Martial Arts Abilities

[David Bofinger]

I tried to separate Unarmed Combat from HTH (which after all is mostly conducted with daggers anyway). But now I think some of my HTH talent (see below) needs to be in Wrestling and require your hands free. Just not sure how much.

When a figure attempts to enter HTH with another, if one has Hand-to-Hand talent and the other does not, then instead of just rolling one die (as described in ITL 116‑7) roll two dice (rerolling 6s if from behind) and allow the figure with the talent to choose which roll applies.
Enemy figures do not receive the +4 DX bonus for the target being in HTH if the target has the Hand-to-Hand talent.
A figure with Hand-to-Hand talent does +1 damage in HTH attacks.
Hand-to-Hand talent has the same effect on pinning attempts (ITL 117) as a level of Unarmed Combat.
If attempting to disengage from HTH combat (ITL 117), roll one less die. Roll one more die if an enemy in the hex has this talent.

[David Bofinger]

Don't like the idea of having one talent for those who learnt in a dojo and another for those who learnt on the street. I mean we could also have one Sword talent for those who learnt in the army, and another for those who picked it up with a gang of pirates, and a third for those who paid a dancing master... but this way lies a lot of mess and I don't see the benefit.

[Steve Plambeck]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

Don't like the idea of having one talent for those who learnt in a dojo and another for those who learnt on the street.

Not even when it affords a broader range of character development, with players more tempted to do so, or rewarded for doing so, by overlapping talents available to them?


"Yes sir, how may I help you?"

"Hi, I'd like two scoops of barehanded combat training, please."

"Sure, you want both scoops the same, or two different flavors?"

"Hmmmm..."

[David Bofinger]

Are you saying you think my sword idea is a good one? Because I put it forward as an obviously bad idea for analogy purposes. Or if you think it is a bad idea, why is it bad for swords but good for unarmed?

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by Steve Plambeck

things no human should be able to do belong under magic, not talents.

In RAW it's mostly true that spell = supernatural and talent = mundane. But there are already a few violations of this rule, like Alchemy, and questionable cases like Physickers making healing potions, and weird quasi-talent "spells" like Staff and maybe magic item creation.

So I don't see why we can't have a supernatural talent. The difference between a talent and a spell is principally mechanical: spells follow a specific casting procedure and talents don't. The obvious way to implement strong qinggong is by supernatural talents.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

So I don't see why we can't have a supernatural talent. The difference between a talent and a spell is principally mechanical: spells follow a specific casting procedure and talents don't. The obvious way to implement strong qinggong is by supernatural talents.

I'm not sure using a few outliers as justification is a good basis for breaking the clear intent for Talents in the game. I would also argue that 'potion making' is clearly presented as a skill in TFT, not some kind of arcane power (though I would probably prefer the latter being more true).

And it's not like we don't have a precedent for 'powers' to model some of the kinds of abilities common to wuxia archetypes (though their implementation is different from what I propose). See the TFT Companion.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

Don't like the idea of having one talent for those who learnt in a dojo and another for those who learnt on the street. I mean we could also have one Sword talent for those who learnt in the army, and another for those who picked it up with a gang of pirates, and a third for those who paid a dancing master... but this way lies a lot of mess and I don't see the benefit.

There is room, however, for talents representing broader or less formal training, I think. Unlike Steve's proposal, my preference would be to make such talents inferior to those that one might build a character around.

For example, in my rules the martial artist must start by investing in the UNARMED COMBAT proficiency talent that works the same as any other base weapon talent. And like those talents, the skill can be enhanced by acquiring my versions of EXPERTISE and MASTERY talents (preceded by SPECIALIZATION in my framework) as well as various complementary new talents such as BOXING, WRESTLING, UNFETTERED DEFENSE, SAVAGE STRIKE, etc.

On the other hand, a character who doesn't want to pursue that focus, but also doesn't want to be completely useless in a fist-fight would likey select this talent...

BRAWLING (B)
Inferior to UNARMED COMBAT, this talent represents informal, but still mostly effective, hand-to-hand skill. It allows the character to fight unarmed at 3/DX -2 rather than the normal non-proficient penalty (4/DX). It also grants +1 to the character’s unarmed damage. If the character also has CAROUSING, they can roll 2/IQ to keep a brawl friendly, unless they choose to fight 'dirty' by grabbing something like a bottle, barstool or rock. In those situations, the character will use such 'improvised' weapons (q.v.) as if they had proficiency with them.

NOTE: This talent will not serve as a prerequisite to any of the more potent combat talents such as SPECIALIZATION, EXPERTISE and MASTERY.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by Steve Plambeck

Yep, I don't want to use the BRAWLING talent. For my own purposes I've renamed "Hand-To-Hand" combat as "BRAWLING", because I never liked the term "Hand-To-Hand" anyway, so having a skill named "BRAWLING" as well would get too confusing.

I share your disdain for the term "HTH" how TFT uses it, but my issues also extend to how it is implemented in the rules. I don't like that there is a separate roll required for same-hex engagements, for example.

As mentioned above, however, I think the term "brawling" is better for reflecting less structured and less effective unarmed fighting techniques.

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by TippetsTX

And it's not like we don't have a precedent for 'powers' to model some of the kinds of abilities common to wuxia archetypes

Maybe this is just a semantic confusion. I'm not sure any more what Steve meant when he said supernatural abilities should be magic, did he mean they should be spells? I thought so at the time, now I don't know. And I'm not sure what you see as the difference between a supernatural talent on the one hand and a power on the other.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

Maybe this is just a semantic confusion. I'm not sure any more what Steve meant when he said supernatural abilities should be magic, did he mean they should be spells? I thought so at the time, now I don't know. And I'm not sure what you see as the difference between a supernatural talent on the one hand and a power on the other.

I don't see a place for "supernatural talents" at all in TFT, but I know not everyone shares that stance.