Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/dragon_safari.html

Let me know which items you found the most profitable please.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Ok. Would you please define "refill" in "on a success refill food and water."?


Also, I think this mercenary's talents look like a typo:
Human Hero Mercenary recruit ST 11 DX 12 IQ 12 MA 10
Mace(2d-1) Small Shield(1)
Alertness, Ax/Mace, Carousing, Goblinish, Horsemanship, Humanish, Knife, Missile Weapons, Quarterstaff, Recognize Value, Shield, Sword, Unarmed Combat I

* You don't list what level of Missile Weapons
* You don't list any missile weapon talents, so Missile Weapons seems unusable and inappropriate unless he's used to being equipped with lightning rods or something.
* He's a 35 point character with IQ 12 and 16-18 points in talents?


Actually, a lot of them seem to have a few more talents than IQ (mainly due to redundant weapon talents), and don't seem to be equipped with the weapons they have talents for.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

These are medium level characters. Good catch on missile weapons, will add a test for that.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

If anyone wants to try joining my play-by-post (i.e. slow) play of this adventure, please come join on the TFT Discord server at https://discord.gg/QmQ8JNg .


(Just an aside, but they seem to pretty much all have a lot of peculiar talents, especially languages and peculiar weapons they don't use. It doesn't really affect playing the scenario, and may be more of a comment of the new weird XP/talent rules, but if he'd started as a 32-point PC, he'd have to spend 400 XP on attributes and (even if he started with IQ 12) 2000 - 3000 XP on random talents. I'm actually very amused/entertained, because it reminds me of the various times in our old TFT campaigns that, even with human-designed mercenaries and NPC companions, the players were often bemused by the peculiar and not-really-helpful abilities of their NPC assistants.)

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Possible typo below starting out: *"then return to Dranning to reset."
Rest or Reset ?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

It's a reset as you get new hirelings.

I'd like to automate all the encounter rolls, but I really don't want to run a big local database with everybody's characters in it.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I rewrote the food entry.

I'll check on PHP session stuff to see if I can automate the adventure some.

Any suggestions on map terrain?

My concepts so far are:
* Clear ground with a slope in a random direction.
* Dry stream bed with broken ground going down the middle, slopes up to either side.
* Ridge line across the map with slopes down on either side.
* Boulder field
* shrubbery
* forest
etc

And I added everybody's favorite mountainside (literately) combat map.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

* Road in mostly open terrain.
* For mountains, much less accessible ground, with rocks, rough ground, trees, shrubs, slopes, things that can be stood upon.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I apologize in advance. This might seem harsh.

Introduction
This is a TFT adventure for (a party of) one or more to four starting characters. The party's leader must have the Animal Handler(pg. 37), Literacy(pg. 36) and Woodsman(pg. 41) talents. This character is issued a prospecting license by the The Wizards' Guild(pg. 60). The license asserts the named character's authorization to transport dangerous substances and lists contact details for the authorizing Guildmaster. They are also issued a one pound book listing the ingredients the Guild is interested in. The party's leader has been hired by the Wizards' Guild to collect the following ingredients for their magical concoctions.

(list items here)

The party leader also starts with a bonus mule(pg. 88) they have trained themselves. Example Mule: ST 25, DX 14, IQ 6, MA 20. Kicks for 1d+1. Maximum load: 300 pounds.

The leader then needs to buy the following items from their starting $1,000.

The party's leader starts with the following items:

(starting items list)

The party's leader also starts with a bonus mule(pg. 88) they have trained themselves. Example Mule: ST 25, DX 14, IQ 6, MA 20. Kicks for 1d+1. Maximum load: 300 pounds.

This leaves the party's leader with $560 to buy weapons, clothing, armor, etc. The mule is lightly loaded at slightly less than 4xST.

The other members of the party (if any) are outfitted normally.
###And how is that? ITL page#s?

The Mercanaries
###Don't break this paragraph up with an awful frame. Put the frame at the end of the paragraph. Better yet, don't use a fram at all. Just use a link that opens in a new tab/window...and explain what the link is for.

