ITL Skills/Talents

[jlv61560]

Apr 29, 2014 7:32:14 GMT -5 nukesnipe said:

So, I've started mapping out the ITL talents on a poster board. I've also reviewed all of my Interplay magazines to see if there were any new talents of interest in there; nothing much, but there were some interesting "spells" for Priests that I'd forgotten about.

Taking a bit longer than I'd thought - pesky job keeps getting in the way. It'll probaby be this weekend before I can make any substantial progress.

Yeah.  I looked over that Priest/Theologian article a few days ago and was somewhat shocked actually.  Apparently they were planning some sort of "Priest" supplement to include those spells as a viable initiative, but man, are they overpowered and unbalancing in my opinion.  

If you look at the ETAN campaign on the web, you'll find a couple of spells that might be more suitable for consideration as "Priest only" type spells (I'm thinking of Bless, and possibly, Mage Bind, here), but overall, I think that spells specifically for priest types ought to be just about as weak as most of the regular spells are, though maybe they could get healing/and detect type spells "cheaper" or something if you wanted to make playing a priest type character more viable.  The real problem with that is that you tend to get into the D&D complexity levels when you bring in that kind of thing.  For example, should a "blessing" type spell actually just be the reverse of the "CURSE" spell already in TFT?  And then should it be restricted to priests only?  And that, in turn, tends to introduce the whole good vs. evil thing, with competing pantheons, etc, etc, etc....  In short, I'm not sure if that might not turn into a "bridge too far" for us to figure out while trying to keep the LAW level of simplicity.

[nukesnipe]

I played around with the Priest thing for a while in my younger days primarily because I found myself in possession of a Priest miniature. IIRC (this old dawg has a 17 year old! ), I used him as my linguist/healer/scholar character - low ST, high IQ. He made dungeon crawling difficult as I only had 3 combat effective characters at a time. He was more suited for use in Unicorn Gold and Silver Dragon.

Funny we're discussing this; I just finished flocking his base tonight.

[jlv61560]

Of course, the real reason that the "Priest" or "Cleric" function got short shrift in the original TFT is because Howard Thompson was a highly active and vocal atheist (still is, in fact -- if you google search on him, you'll find he's in the news occasionally to this day as an active atheist in Texas), and wanted nothing that smacked of that "God" stuff in his game.  Thus, no special powers, no actively involved deities, etc.  And, I have to admit, Steve Jackson did a pretty good job with the original spell mix despite that (though the lack of an original healing spell is traceable back to this according to something I read somewhere once quite a while ago).

Still, it would be easy enough to "fix" if you wanted too, you would just need to spend some time coming up with your "pantheon" and juggling the balance until you got it to where one side wouldn't totally be dominant, thus allowing for conflict that makes sense.  Personally, I sort of like the idea Katherine Kurtz used in her Deryni novels, or that David Eddings used in the "Elenium/Tamuli" series, or even used by David Weber in his "War God's Own" series.  Basically, something that keeps the Gods more or less on their own level, but at least aware of what's going on, while strictly limiting their ability to act, but allowing for the priests to go off and do their own power games leveraging their influence over the masses as a power base.  Not much of a thing for dungeon crawling, but if intrigue and power politics play a role in your campaign, the opportunities for nefarious plots, skulduggery and shenanigans go up an order of magnitude or so.  As one Bishop back in the Renaissance famously said -- "Kings and Princes play for small stakes; the Church plays for the biggest."  

So, in a dungeon crawl kind of game, if your cleric wants to appeal to the Great Flying Spaghetti God, s/he can, but will have to pay some kind of price for the aid -- a quest, perhaps (oooh, see what I did there -- another adventure hook!), or some sort of massive monetary contribution to the local temple (thus removing any large treasure the team might have otherwise earned for smiting the Lich King) or something.  Bottom line, extraordinary powers should be balanced by extraordinary requirements/costs, and even then the level of interference should be strictly limited.  If an "evil cleric" is calling up some sort of Demon, then a "good cleric" ought to be able to access some sort of similar, but opposed being of roughly equal capability (an "Angel" perhaps?); and even then, things should be limited.  Otherwise the whole campaign tends to degenerate into a "Monty Haul" kind of thing where the players and their characters are entirely secondary to a confrontation between mythic powers.  Mind you, you probably already figured out all of this, so I'm rambling here mostly to clarify in my own mind what to do with religion, and the dangers to gameplay inherent in this sort of thing.  

