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Re: (TFT) 3 pairs of sub-attributes. Been done before? --> Superscripts.
OTOH, ST is another matter. If my barbarian, Grog, has an 20 ST, then
he has huge muscles, can lift a great amount and gets bonuses when
wearing armor. Seems natural for someone doing a lot of physical work.
My wizard, Cornholio, has a 20ST too but he didn't get there from
physical workouts. Oops, what does that mean? Does he too have huge
muscles, can he lift a great amount of weight and does he too get
bonuses for wearing armor? This seems odd. The reason for the wizard
acquiring ST is to increase his spellpoints and was apparently
acquired through some arcane fashion. He's not out lifting weights to
increase his muscle tissue. If Grog wanted to cast a spell, he would
have 20 spell points, and all because he lifted heavy things! This
seems to be the most awkward part of the level of abstraction in TFT.
House rule time! I like simple rules to fix a perceived problem and
here is mine:
Let Wizards cast their full amount of ST as separate fatigue. They then
have the option to continue to cast magic past that point but at
physical harm to themselves. For every two ST they desperately loose as
a (painful) wound they get one magic point to cast with.
Now we have Grog, ST 20. He has ripping muscles like all good
barbarians.
We also have the wizard Cornholio with only a ST of 14. He is not as
physically as strong as Grog (he's not as buff) but he can cast a total
of 21 points of spells, similar in power to Grog's ST 20. 14 + 7. Of
course this would kill him to cast the last spell point so in effect he
really only has 19 to cast. That would leave him with 2 ST (wound)
points left. Dramatically this plays out really well in the games I've
played: as the wizard is drained of energy he gets to the point where
the strain of the spells physically start to hurt him to cast. And if
you are playing where you split ST into health and magic points this
avoids the strange tactic where, once you've cast all of a wizards ST
in spells you have him charge in with his staff to whack bad guys over
the head.
--David O. Miller
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