Starting out
###Link to map? Page# in ITL?

The Mountains
###What happens if I leave the mountains? Are we required to stay in the mountains? Why? Tell us these things in the Introduction.

"On an ordinary failure lose one of the two days of food and water stockpile."
###That's very confusing to read. I think you mean "lose one day of food or water". As written, I'm not sure. It took me several minutes to reach a hypothesis.

"A critical success on the foraging roll resets the stockpile and recovers one exposure hit."
###Where else is this foraging roll mentioned? When is it performed? How is it performed? ITL page#s?

[b]Encounter Map[b]
###The encounter map setup requires too much time and rolling. It's too complicated in general.

[b]The Way Back[b]
After seven days the thoughly lost party heads back. Reduce the navigation rolls by one die if they find someplace they've seen before.

###Navigation rolls? Th(or)oughly lost? Please explain and/or point to page#s in ITL.

If they manage to leave the mountains subtract another die from the navigation rolls and subtract one on the daily encounter table roll. If they stumble into a major city they'll be able to gate back to Dranning.

###This goes back to an earlier comments. Manage to leave? Is something preventing that? Stumble into a major city? Does it happen by accident? At this point, I got the feeling we were supposed to stay in the mountains but I don't know why. Please explain and/or point to page#s in ITL.

Return to Dranning
###This seems like info I should know by the end of the introduction, especially if I need to give out XP for each encounter. I think the introduction could use a 'sequence of play' outline or more explanation about what's going on.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

This weekend I'll examine how to make it an automated programmed adventure.

I've started coding it up in PHP with game status stored as cookies on the user's browser. In order to move your current game to a different machine you'd need something like a chrome login to move your cookies.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Coded up the setup. The actual adventure starts next week.

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/safari/index.php

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Quite cool!

Notes on your Prospector generator:
* Vet should only cost 1 if they have Physicker.
* No weapon talents listed.
* Other really useful talents would include Business Sense, Tactics and some others.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I won't be running the combats and it does account for that one skill point for a double healer.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Oh cool, thanks. Might just want to mention to leave room for weapon talents on the page where you choose talents rather than the one after it.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I chose Area Knowledge (1) and Tracking (1) on the skills page. Something's not right...

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Thanks. Fixed the tracking bug and added two more pages.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Basic encounters. A lot of work remains to be done.

Let me know if you bring home any dragon hearts. I'm not getting any younger until you do.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

So what do you want next?

• Add all the monsters in the rulebook to the random encounters
• Track PC health and body parts collected
• Random rough terrain maps
• Continuing adventures with XP going into attributes and talents
• Multiple PCs
• Something else?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

My first random encounter:
===========
Setting: Mountains, Race: Goblin, Quantity: Few, Competence: Beginners, Group: Monsters
Ogres(pg 82)

Ogre(pg 82) ST 30 DX 9 IQ 6 MA 10
Club(1d+6)

Ogre(pg 82) ST 33 DX 9 IQ 6 MA 10
Club(2d+4)

Ogre(pg 82) ST 33 DX 9 IQ 6 MA 10
Club(2d+4)
===========

And I had several more like this but with various races:
===========
Setting: Mountains, Race: Reptile Person, Quantity: Few, Competence: Beginners, Group: Monsters
None
===========

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I don't have all the monsters in yet.

Hint: certain directions give bigger monsters.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Are Ogres a sub-species of Goblin? I've never thought of them that way.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

The selection was for Goblin, but the random result was for monsters. Refactored that out and fixed the lost code.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

So, I've played out some expeditions. In paying the mercenaries, I'm curious about your reasoning for:

Why would mercenaries charge a commission on top of their regular fee for this sort of assignment?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Low credit score.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

LOL. Well, the larger consideration is I think who is willing to sign on to a small not-so-experienced group going into the Gargoyle Mountains hoping to find dragons.

My first party was wiped out in their first hostile encounter, by a not-so-large group of wolves.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

No snake backbone (for serpent torcs) on the ingredient list.

