Noob Question - Books needed to play

[hcobb]

Originally Posted by agentJ

I need to check kickstarter more often or something so I don't miss out again.

Or just follow this account:

https://www.kickstarter.com/profile/warehouse23

For the notifications.

[Gffclarke668]

Maybe I didnt' explain what I'm visualizing very well. Imagine the Pocket Box Melee&Wizard set but at full size and packed into a single book.

Easy (potentially cost effective) intro to the game without having to go in for a large Legacy Edition box (which although a great value) can intimidate some newer players.

Also while I agree with Phil that the digital bundle for $10 on the last kickstarter was AMAZING some players prefer physical copies.

Just some thoughts, don't see any right or wrong involved.

[DeadParrot]

Originally Posted by Gffclarke668

Maybe I didnt' explain what I'm visualizing very well. Imagine the Pocket Box Melee&Wizard set but at full size and packed into a single book.

Easy (potentially cost effective) intro to the game without having to go in for a large Legacy Edition box (which although a great value) can intimidate some newer players.

Also while I agree with Phil that the digital bundle for $10 on the last kickstarter was AMAZING some players prefer physical copies.

Just some thoughts, don't see any right or wrong involved.

This is pretty close. http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...-the-labyrinth
Available in both hard copy and digital.

Don't get hung up on the thought you need Fantasy Trip maps. Pretty much any map can be made to work. Even square grids. Doesn't take much to imagine 'mega-squares' so most of the rules using mega-hexes will work as is.

Bonus points if you have access to some of the new Ogre maps. Those are 1.5" hexes and work fine with the 1.5" FT map overlays. Just imagine those radiation craters are giant gopher holes.

[Axly Suregrip]

Originally Posted by Gffclarke668

Maybe I didnt' explain what I'm visualizing very well. Imagine the Pocket Box Melee&Wizard set but at full size and packed into a single book.

Easy (potentially cost effective) intro to the game without having to go in for a large Legacy Edition box (which although a great value) can intimidate some newer players.

Also while I agree with Phil that the digital bundle for $10 on the last kickstarter was AMAZING some players prefer physical copies.

Just some thoughts, don't see any right or wrong involved.

Gffclarke,
I agree with your first post, in that there should be a "Players Guide". ITL is the GM guide. A trimmed down version of that for the players would be useful.

As far as your asking for a starter kit that is less intimidating than the Legacy box, well there are two easy ways to go:

1) buy Melee & Wizard for about $25. This a good buy since you will get the maps and counters too.
http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...ard-pocket-box

OR

2) Buy just ITL
http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...-the-labyrinth
About $35 hard cover or $18 digital.


So you are in for as little as $18.


If you want a module to play with then purchase DeathTest + Deathtest2. It is a single purchase to get both and these will play well with either M&W or ITL. Available in either physical or digital:
http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...ath-test-2-pdf
or
http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...d-death-test-2
That is about $10 or $20, respectively.


BTW, I am not an employee shilling for them.

[Steve Plambeck]

Originally Posted by Axly Suregrip

Gffclarke,
I agree with your first post, in that there should be a "Players Guide". ITL is the GM guide. A trimmed down version of that for the players would be useful.

That's what I've always wanted to see as well. Players in my experience came in three varieties: GMs (who needed all the rules), players of non-wizards (who only needed the combat rules, talents, equipment, and character advancement rules, but none of the magic rules), and players of wizards (who needed the magic rules and spell tables, but almost never needed the magic item creation rules).

The advantage to the Legacy version of ITL is nobody needs more than one book anymore. But honestly, if you're only a player, and if you are only using non-wizards as your PCs, about 3/4's of the pages in that one book don't apply to you. It'd be nice if that other 1/4 that most players do need was its own separate, small, affordable booklet. Sold separately of course. But I could picture a boxed set that includes one copy of ITL for the GM, and four or five copies of the smaller booklet so you can start a group and equip every player with their own copy.

