Combat capabilities through T&T editions

The next part of my walk through of T&T editions will be a closer look at some miscellaneous rules that pertain to combat, and that might exacerbate or alleviate some of the issues you might have.

Having talked about the hardware, it's time to look at how the classes/types work in combat. In T&T you have those wielding swords, and those wielding magic. There is the middle ground, the rogue wizard, but I will leave it out of the discussion as there's nothing new for that type of character. But, it's worth noting how opposition works, because the monster have their own rules.

Warriors
Let's start with the Warriors. In the first two editions, the only thing a Warrior got was their adds from high stats. Then from the T&T Supplement and on to the latest edition, they get the ability to use their armour extra effectively. So, twice the value for absorbing hits. This kind of coincides with the first serious bump in dice for weapons. From the unofficial 6th unto the latest edition Warriors have also gotten a boost by adding extra damage. I think the +1/lvl kind of makes sense as the armour suddenly absorbs more from 5th ed on, but 1d extra damage per level as in 8th ed just sounds ill thought out. They mention in a side bar it was questioned in play testing. That should have told the game developers this was a bad idea.

Wizards
The magic wielding class have been very uniform through the editions. All first level spells have been available for all wizards, and apart from the 7th ed era where they needed to make a Saving Roll to cast, they have been able to lob spells freely, paying for then by WIZ or STR points. From 5th ed they have been upgraded combat wise with the ability to not only use 1d weapon, but 2d weapons. Then they also got the ability to use adds from high stats, which they were forbidden before. Interestingly, before that switch they had the benefit of being assigned hits last.

Monsters
How about the opposition then? Monsters can be stated out like characters, or they can use the more basic method of just having a Monster Rating. The basic idea is the MR gives the dice rolled, and the adds you add to that in combat. From 5th ed on you use the same amount of adds for each combat round, and before that the monsters used to loose steam as the fight progressed, loosing dice and adds. Interestingly enough, before 5th ed. the rules stated that monsters thrived in darkness and got double their rating in darkness! As sometimes is the case, the British edition adds in a line about rolling the dice off MR to generate the amount of hits a monster can take. Feels a bit odd if you already have the MR, right?

So what does this all mean?
I think we can see how the power of the classes have increased in lockstep with the die ratings for weapons and armor. There are some quirks on top of this, like the Wizards being last to take a hit, that I had either not noticed or just plain forgot. There was one quite interesting note in the editions before the 5th about monsters on deeper levels. I guess they game expanded out beyond the dungeon. But, that suggestion was to multiply the dice the monster rolled by the level to make it easier on the GM when rolling many dice. It seems like the rules writer and developer somehow changed their minds about big dice pools being a hassle.

It's not very far fetched to think that if you feel the present edition is cumbersome, just roll scale back all the numbers! In my next post I will consider that, and some other options.

A bucket full of dice - how the dice have changed in T&T through the ages

Like I wrote in my last post, it seems the biggest issue people are having with dT&T who have come to the game cold, are the dice pools. Since the basic combat mechanic is you roll all dice on one side of the conflict, add it up and subtract from the sum of the other side, you will roll a lot of dice. There ways to either roll fewer, or to sum them up, but I'm going to focus on the historical perspective.

So, was the game always like this? Let's take out the old books. I have in my possession the 1st ed reprint, the 2nd ed, the British 1st ed (1st ed with The T&T supplement included), 5th ed, 7th ed, the revised 7th ed and now dT&T.

Let's take a look at how some of the weapons have looked like through the ages.

Greatsword

1st	2nd	1st British	5th	7th	8th
3d+3	3d+3	3d+3	6	6	7

Bastard sword

1st	2nd	1st British	5th	7th	8th
3	3	3	5	5	5

Great axe

1st	2nd	1st British	5th	7th	8th
4d+3	4d+3	4d+3	5d+3	5d+3	7

Can you also see a trend here? I could take more examples, but I think the point I'm trying to make is clear. The game has become more unwieldy because of  dice inflation.