Random mercenaries still seem to have a lot of languages and peculiar weapons and unused weapon talents, and never to have Shield or Missile Weapons. Some of them have fairly high attribute totals and/or talent points known, but for combat effectiveness are rarely better than (and often not as good as) an experienced-human-designed 32-point fighter.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I am redoing my character generator from scratch and pushing it out into a bunch of include files so adventures can generate them internally and track these characters over time.

Size and value of the backbone depends on the type of snake.

A Poisonous Monster Snake has a firepower between Cave Bear and Long Lankin while the Apep lies between Uncle Teeth and Giant Wolverine.

Updated the list

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/magical_ingredients.html

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Assuming dragon wings are unarmored, just put two branded light crossbow bolts through one wing of a 16 hex dragon for an extra large steppe pizza.

It was fire that killed the beast.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Eh, if you want to think logically about dragon anatomy... I'd tend to think that the "unarmored" part you're imagining would also be a part of a wing that a bolt, even if it penetrated the membrane, would tend to pass through and do no significant injury to the wing. (A hole a fraction of an inch in a wing quite a few yards across.)

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Am I correct that Dragons deserve wimpy firepower ratings?

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/firepower.html

What they need to do is wear a bandolier with a half dozen molotails as this would greatly increase the fire damage done by a 14 hex dragon.

What are the proper dragon tactics? Small dragons like the 7 hexer seem to do best by landing and trampling while the 14 hex is best served with flying claw swipes, exposing just his tail to counterattack, and then do an Immelmann turn to swipe again, never using the fire.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I would say dragons are a good example of why a one-dimensional threat rating is not adequate to describe how dangerous something is.

Dragons as listed are not as deadly as I would expect, and are quite vulnerable especially to groups of humans, if the situation (i.e. usually the dragon's behavior) allows the humans to do multiple attacks per turn on it. On the other hand, a dragon played smart in the right situations can kill many humans, or at least avoid being killed (if nothing else, by being given a contest of IQ with a bonus for lifetime survival thinking and the ability and habit of flying and surveying scenes from the air before descending, and simply not attacking dangerous-looking groups of humans).


Dragons face several issues:

* Groups of armed humans tend to be able to do a lot of damage in a few turns. Dragon ST, armor, and damage may look high, but really doesn't compete well with a group of armed humans, so they need to avoid being attacked by several humans at once, but that's hard given the movement rules for multi-hex creatures, unless they stay flying or use terrain or the situation otherwise allows them to avoid being ganged up on.

* The larger ones can be defeated by the problematic simplistic Effects of Injury rules that let you knock anything down and take it out of action for two turns by doing 25 points of damage to it in one turn, regardless of how much ST it has or whether it is a four-legged creature.

* Dragons only get a claw and a breath attack that do damage, but the damage values are not that great, and the breath attack uses thrown modifiers and reduces the dragon's ST by as much as taking a strong weapon hit themselves.

* Aimed shots to the wings, especially if the GM decides arrows can do normal damage to dragon wings, and even moreso if he decides they get no armor.

* The tail and trample abilities are resistable with a 3-die roll, so aren't that useful against more capable humans.


Effective dragon tactics include:

* Roleplay them as very smart & cunning monsters who have developed habits that have kept them alive for many years, meaning they will avoid doing anything with much chance of getting them crippled or killed, if they can help it.

* Don't do assaults on groups of armed humans.

* Convince the GM that if you've survived long enough as a dragon to be 7-hexes or greater, you have a good chance of having schemed, traded, or slain your way into possession of magic items, preferably things like Stone Flesh or Reverse Missiles.

* Stay flying and use obstacles to keep yourself where ranged attacks can't hit you (and/or Dodge) until the turn you zoom across the tactical map in one turn when you win initiative, attacking one victim at a time, possibly from the side/rear and/or avoiding archer/wizard ranged facing, and then zooming away to circle back.

* Fly high and drop boulders on people.

* Surprise attacks.

* Consider whether the cost of a breath attack is worth it or not.

