wizards and the 'scholarly' talents

[larsdangly]

I think there should be a number of talents besides literacy that can be purchased for equal cost by wizards and heroes, both because I find it to be in keeping with the scholarly life of wizards and the sorts of things I imagine wizards having to think about when they learn magic, and because I think it opens up the diversity and interest of wizard characters without meaningfully 'messing' with the sorts of play balance that seem to bother people. It feels like a 'win' all the way around. Here's a list of the talents from the new edition I would treat this way:

Literacy
The Mundane Talents, Scribe, Astrologer and Calligrapher
Naturalist (perhaps the most controversial, as it is quite useful)
Detect Lies (seems disproportionate to make a wizard pay 4 for this)
Physicker
Writing
Priest
Expert Naturalist
Chemist
Mathematician
Scholar
Alchemist
Master Physicker
Theologian
Languages

The one major counter argument for this, I would say, is that it infringes on the purviews of character types that don't get much attention in most of our discussions of the system but that are really interesting and fun in play: practical or scholarly types who are neither wizards nor blood soaked maniacs - just skillful people making their way through a dangerous world. Some of the great heroes of fiction fit this mold (e.g., Indiana Jones). If one found that my suggestion above discouraged these sorts of PC's, I'd suggest scaling back on the list. Personally, I don't find this to be the case, simply because the players with whom I interact tend to create PCs that are interesting to themselves rather than having some idealized mixture of powers.

[Tenex]

I did that in my campaign for many skills as well. My list was almost like yours.

I did not include Detect Lies or the Physicker/Master Physicker skills.

I did include Naturalist and Expert Naturalist. But that's because I reworked the naturalist skills and made them more bookish. In canon, the N/EN skills have combative components. I pushed the combative stuff to woodsman and made the N/EN more like well schooled Biologists. So it fits with the "bookish" angle you are aiming for.

Physicker/Master Physicker strike me as paramedic type skills. Not entirely bookish, but hands on in a crisis situation. I'm good with the Wizard having research/academic type skills for the same cost, but I stayed away from anything that had a crisis manual component. Alchemist and Chemist have a manual component, but it is not done urgently.

I make a distinction between a skill being rolled against IQ or DX in that an IQ based skill may still have a manual aspect. Only if a skill was completely cerebral did I let a wizard take it for the same cost as a hero.

I wouldn't allow Detect Lies because it isn't a research/academic type skill, even though it is IQ based.

This is just my arbitrary thoughts on it. I admit that this structure is based on my view of Wizards as bookish recluses. If that doesn't match your worldview of Wizards then my thought process probably doesn't work for you either.

[larsdangly]

I like to view wizards as members of communities not unlike medieval universities (or the Unseen University of Disk World).

[Chris Goodwin]

Literacy, Languages, Mathematician, and Alchemist are already. I agree with most of your list. I might add Knife, because wizards can use daggers, and maybe Quarterstaff as well.

[hcobb]

Wizards don't get a point break on Knife. If you allow this then can they buy Sword for only 3 points?

[Skarg]

Deja vu. There was a thread almost identical to this one before.

As before, yes, good list. Yes, the ones Chris already mentioned already are exempt. Most of the others should be too, yes.

I don't know if this detail has vanished from the new edition or not, or if it was a Metagaming Q&A only, but in old TFT, the Knife talent was only needed to throw knives - not to just use them to stab, or at least, not in HTH.

Or if getting detailed, maybe a wizard can pick an interest/aptitude type - some are probably nature-oriented, others might have social affinity enough for Detect Lies but others not... but that detail isn't particularly needed except per character concept, since you can just only take the talents that make sense for the character.

[Tenex]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

I think there should be a number of talents besides literacy that can be purchased for equal cost by wizards and heroes, both because I find it to be in keeping with the scholarly life of wizards and the sorts of things I imagine wizards having to think about when they learn magic, and because I think it opens up the diversity and interest of wizard characters without meaningfully 'messing' with the sorts of play balance that seem to bother people. It feels like a 'win' all the way around.

VERSUS

Originally Posted by larsdangly

Perhaps a good way to create a 'type' is simply to invest in a talent relevant to that type: the talents are already there, so no need to super impose another layer of rules.

Am I missing something here? I'm not sure what your point is. Are you discarding your thoughts in your opening post?

[larsdangly]

No, I was responding to the suggestion that wizards have some sort of 'meta' type on creation (nature wizard, etc.). I would not want to do that, and instead prefer that you individuate your wizards using talents. It is a separate question how much those talents should cost. I stand by the OP statement, that I find it more interesting when wizards have a bigger menu of relatively affordable talents.

[Tenex]

Yeah, OK, I agree on both points.

[David Bofinger]

TFT basically has two lists of abilities: talents that are cheap for heroes but expensive for wizards, and spells that are cheap for wizards but expensive for heroes, with a small overlap. You're talking about expanding the overlap.

An issue here is that in some campaigns wizards might not be the scholarly type. Or some might be and some might not.

Chris Goodwin suggested a cleaner, more generic method: having multiple cheap lists and any character has some of them. So there might be lists for:

• melee combat
• ranged combat
• woodsy outdoorsy stuff
• scholar-like activities
• spells (at least one)
• everything the thieves' guild teaches
• etc.

Then different characters have a mix of these cheap lists.

• Magic and scholar makes a classic TFT wizard
• Melee or ranged combat plus outdoorsy makes a ranger
• Magic plus outdoorsy makes a druid
• All lists makes a renaissance man, and in some campaigns this might be free
• etc.

Some lists will probably cost more than others. Maybe some lists can be bought at a basic level, so a thief can learn basic combat abilities but fights at a DX negative not suffered by the fighter. I think this has some interesting possibilities.