It kind of reminds me of how D&D grew out of proportions in 4th ed. where the hit points of both player characters and monsters were in the hundreds! The game wont feel more epic if all numbers are raised, it will only take longer to play. I think WotC proved that for all of us who played that edition of D&D. But, wait! Did T&T raise all numbers? Let's look at some armor.

Plate

1st	2nd	1st British	5th	7th	8th
10	10	10	14	18	16

Scale

1st	2nd	1st British	5th	7th	8th
4	4	4	8	8	10

Even though the Plate armor is not increasing all the way, we see the trend here as well. The fact is, the situation is more complex than it seems. In the earliest editions, armor was ablative! That 18 points of damage reduction you get in 7th ed is even better than the 10->18 step looks like!

So, the damage dealt have increased, and the damage absorbed by armor have increased. You could try to figure out the relation between those, but I will just state that in that increase you have also increased another thing. The time it takes to resolve a combat.

In my next post I will take a look at some other rules that have changed during the years, and in the final post I will serve up my take on how I would use the rules in my game.

Some thoughts on the latest T&T edition

So finally did the big book arrive! The Kickstarter campaign was not really the most pleasurable experience you could imagine, but it no shit-storm either. It was overdue, long overdue, and sometimes you wondered why. But, here it is at last. Let's read.

I own multiple editions of T&T, from the reprinted 1st ed, the 2nd ed, the British 1st, 5th ed, 7th ed, 7th ed revised and now the 8th AKA dT&T. I have some seen some trends and changes from 1975 to today, and I was actually worried about some of those carry on into the latest edition. The worst fears were not realized, luckily. But, some things have clearly been changing for better or worse.

My biggest complaint, which seems to mirror most of the play reports I've seen from peoples who have come to the system cold, is that there's too much arithmetic and too many dice. While it's not hard to add 1 and 4, or 6 and 6, it becomes more cumbersome to add 1 and 4 and 6 and 6 and 4 and 3 and 2 and 2 and 4 and 6 and 6 and ...

Have you tried any wargames lately? I have found that what makes a hex and chit game workable for me today with family and commitments outside gaming is mostly the amount of counters. I figure it's the same thing for a miniatures game. The more you have to handle during your turn, the longer it takes.

So, doing simple things multiple times is time consuming? Great insight, Sherlock!

Well. I have some data I want to talk about, and a suggestion to make those problems mentioned less acute. Stay tuned.

T&T hacks - D6 Star Wars

Some people likes their games wild and crazy, some want it more downplayed and subdued. If you like me have looked fondly on DARO (Doubles Add and Roll Over, the exploding dice mechanic of T&T) results in the stratosphere, you probably like it wild.

Maybe T&T does not need any more of that juice? Well, let's take a look at another way to inject some unpredictability in your game. Let's take a cue from the WEG edition of the Star Wars RPG.

In SW, you used a dice pool system. Traits where rated in dice and you gathered them all up and rolled and summed them. Kind of familiar territory so far. There was an additional quirk, though. In addition to the dice from your traits, you also rolled a Wild Die. Since I only have the 2nd ed. of the Star Wars game, I am not 100% sure if this mechanic was there from the start, and I know it was tweaked in later editions of the rules. So, what use is the Wild Die? Simple. It makes a situation a little more interesting.

To incorporate the Wild Die in your T&T game, just take one of the dice you use and make sure it's special. My T&T dice used to be the black ones with a troll or the T&T logo instead of a one, but I gave all those away. Nowadays I use ten white Gamescience dice. For a Wild Die, I use my blood read die with the Minotaur logo from my former FLGS. Make sure it stand out!

When you roll your dice, keep an eye on that special one, the red one in my case. If it turns up a six or a one, it's time to rumble.

1. Something just happened, and it is not to your favour. If you made your roll, you still made it, but another complication shows up. Say that you rolled a SR on DX to jump over a chasm. Maybe you got over safe, but that belt pouch of yours dropped down into the depths! Say that you rolled a SR on CHA to intimidate those hyenakin you let you pass, but now they insist on accompanying the brave adventurers and making a nuisance of themselves and making it impossible to sneak up on that dragon. I don't think I have to give any examples of what happens when you fail and roll a 1. Bad stuff. You'll have to determine before the game how harsh you want to be.