* Consider retreating after first getting injured or using fatigue, and going and resting up before tracking down the foes and attacking again. A thoughtful GM should pro-rate your resting rates to your ST, so a ST 60 dragon would rest/heal ST at 6 times the rate of humans.

* If you are for some reason staying and fighting, try to move so as to avoid being attacked by as many foes as possible per turn.


Some possible GM house rule buffs for dragons include:

* Fix the Effects of Injury for high-ST monsters, so it takes at least 1/2 ST or more damage in one turn to knock down a dragon.

* Change the rules for nimble four-legged animals getting up from being knocked down - if you knock over a dog or lion, they aren't out of action as long as a human. I imagine the same would be true for a dragon or hydra, so maybe let most 4-legged creatures get up on their next action instead of losing their next action and then get up.

* Use a house rule about "you don't engage me" options, so three hobgoblins or Images can't immobilize a 7-hex dragon and keep it from turning around or flying away.

* Use one or the other of the articles in Interplay about dragons, particularly the one that converts dragon breath to area effect and lets dragons spend points to customize themselves.

* If a dragon isn't breathing fire, let it do a bite attack instead (Steve said he thought that sounded reasonable on TFT Discord chat a while ago).

* Let dragons learn talents, e.g. Tactics, Strategy, Toughness, Thrown Attacks, Brawling, Running, Aerobatics, Claw Mastery, Breath Mastery, etc.

* Rule that bolts/arrows/slings don't do significant damage to wings (or at most 1 point).

* Dragon resting/healing appropriate to their size (multiply healing rate by ST / 10).

* And of course, a real game-changer would be if they could use spells.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Here's how I would arrange things:

• There is a gate in the center of each of the mountain hexes with conceal-5 on it.
• Use a crystal ball to determine which gate to use.
• A small team steps through the gate and does Calling-Dragon.
• When the dragon arrives they step back through the gate and the next team activates in the next hex over.
• Continue kiting the dragon until you've got him in the right spot.
• Oh no, yet another rogue dragon is attacking the village of the alchemists.
• Activate the air defenses to slice up the beast.
• Once all the dragons within a few score miles are exterminated relocate the village and start over.

Alternative: Do one calling on a major flight route inside a cave that has a huge one way gate for dragons only to the Abattoir chamber.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Seems like another very tall order in terms of being able to organize/control a population to go along with your plans. Requirements to attempt:
* A good reason why.
* Parties with gate wizards willing/able to go into the mountains to set up the network.
* A crystal ball. (seems to me like it would be optional, though.)
* A community that won't object to your plan to try to wipe out the dragons by bringing dragons to town one at a time.
* "Air defenses".
* Later, the community being willing to "relocate the village".

It points to aspects of two magic abilities which I think generally could be problematic, though (praise be to Steve Jackson) one has I think been nicely limited to avoid implied possible applications of this sort, in the new edition:

* Calling is still annoyingly irresistible, but it was always limited to a relatively short distance, meaning you're going to need a very dense gate network to cover a large area, and called creatures do not have to put themselves in great danger, so what you're going to do, it seems to me, is get dragons to see they're being called to some town, at which point they'll probably leave, and probably tell the other dragons about it. Though I'd also expect the dragons to know something was up long before, what with the gate network construction crews trying to put gates every few miles in the mountains...

* Crystal balls were far too easy/reliable/powerful in original TFT. However in the new rules they merely let you see some scene up to the GM, which unless the GM is really wanting your scheme to work efficiently, seems unlikely to often help you pinpoint dragons very well.

Even if society were down with your plan, the gate network were in place, the range of Calling wasn't an issue, the breaking down gates weren't an issue, the inability of Calling to make creatures put themselves in great danger weren't an issue, the crystal balls weren't needed, and your air defenses were great, dragons still average higher IQ than humans by a lot, and the bigger ones clearly have good survival habits.

