Introduction
Recently the Quickstart for Tunnels & Trolls: A New Age appeared on DriveThru RPG. As I’ve said in earlier articles I have some fondness for this RPG which I had the privilege of GM-ing only once. The rules are kind of janky but work surprisingly well at the table, and the wholly optional setting is weird in a good way and very tongue-in-cheek.
When I downloaded TnT:ANE I was expecting a rules refresh, maybe an evolution of the 8th edition. Instead I found a “reinterpretation” of the original almost wholly unlike the rules and setting of any previous edition. To say I was disappointed is an understatement.
The following may sound like a petulant teen of a divorced parent calling that parent’s new spouse “not my real dad”. (Or mom.) I don’t care. If you want a real, objective review of the new Quickstart, read Reviews From R’yleh. (Other reviews may be available; search the Web.) This is my highly subjective take on the system and setting presented, contrasted with the original game.
The Old T&T
While I’ve described the mechanics of T&T somewhat in the articles above, I’m going to review the mechanics for contrast. Here I will use the 8th edition, a.k.a. Deluxe Tunnels & Trolls (Flying Buffalo, 2015), which is both the final edition under its old publisher and arguably the cleanest set of rules.
Old Mechanics
T&T has two disjoint mechanics for task resolution.
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Saving throws, later extended to other contexts. Players roll two dice and add a relevant attribute (and later Talent bonus) to beat a target number which is always a multiple of five. However, on saving throws Doubles Add and Roll Over (DARO), i.e. add the total of the previous roll to a new roll, which may also DARO. This mechanic also resolves spells and missile weapons used during melee combat.
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Melee damage rolls. In combat, all characters roll their attack dice, add their “Adds”, and add their total to the total damage for their side. The side with the most damage wins that round, and inflicts the difference on the losing side, who can distribute the damage points however they wish. There are some small refinements, e.g. “spite damage” which always bypasses armor.
Modern game design prefers single unified mechanics, and the melee damage round has been called by an RPG.net reviewer as the “worst system ever”. On the other hand, arithmetic notwithstanding, it’s faster to literally roll all attacks simultaneously. Systems like Into The Odd likewise eschew “to-hit” rolls and traditional initiative order … but T&T did it first.
Old Character Generation
Characters have eight attributes: Strength (STR), Dexterity (DEX), Constitution (CON), Speed (SPD), Intelligence (INT), Luck (LUK), Wizardry (WIZ), and Charisma (CHA). Physical damage comes off CON; spell points used in working magic come off WIZ. Each attribute is rolled on three dice, with a TARO (Triples Add and Roll Over) rule and, in the advanced game, special “types” (classes) for those who roll especially well. Nonhuman “kindreds” (species) multiply each of these rolled scores by a set of factors specific to that kindred. Attributes can start especially high (or low). (An optional rule uses point allocation.)
Once attributes are set, the character chooses a “type”. The three base types are Warrior (high combat effectiveness but no magic), Wizard (high magical effectiveness but poor combat ability), and Rogue (a little magic and some combat effectiveness). Wizards and Rogues record their spells, and all characters calculate their combat Adds from their characteristics, and damage for their weapons. Characters also choose Talents, which give them a small bonus in circumstances related to that Talent.
Monsters have only a single prime attribute, Monster Rating (MR), from which the GM can derive Hit Points (MR), dice of damage (MR/10), and adds (HP/2). Combined with the combat mechanics, ten MR 20 enemies are equivalent to a single MR 200 creature.
Characters gain “Adventure Points” for making saving throws, casting magic, and defeating monsters. Players can spend AP to improve attributes, improve Talents, or become an “Adept” in a particular school of magic.
Old Setting
Deluxe Tunnels and Trolls presents a detailed overview of Trollworld in its latter half, but in my game I never used the setting. There are certain elements that leak into the rules, e.g. a Wizard Guild explaining the difference in magic acquisition between Wizards and Rogues, or the difference between stone “Gristlegrim” dwarfs and original organic dwarfs.
DT&T is easy to houserule. If a GM doesn’t want to allow certain Kindreds or character Types, that won’t break the game. Maybe the game makes more sense when using all the continents, kingdoms, and personalities Ken St. Andre and his collaborators developed over five decades, but it works just fine without them.
The New T&T
The “New Age” setting and rules might be a reaction to the math-heavy systems of previous editions: smaller numbers, less counting, and more keyword-based mechanics.
