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(TFT) Sprinting.



Hi Charles, 
	I for some time have used sprinting rules
where you may double your MA (but you triple the
penalties for terrain) at a cost of 1 fST / 2 turns.
It works well.  I also have a Racing talent which
adds another 2 hexes to your movement.  If we 
assume that one in one hundred people start at 12
MA (very long legs, genetic predisposition to run
fast), then using these rules it is almost possible
to run a 4 minute mile if you have 30 ST to pay all
the fST to sprint the whole time.  I consider this
to be quite realistic.

	Human hunters have such huge endurance that
they can catch most prey but simply chasing it until
it drops from exhaustion.

	I think the combat turn is fine.  I the 
speed thing bothers you, use your sprinting rules.

	Rick


On Wed, 2004-05-05 at 19:11, Charles Gadda wrote:
> This has probably been touched on before, but I recently did a little
> digging and came up with some profound disconnects between movement and time
> in Melee/TFT and the real world. Which is all right, to an extent, but
> perhaps this ought to be looked at a bit more closely.
> 
> Let us consider that the "average" human has an MA of 10, which means that
> he can run 10 hexes in a single 5 second turn per canon. How does this
> compare with reality? Not well - an average person can generally run about
> ~15mph or thereabouts, which works out to about 5 hexes ***per second***, or
> an actual MA of 25! It gets worse when one considers a trained runner. In
> TFT they have an MA of 12, but the fastest human on record (Tim Montgomory
> in the 100m dash) averaged about 23mph, with an instantaneous speed of
> 26.5mph, which would be 9.75 hexes per second, or an instantaneous MA of
> close to 50(!).
> 
> Once one considers the animal kingdom, everything goes out the window. A
> Cheetah can attain a top speed of roughly 67-68mph, with a corresponding MA
> of 125 (!!!). Plainly, TFT is way off with a lot of its math, here. As an
> aside, this is probably one reason why SJ went to one second rounds - a
> person can rapidly run off the map on any larger time scale!
> 
> Worse, some of the apparent scaling is way off, as well. In TFT a brown or
> grizzly bear has an MA of 8. However, in the real world these critters have
> been clocked at around 35 mph, or more than double the average running speed
> of a human. Thus, a "scale" MA of 20 would be a lot closer to reality.
> 
> As a point of fact, there are few large land animals that humans can outrun.
> We're pretty darn slow, all things considered.
> 
> There are two underlying problems here:
> 
> 1. Semantics - the definition of MA as one's "top speed" is a misnomer. At
> best it represents something of a "jogging" speed that can be sustained over
> a fairly long distance. Which, BTW, is quite reasonable for combat.
> 2. The time scale might be too long. A lot can happen in 5 seconds, to say
> nothing of ground covered.
> 
> The first problem can be solved by defining MA as a top jogging speed, and
> creating a new "sprint" option that allows you to run at double MA at a cost
> of 1 fatigue per turn. This technically understates MA somewhat (in the
> average example, you'd only make 20 vs. 25 hexes per round) but it is easier
> to calculate at a glance and I think it fits the "close enough for
> government work" criteria to be eminently usable. We only need reflect
> reality, not slavishly adhere to it.
> 
> Of course, animals are still a problem. For the cheetah, half of 125 is
> 67.5, which is hardly helpful. However, it may be that with animals their
> "jogging" or "combat" speed is not so high and does not follow the same
> proportions as a human type, and may only represent, say, < (as opposed to
> =) or less of their top speed. Anybody have any insight into this? DMG II?
> (don't know if you know or not, but you're so chock full of esoteric
> knowledge I thought I'd ask.). If there is a basis in truth here, it would
> solve a number of problems. In the bear example, their "combat" MA would
> come down to about 14-15 or so (perhaps less), which would be manageable,
> but clearly make them faster than humans. And of course they could still
> sprint at high MAs to catch the unwary. Cheetahs would probably just need to
> be scaled down a lot, period.
> 
> Something else to consider with animals is that in most cases they attain
> their top speeds for only very short runs and tire quickly - even moreso
> than we do. I do not know enough on this to fit it in to the mix here, but I
> am aware of it in outline. I think it would be very helpful if this were
> understood better.
> 
> One could also consider reducing the combat turn from 5 to 3 seconds, which
> would further allow things to be "scaled down" to a more manageable level.
> Going beyond movement, it would also help when contemplating things like
> rates of fire out of modern semi and full auto firearms, for example, since
> it would help "scale down" that as well. Not really in favour of this, but
> it is a legitimate point, and thought it should be brought up.
> 
> Suggestions?
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