Quoting David Michael Grouchy II <david_michael_grouchy_ii@hotmail.com>:
I'm very much with Ratio on this one. I'm far more dangerous and angry aboutit though, saying things like 'the need for more numbers is the sign of a weakmind.' I could run an entire solar system of planets full of people, through all tech levels, and with infinite variety (including things like inteligentrobots and baby scaleless dragons) with the existing In The Labyrinth systems. I have witnesses who can verify this.
Apparently, my tact was recognized. I'm possibly more adamant about my position. But I don't tell other people how to run their games. And yes, I've done nearly the same using TFT as a 'meta-rules' system. Meaning that I see TFT more as 'rules-about-how-to-make-rules' than a completely complete package (though there's certainly enough in the printed material to do a lot).
I've written posts on this very forum showing how a single talent in TFT isexactly equal to an entire character class in AD&D. I mean it's really really obvious. Theif, Priest, Warrior, Steve Jackson didn't even change the names. Slow down and hear the words for a second. I mean Illusionist is an ENTIRE character class in AD&D. It's a two point talent in TFT.
And here I disagree, at least in part. First, a slight rant on D&D. I consider Gary Gygax to be the Sigmund Freud of roleplaying games. That is, he is to be revered as the guy who thought the whole thing up. But, like Freud, his most valuable contribution is not his creation (D&D have several notable faults). It's the fact that he got people thinking that there has to be a better way. One of those better ways is TFT. As far as Illusionists go, I'm not sure which Talent you are referring to. I'm finding it difficult to reconcile your statement that an AD&D class with 66 available spells can be distilled into a single TFT Talent. Especially as such AD&D spells as Blur, Light, Darkness, Phantasmal Force, etc. have pretty good TFT analogues. Just that would appear to refute your statement. To which Talent do you refer?
My preference for TFT can, however, be stated somewhat along the same lines as yours, though. One of the things I dislike about D&D is the class system. One of the things that I like about TFT is that, in effect, every character has his own class. One can construct a very plausible canonical AD&D Illusionist in canonical TFT. One cannot take an arbitrary Hero or Wizard in canonical TFT and construct a plausible canonical AD&D character. One could plausibly state that AD&D classes are just build packages rigidly made up of Talents and Spells, whereas TFT is non-rigid. This may just state a preference for point systems over class systems. But I think TFT does a very good job at the point system. The Talents and Spells are very useful, but this is balanced by the fact that no character gets all that they want.
Neil Gilmore raito@raito.com ===== Post to the entire list by writing to tft@brainiac.com. Unsubscribe by mailing to majordomo@brainiac.com with the message body "unsubscribe tft"