New Mechanics
The central mechanic of T&T:ANE is a simplified dice pool, involving, as the book says, no more than ten six-sided dice.
All tasks, including combat, depend on rolling a number of dice equal to an Attribute, normally counting all dice showing a 4, 5, or 6 as a “hit”. For various reasons, a roll may be BLESSED, which means a 3, 4, 5, or 6 is a hit, or CURSED, in which only 5 or 6 counts as a hit. For each double shown on the dice, the player can roll two extra dice; if the extra dice roll doubles, that adds another pool of extra dice to roll, and so on. Triples add three dice, and so on.
If the number of hits meets or exceeds a Target Number, the task succeeds. In opposed contests if the number exceeds the opponents’ number of hits, the higher number of hits wins; in combat, the difference is the number of damage points done to Stamina (see below).
On the other hand, three or more 1s on the dice indicate a “Dramatic Setback”, called a Critical Failure or Fumble in other systems. In combat characters impose “threat” dice on their opponents, which makes them more likely to succeed but also more likely to have a Dramatic Setback.
The PDF later introduces the “tag” mechanic properly. Each Tag conveys a specific modification to the above rules. BLESSED and CURSED are tags. Armor grants the ARMOUR X tag, which absorbs X points of damage. Weapons may have the POOR tag which means the break easily, or QUALITY X, which grants X dice to attacks with that weapon but, as a consequence of the “setback” rules, tends to degrade over time. “Stunts” during combat can inflict tags like DELAYED (skip your next action) or grant tags like COVER (attacks against you are cursed).
New Character Generation
Character generation is entirely random: roll a die to determine your score in six attributes – STR, DEX, CON, INT, WIT, and CHA, each 2 to 4 dice – plus three point pools – Stamina, Mana, and Luck, also from 1 to 4. Even your choice of Kindred – Humankin, Dwarfkin, Elfkin, Halfkin, Orckin (sic), Goblinkin, or one of a dozen forms of feathered, furred, or undead kin – is by default a random die roll. Each Kindred has a Trait, a once-per-session special ability, e.g. humans can perform a small ritual before rolling CURSED dice or making a normal roll BLESSED.
Players then choose their character’s path through die roll or selection. The six paths presented are Might, Shadow, Endurance, Craft, Spirit, and Wizardry. Each path has its own Talents, e.g. Endurance can spend a Luck point to reduce damage to 1 point. Wizardry, of course, is the only path for casting spells from one of two given schools, each of which is presented with only two spells.
Finally, players roll more dice to determine their character’s starting weapon, inevitably of POOR quality, and a chunk of Troll quartz with a specific minor ability. Each character also gets a knife. That’s it. Clearly the rules are leaning into the “zero to hero” concept.
Monsters have only a single Attribute, Monster Rating (MR), the value of which determines the number of dice they roll and their Stamina. Monsters lack Luck and, in this draft, Mana.
The Quickstart has no character advancement rules. My guess would be either an XP-based system that raises various stats or something that dishes out random advancements.
New Setting
T&T:ANE occurs in the “Trollmark”, a world once populated by opulent human kingdoms until ravaged by trolls during a period of darkness. Once the sun rose again and returned all exposed trolls to stone, surviving meat-people rebuilt. Delving for the riches of those defunct, buried kingdoms became a viable if dangerous career path.
Beyond a one-page description these rules don’t define the Trollmark. We can make inferences from character generation and the mini-adventure, “Trouble Brewing”. The various kindreds seem relatively comfortable around each other, at least in dive bars, and every beginning adventurer starts with only a knife to defend themselves.
Conclusions
Taken on its own merits T&T:ANE isn’t a particularly bad system, but what’s been released so far isn’t especially good, either. So much seems recycled from other RPGs and even boardgames. The BLESSED/CURSED mechanic reminds me both of D&D advantage/disadvantage and the Arkham Horror die mechanic.
Will this edition appeal to modern gamers? Possibly. The setting has both Tolkien species and animal folk, the mechanics are simple, and the combat system looks a lot more like those of other RPGs.
Is it Tunnels & Trolls as we once new it? No. Not since Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition have I seen a company so thoroughly discard the original game and release something wholly different under the same brand name.
Will it be a commercial success? Time will tell. So far Rebellion Unplugged sells the Flying Buffalo editions on Drive Thru RPG, but that could always change. If I had to predict, the full TNT:ANE rules will feel familiar to modern gamers, but whether this familiarity will drive sales or promote indifference I can’t say.