Depending on how many dragons there actually were out there and what sizes and community they have (and presumably, there are enough to make your project worth the effort which would tend, it seems to me, to be many dragons), I think the actual result of an effective such system would be either the dragons either leave the area, or they organize a massive dragon counterattack.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

How do the dragons respond to a calling into a gate to a death chamber on the other side of the world?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

You'd have to play it out, and it would depend on many things such as what the dragon population is like and what this death chamber is that it somehow bypasses the clause about Calling not getting things to go very dangerous places, and what happened during its creation.

And I'm sure if you try hard enough you can wipe out the dragons... not sure why someone (let alone society) wants to try, or what your point is here.

But I tend to imagine that sooner or later, a dragon being Called is going to roar and get noticed by and/or reported to some other dragons, who will then both know it is a danger (so Calling will stop working to get dragons to go into it) and provoke a response.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

There is no danger for a dragon in the cave, they just get gated away as they're called into the cave.

Setup costs:
2-hex magic carpet: $10,500
50 point powerstone: $51,000

Weekly cost:
Dangerous work for an IQ 15 wizard: $300
200 points of powerstone recharge: $1000

You're going to need to trap about four dragon hearts each week (at a new location for the dragon roach motel) to get this to pay off. A 14-hex dragon every year would also help.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

If the gate in the cave results in them not coming back, it would seem pretty dangerous. How the Calling spell's limits work is up to the GM to determine, but it seems to me that there are many ways it could/would end up in some other way than the dragon flies through your gate.

The spell calls the subject to the wizard, but the subject won't endanger itself, and the subject gets to stop when it "arrives".

I'd tend to think that entering unfamiliar caves might even qualify both as having arrived, and/or as being a dangerous place, even just on sight, particularly for a high-IQ safety-conscious dragon who is not accustomed to being the subject of a Calling spell.

Moreover, even if the GM lets your gate scheme work, as soon as another dragon witnesses or hears about the scheme (and apparently you're expecting a high-dragon-density area), then I'd think word would spread really quickly, and getting Called places would be considered dangerous, especially into caves.

i.e. Even if you concoct an effective such scheme, using it in a dragon-rich area seems like an invitation to a massed dragon counterattack, and/or something that would have the dragons move out of the area and _then_ plot a terrible demise for whoever was doing that.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I just revised the monster tables with the new threat rating system so they shouldn't instantly trash your party.

You can try the random generation here:

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/squad.php

Once I get all the features of DS worked out I'm tempted to make a more storytelling online adventure next time.

The choice is do I let the player freely choose any character type they want or hand them an awkward munchkin that they then develop over time by choosing where to put their XPs?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

The attributes seem higher, but looking at a bunch of urban Regular human mercenaries, I still see more than I would expect of:

* zero shields
* zero people with Missile Weapons
* redundant unused weapon talents, including specialist talents for weapons not equipped - e.g. Fencer with a broadsword)
* high number of peculiar weapons
* generally rather surprisingly higher number of talents than IQ
* high number of peculiar hobby talents and random exotic languages - (If I want someone who knows Sasquatchish, I'm going to try your mercenaries' guild before I try my local scholars' guild.)

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Sasquatchish? isn't listed on the Rosetta Stone or Babbel websites.
Planning a trip to speak with the Tibetan monks. maybe they know the Yetian dialect.
Anyone want to come along?

and the LOL award goes to Skarg.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Thanks, adjusted.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Which would you rather have on random characters, the two best weapons (Shortsword and Saber) or the best weapon for each of their weapon skills?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

If the character makes a 2/IQ roll (11 or 12 auto-fail), then I'd assign them:

A chance to give them armor only if it doesn't reduce adjDX below 11.

If the character has Bow or Crossbow, give them one of those.
Else if the character has Thrown Weapons, give them 1 or 2 thrown weapons.

Then if the character also has a decent melee weapon, give them one of those.

If they have Two Weapons talent, and their melee weapon of choice is one-handed, give them two of those.
Else if the character has Shield talent and a one-handed weapon, give them a shield, but not one that reduces their adjDX below 11.

Then if they still only have one weapon/shield total, see if there's a thrown weapon you can give them too.