6. Some just happened, and it was to your favour! If you failed your roll, you still failed, but something happened that opened up new venues to approach the problem. Say you failed to intimidate that hyenakin chief, but he instead haughtily proclaim that such an insult to his honour has to be answered the traditional way, with a duel. At the chess board. Maybe you'll win that challenge? The icing on the cake that a success and a 6 is combined need to be elaborated. We all like cake, or pie. Maybe both.


Optional: I think the Wild Die is used to best effects on SRs on stats, but feel free to add it to combat as well.

I hope you think these hacks sounds interesting and inspire you to try them, or your own variant thereof, in your next T&T game.

Fight on!

Old and new together

I played D&D 3rd ed. yesterday, and it was a very interesting mix of old and new. Most of the players were older than the hobby, which is not always the case these days!

We don't need no stinking character sheets! Graph paper works just as well for us!

 

When I was your age we didn't have no metal miniatures! We used sticks and pinecones and, and... pieces of plastic!

My dude is the d12, since I feel they need some love...

During a trek through the wilderlands of the southlands we were beset by a pride of lions! Six lions attacking a crowd of humans, arguing over whether playing the pipes raises or lowers the morale. All the while birds are circling us, and out in the sea are the mysterious ships of iron, travelling under the surface. Will we get the help we need from the tower of the iron fortress? Never ending drama.

T&T hacks - Over The Edge

 Since Over The Edge showed up in 1992, designers Jonathan Tweet and Robin D Laws have designed more games, and all are very much talked about. I don't know if it started with OTE, but it has been a very influential design. Let's take a look at why.

The setting of the game is very surreal. It's a game where every oddball tabloid conspiracy is out there, fighting over reality. It makes my head spin every time I read it. It is also the only have I have played where That Guy(tm), don't even stand out, he is just like the rest. Yes, it's that odd. But, I don't think it's why the game is so highly regarded, it's the rules.

To make a character, you pick one defining trait, a few supporting ones and assign them some dice. Easy enough, eh? The really interesting thing is that those traits are not picked from a list, or even limited very much at all. Basically, you can take any descriptive phrase at all, and make it your defining ability. In one game I made a character that had the trait Playboy. I used it for seducing, gambling, shopping and intelligence gathering. On the other hand, you could make it quite narrow, and then you get some more dice to assign to it. More dice are good when you roll them, add and try to beat a target number. But, I guess you see how that is the least exiting part of this. No two characters will look alike, and you have lot of freedom to define the characteristics of your character. Now let's see how we can take this system and put it into the guts of T&T.

In this hack, you have one trait called the Expert trait. This defines what your character is all about. Write down whatever you feel define your character, and roll 2d6+6 for that trait. Now, write down two more Good traits. These are the abilities that you feel gives you some breadth and is important, but not as defining. Roll 4d6 and pick any three for both those traits. Lastly, everyone has a Flaw, the ability that always gets you into troubles. Roll 2d6 for that trait. For any other trait you feel you need, roll 3d6.

Now, in order to be able to use as much as possible of the standard T&T rules we need to think of combat adds, combat hits and magic. Designate one of these traits as your Health trait. It can be your Flaw or your Expert trait. This is going to work just like CON usually does in T&T. You also need to define three traits that is level defining, and contribute to combat adds. Pick any three. Lastly, pick your Mystic trait, which works like INT and WIZ does in T&T.

Got that? Let's summarize.

The traits

• One Expert trait - 2d6+6
• Two Good traits - 4d6, pick any three
• Flaw - 2d6
• Other traits - 3d6

Their usage

• one Health trait - works like CON
• three combat and level traits - works like STR,DX,SPD and LK in T&T
• one Mystic trait - works like a combination of INT and WIZ

This replace the regular T&T character generation, but after that you play as usual, with SR on the traits in place of stats, and roll weapon dice plus adds just like usual in combat.

Since this is very different from the usual fare, expect the games you play be very different. Tweak those numbers a bit and roll some different dice, but keep the distinction of one one trait higher than the rest, two above average and one sub par.

meme: Dice pron

Never the one to miss an opportunity to talk about dice I join the ranks of dice pornographers. I might hate dice superstition, but I love the dice.

