On Fri, 28 Jan 2011 14:40:02 -0500
Joey Beutel <mejobo@comcast.net> wrote:
Well similar to color (with its spectrum), we have the entire
rulebook
as a set of things our games have in common. Even if we ignore parts
of the rules.
On Jan 28, 2011, at 2:43 AM, Jay Carlisle wrote:
Again...
Does anybody actually know what 1 point of damage is supposed to
mean?
The conversation about abstraction vs. realism in TFT is one that's
gone
on for years. I'm an abstractionist, so to me one point of damage
means
around 1/12th of a starting character's total ability to withstand
injury.
What kind of injury should that be? What's a dagger to the gut really
worth? What's an arrow in the arm really going to do? These things
matter a great deal to Jay and others who are adding detail galore to
their systems. It's all pretty arbitrary to me, though.
I'm on record as having been drawn to TFT for its simplicity and its
use of multiple 6-sided dice which brings a bell-shaped curve of
probability
to the game rather than the flat line a single D20 brings.
I love Jay and his maniacal research into all the aspects of the
game that
he brings, but it's an approach that isn't my cup of tea. With all
the
games I play, I find that the more realistic the game tries to be,
the less
into it that I am. I got into gaming through some friends that
enjoyed
wargaming, and have moved little stacks of cardboard chits around on
a map
for a long time, but after a weekend of being bored to tears with
Advanced
Squad leader, I find I'd rather play Battle Cry.
It was the same for me with RPGs. I started with Melee & Wizard and
expanded
into ITL, and when I was asked to play in a D&D game, I was
astonished to see
how slow the game went, with rolls for everything. Maybe that was
just a case
of one DM and his desire for accurate modeling, but I saw it in
every D&D
game I played or witnessed, where TFT always flowed and allowed the
adventure
to move forward.
So, what's one damage point? Anything we want it to be!
--
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Joe Hartley - UNIX/network Consultant - jh@brainiac.com
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
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