The other way to handle that would be with the H.P. Lovecraft approach -- when gods are invoked, things get out of hand and everybody dies or goes insane with appalling regularity.  And, in Call of Cthulhu, that works pretty well.  Then, invoking even a relatively benign god might carry such huge risks that it's hardly worth it to the party, and only is used in an otherwise insurmountable crisis in order to save the world, knowing that the probable price will be TPK or worse (like destruction of the surrounding area and all its inhabitants too).

Maybe the best idea, if we really wanted to look at this for our own campaigns, would be to invest in a GURPS book on religions (I'm sure they have one or ten by now, though I haven't actually looked -- they have books on EVERYTHING over at SJGs!), and browse through it.  If it's written by Steve or Robin Laws or someone, odds are it has some good ideas on how to introduce religion to a campaign as well as on how to balance it out....

Random thoughts on the subject on a Wednesday, I guess....  

[nukesnipe]

I honestly haven't given the deity aspect much thought, though my gut response is to treat Priests/Clerics as another form of wizard with a different and limited array of "spells". I saw blessings and other such "magic" as ritualized endeavors ill-suited for dungeon crawling. As for on-the-spot wishes, etc, I sort of saw those as requiring an "automatic" or "critical" success - a die roll of 5 or below on 3d6 - to keep them from being too unbalancing. Perhaps how tight monetarily you are with your deity determines whether you need a 3, 4 or 5?

Just thinking out loud.

[nukesnipe]

Hmmm. It appears my last post made me a "Junior Member". Doesn't seem right considering I've been posting on these forums for something like 6 or 7 (8?) years....

Yeah, my two cents and I are talking to you Bret!

[mister frau blucher]

Guys,

I've been gone a few days. A bit of testiness , but thanks for rising above some misunderstandings and being civil - I mean that. The internet can be pretty nasty, and I hate to see some anger on my boards. Sometimes I am a bit hands off, because I hope we can just have fun talking about our games.

Glad to see things have taken such an interesting turn. It will take a while to get back up to speed. I have had some eye problems recently, and my eye dude told me to reduce eye strain. So an hour on the computer each night is it for me, for a few weeks anyway. In addition, a few of those posts gave me brain strain! Getting technical. That is a good thing!

I always wondered if HT's pronounced atheism had anything to do with the absence of the cleric in TFT, or its absence as an archetype in fantasy literature. It is definitely something D&D added to the cultural lexicon, in its now-familiar aspect anyway.

Scott, you certainly deserve to be more than a junior member. Let me see if my god-like mod powers include changing that...


Bret

Edit: OK, Scott, a custom title did not change the Junior Member thing, but adding 200 to your post count did. You have actually made more than that through a few other iterations of these boards. Let me know if you want to keep 15mm Warrior, or if you want 15mm/18mm Priest-king, or something else!

Same goes for Jeff and platimus - if you want a custom subtitle thing, let me know! I appreciate the contributions you have each brought to this thread.

[nukesnipe]

May 1, 2014 20:06:37 GMT -5 mister frau blucher said:

Edit: OK, Scott, a custom title did not change the Junior Member thing, but adding 200 to your post count did. You have actually made more than that through a few other iterations of these boards. Let me know if you want to keep 15mm Warrior, or if you want 15mm/18mm Priest-king, or something else!

ROTFLMAO!!

That's too precious! I couldn't resist bearding you. 15mm Warrior is just fine - I'm surprised you didn't choose something like "Penny Ante".

[jlv61560]

I'm with you on the deity in the dungeon crawl idea.  I don't think some junior cleric should be able to trot out a "wish" type spell on a whim.  Like I said, maybe they get certain spells for "half price" and have one or two special spells, though those things should be just about like any other magic spell in terms of effect -- otherwise the cleric becomes the heavy artillery that gets trotted out as a deus ex machina anytime anyone gets into trouble.  The idea of adding in religion should be to complicate the PLAYER'S lives by giving them some alternatives that come with some additional problems (resource management again), not the GM's!  Plus doing so would raise the opportunities for intrigue quite a bit since it adds another entire arena for such things to the already existent state politics and merchant politics areas.

[jlv61560]

Oops, missed your post initially Bret -- something about the way my computer updated the list, I think.

Nah -- I really AM a Junior Member -- only been here a little while.  Hardly enough to earn any special titles, I'd think!  Save that stuff for the guys like nukesnipe who've actually paid their dues!  