First, all of them!

Th big pile

I love FUDGE, both as a concept and its derivations. I once read an article on how to make your own FUDGE dice, from ordinary d6. Later I bought my own real FUDGE dice but I still have a soft spot for my own ugly ones.

FUDGE dice

Since we are talking about special dice, this is a favourite. I got a novelty dice from my wife, and the text on the dice about what to do right now "breathe", "make love", "relax" and suchlike is cool. Nice box too.

novelty die

Then there are these puppies. Now when I live far from any game store, and continents away from free RPG Day, I find the special dice for that occasion and for the game store I used to frequent (Minotaur Games and Gifts) to be of some sentimental value. Longtime readers of this blog will understand the value of the third one.

sentimental dice

Now for the meat of it. These are my Gamescience dice (hey, I like them. So sue me!), my T&T dice and my averaging and d3 dice. The last one I feat exceptionally neat. This is my "go to" bag. Also, the bag is a homemade gift from my wife.

the first dice I reach for

Then we have the big pile. In here are the dice for WoD and dice pool systems, random dice from all the games I own. In my boardgame collection I even have another pile of d10s. You will note that missing is both d16. d24 and d30 dice. Someday, maybe.

the big pile

I like me some dice!

Naturally I also have a pile of poker chips, playing cards and a tarot deck. All are used in my rpg sessions. The big pile of pennies is also counted to this oddball section of gaming tools.

Enjoy!

What is it about dice?

I have been following the DCC RPG posts in the blogosphere, where people have been giving their expressions about the beta rules. Many have commented on the oddball dice needed. That combined with me reading an issue of Knights of the Dinner Table before falling asleep yesterday, have gotten me started on dice. Have you read Hackmaster? They have a whole chapter in the new Basic game on dice!

What is it with gamers and dice?


Warning, a rant coming up! 

This probably wont win me any friends...

Trust me, I have the collecting bug, so I can understand that angle. I can also understand the aesthetic reasoning of getting hold of a set that matches the mood of the game, or otherwise fitting what you are playing. I mean, I would love to play a game with stone or metal dice if I played a dwarf in a fantasy game.

But, what about the pure superstition about "lucky dice" and idiotic methods of dice rubbing, not letting anyone touch them and so on?! What?

In the KotDT comic, they even have a long running story about a die which curses all other dice around if it's every used for it's "superior" results. The weird thing is, I have heard similar stories in real life.

Whatever you think of Lou Zocchi, his claim that some dice are "lucky" because they are uneven kind of makes sense. In the light of that, it makes even less sense to care about lucky dice. If you really care that much about true random distribution, use those precision dice. If you don't care, grab what you have a roll them bones and have fun. But if you really grab that special die when a important roll is on the line, aren't you really cheating?

Reading the chapter on dice in Hackmaster Basic, a game that no longer is forced to be a parody, I was amazed of how much hogwash and hokey this was. Either it is parody and humour, or it's just as ill fitting in a rpg rule book as a chapter on the body humors in a modern university textbook for physicians.

Are we gamers all just fun and games, or are we a superstitious lot who'd rather be cheating?

You like dice?

I just found this out. That dude is serious about dice! Impressive stuff, to say the least.

The point of dice

I'm doing some prep work for my new game, and one thing I'm reading is Burning Wheel. In this amazing game Luke Crane writes something really cool about dice, and I'm going to quote it in full. Consider this:

"Why roll at all? Why not just agree on what's happening? We're all fair-minded adults, right? Well, social agreement is a fantastic ideal, but it is subject to bullying, blustering, intimidation, manipulation, cajoling, persuasion and lying: all things that are separate from the characters -- part of a social dynamic that is apart from the game. By relying on the dice, everyone is on a level playing field. Burning Wheel is a game, not acting class. The versus tests get everyone playing the game, and besides, your characters only advance if you roll the dice!"

