Re: (TFT) Crossbows Are Too Powerful ?

["Ty Beard" <tbeard@tyler.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Stan" <srydzews@ix.netcom.com>
To: <tft@brainiac.com>


> Ty Beard wrote:
> > Here you can also see the gaming absurdity of equating penetration and
> > damage. In GURPS, an M1 Garand does 7d+1 damage -- an average of 25.5
points
> > per shot. Few ST 10 normals in GURPs will survive a single hit from such
a
> > weapon. A sci-fi blaster rifle does 12d damage (!).
>
> Well, GURPS has its own way of decoupling the damage from the penetration.
> Depending on the hit location, the majority of that 7d+1 will probably
> be lost.  And ST 0 <> dead in GURPS the way it does in TFT.

I know but IIRC, a character is dead at -his ST. And with an average of
25-26 points of damage, a ST10 GURPS character is going to be dead most of
the time.

And it's been awhile since I played GURPS, but I never used hit location
rules (life is way too short).

> I still think, though, that while reality is good, it isn't the main
> thing.  This may be heretical, but IMO a game is about interesting
choices.

Fair enough. And it's clear that Steve Jackson was motivated more by game
balance than by realism (whatever that is). In Melee, you took whatever
weapon you could use. There was no cost, rarity, talent requirement, etc. So
weapons had to be balanced in other ways -- ST to use and ROF were how he
balanced missile weapons. This is an unfortunate legacy of Melee.

> As it is now, TFT longbows may be underpowered compared to real longbows,
> but the higher ROF makes up for it.

Agreed -- if you're fighting lightly armored foes. But you cannot replicate
the superiority of English longbowmen over knights with TFT. My rules
changes are an attempt to remedy this.

> In my opinion, using your figures...
>
> > > -Longbows require a ST of 13 and do 2+1 damage.
> > > -Heavy Crossbows require a ST of 12 and do 2+1 damage.
> > > -Light crossbows require a ST of 10 and do 1+1 damage.
>
> ...really means that almost no one except perhaps a starting character
> would use crossbows, assuming the ROF at normal and high DX levels
> remained the same.  Realistic?  Very possibly.   But that's one less
> choice to make with your character, and to me, that's bad.

I disagree. You could (for instance) allow anyone to use a crossbow without
a talent. They *were* very easy to use compared with bows, swords, etc.

> But that's just me.  One other comment I would make is that the
> statement "these weapons ignore all armor and shields" should have
> a bit of elaboration.  Should they really ignore a +5 W/A enchanted suit
> of fine plate?  What about the armor of monsters?  It ignores all that?
> I think it would be better to say that they ignore X points of armor,
> with X being whatever you judge appropriate.  Five or six points, I'd
> guess.

I agree. My statement was really just a rough sketch and would definitely
need to be filled out. As you suggest, you could instead easily integrate
penetration into any RPG like TFT by simply stating that the weapon does
2+1(5) damage where the number in parenthesis is the amount of armor
ignored.

--Ty Beard
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