If they failed their 2/IQ roll, then give them a random sub-optimal quirky weapon selection, such as:

roll 1d6:
1. Give them the two "best" weapons (shortsword and sabre, like you suggested).
2. Give them one weapon (or shield) for every weapon talent they have.
3. Give them only one weapon, for a random talent they have.
4. Give them a weapon and/or shield, but pick one lower than their ST would let them use.
5. Randomly pick two talents and give them a weapon (or shield) for each of those talents.
6. As per the system as if they made their IQ roll, but don't limit their armor and shield use.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Well there is a DX 12 cutoff for some talents, so will consider that.

Also thinking about adding a monk career path, should I add ninja also?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Assassins.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

C.f. pages 58 and 13.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

What do you mean?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

My system will already generate Spies, which are the official assassins of the game.

What did you have in mind?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I was just thinking that ninjas per se aren't really mentioned anywhere in the Cidri setting stuff, and so I'd expect assassins for a Cidri game before I'd expect ninjas.

I did get the idea that your starting point for these random characters was to follow the heroic archetype categories suggested in ITL, and/or the job table, but it seems to me that assassin characters are often different from spy characters, which are also different to me from ninja characters.

The heroic archetypes list on ITL 12-13 also seems different from what I'd expect to find in the general population of a world, unless it's supposed to be a world with lots of heroes in it.

The talents suggested for a Spy on the job table are good for a spy and might be helpful for an assassin or ninja, but that's a lot of talents which wouldn't be the main sort I'd expect. They're all sneaky, but spies mainly gather information - not all assassins need to learn to read and write three languages, be streetwise, and may not need to be masters of disguise. They do need some way to kill people effectively (which isn't in the spy job description).

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

A bit of an update:

http://www.hcobb.com/tft/rand_squad....comp=3&group=L

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Would it be easy to have it allow setting any average attribute total from say 24 to 50?

The existing levels don't match my following of the ITL meanings of attribute totals.

I.e. 30 is supposed to be average human, so I'd like a setting for 30 average, and if I can select above-average people, why can't I select below-average people? The lowest you have, Beginners, gives average 32-points, which to me undermines 32 point PCs meaning above average (ITL says "high average"). The next level you offer, Regulars, seems to average 38, where to me that's a very gifted and/or experienced person (ITL says "superior"). Then your two higher levels seem to be 38-39 point average, but with piles of talents?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

My rule is:

1. 32-point starting character plus 500 XP per year.
2. Put as many possible points into raising attribute totals.
3. All remaining points go into skill points.
4. Then find the maximum possible job this character can qualify for under their randomly chosen path.
5. Allocate attributes to match the job requirements.
6. Randomly allocate extra attribute points.
7. Add talents and spells needed for the job.
8. Randomly determine additional talents and spells with a majority going into career fields.
9. There is a chance that mana will be taken instead of skill points for wizards with S2+

Should I switch from Evil Steve's exponential attribute costs to my quadratic model?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Depends on what your purpose is. For your own campaign, yes.

But 32 should not be the starting point, and 500XP per year is wrong for NPCs.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Problem with dropping below 32 is that some races start with zero extra points.

What is the basis for using any number other than 500 XP/year for NPCs? That's where all of my calculations wind up at.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

I don't follow. Give an example of what you mean?


The basis is that new RAW, attributes only cost 100 XP to increase up to 34 points total, and yet the average NPC human is supposed to be 30 points total.

If you take even a 24-point character (ST 8, DX 8, IQ 8) and give them 500 XP per year, then they can become a 34-point character in two years.

So those two data points are incompatible.

Looking at data such as the opponents in Death Test and/or Tollenkar's Lair, or almost every other product published for TFT, even typical but not exception dangerous armed men tend to very often be in the 30-33 point range. That's consistent with it not being a mistake that most of the population averages 30 points. Meaning they must not be getting 500 XP per year, or else they almost never spend any of it on attributes at 100 XP per point up to 34, or else if they did, yeah, you'd be right, most of the population would drift up to 38 points or so quickly, and the average would be more like 36-38 points.

