Racial experence modifiers

[hcobb]

For anybody who doesn't see Reptile Men as nature's ninja... (With a rework)

First change the exp progression to this: It costs a character 100 XP to raise his first attribute point by one over his starting stats. Each additional point costs 100 XP more than the previous. So the second attribute point costs 200 XP and the third 300 XP and so on. Knowledge slot cost remains a flat 500 XP.

Reptile men, Gargoyles and Giants grow stronger as they age, but only a rare few are skillful. Reptile men and Gargoyles pay half of the normal XP cost to raise their ST by a point, but they pay 100 XP more than humans would to raise the DX or IQ. Knowledge slots cost them 1000 XP each. Giants are the same, but their cost to raise ST is a third of what humans would pay.

Example: A Gargoyle hero first spends 200 (instead of 100) XP to raise his DX from 11 to 12. Then he spends 300 (instead of 200) XP to raise his IQ from 8 to 9. Then he spends 150 (instead of 300) XP to raise his ST from 13 to 14. Finally he spends 3000 XP (three slots times 1000 XP each) to learn the Turn Missiles spell.

Halflings pay double XP cost to raise ST but it costs them only 400 experience to buy knowledge slots for DX based talents. (Halfling wizards still require double slots to buy most talents, but they get a break on the cost for each slot.) Hardy types, they generally roll one less die on ST-based saving rolls to resist poisons, the elements and such.

[JLV]

This system was at least implied in the original TFT, when it suggested that Elves and Dwarves only accumulated XP at half speed since they lived so long. That implied (at least to me) that lots of tweaking could be done in how much attributes cost and how quickly XP were accumulated on a race-by-race basis. Under the new rules, it could also affect how new talents/spells are learned (by varying the cost of each in relation to that particular creature type).

I think what we need is a general rule on this topic.

[platimus]

On Giants...

Giants have ST ranging from 25
to 40, DX of 9 or 10, and IQ of 7
to (in case of a genius giant) 10 at
the highest. Since Giants are so
clumsy, the greatest treasure you
can offer one is something to
increase DX. A few giants are
wizards, slow and without
many spells, but powerful.

and...

If the GM
allows Giant characters, start them with ST 25, DX 9, and
IQ 7. They can never increase DX or IQ over 10 without a
magical item.

If you max-out the Giants DX and IQ first, you'll have 36 points. After that, you'll have to spend XP on ST, talents/spells, or the other misc. uses. This doesn't seem to require any special XP rules to me. I would assume an ST40 giant is QUITE old in human years. I don't see any need to create special XP rules for any of the races mentioned so far.

[platimus]

On second thought, I can see problems once they reach the 40th stat level if you use the official XP costs for raising stats. I was planning on using these XP costs though (for all races/characters)...

Added attribute point / XP cost
33 / 200
34 / 400
35 / 600
36 / 800
37 / 1200
38 / 2000
39 / 3000
40th and after costs 5000


Talent(1) costs 400XP
Talent(2) costs 800XP
Talent(3) costs 1200XP

[Skarg]

I tend to define every race's usual and exceptional ranges, and what it takes for them to improve, in crunchy detail, but then, I'm a crunch-loving GURPS GM.

But even in TFT trying to keep things light, I think there's a major need for more attention than is in the new ITL, especially since the only experience curve given is based on going from 32 to 40 as a human, and because there are new 32-point listings for reptile men and gargoyles (whose average NPC members are 35 to 39 points).

i.e. we've got:
Humans/Orcs/Elves/Dwarves: 32 PC, 30 average
Halflings: 30 PC, unknown average - 28?
Goblins: 32 new PC, was 30 PC - unknown average - 28?
Hobgoblins: new (PC?) 28, used to be 26 - unknown average - 26? 28?
Gargoyles: 32 new PC, was 35, 39 average (q.v. spell, Melee)
Reptile Men: 32 new PC, was 38, unknown average - 36?

Also consider that in original TFT, Gargoyles and Reptile Men (and also Giants and Centaurs, which I'm ignoring for now for sake of simplicity and because I'd use more-different systems for them) paid double experience to improve, back in the old TFT EP system, which was much flatter and allowed near-indefinite improvement with enough EP.

Also notice that gargoyles have a hard IQ cap at 10, and giants have a hard DX and IQ cap at 10.

I think that I'm not too worried about halflings, goblins or hobgoblins, but I would tend to want to adjust the attribute/XP scale for them so that their difference from humans doesn't vanish down to essentially the lowest cost to advance an attribute, twice - especially with the PDF preview's setting of 100 XP for that - that makes halflings get a 2-point talent (thrown weapons) which would cost 1000XP to learn, for starting with two less attributes - but if they can buy both of those for 100 XP each, that seems like a silly good deal to me and fails to meaningfully not be like humans with benefits for a temporary reduction in attributes.

But that points out that the current XP table also seems way too shallow at the start and way too deep at the end, to me. I'm going to ignore that for now. (i.e. I prefer Platimus' table above, and even more prefer Steve's previous table which was:
100
300
700
1500
2700
4300
6300
9300
though I'd let it go over 40.

So for haflings or hobgoblins, and perhaps for goblins, to keep them adjusted down a bit, I would say their XP table should be read with a 2-point racial offset.

