Re: (TFT) 18's & broken weapons / weird stuff / variety of encounter. 2

["Neil Gilmore" <raito@raito.com>]

> 10 or 15 years ago I wanted TFT to be
> realistic, now I worry about what is fun.

Amen. TFT isn't even close to reality. I used to think so, long ago, because
of the lethality of combat. Then I did a lot of studying. The idea of being
able to kill someone in plate armor with a single handed sword is ludicrous.

These days, I want it to be fun, and consistent. And to that end, I enjoy
TFT. It's fun partly because you can have elaborate roleplaying campaigns,
while still just getting some people together in an arena. It's consistent
because the mechanics are simple. If it's not in the rules, the GM picks the
appropriate stat and number of dice, and you're off and running.

But back to the quality of weapons debate. It is my opinion that in worlds
where magic is indistrialized, or even partly so, the quality of weapons is
quite high. Imagine begin able to finely control the temperature of a forge,
either directly through fire spells, or indirectly through a fire elemental.
Imagine specialized magic to alloy metals (remember, my campaign has quite a
bit of aluminum around, mostly due to indirect use of magic). This makes
good weapons possible.

Now, I fully realize how fantastic the abilities of a medieval swordsmith
were to be able to make asword from nothing but what they could pick up off
of, or dig out of the ground. But I'd take modern steel over it any day.

Neil Gilmore
raito@raito.com
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