Monday 25 March 2019

"Fixing" missile combat in Tunnels and Trolls

Image: The archer by Bonie Varghese

Tunnels and Trolls has a lot going for it, but one of the more confounding elements has ever been the use of missile weapons in combat. Each edition has its own version of how pelting monsters with arrows should work and you can see why it's tricky based on the fact T&T combat is abstract.

For me, the closest rule that makes sense is in 5th edition. Player makes a Dex roll against a specific creature. If it hits, the damage occurs no matter what side wins the round. However, missiles do not count towards the HPT. I can get on board with this - the advantage of being an archer is that you can stay in cover and snipe off monsters. The disadvantage is that you have to roll to see if you hit in the first place.

In 7th edition, your missile attack counted towards the party's HPT if they make their Dec roll, which makes archers incredibly potent - too potent, and in Deluxe, well, things get even wackier by having missiles contribute to the HPT even if they DON'T succeed their Dex roll. This means if two sides of archers shoot one another and all miss, one side will inevitably take damage. Nope.

So here's the Trollish Delver method:

- Ranged combatants make a Dex SR based on distance and opponent size as usual.

- If they succeed the roll, they roll their weapon dice. This will come straight off the monster's MR or Con, armour absorbing, regardless of which side wins the round. This does not contribute towards HPT.

- The opponent makes a Luck SR based on the archer's Dex (or MR) divided by 10, rounded up (so against an archer with 23 Dex, they would roll a L2 Luck SR). If they succeed, they take half damage from the hit.

- An archer can make a missile attack as normal against a creature not engaged in melee. If they are engaged in melee, the SR to hit is increased by a level.

- An archer may choose to 'steady their hand'. This decreases the Dex SR they need by one level (to a minimum of 1) but halves damage dealt on a hit.

- If an archer is met in melee combat, they can fire point blank, but they would also take the full damage the attacking creature rolled.

- In a solo adventure, missile combat can be used  prior to the first round of combat before the opponent attacks. The opponent doesn't get a Luck SR. The range is always considered to be point blank (L1SR).

Hopefully this helps make missile combat a little more even.

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