There are multiple things here that I really dig. The quest for a game that works, even if people are not acting live fair-minded adults can take you down many different paths, but having a system is a must. Note also that BW is a game, and I think it should be emphasized. While you can go in a mental spin about how roleplaying is a new art form of interactive storytelling, it shines when it's grounded. A game. A game which can be played on multiple levels, at the same time be what different people want out of it. Finally, by grounding that in the rules, preferably the advancement rules, you have a vehicle carrying the kind of game play you want. There's nothing like it.

Roll the dice.

Randomness and fun - old/new school

I just revisited some old bookmarks and found two interesting ones I wanted to share.

Compare Zachary Houghton and Vincent Baker.

RPG Blog II

anyway

Zach very aptly put the focus on what is fun. Memorable gaming is fun because of the wonder of the unexpected.

Compare that to this.

Vincent very aptly shows us how aligning player expectations using the game system to share the benefits of the effects on the characters from some action.

In one case you accept before the fact that the random effect will be endured, because it is the shared benefit will be a cool story. You have the expectations aligned beforehand

In the other case you do that which will be a cool story, because the game system helps you to align player expectations, in play.

Look at the end result. You have a cool story where some suffer and some gain, and you have agreed that this is cool, and there are ways to broker the pain.

I like how this converge.

What's the probability? AEG knows!

Remember the last post? I did find something yesterday that made me want to post a follow up.

Have you scratched your head about dice pool based systems? Those really drive me crazy when it comes to probabilities.

When AEG once printed the Game Masters' Guide to 7th Sea, designed by John Wick, they included something really nice, a table of probabilities.

If you own a copy of the GMG, turn to page 203 and you'll see the probabilities of reaching the different Target Numbers with different sized dice pools.

A big Thank You! to AEG for that table!

I wish every game designer included such a table in their game.

What's the probability?

That is one of my most common questions. I very often wonder just that. What's the probability of something happening? I'd like to tell before rolling dice about probabilities. I one took down the math books for some basic high school mathematics, and even though I had once studied that I couldn't make head or tail out of it. 

I have posted about my Wednesday game before, and the great fun of playing 3:16. One reason it have been fun is that one of my players, who usually don't complain about dice or luck, in the session last week rolled amazingly bad!

Imagine rolling 20-something d20 rolls a night, and having 14 of those turn up a 0!

That guy missed a lot, but when he managed to roll under 8 for his Fighting Ability check, his kill number were impressive. His ability to roll high was consistent. In a game system where you should roll low, but higher than the opposition, his rolls where hilarious. Of course I had him narrate all his failures.

But, what's the probability?

Apparently poker buffs don't talk about luck, they talk about "variance". The same guy who rolled all those zeroes told me, that some have kept statistics on all their hands to calculate "variance". Even though it should even out, they have decided that there seem to be such a thing as luck. Everything should even out, eventually, right? The question is how close to infinity you have to get.

But, rolling 14 0 out of 20 something rolls? What's the probability of that happening? Amazing. I love dice.

Rolling or designing

I have been thinking a bit about how I experience the characters I play. I have said before that I am a firm believer in rolling the dice and see what I get. But, in some games it's not even an option.

There is one game I'm playing in right now, and I am not totally satisfied with it. Some of it is the GM style of our GM, which don't suite me very well. I think he is not as much of a referee as I would like, but there's also the issue with my character.

When I have to design a character I usually have a hard time coming up with something, and when I do it usually result in a "one trick pony". I think I have begun to understand why. Designing a whole persona I will think of personality traits I want to emphasize, some core skills and then turn that into game mechanics.

My problem is that after doing this I act out those traits, use that skill and then it's over. Even worse. I might sit there waiting for my meticulously designed character to get spot light and focus in a way that make just those abilities come alive. Sometimes it wont even happen, and I'll be bored.

On the other hand, if I roll for my character this wont happen. When I bring some dice to the table they will provide me with something far more multi-faceted. At all times I will roll with the punches and try at every moment in the game to look at my character sheet and think "do I have anything I can twist to fit here?" Basically, the dice will "design" more posibilities that I can.

What is a die? More than one choice, and improv creation. That's how I roll.