And I do remember Steve Jackson commenting on some BB system or something back in the early 80's that HT had some serious problems with the whole "priest" thing, and so he figured he could do pretty much all the same kind of things with regular magic users and spells and let it slide, even though in Steve's original campaign (which was pretty much D&D with his new combat and magic system added in) they had such things.  I believe that someone else involved early on in TFT (I can't remember for sure -- Ben Ostrander?  Someone.) later noted that they had actually HAD a healing spell, but it got nixed by HT as being too much like a priestly skill.  I also seem to recall SJ mentioning that too in passing during an interview a few years later.  SJ never really commented on why he and HT had their big falling out; I always assumed it had more to do with artistic control versus publisher control, but who knows?  HT ain't talking either, though he pursued his personal vendetta against Steve in some pretty petty and childish ways.

[platimus]

This is interesting. I thought HT had disappeared from the planet - no one knew where he was or how to contact him. I never knew he was such an atheist either. I'm not an atheist but I really like the way TFT and LAW have handled or not handled religion, clerics, priests, etc. These things seem better left to campaign materials. GURPS sounds like a great resource for that. As a side note, I've often wondered why GURPS isn't latched onto for those wanting 'Advanced LAW'. I'm not very familiar with GURPS though.

I'm inclined to treat priests, clerics, etc. as specialized warriors or wizards as well. More inclined to the warrior side. As 'non-mages' they would have to pay 20XP for spells instead of the 10XP that mages pay. Mage armor restrictions apply for Priests. Maybe an extra die to cast spells for cleric/paladin types that have no armor restriction. As far as 'wishes' go, I wonder if rules for karma/wishes that are in LAW are different than what you guys (nuke and jlv) are referencing in your 'ancient scrolls'

Excerpt from LAW rules:

Karma/Wish
A character expends a karma point to re-roll one set of dice. A character expends a wish to negate all damage, even if he was just "killed." A character can use a wish as a karma point, or a karma point as one XP. Unexpended karma, wishes and XP roll over to future adventures.
Curse
A cursed character adds or subtracts one against all his checks and damage rolls, worsening the result. He can lift the curse by expending one wish, three karma points, or 10 XP. Curses are cumulative.

That 'wish' doesn't seem terribly unbalancing if handled with care. Off-the-cuff...

Divination (skill) - On 3/IQ (+Divination), character gets one karma point per Divination level to be used in current adventure.
(similar to Bard Skill; used once per adventure)

Added rule:
2 Karma points can be used to Curse. 3 Karma points can be used to Wish.

Edit: Maybe that's too generous? Maybe the priest, cleric, and paladin should pay 20XP for skills and spells?

[nukesnipe]

Minor deviation from the topic, or maybe not....

When Metagaming went under and support for TFT became non-existent, I started looking around for some sort of alternative solitaire game that I could co-opt for TFT. Nada. I somehow found myself in possession of a copy of Steve Jackson's Man to Man, which was the basic fantasy combat rules for what was to become GURPS. I found them to be very compelling, especially with the way weapons are treated as force multipliers instead of having fixed damage dice.

Then, GURPS came around and they published a few solitaire (Conan based) modules. While interesting, I did not find them as entertaining as the TFT microquests. One of them had some sort of sea monster that I couldn't figure out how to game as I found the rules for it very confusing.

In any event, I went all in on the first edition of GURPS, gathering up the books I needed to convert the TFT games to GURPS. But, after purchasing several books, I just couldn't get into it.

At some point, I discovered an article in Space Gamer #71 - this must have been in late '84 - that talked about converting TFT character stats into Tunnels and Trolls Version 5 stats and vice versa. Interesting. More so after I discovered that TNT was HEAVILY solitaire based - I'd never seen nor heard of TNT, though it had been around since right about the time of the first edition of D&D. Suddenly, a whole new vista opened up for my TFT characters. The only drawback was that, while frequently humorous, the TNT solitaires were very hard on characters; it was very easy to quickly lose a TFT character you'd invested a lot into in a relatively low-level TNT game.

For what it's worth, TNT is still around - they are in the process of finalizing the Deluxe Tunnels and Trolls game (version 8, perhaps?), and has a very active DriveThruRPG community that publishes solitaire modules. The game is not miniatures based, although it can be adapted for miniatures. I find it a nice alternative when I don't feel like breaking out the miniatures and setting up a table. Also good on an airplane if you have a nice RPG dice roller app on the smart phone.

