Current Play: Portland Debacle

[oldwolf]

With TFT, I think it is critical to point out the deadliness of the combat. That in an actual campaign, any time the PCs find themselves in anything resembling a fair fight, they have screwed up spectacularly in the prior planning department.

TFT requires players to approach combat the way a police swat team approaches a raid on a drug dealer: total surprise and overwhelming force.

The combat does, however require a fair bit of practice. This can be done a couple of ways. 1. Start off a game session with some quick arena combat between NPCs run by the players. The PCs are assumed to be in the audience watching the poor gladiators get their livers carved out. Afterwards the PCs can discuss what worked, what didn't and why they would never be gladiators, while having a brew at the local tavern. This then transitions to their planning for the sessions main adventure. Or. 2. Arrange to start with in character combat training using practice weapons that leave marks and some bruises but no actual injury. In this case the players use their normal PCs and the training is part of the roleplay. This works quite well if the PCs are all part of some organized group: A mercenary company, local militia, retainers of the local minor lord, etc. Once more, after the practice combat the PCs gather someplace, perhaps the mess hall, and plan the sessions main adventure.

[JustAnotherJarhead]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

TFT is simply a poor fit for players who expect to win as the 'default' case, or who want to be clearly signaled when they are in a situation that carries a risk of defeat. It is hard to play TFT without a significant risk of defeat...

Lars nails it again.

Heroic games are for heroic players.

TFT has always been the mortal game for 'normal' players who don't actually EXPECT to survive a heavy crossbow bolt to the chest.

Just the shortage of healing type magic lays out the mortality and realism of the system from day one.

It's also what makes TFT awesome for decades now, and for decades to come.

[GranitePenguin]

Originally Posted by oldwolf

With TFT, I think it is critical to point out the deadliness of the combat. That in an actual campaign, any time the PCs find themselves in anything resembling a fair fight, they have screwed up spectacularly in the prior planning department.

Originally Posted by JustAnotherJarhead

TFT has always been the mortal game for 'normal' players who don't actually EXPECT to survive a heavy crossbow bolt to the chest.

I have the same love/hate relationship with Rolemaster. The deadliness of the systems promote the RP part of RPG. Fighting is the tactic of last resort, because you are likely to get killed if you do. Roleplaying your way out of a situation is a better option if possible, and IMHO makes for a much more interesting game. If all you want is a hack-n-slash HP-fest, this isn't necessarily the right choice to accomplish that.

[DarkPumpkin]

Originally Posted by GranitePenguin

I have the same love/hate relationship with Rolemaster. The deadliness of the systems promote the RP part of RPG. Fighting is the tactic of last resort, because you are likely to get killed if you do. Roleplaying your way out of a situation is a better option if possible, and IMHO makes for a much more interesting game. If all you want is a hack-n-slash HP-fest, this isn't necessarily the right choice to accomplish that.

The difference with Rolemaster is that character creation is a major undertaking in that game. The mismatch between investing hours in a character then dying in 10 minutes is a near-fatal flaw in the system. At least TFT doesn't have that problem.

[GranitePenguin]

Originally Posted by DarkPumpkin

The difference with Rolemaster is that character creation is a major undertaking in that game. The mismatch between investing hours in a character then dying in 10 minutes is a near-fatal flaw in the system. At least TFT doesn't have that problem.

Man, you aren't kidding about that. That was so excessive our first sessions used to be "character gen parties" because there was no way you were going to play that first day. I actually wrote a program back in 92-93 to do a lot of the heavy lifting, which is just insane.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Chris Rice

For a first play, I'd always give the players pre-generated characters. For a start off it saves time, but it also means they wont design characters that aren't going to work well (like the low adj DX characters you mention).

This is true of most games.

The further the game from the player's prior experience, the more likely, unless character generation is totally random. And TFT is decidedly NOT random.

[larsdangly]

Word to the wise: One way to manage PC risk with the desire to do dangerous seeming stuff on adventures is to pack your dungeons (temples, whatever) with a diverse pallet of obstacles and threats that mostly consists of things other than balanced fights with armed monsters. Examples include: natural obstacles and traps (the risk of which can be closely managed by the GM, while presenting interesting puzzles to the players), nuisance creatures, bugs, plants and other weird things that only threaten you in specific ways, and non-combat encounters. Think Indiana Jones rather than Temple of Elemental Evil.

[Chris Rice]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

Word to the wise: One way to manage PC risk with the desire to do dangerous seeming stuff on adventures is to pack your dungeons (temples, whatever) with a diverse pallet of obstacles and threats that mostly consists of things other than balanced fights with armed monsters. Examples include: natural obstacles and traps (the risk of which can be closely managed by the GM, while presenting interesting puzzles to the players), nuisance creatures, bugs, plants and other weird things that only threaten you in specific ways, and non-combat encounters. Think Indiana Jones rather than Temple of Elemental Evil.

Exactly. If every encounter in your dungeons is a well matched challenge for the party (a la Death Test), then the characters won't last very long in this game. Tough battles should be a highlight rather than the norm if you want any chance of longevity.

[Helborn]

There is another option which I found in a number of the Dark City Games games - use underpowered opponents - pit your 32 pt characters against 28 pt or 30 pt characters. This allows them to learn the system while facing opponents with ST of 10 or 9, AdjDX of 9 or 8 and IQ of 8 which allows them to survive without being outclassed from the outset. Damage is less, number of times hit is less and talents are minimal. Just enough to give a serious challenge while they're learning the system.

Anyone who doesn't understand that a balanced system where you kill an opponent with one blow means that you can be killed with one blow either learns quickly or walks away to find a kindlier fantasy