Some ideas about stat checks, from Frank Menzter and me

I peeked in at Dragonsfoot today. Usually it's not of my hangouts, but I felt like seeing what was going on that end of the world. As some of you might now, some hobby Big Names have their own Q&A threads there. Not all of them are very lively, and some are just open house chatting and rambling. Anyway, I checked what Frank Mentzer had to say to the world, being a bit curios about that business plan of his. Nothing new seems to have happened on that, but he was answering questions and pontificating upon other matters. One thing he said was how they handles ability check in his game.

Since the games of yesteryear usually didn't have skill systems, you used some other mechanic when you wanted to do something not specifically covered by the rules. Rolling a d6 (grumbling grognard method), rolling a d20, rolling against a save of some kind or rolling against some stat. Those are the classics.

I grew up in BRP land, where there were skills aplenty. But, if for some reason no skill covered it, it was time to roll against a stat. There's a Resistance Table in the rules, used for e.g. arm wrestling (I promise, it's the first thing I've ever seen anyone use as an example, or used in actual play!) which can be used when pitting two basic stats against each other, so the idea to use roll against the stats are there. Frankly, the stats usually don't do that much in BRP (unless you count the Idea Roll and relatives, recently expanded in the big BRP tome), so sometimes you feel like using them.

There are some fairly interesting ways to roll a stat check. My favourite one is to roll a different amount of d6 depending on difficulty. Try to roll below 13 with 7d6!

Now, Frank didn't do stat checks. He had used "roll a d20, get above 12" as a standard, but also liked the idea of using saves. Personally I find the saves for AD&D to be so bizarre and non-intutive that I get a migraine just trying to remember what those crazy categories are! I think the unified saves in 3rd ed was a stroke of genius. Much have been written about saves and how they work or not. I think they are a mess in anything pre 3rd ed D&D. There, I said it. Anyway. Frank Mentzer didn't use stat checks.

Why did Mentzer think stat checks was a bad idea? Well, he actually had his reasons. However you twist and turn saves on their heads, they are a factor of a class based system. In D&D everyone have saves, and they are set before hand, equal for all. Rolling against a save is same for every 4th level Cleric, but the stats are individual and based on luck. Well, rolling dice is random, of course, but the way I understood Frank's reasoning, he felt the player should bring some skill to the table. Rolling against stats felt like to much randomness, since you would be better at saving if you was lucky when rolling your stats.

I'm not sure I buy that argument, but it's an interesting way of seeing it. Of course it's interesting to compare all of this to T&T, where everything you do will be a stat check. I do think Frank Mentzer have a point about randomness, but I still think it makes sense in T&T. Since there's nothing not based on stats, there will be a common base for everyone. Rolling enough dice will actually make the outcome drift toward the average. I find that kind of weird myself, but I know that the law of averages will make it even out. Also, I have seen by my own game table that smart players go further in T&T.

Choosing when to roll, and make it count when you're in a postion of strength is very important. That's one lesson I learnt from Advanced Squad Leader. If you take every opportunity to roll, bad things happen. Attack from strength, it's a proven maxim. How you roll them bones, that's another kettle of fish. Food for thought.

How to have fun with your kids

I swear it had nothing to do with Grognardia talking about dice! Buying crayons was something we had been thinking of doing a long time now. My daughter is very good at painting and drawing, and she haven't gotten any new crayons in a long while. Gamers with memories of yesteryear know that crayons and dice go hand in hand.

This summer I bought a big nice batch of Gamescience precision dice, and I bought them uninked. Since I never bought a boxed set with dice and a crayon it was time for me to have a go at it now.

So, a nice set of orange dice in front of me, I convinced the daughter that we should do some crayon drawings. She was gracious enough to let me borrow the sky blue crayon. While she was drawing a tree, a house and a playground I managed to fill in the numbers on a d4, d6 and a d10. At this point the next generation gamer peeked out of my daughter's face as she asked me what I was doing, and if she could try. Number 2 and number 11 on the d20 was promptly filled in by a proud four year old proto gamer. We even tried the d6 together. It rolled good numbers.

When you wonder next time how to spend time with your kids, try "inking" some dice with wax crayons together! It was fun.