Regarding clerics/priests: they're neither fish nor fowl. LAW's karma and wish points imply some sort of celestial intervention, so having a class of character that can somehow tap into it on an irregular basis seems reasonable. I don't think there needs to be a separate spell system for them as that starts to get very GURPS-like (different academies of magic and so on). I am kind of warming up to the idea of Cleric "skills", but with serious restrictions, similar to what I've previously posted. Here's a thought for a Cleric class and Blessing skill:

Cleric: a character attuned to a specific deity. Clerics start with the Blessing skill and three additional skill/spell points. Clerics learn the Blessing skill at 10 XP per level, and all other skills and spells at the rate of 15 XP per skill or spell.

Social Skill "Blessing": Prerequisite: Cleric. On a 3d6 roll of 5 or less, grants one blessing. A natural die roll of 3 (triple 1s) recovers all fatigue lost by the Cleric. Each level provides an additional -1 die roll modifier. Each blessing can be used in one of the following ways (there are no IQ requirements for a blessing, a failed blessing costs the Cleric 1 fatigue point):

1. A character that has been blessed gains one Karma point. A character can only "carry" one Karma blessing at a time. A Karma blessing costs the Cleric 1 fatigue point.

2. A blessing can be used to heal wounds in the same manner as the Heal Wounds spell.

3. A blessing can be used in the same manner as an Assist spell.

4. A blessing can be used in the same manner as a Dispel Magic spell.

5. A blessing can be used in the same manner as a Spell Shield spell.

The idea behind the negative die roll modifier is that it represents the piety of the Cleric. The more pious the Cleric (as denoted by his Blessing skill level), the more likely his deity will look favorably upon his supplication.

As for the Blessing skill, I tried to think of how a blessing could be manifested. I like Platimus' Karma point idea, so that was easy. Likewise, using a blessing to heal someone seemed like a no-brainer. But how else to use a blessing? Obviously, a blessing can uplift a person, or protect them from harm. The Assist, Dispel Magic, and Spell Shield spells seemed to fit the bill. But, if I'm going to require a 5 or less on a modified 3d6 roll, the IQ requirements for those spells seemed excessive.

Since the Cleric has a foot in each of the "mundane" and "magical" worlds, it seemed right to "split" the difference in XP requirements for skills and spells; besides, it's simple and easy to remember. I toyed around with having Warrior-Priests (10 XP/Skill, 20 XP/Spell) and Theologians (20 XP/Skill, 10 XP/Spell), but that didn't feel right. Another alternative to having a separate Cleric class of characters is to make the cleric skill open to both magical and non-magical characters at the rate of 20 XP per level, but that seems kind of harsh.

The Blessing skill is the Cleric's bread and butter; he will have to have a fairly high level in this skill be reasonably effective (Level 5 (assuming a Level 0 entry skill) gives him a 50-50 chance of pulling off a blessing). At 10 XP per level for the Blessing skill and 15 XP per level for everything else, you can focus exclusively on cranking up the Cleric's piety ("He was a very pious man who walked with his god and wouldn't hurt a fly"); advance weapons skills ("He was the Sword of his god, smiting heretics where they stood"); or, advance his spells ("He was the Flaming Hand of his god, smiting blah, blah, blah...")

Just some thoughts....

[platimus]

Some thoughts on your thoughts...

Regarding clerics/priests: they're neither fish nor fowl.

If this means you think they should be their own class or classes, I agree if they are going to have different skill/spell XP costs, class-exclusive skills, etc.

I don't think there needs to be a separate spell system for them

I agree - there shouldn't be a separate spell system for priests, clerics, and paladins.

I am kind of warming up to the idea of Cleric "skills", but with serious restrictions, similar to what I've previously posted.

Were those in another thread or this one? I'm having trouble finding them.

I'd love to hear what you, jlv, or anyone thought about my priest/cleric/paladin ideas. They seem pretty similar to yours.
(Edit: Nuke, I think you edited your post while I was making this one. Only half of it showed up when I started posting. So maybe a nevermind is in order.)

[platimus]

When I think of Priests, I think of Tower of the Elephant or Rogues in the House types of priests. Cult-y. They're basically sorcerers that have found a creative way of funding their research and gaining political power - preying on the superstitions of the masses. Let us Prey. Ha! Again, I'm not an atheist but I am somewhat cynical of cults. Due to the nature and settings of these types of games, I don't normally think of 'Priest' as anything resembling a Roman Catholic Priest. I think more ancient-y and cult-y. Some good, some bad, some just plain kooky. That said, Nuke's stipulations for use of the Karma Blessings seems narrow. No offense. Just being candid. What if those uses of the karma don't jive with the pantheon? Why not just let the karma fuel spells instead of fatigue? Or let the karma recoup the fatigue. If some number of karma points adds up to a wish and a wish can negate all damage, I'm assuming it also negates fatigue. Let the pantheon dictate (if desired) which spells (and/or skills) may be learned. This gets into the religion/campaign side of things, IMO.

