Re: (TFT) new rules: UC talents and character generation

["Charles Gadda" <cgadda@earthlink.net>]

Interesting read!

I've thought along similar lines for the character generation in terms of
putting upper limits on stats, though I've come to no conclusions as to the
best way. Your approach seems... complicated. And much of TFT's virtue is
its simplicity. (Like my healing rules - too complex. I'm doing a rewrite
that is much simpler across the board). Also, while I also thought of a
"knowledge" stat (or adjIQ, or whatever - there are alot of variations on
this theme that have been posted here) I'm beginning to lean more towards
leaving IQ alone, though perhaps reducing the costs of select talents and
coming up with a default skills list (I don't know what this means exactly,
yet. The only example I can think of is that most of us know how to ride a
bike, so it should be a "free" talent in that respect, though relatively few
of us are involved in dirt bike racing, which would most certainly be a "for
cost" talent)

As for the UC rules, whilst I admire the effort and careful thought that
went into them, I would not use them. This goes back to a problem I have had
with the original TFT rules, namely that the UC talents are seriously out of
whack both with the rest of the rules and with reality. In terms of the
game, the UC "family" comprises five talents that cost a total of 11 points,
with the last three requiring an IQ of 14. No other "talent" type
profession, not even that of a doctor (i.e. physicker) requires so much
effort in terms of talents and points. From a standpoint of realism, *any*
martial art is demanding - to assume that "only" the Far Eastern unarmed
combat skills were so advanced as to warrent such deep study is one of the
great myths of the modern age. That, and the bizarre mysticism surrounding
the Japanese katana... (and, no, they could NOT cut machine gun barrels in
half.)

Quite frankly the European martial arts were every bit as advanced as
anything coming out of the Orient - check out Talhoffer's Fechtbook for one
of many extant examples. It is highly irregular that one can be a master
swordsman with a mere two talents and 5 points, and require more than double
that to master unarmed fighting.

There is nothing mystical about Kung-fu or any other Asian martial art. As a
reminder, the feats of Jackie Chan, Jet Li, et al and movies like "Crouching
Tiger Hidden Dragon are NOT reflections of anything remotely resembling
reality. Probably more than 90% of it ranges from the utterly impractical to
the physically impossible (without choreography, wires and other Hollyweird
nonsense little of it would work). It is, in the end, a highly unrealistic
basis for any talents.

My feeling is that there should only be three UC talents, to keep more in
line with other "professions". Further, I have stripped some of the
capability out of them and put it into separate talents. For example I use
the Defensive Quickness talents out of Interplay - thus, I have removed that
ability out of the UC talents. In this manner both a swordsman or a kung-fu
master may learn these abilities - it is not "just" in the sole purview of
some barehanded, barefoot monk.

If one simply must have five UC talents, than you should at least expand
other fighting areas, such as swordsmanship. Iindeed, one can make a case
for other non-combat professions, as well - thief comes to mind). After all,
its not like they just stand there and hack at each other - there really is
such a thing as foot work, even for people that play with swords! But I
think it makes more sense to strip out some of the overwrought dreck and
B.S. out of the UC talents.

Martial arts are martial arts - East or West. All demand high levels of
practice and skill. Even firing a gun accurately demands a tremendous amount
of concentration (of course, to fire it inaccurately and hose someone at
close quarters does not require quite as much talent...)

I do hope I have not discouraged you! I do not mean any of this harshly, and
I do admire the time, thought, and effort that went into your rules
proposals, and hope you do more! I just feel a need to dispel a few myths.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Gfoeller" <johng3110@hotmail.com>
To: <tft@brainiac.com>
Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2005 9:15 PM
Subject: (TFT) new rules: UC talents and character generation


> Hi, all !
>
> I have some house rules for TFT that I posted online.
> http://johntft.tripod.com   One is for the Unarmed Combat talents; the
other
> is for character generation.  There will be more later.  My apologies for
> any typos.  Let me know what you think !
>
> --John
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