Simplified Melee

[hcobb]

Remove options and engaged.

Each movement phase each figure can expend as much of their MA to do whatever they like. At the start of movement they can declare dodge/defend which takes up half their MA at that point.

Readying a weapon from the ground or your belt is either 3 MA or use the Quick Draw talent.

If you move away from a figure's front hexes then they get to take their action (if they have one) then to attempt an attack. This includes stepping into their hex from the front for HTH.

Then during actions phase do any one action that doesn't require less movement than you used this turn.

[Shostak]

Reminds me a bit of Starleader: Assault! from Metagaming way back when with its action points.

[Chris Rice]

That's fine with just a few figures but is way too fiddly once the numbers grow.

[Aman]

I'm going to work on some streamlining of the system just to make it a big quicker to pick up for experienced gamers and easier to handle for newbie gamers. I like the tactical granularity, I just think there are a few too many exceptions, and a bunch of rules that handle secondary stuff that is peripheral to beating each other up [isn't that why we're playing this??], like changing out weapons, pick things up, etc. Once I have to sit and imagine how far I can quickly crawl in 5 seconds, I'm in an "excess granularity zone" and ready to streamline!

Still, love the core aspect of the system and how much decisions matter for tactics.

[JimmyPlenty]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Remove options and engaged.

Each movement phase each figure can expend as much of their MA to do whatever they like. At the start of movement they can declare dodge/defend which takes up half their MA at that point.

Readying a weapon from the ground or your belt is either 3 MA or use the Quick Draw talent.

If you move away from a figure's front hexes then they get to take their action (if they have one) then to attempt an attack. This includes stepping into their hex from the front for HTH.

Then during actions phase do any one action that doesn't require less movement than you used this turn.

Always loved the action point idea ever since X-Com (should we really be calling it the X-Com system? Was there something else before that?)

However, I feel the only way to do it right would be to allow all actions, including combat, happen for every character. Nullfies a lot of fiddly.

That might work well with a modern day/sci fi scenario becuase of so many shooters.

[Steve Plambeck]

As long as we're talking crazy stuff, I devised a system long ago extremely similar to what Henry is talking about in the OP. Alas it never got play-tested and the MS gathers dust.

It was simpler than Melee in a couple respects. The movement phase was eliminated. Each figure got a turn to act, with different amounts of movement actually being options on the table of options.

All the options had a cost (as in an action point system), with those costs being: 1/4 turn, 1/2 turn, and 3/4 turn. When it was a figure's turn, it could execute as many options as it wanted to, in any order it wanted to, as long as the total of the costs never exceeded 1.

Moving 1 hex cost 1/4 turn. Moving more than that up to 1/2 MA cost 1/2 turn. Casting a spell or firing a missile weapon cost 3/4 turn. An attack cost 1/2, as did my equivalents of defend (an active Parry attempt) and dodge.

So for example a figure could move 1 hex and fire a bow. But unlike Melee, they could also fire their bow and then move 1 hex. Move 1/2 MA and Attack, or Attack and them move 1/2 MA (if now disengaged), etc. etc. Anything that could happen in Melee could happen here, but other combinations as well -- it was meant to just flow easily. Scooping up a weapon or other small tasks were also 1/4 turn, affording the ability to still move some distance or fight on the same turn.

Other ways it was "simpler" than Melee was I got rid of the roll for initiative (without a movement phase it became meaningless) and everyone just went in order of their (armored, but not otherwise adjusted) DX. The bug/design feature was that everyone would go in the same order every turn. Not sure what I'd have done about that if I ever finished the dang thing.

[Terquem]

I would think it could be streamlined even further - there are only five actions, attack, cast a spell, move double movement, defend (includes dodge), and help another figure

Oh, maybe have bonus actions in some odd situations

Or, wait, wait, streamline it even, even, more - no individual actions of any kind, no to hit rolls, just roll all the damage dice each side of the combat can do and whoever rolls highest wins!

Wait, what game is this again?

I think this is why it was said, more than once, this weekend at vFnordCon that there will be no second edition. The game is a set of rules that, in the general sense, works. Yes, there are always nuances that upon consideration lead to adjustments in the rules to satisfy different ideas about what is fun and what is playable.

Changes to rules will inevitably lead to new games - this is how we got TFT and T&T in the first place. Even D&D itself is an adaptation of an earlier rules set to satisfy someone else ideas of what kind of game they wanted to play.

The Fantasy Trip does not need to be "fixed". It is playable as it is. First edition D&D, even OD&D are playable, if that is the kind of game you want to play. There is nothing wrong with having house rules for your group, if that is the game everyone wants to play.

I don't always understand why it seems to feel like a "crusade" to convince others that your house rules make the game better.

[Skarg]

TFT is about my minimum bar for detail, below which I tend not to be very satisfied with the game, unless I'm doing a large mass combat with lots of low-focus NPCs fighting each other.

[Steve Plambeck]

Originally Posted by Terquem

Or, wait, wait, streamline it even, even, more - no individual actions of any kind, no to hit rolls, just roll all the damage dice each side of the combat can do and whoever rolls highest wins!

I gather that was intended as a tongue-in-cheek kind of rebuttal, and that's quite alright.

Originally Posted by Terquem

I think this is why it was said, more than once, this weekend at vFnordCon that there will be no second edition. The game is a set of rules that, in the general sense, works. [snip] The Fantasy Trip does not need to be "fixed".

That gives me somewhat mixed feelings. On the one hand I heartily agree with you, the game doesn't need to be "fixed". On the other hand, the text of the Legacy Edition rulebook could certainly stand a little more editing and some improvement. The game doesn't need fixing, but there's a few places in the manual it'd be nice to have a couple fixes. There really are some ambiguities, and a read of the main forum is all one needs to compile a list, and that's all completely apart from the subject of house rules. Of course many house rules have been spawned by inconsistencies or ambiguities in the official texts in the first place.

But I'm glad to see anyone passionately defend TFT as a wonderful game system, and I've preached that gospel myself for decades -- mainly to D&D players :)

Originally Posted by Terquem

I don't always understand why it seems to feel like a "crusade" to convince others that your house rules make the game better.

Those of us that concoct house rules are also naturally passionate at times over our ideas. Improvement of course is highly subjective, but espousing an idea here, in the sub-forum wisely set aside for these speculations, may get animated but it's less a crusade and more just an intellectual game of it's own. Anyone here is probably a bit competitive, or we wouldn't be players of a game that let's us imagine resolving our differences at the point of a broadsword :)

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by Steve Plambeck

Those of us that concoct house rules are also naturally passionate at times over our ideas. Improvement of course is highly subjective, but espousing an idea here, in the sub-forum wisely set aside for these speculations, may get animated but it's less a crusade and more just an intellectual game of it's own. Anyone here is probably a bit competitive, or we wouldn't be players of a game that let's us imagine resolving our differences at the point of a broadsword :)

Oh, there's an idea - if players disagree on what house rules to use, fight arena combats to decide!