... one of those, OR I could gain FIVE ATTRIBUTE POINTS.

In original ITL, if anyone had not yet used all his IQ points, he would need ZERO XP to learn a new talent - he'd just need to spend TIME studying it. If anyone increased their IQ by one, they could gain such a free point, for no more cost, again by spending the time to study it.

So lower-level characters can and did do a fair amount of learning new talents and spells. Now it requires huge amounts of XP compared to the cost to transform your attributes from average to very capable, something many people in world never do, considering the average, again, is 30 points.

i.e. There is a missing mechanic for learning talents and spells without using the XP method which was originally proposed, and still described as, a method for above-average people to push their limits when they start to become high-attribute characters.

[Shadekeep]

Originally Posted by JLV

Honestly, I wouldn't give anyone any XP back for "unlearning" something; it's not like you can go back in time and "undo" an action in the game. You chose to learn it in the first place without anyone twisting your arm; if you later decide you made a bad choice, well, choose more wisely next time. I know that sounds harsh, but, it's the way I'd run it. No "do overs" in the game. (And, canonically speaking, that policy is fully implied by the "if you do or say it, so does your character" rule, which also doesn't allow you to "I take it back, I didn't mean it"...)

Agreed, this is the way it should work. Particularly in a role-playing game, where the main mechanic is right there in the name. You're not tweaking a video game character for maximum efficiency, you're playing a person with all the virtues and flaws that it implies.

If your character works as a baker for 30 years and suddenly decides, "man, I should have gone to Physicker School", well, no amount of dragon forgetting-powers is going to turn that clock back. The best they can do is start learning now to make up for lost time. And maybe look for some youth potions.

[The Wyzard]

I think this can probably be fixed by the individual GM tweaking XP costs. Something I noted in ITL is that you don't get XP for combat results as you do in Melee/Wizard (or, IIRC, original ITL) - the award is per-session. That's interestingly different, and it changes the feel a lot.

It also means that since XP awards are arbitrary, you can scale the costs however you want. For example, I'd knock a zero off of them all, since I don't see anything that isn't divisible by ten anyway.

Something like this:
1. PCs gain 1-10 XP per session, depending on the length and difficulty of the session.
2. A talent or spell costs 10 points (with the normal multipliers for heroes buying spells or wizards buying talents, multipoint talents, etc.)
3. Your first additional attribute point costs 10 points, with each additional one having the cost multiplied by 1.5, rounding down, unless rounding up gets you to a number that ends with 5 or 0.
4. Lesser wishes are 20, but you can only have one at a time. Manastaff upgrades are 15 XP.
5. Buying money with XP is stupid and I'm not writing rules for it, thanks for coming to my TED talk.

That's probably less than 200 words of house rules, took me five minutes to write, and I'm pretty happy with them. XP in ITL is simple enough that you can house rule it however you want without breaking much of anything.

Addendum: This is what attribute costs would look like if you used the above math.
33rd: 10
34th: 15
35th: 22
36th: 33
37th: 50
38th: 75
39th: 112
40th: 168

Things still level off pretty sharply in the attribute department, but your 38th point is only 7.5 times as expensive as your first attribute purchase, instead of 16 times as expensive. Alternately you could do something even more level than this, say just having each attribute point beyond the 37th cost ten more XP than the previous one. If you can get five or six points worth of talents for the cost of one attribute point, that might do the trick, even if they don't continue to increase exponentially in cost.

It pretty much depends on what you want your campaign to look like.

You could even have flat costs for everything and just adjust the amount of XP you give out per adventure as the campaign goes on.

[platimus]

Originally Posted by JLV

Why would you need to? Under the new system, there is no effective limit on how many spells you can learn, so if you happen to know that particular one, and make the command decision to not use it, it doesn't impair your character's future learning in any way. The only downside is that you learned it in the first place, thus "wasting" either a slot (at the time of character creation) or some time and effort (in terms of the XP) you spent to learn the spell.

Honestly, I wouldn't give anyone any XP back for "unlearning" something; it's not like you can go back in time and "undo" an action in the game. You chose to learn it in the first place without anyone twisting your arm; if you later decide you made a bad choice, well, choose more wisely next time. I know that sounds harsh, but, it's the way I'd run it. No "do overs" in the game. (And, canonically speaking, that policy is fully implied by the "if you do or say it, so does your character" rule, which also doesn't allow you to "I take it back, I didn't mean it"...)

I agree. I wouldn't give any XP back either. I thought I was being generous with my ruling for forgetting a spell. I would never allow a Talent to be forgotten.

[hcobb]

Heroes need IQ as they are always rolling against that.

Wizards need DX as they very rarely roll against IQ.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by JLV

Why would you need to? Under the new system, there is no effective limit on how many spells you can learn, so if you happen to know that particular one, and make the command decision to not use it, it doesn't impair your character's future learning in any way.

I was thinking about this too and for some reason, it bothers me. Is it right or realistic (and I know that is a loaded term) to have no limits whatsoever on the talents and spells that a character can aquire? Shouldn't it get more difficult to learn new things at a certain point? Why wouldn't costs go up eventually?

[platimus]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Heroes need IQ as they are always rolling against that.

Wizards need DX as they very rarely roll against IQ.

Color me intrigued. I'm having trouble figuring out how these statements relate to this discussion. Can you elaborate or provide some context?

[Wayne]

I think this is what he means:

Spells you roll vs DX to succeed

Most non weapon (but not all) talents require an IQ roll
Eg. Ac. Hearing, alertness, animal handler, bard etc

[hcobb]

I.e. IQ is of reduced value in the new TFT. However I think it is about balanced now.

Heroes need to roll 8 dice it'll be against IQ, but an 8 die roll for a wizard would usually be against DX.