Defending against the Flinger
 

The TFT Companion reprints the Classic edition Flinger article at page 15 and notes that the rules have been tweaked to restore the power of the light crossbow over the Flinger in Legacy, but does not spell out how this works. So how exactly does one defend against the Flinger?

Short answer: Use the defend option.

Longer worked example:

1: All of the Flinger's ranged attacks are thrown, not missile weapons.

2: Defending is effective against thrown attacks (Legacy ITL page 117), may be made after a half move and is effective against attacks beyond adjacent. (Hexagram #9, page 3)

3: Legacy has very effective Defend options for say Weapon Expertise (ITL 41) and Unarmed Combat IV (ITL 43)

Classic's Flinger typically has adjDX 15 which is a 95.37% chance (Handy chart at https://www.hcobb.com/tft/TFT_Saving...rcentages.html ) to hit or trip up their foes, if these targets do nothing.

Against a figure who takes the Defend option and who has either Fencing or Weapons Expertise and Shield Expertise this is either adjDX 14 or 13 (What the fnord are "melee attacks" anyway?) and is rolled on five dice instead of three. This reduces the to-hit chance down to 22.15% (or15.2% if thrown weapons are "melee attacks"), and even without the defend option an expertly handled small shield bounces almost all Sha-ken attacks.

Also in Legacy daggers can now explicitly be made Fine Weapons (ITL page 123) and a starting character can easily have Dagger Expertise and a very fine steel dagger for 1d+2 damage.

Alternately a half-elf wizard with the Dagger Expertise talent and the Staff III spell holding a (not fine if clothes are to be bought, unfortunately) silver dagger staff does only 1d damage in melee, thrown weapon, HTH, and occult attacks, but the occult attack ignores mundane armor, has a range of two hexes, and is +3 to hit, at the cost of one fatigue point per attack. This wizard is then expertly prepared against HTH attacks, especially if they have a Naturalist team member to extract natural poison (ITL page 126). The same combination of abilities can be had with a starting elf or goblin, but without the chance to save a memory point by taking Common as their native tongue.

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

I had totally forgotten about The Flinger article...good find!


Ferret

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

As a quick summary, defending against thrown weapons in the Legacy edition is:

1. Explicitly ruled OUT at Melee rulebook page 20
2. Implicitly ruled IN at Wizard rulebook page 20 and ITL page 117
3. And explicitly ruled IN on the GM screen

Your GM may vary, depending on which rules she read last.

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

Nice summary. You could also say that defending against thrown weapons is implicitly suggested in ITL, though it's less clear.

A thrown weapon is a physical attack, like any other regular attack except for the range penalty and the fact one can dodge it. If we take "non-missile" literally, then clearly one can Defend against a thrown weapon.

Things get sketchy when you realize that dragon's breath is treated as a thrown weapon, however. I could see using Defend in this case if one held a shield, but I can't see Defending when holding a dagger. (I'm not sure how one Defends against a thrown mace when wielding a dagger either, to be sure.)

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

A worked example here: https://www.hcobb.com/tft/Job_Role/Flinger_Thief.html

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

The summary is pretty detailed. However, thrown weapons are physical attacks. One can easily block them.

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

Legacy Flinger, Human, age 20
ST 8, DX 16, IQ 8, MA 12
Talents: Brawling, Carousing, Knife, Lasso, Running, Thrown Weapons
Language: Common
Weapons: 2 very fine dagger (1d+1), 4 lasso (1d+2)
Attacks and Damage: Punch (1d-3)

Use lasso to trip people up then stab them in the eyes.

Note that this Legacy Optimized Flinger is just barely keeping up with the dagger experts.

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

A few calculations on the lasso:

1. Note that rope weighs 1.8 pounds per fifteen yards (ITL 67)
2. and that therefore a 15 yard-long lasso (ITL 113)
3. weighs 1.0 pounds (ITL 110),
4. lasso can be used the same as standard rope (ITL 119)
5. and can reach 15 hexes (ITL 113)
6. which is 15 * 4 (feet/hex, see ITL 11) / 3 (feet/yard) = 20 yards.

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

Is Defend somehow more useful than Dodge?

Re: Defending against the Flinger
 

There's no talent that boosts Dodge (other than Shield Expertise). While Legacy has the ultimate talent of Dagger Mastery.

So a typical grandmaster with say ST 6, DX 14, iQ 20, Dagger Mastery, Staff V, 40 mana and a blur ring does a half move defend and occult blast. The LOFs then apply lassos at adjDX 18 and have a (18-4)/6d = 6.08% chance of bringing her down.