TFT Dungeon Crawling

[tbeard1999]

Moved from the priest/theologian thread.

Originally Posted by JLV

Under the rules as written, dungeon crawls are pretty much a non-event (unless the dungeon has racks of healing potions in various rooms scattered throughout the place), because basically you wind up getting wounded pretty badly in fairly short order and have to disengage and return to town for a few weeks of leisurely healing. ...

I sincerely hope that Steve comes up with some clever way to help "fix" this; healing spells will help, but honestly not as much as in other games, because the caster needs to then rest up for a while to "recharge" his fatigue. So even with them, "dungeon crawling" will become more like "dungeon peristalsis;" with frequent stops and starts, given the overall greater lethality of TFT as compared to say, D&D...

Any game with a quasi-"realistic" combat system will be unable to match D&D for dungeon crawling. My campaigns had a *lot* of healing potions (and I allowed them to heal 1d6 ST). Perhaps not realistic, but what are you gonna do?

I could see a TFT variant that would modify TFT to be better suited for dungeon crawls. The best idea I've had over the years:

Only half of a figure's ST (round down) represents actual ability to withstand damage. The remainder is "luck points" that can be recovered after every fight with a few minutes of rest. However, this recovery ability is limited each day.

Figures with Veteran can recover 2 x ST in luck points each day. Figures with Warrior can recover 1.5 x ST (round up) in luck points each day. I'd reduce the minimum ST for Warrior to (say) 11. Other figures can recover 1 x ST in luck points each day.

Healing potions, spells and physickers will heal body damage first and will take effect after luck points are recovered.

(Optional) Mooks have no luck points, which effectively halves their ST for damage purposes.

Monsters are handled on a case-by-case basis, but generally should not have luck points; their ST is not halved for damage.

Example - Bob the Fighter has ST 13, and the Warrior talent. He can recover a maximum of 20 luck points each day. He takes 10 points of damage in a single combat, reducing his ST to 3. After the combat is over, he recovers 7 points of "luck points" by resting. His ST is now 10.

The party's physicker heals 2 points of remaining damage, restoring his ST to 12. (With this rule, you might letting physickers heal only 1 point of damage and master physickers 2 points of damage.)

I like this system better than simply doubling ST or somesuch, because individual TFT combats won't be slowed down by multiple rounds of hacking. Each individual TFT combat will move as fast as it did before adding this rule. And, the TFT combats will still be somewhat deadlier than D&D combats.

Also, definitely use one of the revised death and damage systems.

This would also make mooks easier to kill with a single blow, which might be a desirable end.

Also, you may want to consider getting rid of double and triple damage for minor monsters. Or not.

A fun rule for certain nasty monsters - they will keep fighting 1d turns after they’ve been “killed”.

Some kind of healing spell is probably a Good Thing for dungeons.

What are some other ideas to make TFT more dungeon friendly?