Tidying up...

Cleric - A Cleric supplicates a supernatural being for favor and power.
Clerics start with 1 point of the Supplication skill and 4 other points of skills or spells. Clerics purchase additional skills or spells for 20XP. Clerics may wear metal armor but spell casting when doing so requires a 4/IQ check instead of a 3/IQ check.
(This allows the Cleric class to sub-archetype: Priest and Paladin. 20XP for spell/skills is steep but the karma rewards are high)

Clerics can use 2 karma points to Curse and 3 karma points to Wish. (Other characters can donate their karma points to the Cleric if the Cleric leads them in a prayer to the Cleric's deity. A Bard could even offer his karma-inducing songs in praise of the Cleric's deity.)

Supplication (skill) (Clerics only) - On 3/IQ (+Supplication), Cleric gets one karma point per Supplication level to be used in current adventure (doesn't carry over between adventures but can be converted to XP; similar to Bard Skill; used once per adventure; more in-line with current skills).

Edit:
Maybe the Supplication skill should be implemented as a Holy Symbol. Holy Symbol is to Cleric as Wizard Staff is to Wizard. Cleric starts with a Holy Symbol that can store 1 Karma point. Cleric can increase the karma capacity of his Holy Symbol by spending 5XP per 1 point of karma. The Holy Symbol replenishes its karma pool at the beginning of each adventure. Yes, I would bump the 20XP per skill/spell cost down with this approach. 15XP/15XP sounds nicer here.

[jlv61560]

Hmm. I'm going to intervene and say that the draft "Blessing" spell you came up with nukesnipe, seems too powerful -- since it does the same things all those other spells do, it negates the need for those spells at all.  Why learn any of them (at a cost of 60XP for our putative Cleric) when one 10XP spell does it all?  Likewise, unless Mages simply aren't allowed to learn Blessing, then why would they waste 40XP on the other four spells when 10 does it for them?  So, I'd vote (were this a democracy) to just stick with Platimus' Karma point idea.  That seems about fair, and if you want to imply the gods are fickle, then you could either make the success role for casting Blessing harder or simply have the karma point expire after a period of time.  Plus it matches with the general KISS principle that LAW seems to encourage....

I hear you on the GURPS stuff.  Like you, I got Man-to-Man figuring it was SJ's attempt to rewrite TFT the way it should have been written in the first place, and I liked some of the features in it.  But then the GURPS 1st edition came out, and it just felt too fiddly compared to the good old fashioned fun of TFT.  I just couldn't get into it.  On the other hand, the SOURCE books they publish are the bomb -- you can almost ALWAYS find something brilliant in them for general use and/or inspiration, and they aren't obtrusively tied to GURPS with tons of material that can't be used any other way the way too many of the other systems are.  I believe I'll start digging on E23 and see if I can find some kind of religion source book there to take a look at.

As a general rule, I concur with both of you on the roles of Clerics -- I'd prefer them to use regular spells and weapons, for the most part, perhaps with some disadvantage at each that is still an advantage compared to the other two roles -- e.g., maybe not only 15 XP for spells; but maybe 15 XP for skills too.  They're sort of halfway between the two others then, which should make for some interesting and eclectic choices on the part of your players.  I LIKE the idea of giving them a Cleric-only BLESS spell that isn't too strong (and maybe a 10XP cost for it is still a good idea), and maybe letting them take the HEAL spell at 10XP too.  Similarly, if you want to follow the D&D paradigm for clerics, maybe have them only pay 10XP for mace skill levels, but 20 XP for edged weapons skills, but again, that could all just as easily be addressed on a campaign-by-campaign basis without being codified in any overarching rules set.  Actually, just about all of this could with the possible exception of adding the Bless spell idea to the basic rules set....

[platimus]

Jlv, I don't have any old TFT material that references a BLESS spell, or I'm having trouble finding it. What would the BLESS spell do? Without knowing that, it seems like a Cleric could 'bless' other characters by casting many of the current spells on them.

Cleric says, 'Bless you, my child.' and casts one of the following on you: Blur, Assist, Speed, Stone Flesh, Heal Wounds, etc. etc.