And with a threshold topping up about 40 points, that would mean that instead of starting out as above-average people at 32-points, PCs would start as inexperienced incapable people who have no business trying to go on adventures at all, and that the most of the population of competent people will tend to be in the 37-40 point range, a really small slice of really powerful people that is well above the sweet spot for most TFT play.

i.e. I think it's a mistake to think everyone in society is getting 500 XP per year.

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

Gargoyles and Giants start with zero added points.

How do I generate a below-zero Gargoyle without marking her as a child?

Re: Dragon Safari: An adventure for TFT
 

You have to make a GM call because RAW does not define what attribute totals mean for non-base-32-point races. And RAW doesn't tell you much about NPCs other than the listings of what point totals mean, and sample characters.

Per the earlier discussion of XP costs varying for races with different-scaled attributes, I would tend to think that points for individual giants and gargoyles could vary, but ST would vary more than humans, and DX and IQ would vary less and be subject to limits.

Gargoyles:

It seems to me that 32-point PC gargoyles are sub-average for typical adult gargoyles, because a "regular gargoyle" is listed in the Summon Gargoyle spell (and basic Melee, as always) as ST 20 DX 11 IQ 8 (39 points). Original ITL PC gargoyles were ST 16 DX 11 IQ 8, no extras.

I think the 32-point PC gargoyles are clearly 32-points for (meta) "fairness" notions, but does mean ST 13 gargoyles are thought reasonable, though well weaker than the "regular" ST 20 ones.

Seems to me the GM is left to interpret that (and your generator is optimistic trying to do all combinations of races and types - gargoyle ranchers? gargoyle navy?). Notably, we don't know what their actual normal min stats are.

My own interpretation would be that:
* Common capable warrior gargoyles are about ST 20, corresponding to 32-point humans (from comparing Summon Gargoyle to Summon Myrmidon, and Melee stats).
* Average human 30 thus equates to average gargoyle ST 18.
* ST 16 gargoyles are probably weak and/or young.
* ST 13 gargoyles are probable at or near minimum for normal non-dependent-youth gargoyles, maybe min ST 11 or 12.
* Gargoyle min IQ 8, statistically like human IQ 8-12. 9 like human 13-15. 10 like human 16+.
* DX seems to tend to be 11, but I imagine could be as low as 9 or as high as 13 and still be within common norms.

So in making random below-average-but-normal NPCs gargoyles, I might make them something like:
ST 10 + 2d6 / 2 (round up)
DX 9 + 2d6 / 3 (round down)
IQ 3d6 -8, min 8

Giants:

Giants are unchanged from old ITL, and are one of the few examples that nicely lists both NPC stat ranges, and PC stat ranges, and shows the PC stats are for the low end of all possible giant attributes, at ST 25 DX 9 IQ 7.

Melee (old and new) lists giants varying a bit more than ITL does, suggesting min ST 24, and max but exceptional ST at 50, and not mentioning a max DX but says "rarely more than 9" which is cool because it is relevant to NPC population statistic rather than just listing a range and leaving people to think maybe it's as common and as easy for a giant to add 1 to IQ as to ST, just with a maximum.

My own interpretation would be that:
* Typical average giants have about ST 30 (the ST you get when you cast Summon Giant), so ST 30 DX 9 IQ 7 corresponds demographically to a 30-point human.
* ST 25 giants are probably young or weakish for other reasons. Perhaps ST 24 is what giants tend to be when they come of age.
* There may be some DX 8 giants, but they'd be about as rare as a DX 8 human.
* Other giants are DX 9 or 10, and that's a fairly big deal, with distribution being maybe 50/50 over the healthy adult population that isn't DX 8 or less somehow.
* IQ 10 is described as "genius giant", so I'd tend to equate that to maybe human IQ 14-16+, and rare. Many IQ 7 or 8, a fair number 9, only a few 10.

So in making random below-average-but-normal NPCs giants, I might make them something like:
ST 24 + 1d6
DX 9 (maybe 1 in 6 of being DX 8)
IQ 7 + 3d6 / 6 (round down)