(TFT) Roleplaying talents --> Michael's suggestion: roleplay your armourer

["rsmith" <rsmith@lightspeed.ca>]

Michael wrote in part:

>>>>Diplomacy should no more require detailed narration than
>>>>Armorer, or Fencing, or Create Gate.  

>It doesn't. It requires the *same* narration! 
>
>So let me get this straight. You just allow a player to walk up to a
>hostile orc and say "I Diplomacy him." clatter of dice. "I made it."?
>Sounds like fun....

	Sarcasm aside (Diplomacy never worked that way as I'm
sure Michael knows), I can see his point.  But I don't feel 
that this is the whole story.

	When I was roleplaying in highschool I had a friend, 
Paul, who was slick.  He could sweet talk any one.  By 
Michael's reasoning, EVERY one of Paul's characters would 
have Diplomacy.  (Or at least, every one of his characters 
would have the full advantages of Diplomacy if they took 
it.)

	One of our gaming buddies was mentally handicapped,
(not severely, just a bit slow).  By Michael's reasoning
he would never get the full advantage of Diplomacy, New
Followers, Math, etc. because he was not a good enough 
roleplayer.


	I've always looked on the character sheet as a 
contract between the player and the GM.  If the character
does not have (for example) Climbing, then the character
should not be able to climb well.  But it cuts both ways, 
if they have paid the points for Climbing, then by darn, 
they should be able to climb!


	A couple of years ago, a player in my campaign 
said that he wanted to take a character with Strategist,
Logistics, etc, and become a military type.  The only
problem is that he had NO skills as a commander.  Should
the GM in this situation say, "Well again you messed up,
your troops have low moral, again, and you've been 
outmaneuvered on the battle field, again.  Gee, you sure
suck at being a commander!"

	This is an extreme example perhaps.  What I did was
I prompted the player, when ever he was going to make a
really lame move as a military commander.  (He was way 
too democratic for a military type, especially given that
his troops were ill educated conscripts.  Also he lacked 
the killer instinct to force decisive victories.)  After 
a couple real years of hints and help, he could roleplay 
a military type pretty well.

	However Michael specifically said you shouldn't 
prompt players.  (His example was about facing and 
maneuver's even tho the player's character was a 
competent fighter.)

	
	I was searching on Google a little while ago for
TFT. (Just seeing what turned up.)  One page was by a 
guy talking about the micro-games.  He said that Melee
and Wizard rocked, but ITL sucked because characters
were too much alike.  (GURPS with it's advantages and
disadvantages was a big improvement in his opinion.)
In any case, he stayed with D&D because it had more
possible characters types and better roleplaying(!).

	If you are punished each time you try to play 
character's BEYOND your personal abilities, then your 
choices of characters become just a little narrower, 
IMHO.


	But encouraging players to roleplay their 
Armourers sounds like a good thing to me.   :-)


	Rick
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