The Invulnerability Problem

[hcobb]

Dhallak has 13 "hit points" and armor and enchantments that stop 13 hits per attack. You can one-shot him with an ordinary broadsword, but this is very very unlikely.

A good starting point on a fix would to make most magic items (Blur, Invisibility, Iron Flesh, Flight, etc.) cost one fatigue per minute to use and impose armor wear and tear on silk robes that stop three hits (minus one point of enchantment for every twenty hits done to them).

[larsdangly]

I'm not a big fan of armor wear-and-tear rules because they require an irritating level of additional record keeping; I can't think of a time when I could get a group to really do it (or care whether they did or not).

But having magic items cost ST to use is a very effective way to limit their use and is right there in black and white in the rules. It is actually really expensive, in cash and time and staff, to make self-powered magic items, so it is quite sensible to have non-self-powered items be the norm. This rule doesn't apply to enchanted armors or shields, so you have to either limit their availability (e.g., force people to make them rather than just handing them over) or add a house rule.

One thing I find confusing and somewhat frustrating about the Legacy Edition rule book is that it sets up a clear system for distinguishing between self-powered and non-self-powered items, and then presents a whole bunch of items that don't make it very clear which they are.

All that said, is this a problem in your campaign? I'm finding that front line fighters have ways of getting to 6-10 points of armor protection if they really want it, and that I think this is a great thing - the trade offs in DX penalties and talents feel fair and the outcome is someone who has the resilience I expect of an experienced knight (tank/whatever). I suppose if I handed them a self-powered iron flesh ring it would be a game changer, but I haven't done that.

[Skarg]

Iron Flesh and Stone Flesh enchantments don't say they have a ST cost, and Stone Flesh's listed cost is very low for such a game-changing item.

I have seen Stone Flesh stacked with armor on powerful fighters make those fighters nearly invincible especially when they have allies and play well. Battles with normal opponents started to be come very uninteresting slaughters. It took us five years of steady play with the original rules and experience system before we got to that point (though we would have got there sooner if the players and the GM hadn't both gotten worried about too many magic items some years before that).

Adding a ST cost would help somewhat... but not all that much. We ended up adding magic item breakdown house rules which DID get people to be much more hesitant to power up their magic items, especially against ordinary foes.

[Shostak]

I haven't given out magic items like unpowered Stone Flesh rings or even +3 armor since I was a young teenager, so the Dhallak-type of problem doesn't really arise at my table.

IF your PCs are routinely so armored and that they are unlikely to be hurt, take the toys away, since they don't actually make the game more fun. Have the encounter adversaries armed with net and misericorde, or disenchant the armor with Remove Thrown Spell. Or both.

[tomc]

Throw him down a well. Come back in a few weeks and claim the goodies.

[hcobb]

Or just toss him into his own Death Test?

[larsdangly]

This issue is a two-edged sword: on one hand, PC's with well chosen and supplied strategies for protection can reduce their routine risk from common foes to the point where some encounters are uninteresting. On the other hand, that is exactly the point of powers given to advanced characters in many other games, as a way of enabling dungeon crawls or other extended adventures, or of permitting cinematic sorts of action. This issue is one of those places in the game where you find a 'gear stick' and need to decide whether your campaign is going to be played in 1st gear, with goblins and street brawlers posing real threats to player characters, or 5th gear, with lone heroes facing and defeating full grown dragons.

I actually think this problem is less acute in TFT than in other games, even if you do have players who manage to create, find or buy powerful protective magic. A group of 32-40 point orcs that substantially outnumber the players is still going to defeat a heavily protected character, through some combination of tactics, heavy weapons and/or spells. I.e., combat doesn't ever become a total walk over other than simple and obviously unchallenging choices.

And the X-flesh rings are precisely the sort of items that really NEED to have the ST cost specified. If they are self powered then they can be a huge part of an 'invulnerability plan'; if not, then their ST cost is so great that even powerful heroes will only use them in the most dire of circumstances, which could be part of a challenging, balanced campaign.

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Dhallak has 13 "hit points" and armor and enchantments that stop 13 hits per attack

One obvious way to kill him is to pin/entangle/whatever and have someone else take a turn to aim and coup de grace. But it's rules interpretation dependent: how helpless is helpless.

A good starting point on a fix would to make most magic items (Blur, Invisibility, Iron Flesh, Flight, etc.) cost one fatigue per minute to use

Yes, at least that. Or make every magic item cheap but it breaks if you roll a 6 when you turn it on for the turn.

I've come to feel that magic items generally cause more harm than good and the game would be better off with 90% of them removed.

[Shostak]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

I've come to feel that magic items generally cause more harm than good and the game would be better off with 90% of them removed.

Agreed. Consumable magic items like scrolls, potions, ointments, teeth that turn into skeletons when hurled at the ground, etc., are examples of one-use items that give plenty of magic, but without the lasting imposition on the game.

[Senturian]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Iron Flesh and Stone Flesh enchantments don't say they have a ST cost, and Stone Flesh's listed cost is very low for such a game-changing item.

I would think as an item, they require the same Strength costs as if casting the spell.
I always treated self powered items could only be created thru a wish gained by a Demon or Angel. There wouldn't be many available on the open market. Almost have to kill the user to obtain one. Challenging...
And if it has a Limiting spell, useful to a few or Expunge, worthless.