Magic rules might seem to be a loose end though. I'd seriously doubt anyone would want to see a three manual edition like we had in the old days -- I know I wouldn't. But I think all the magic rules could easily fit in a short "Player Manual" if you left out the magic item creation stuff and potions entirely, leaving the ITL manual as the source book for all that. Over 20 pages of ITL are devoted to those things, when in practice only GMs need a copy of that.

Also keep in mind the magic section would be even shorter than the original Wizard, which had to duplicate the sections on Turn Sequence, Movement rules, Options. etc that also appeared in Melee. Being in the same booklet, none of those things would have to appear twice. A description of spell types followed by the Spell Tables if pretty much all that would be needed to round out a "Player Manual".

[Shostak]

Even if you are always not GMing and instead running non-wizard PCs, it can be super helpful to have and know the rules for all the other things. ITL costs less than the D&D Players’ Handbook or Call of Cthulhu Investigators’ Guide and gives you a lot more.

[Steve Plambeck]

Originally Posted by Shostak

Even if you are always not GMing and instead running non-wizard PCs, it can be super helpful to have and know the rules for all the other things. ITL costs less than the D&D Players’ Handbook or Call of Cthulhu Investigators’ Guide and gives you a lot more.

That's me, and that's you, and it's surely true for all of us old-timers, especially the ones addicted to this forum :)

I wanted to know all the details of every aspect of the game from Day 1, and went tracking down everything in print. But looking to recruit new players and see TFT expand to a wider audience rather than just hang on, and being in this era of shorter attention spans where instant gratification is expected, making the rules as accessible and easy-looking as possible is probably a good idea. Note I'm advocating making the game look like a simple thing to get into -- appearances can be everything. Or let me suggest it's better to not look more complicated than it really is, and then scare anyone off.

No one should feel they have to read 175 pages before they start playing, and we know they don't, but they don't know they don't. This is why we have folk coming to the forum asking which books they really need and what they should get. Once someone is playing, there's nothing to stop them from getting further into the game and reading every book, buying every module, and collecting everything and studying to their heart's content. Everyone's degree of interest will vary -- and that's perfectly okay. Just because someone doesn't want to get as deep into it as someone else doesn't mean they won't be a fun, great player to have at the table.

Now putting my GM hat back on, I'm not sure it isn't a good thing to have players that don't learn everything. Reading it all is something of a spoiler. Easier to stay in character as Conan the Teenager if you don't already know what to expect when you go up against a wizard -- or a Troll, or even a pickpocket. Yes I suppose, if you always want to "win" you want to know everything. But certainly every character isn't supposed to know the difference between an Image, an Illusion, and a Summoning. Nor should a new wizard on her first adventure, coming from an academic background, necessarily realize how dangerous a high-DX archer can be. Yes the wizard should know to put down an iron object if they want to cast a spell, but anyone else shouldn't be so sure about that they won't decide to run or dodge when the mage points a finger at them, even if the mage has a sword in hand.

ITL is full of hints to GMs on how to run things -- should everyone in the party guess what's coming because they've studied those rules so closely? Knowing too much may spoil a surprise! So I'd advocate for rule books organized on a "need to know" basis, not just for efficiency's sake alone but because it feels right from the storytellers viewpoint.

[Axly Suregrip]

A players guide is very useful in introducing a new player to the game without handing them an intimidatingly large manual (ITL).

It should contain:
- character sheet
- list of combat options
- talents
- spells
- weapons/armor lists
- extra purchase items list

BTW, the "The Fantasy Trip Character and Reference Booklet.pdf" file comes close but is missing the Talents & Spells lists.

[DarkPumpkin]

ITL is, as has been mentioned, a very low-cost one-book option compared to other games on the market. And Melee (free in pdf) and Wizard are even lower in cost and easy pathways to learning the game.
I would guess that the marketing and production budget might not extend to development of further rules subsets and entry points to the full game.

[Rolando]

i think the best way of not intimidating new players you get free PDFs with almost everything a new player needs to know, Melee and Wizard.

If the player is interested enough to keep playing or get into ITL the full book is no longer intimidating and best to have everything there is in a cheap package.

Also, a GM may print a few pages from the even cheaper PDF and make a booklet if that is wanted.