I'd say gargoyles and reptile men should get a similar positive offset, but that it should probably be at least doubled in cost (as in original TFT), and that they also want a mechanism to counter the natural temptation to pile their points into DX since they have plenty of ST. That could be done with a cost multiplier for raising DX (maybe both can raise ST normally, but DX or IQ costs 2-4 times as much?).

[platimus]

I think my minor adjustment of the XP/stat progression table is enough if you consider/assume that most/all of the races you're worried about live at least twice as long as humans (and, therefore, get more "life-time" to earn XP to buy those higher stats). If you start making it easier/faster for various races to progress, you're upsetting the balance and showing favoritism. IRL, that's called racism. I question the morality of this in the real world and the game world.

I think Steve already did a good job of describing what was "normal" and "maximum" for these races in ITL.

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by platimus

I think my minor adjustment of the XP/stat progression table is enough if you consider/assume that most/all of the races you're worried about live at least twice as long as humans (and, therefore, get more "life-time" to earn XP to buy those higher stats). If you start making it easier/faster for various races to progress, you're upsetting the balance and showing favoritism. IRL, that's called racism. I question the morality of this in the real world and the game world.

I think Steve already did a good job of describing what was "normal" and "maximum" for these races in ITL.

Racism is about heritage of humans.

Giants and Reptile men and Gargoyles and hobgoblins are subjectively different sizes and are different in other ways. It has zero to do with racism.

[platimus]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Racism is about heritage of humans.

Giants and Reptile men and Gargoyles and hobgoblins are subjectively different sizes and are different in other ways. It has zero to do with racism.

My last post probably came across as WAY more harsh than intended but the idea of making XP costs significantly cheaper for certain races does not appeal to me at all. It doesn't seem fair or balanced. I'm sorry if I've spoiled the fun by using the R-word.

[Skarg]

Ok no worries on that, but I think also I wrote a post with several separate ideas and it may not have been clear what I meant.

I'm not sure what specific points you agreed or disagreed with, or if you followed what I meant.

That is, you wrote:

I think my minor adjustment of the XP/stat progression table is enough if you consider/assume that most/all of the races you're worried about live at least twice as long as humans (and, therefore, get more "life-time" to earn XP to buy those higher stats).

I suppose you mean that you think if we use your table it will mitigate the issues with halflings & hobgoblins zooming to catch up with humans, since your cost for attributes up to 33 is 200XP rather than 100XP? And, that it's ok if a 32-point gargoyle or reptile somehow also coincidentally (but really for "fairness") progresses at the same rate as humans in terms of attributes, because they live twice as long, so they'll have longer to reach their prime, and your table flattens out at the end rather than doubling towards infinity with every point like the one in the preview PDF?

Assuming that's what you meant, we could check the numbers and see how it looks.

I notice in considering this, that it seems like the new ITL somehow jettisoned the mention of some races living longer than others.

Checking original ITL page 32, the listed races did not include gargoyles, BTW, but they did include Reptile Men, Elves, Giants and Centaurs. It was NOT the same list as the list of races which had to pay double EP to increase attributes, however.

The rule on EXPERIENCE POINTS FOR VERY POWERFUL RACES on original ITL page 10 did list Gargoyles, and Reptile Men, Giants and Centaurs, but not Elves, because the reason was about their high attribute totals.

[platimus]

Skarg,
The post of mine that you just quoted was aimed mostly at the OP that says:

Reptile men and Gargoyles pay half of the normal XP cost to raise their ST by a point, but they pay 100 XP more than humans would to raise the DX or IQ. Knowledge slots cost them 1000 XP each. Giants are the same, but their cost to raise ST is a third of what humans would pay.

Regarding your post:

I think that I'm not too worried about halflings, goblins or hobgoblins, but I would tend to want to adjust the attribute/XP scale for them so that their difference from humans doesn't vanish down to essentially the lowest cost to advance an attribute, twice - especially with the PDF preview's setting of 100 XP for that - that makes halflings get a 2-point talent (thrown weapons) which would cost 1000XP to learn, for starting with two less attributes - but if they can buy both of those for 100 XP each, that seems like a silly good deal to me and fails to meaningfully not be like humans with benefits for a temporary reduction in attributes.

I agree with the part in bold. I don't understand that whole paragraph but it sounded like you wanted make stat advancement slightly touger (at least in the beginning) for them, mainly because of your take on Halflings getting "Thrown Weapons" for free.

I'm not sure what was intended with halflings "automatically have the Thrown Weapons talent" but my ruling there is that it is NOT free. It takes up one of their starting talent slots. Therefore, I feel no need to adjust the XP/stat cost scale just for them.

Also, I took the following as an argument from you against halving XP costs for Giants, Reptile Men, etc. (as the OP suggested)

Also consider that in original TFT, Gargoyles and Reptile Men (and also Giants and Centaurs, which I'm ignoring for now for sake of simplicity and because I'd use more-different systems for them) paid double experience to improve, back in the old TFT EP system, which was much flatter and allowed near-indefinite improvement with enough EP.

Also notice that gargoyles have a hard IQ cap at 10, and giants have a hard DX and IQ cap at 10.

And I agreed with that also.

Bottomline: I see no need to adjust XP costs on a racial basis but do see a benefit (for all races) in adjusting the XP costs the way I have. And I may change my numbers a bit but I think what I listed is pretty close to what I will end up using.