Re: (TFT) Myth III boardgame

[pvk@oz.net]

> I never saw the board game however. Is the combat system any good?

The board game is an artifact. It was created as a promotional item for
Myth III before it came out, and I think just a few sets were sent out to
media and the like, distributed at trade shows and so forth. It's a short
set of rules with one full-color map and counter set. Pretty simple and
limited, but interesting to see, and not bad for a simple rule set. The
simplicity lends itself to introducing players to tactical gaming, or
perhaps to using for larger-scale battles.

It reminded me of something I've used with my GURPS games, for when I want
to play out a large battle but not have to have tons of record sheets and
spend 50 hours resolving it. That is, I define certain classes of troops
based on equipment and skill, making each type of soldier a full character
sheet. Then I do some math to calculate what the chances are of successful
debilitating attacks from each soldier type to each other soldier type,
perhaps fudging in some factors such as the discussion this email list had
earlier about how most people will stop fighting after they get hurt.
Essentially I make a system of charts that let me resolve a turn (or even,
muliple turns) of combat between two combattants with the roll of one or
two single dice (I used 12-siders for more precision). The maneuvers could
be the same, and if fully-detailed characters fought the nameless minions,
I could resolve it using the regular rules using the minion type's sheet
and tracking details if needed. The result was a massive increase in play
speed, and the ability to have large battles going on around the main
characters, without taking all day to do it.

I've done TFT and GURPS games with miniatures without hexes sometimes. As
long as it's not competetive so players might whine about range and facing
interpretations, I think it works fine, though I understand the desire to
stick with hexes. I don't think all that much house ruling is needed for
virtual situations. I use rulers for range and line of fire determination
even on flat hex maps. GURPS has a few added details for fighting at
different elevations, which are sort of portable to TFT. They mainly just
add or substract a point or two per level of elevation, and a bit more
against head or feet targets, which of course can't be targetted beyond
the weapon's reach (no hitting feet of someone way below you with a
shortsword, but a +2 to aim at their head - something like that). For
movement, maybe double the cost to enter slopes above a certain steepness
- otherwise maybe cost 1 movement point per half-meter elevation gain.
Maybe figures willing to careen downhill can add one to their movement
allowance for every meter they decend a slope in a turn, but with a chance
to fall based on how much bonus movement they take:

+1 hex/turn   - minimum 1 meter elevation loss  - 2D vs DX or fall
+2 hexes/turn - minimum 2 meters elevation loss - 3D vs DX or fall
+3 hexes/turn - minimum 3 meters elevation loss - 4D vs DX or fall
etc.

Running talent reduces chance to fall by 1D.
Show your intended course, then roll. If you do fall, you land half-way
along the line - if that's half-way between two hexes, you get to choose
which one.

PvK
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