07-15-2018, 06:21 AM | #171 | |
Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: Coquitlam B.C.
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Re: New Skills
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I've added a lot of new talents, and I assure you that characters in my campaign don't feel 'samey'. But in new TFT, you can't be a pirate AND a thief. Someone with IQ 12 is crazy if they take Horsemanship, that is 1/12 of everything they can ever learn. That suggests that the sweet spot is on the side of more memory needed. Warm regards, Rick. |
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07-15-2018, 06:24 AM | #172 | |
Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: Coquitlam B.C.
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Re: New Skills
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I have almost every issue of The Space Gamer (TSG), and I have no memory of that article. Do you happen to know which issue it is in? (If it is too much trouble to find, don't worry about it.) I would love to reread it. Warm regards, Rick. |
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07-15-2018, 06:31 AM | #173 |
Join Date: May 2013
Location: Tyler, Texas
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Re: New Skills
I’m very opposed to turning TFT into a game where you can create characters who effectively can do everything (or almost everything) well. The fact that this *might* describe certain fantasy characters doesn’t matter to me for several reasons.
First, TFT is not attempting to explicitly model those milieus. Second, these characters may be “one-in-a-million” characters; designing the rules to allow such characters anytime turns the game into a parody of Monty Haul campaigning. Third, this type of approach is bad (very bad in my opinion) for gameplay. I’ve found that campaigns tend to work best when each PC can do at least one important thing significantly better than anyone else in the party. Allowing characters who can effectively do everything eliminates this and makes everyone more or less the same. BOOORING. It also robs us of what I consider to be a real TFT strength - players have to make serious tradeoffs. |
07-15-2018, 08:11 AM | #174 |
Join Date: Dec 2017
Location: London Uk, but originally from Scotland
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Re: New Skills
Ok, having spent a couple of hours going through on-line indexes for the Space Gamer, I came up blank. That's because it was actually in issue 15 of Different Worlds, "A Modest Proposal for The Fantasy Trip" by David R. Durham. In my defence, I will say it was a long time ago!
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07-15-2018, 08:17 AM | #175 |
Join Date: Dec 2017
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Re: New Skills
I would say the correct number of talents, the number that makes the game feel richer than when originally published but still TFT, is a ~50 % increase. Much more than that and the whole thing starts to get pretty complicated. Fewer and we'll be left wondering what could have been done with a more ambitious new edition. But, I'm not terribly worried about 'bloat'. The fundamental rule that prevents TFT from getting to complex is the limit on how many talents each character can have, not the total number of talents in the game. TFT feels simple because each character typically only has 5 or 6 talents. Increasing the number of talents in the game just increases the diversity of character types, not the complexity of any one character.
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07-15-2018, 09:39 AM | #176 | |
Join Date: May 2018
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Re: Memory cost of skills.
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If you think a maximum of double IQ in talent points is the sweet spot, what about this?
This would allow up to double the TFT-classic talent points instead of up to roughly 1 1/2 TFT classic talent points. |
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07-15-2018, 10:21 AM | #177 | |
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Arizona
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Re: Memory cost of skills.
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07-15-2018, 11:24 AM | #178 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Carrboro, NC
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Re: Price of talents
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I agree that experience should determine how many talents you can learn, and IQ should limit which talents are available to you. Lots of people are never going to grok calculus, but have mastered enough skills to put their IQ in the upper teens (at least) in the old system. |
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07-15-2018, 11:49 AM | #179 |
Join Date: May 2015
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Re: New Skills
An observation: Limiting talent "slots" to IQ would tend to make it seem optimal to have as many talents as possible be 3's or 2's rather than 1's, which sort of reverses the way they were originally designed.
Slots would also seem to favor taking large chunky talents over ones that come in detailed levels (still mainly UC at this point), but it also discourages knowing a few different weapon talents. (I could learn Tactics and Strategy now, if only I hadn't learned Knife and Shield in addition to Ax/Mace... what?) A few examples for comparison: Bob (a farmer - become - man-at-arms - then Mercenary) learns Knife, Crossbow, Ax/Mace, Shield, Literacy, Horsemanship, Swimming, Climbing, Sex Appeal, Running, Farming, and Boating, that is 14 (learning) points in 12 talents (slots), all of which require only IQ 7 or 8. He's quite capable at many things but has no talents requiring IQ 9+, two 2-point talents, and no 3-point talents. Gary (a combat-focused warrior), learns Sword, Bow, Running, Missile Weapons, Warrior and Veteran. He used 14 (learning) points 6 talents (slots), and the talents required IQ 9. Emanuel (a scholar), learns Literacy, Scholar, Master Physicker, Chemist, Alchemy. He also used 14 (learning) points in 5 talents (slots), and the talents required IQ 14. If the proposal is to let EP be spent for talents but only limited to slots equal to IQ, then: Bob will need IQ 12 to get his talents. He could start with them only if he started with IQ 14. Bob is not allowed to learn any more talents because he is out of slots. (All those varied outdoor proficiencies apparently leave him incapable of learning anything else unless/until he jacks up his IQ.) Gary only used 6 slots, and the highest required IQ is 9, so he could stay IQ 9, and go on to use EP to learn another 3 talents. If he had IQ 12 like Bob, he could learn 6 more talents (even 2- or 3-pointers). Emanuel only used 5 slots, and the highest required IQ is 14. He can go on to learn another 9 talents (even 2- or 3-pointers, except there are not many more 3-pointers to learn except spells - if he did learn 9 spells, that would have required IQ 41 in ITL). This doesn't seem very fair or logical to me. |
07-15-2018, 12:27 PM | #180 | ||
Join Date: May 2018
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Re: New Skills
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What about limiting it to 2x IQ total talent points? |
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