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Re: (TFT) what Dark city modules have you played? Im thinking of getting
On May 19, 2012, at 4:47 AM, Jay Carlisle wrote:
On Fri, May 18, 2012 at 11:42 AM, Joel BoardgameRpger wrote:
Sewers is suggested at *ADVANCED: 38 point characters*
???
As I recall DCG has its own system that translates into TFT simply.
So I'm not trying to get into that directly but I am a bit curious
as to
how folks view the ideas of attribute points and levels in TFT.
I believe we've had some discussions of this before, and it is all
relative to the other characters in the campaign (including all the
NPCs in the world).
In the view I use starting 32pt Figures are fresh out of high school
so to
speak, a bit more talented than Joe Average at 30pts but not
prodigy's.
Were they american football players they would be well recruited
standouts
on their high school teams but redshirt recruits at top level
university
programs.
I always viewed it as being more like:
30: Inexperienced/lacking in any real talent. People who are 30's
rarely go much higher. Most people are not 30's, but they are a large
minority. Not "average" but "low average."
32: This is more like average. Many attain this level of ability at
one point in their lives or another.
Stats are flexible over time, of course, but if you see a random
person from the age of 18 to 35, he's probably somewhere between 30
and 36, with the median being 32.
College level standouts move into the 40 to 60ish attribute points
level
which is a rough average at the professional level.
Thats a massive jump. What about 36? 38?
I don't think I've ever had a 60 point character in my games.
There is enough difference (a fairly large difference, that is)
between a 36 pointer and a 32 pointer in my opinion.
40 starts to represent the elite.... a 40 pt soldier is one of the
better soldiers in his unit, or perhaps a knight trained from birth to
fight. If he is a scholar then he is a professor... highly
knowledgeable on many subjects (note that assuming he is average, 11,
in DX and ST, then his IQ is 18-- genius level according to TFT,
though I'd note that 'genius' does not mean 'einstein,' it just means
'very smart.')
By 50, in my game worlds, you're dealing with literally the best of
the best. The best fighter in the kingdom, the best archer in the
kingdom, the head wizard, etc.
I know this isn't reflected that well by the employment experience
bonuses but I tend to assume that those would work differently for a
non-PC and I also tend to tone those down for PCs... they are a little
too much in the long run. I usually just reduce the rolls from once a
week to once a month and multiply the salary by 4.
Assuming that human maximums are around 30 in a attribute (only
directly
suggested for ST but not too big a leap perhaps) then the statistical
maximum for humans is approaching 100 in a 'realistic' campaign.
Sure the attribute points get expensive in experience points,
something
like 2.5 million exp per from 95 to 100 I think, but at that level of
attribute points it's not unimaginable to see situations where a
Figure
might muster enough to get some mighty big chunks of exp quickly.
I'm thinking of the Dark Lord leading a small army of apprentices
with Aid
and a mess of ST batteries mustering a nuke-like Fireball on a city.
And of course 6500 exp gets a Figure to 29 in an attribute at
minimum and
46 total points is still under 10,000 exp.
I've never had a character like that (my games are slightly more
mundane than the dark lord leading the army of minions...) but I could
see it being the most powerful individual human around. Totally
fantasy-- how many people do you know are the strongest (herculean, in
fact, so pure mythology), most dexterous, and intelligent people in
the entire world all at once, and to the point where they are the best
in all categories that the world has ever seen?
Might make for an interesting ubermensch big bad, if the characters
have enough allies, but its not what I'd consider the 'normal' maximum
for a human... its a level only attainable by nearly god-like (in the
greek "hero" sense) beings, and even then it doesn't come naturally...
they need to train to reach that level.
I have had characters approaching 30 in individual stats, however...
if you're around 50, the best in the kingdom at something, you can
easily be a 30 ST hercules-type hero. Or a total genius wizard. Or a
great enough archer to easily split others' arrows. That said, you
will be much more average in other ways.
There also seems to be an assumption that Joe Average pretty much
stays
static at 30 pts over the course of their lives even though the Job
Lists
suggest otherwise for at least some Joe's.
Yeah, the job lists are clearly broken for basing the entire world
around. Hence, I adjust them for PCs and almost entirely ignore them
for NPCs.
On one hand people do evolve over their life time, but Traveller got
it right-- basically people learn their stuff when they're pretty
young, and the rest of their lives they're mostly just using what they
know.... they learn more about the world and become more experienced
but their capabilities are actually fairly static. Maybe a new skill
every couple of years if you really focus on it.
I also think about stuff like The Princess Bride or The Bridge of
Birds
where the concept of the best in the world at something is strongly
featured in areas of the overall story often as driving reasons to
quest.
What's stopping a Figure with New Followers from questing for the
strongest
man in the world or similar?
Nothing, I like the idea and have used it before... its just that
those characters (the strongest or whatever) tend to be somewhat
limited in other ways.... not ridiculously so, but he's not going to
be a super genius too.
Another thought, if 30pts is considered an average in a medieval (ish)
setting what might the average be for a modern "first world" Joe?
I'd imagine they are roughly equivalent. The big change will be in
Talents.
I've read some stuff that suggests that very ancient man (pre-
civilization hunter gatherer types) were at about olympic levels for
us... some think that hunters could run at speeds approaching Ursain
Bolt. (that said I think most people can, for a short period, probably
do something similar if they are desperate enough... its just that on
a track with no danger of death chasing after you, people don't have
the burst, so its impressive that guys like Bolt can run like that
'casually')
However, by the time that people were farming and living in villages
(3000 BC, say), that had changed... and honestly I'm doubtful of those
archeologists who think that the above is true, because, honestly,
look at hunter gatherers today. Sure, they aren't living on the best
land, usually, and they are somewhat restricted in where they can go
by the modern world, but ultimately that doesn't make up for the
difference between "fairly average guy who might be considered fit and
relatively experienced in spearing/archery or whatever compared to a
'modern' man" and "better than anyone alive today."
Anyway. Medieval-ish. Ever went to a museum and stood by a suit of
armor? Knights were very short.
I'd say that a modern person is still around 30-34 on average.
Strength really hasn't changed that much (people probably put more
points in intelligence and DX and less in ST but its ultimately
averaging out). DX has arguably gone up as people have better
nutrition so keep their eyesight better for longer. IQ is probably
about the same (little higher?) but people get more IQ-y talents and
less fighting and farming talents.
The base line for some talents changed. No longer does mathematics
mean "can do any math at all" as everyone can do math, its more like
"knows post-calculus math well and uses it."
I consider that statistical maximums are pretty much inevitable at
some
point in a campaign game.
This doesn't mean that there's a bunch of Figures on the high end of
the
statistical bell and in a setup with a strong fixed class society
where 80
or 90 percent of the total population are peasants the few near the
maximums are most likely peasants who may never be considered for
knighthood or otherwise excluded from most consideration but even
then an
occasional Faraday or Ramanujan trickles through the cracks.
Or maybe I'm completely off base...
It's something like 25 million exp to get to 100 attribute points.
At 20 exp per Joe Average it's around one and a quarter million
Joe's to
max a Figure statistically.
Rome was probably near that population in her height and perhaps a few
other ancient cities were knocking on that door population wise.
Nothing says the Dark Lord gets exp for nuking a city but nothing
says he
wouldn't get anything for it either.
Oddness abounds...
One definitely cannot reach those levels by fighting alone.
"Harrison tore the straps of his handicap harness like wet tissue
paper,
tore straps guaranteed to support five thousand pounds."
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