General TFT:ITL discussion

[Gilladian]

Way back in 1978 or 79 I lived in Copperas Cove, Tx. Steve Jackson and a friend of his whose name I have long forgotten used to come up from Austin to the Bunker Hobby shop and ran a playtest of a game called "THE Fighter". Eventually that game became Melee, which was the first incarnation of TFT (Melee and Wizardry were the two rulebooks). I'd guess that the friend I remember must have been the Metagaming person. I only met Steve Jackson once, but his friend ran games for several months that I participated in fairly regularly.

We played TFT quite a bit in the mid 80's. It was a fun game system, but I do remember dying a lot...

 

[Rothe]

Steve doesn't own the copyright. The IP belonged to a company called Metagaming. When he initially approached them about purchasing the game, their asking price was allegedly ridiculous. So he went and developed GURPS instead. Years later, when someone looked into it, the rights were such a tangled mess due to inheritance and other deals that there was no real hope of freeing them up.

Similar to what I've heard, and actually investigated once where such rights lay. Stopped by the realization that I'd have to spend significant time or several thousand to nail it down. Others have tried one can always contact them. Purportedly Metagaming asked for $250,000 (this back in 1980).


Check out this link, http://www.reese.org/tft/designnt.htm
where Steve Jackson tells part of the story and history of TFT.

 

[Rothe]

I can't believe I've never heard of this before. But I certainly am curious now. . .

You might be amazed by what you learn when you look into it, as well as other RPGs from the late 70's. You may find that concepts touted in LA, C&C and D&D have been around for quite some time. TFT may also show you how a combat system can be more tactically "realistic" than AD&D but yet simpler, faster and easily explained.

 

[Rothe]

For more information on TFT here are a few of my favorite fan sites:

http://www.loran.karoo.net/tft/index.html

http://www.jgimmigration.com/tft/index.htm

http://www.thefantasytrip.org/

and of course

http://www.reese.org/tft/index.html

 

[cattoy]

TFT brings back memories. Nearly all of them good ones. Pity about what happened to it. It should be more famous than it is.

 

[Nimiriel]

Yeah, I love TFT because it's so simple. We got some rules to D&D, but they're really complicated and would take forever to learn. I also enjoy the fact that real-life characters can be recreated in the game--you can have a paper-and-pencil twin that can go clean out dungeons. Of course, these people are usually not too effective in combat because most of us don't devote our time to learning Silent Movement or how to use sha-ken.

 

[Nimiriel]

Way back in 1978 or 79 I lived in Copperas Cove, Tx. Steve Jackson and a friend of his whose name I have long forgotten used to come up from Austin to the Bunker Hobby shop and ran a playtest of a game called "THE Fighter". Eventually that game became Melee, which was the first incarnation of TFT (Melee and Wizardry were the two rulebooks). I'd guess that the friend I remember must have been the Metagaming person. I only met Steve Jackson once, but his friend ran games for several months that I participated in fairly regularly.

We played TFT quite a bit in the mid 80's. It was a fun game system, but I do remember dying a lot...

Steve Jackson lived in Austin in the '80s? So did my dad... He hasn't said yet where he heard of ITL, but it was probably word of mouth. Interesting coincidence...

Where is Copperas Cove in relation to Austin?

 

[SWBaxter]

I wish someone would persuade Steve Jackson to give up the copyright, or at least reprint. I have a bunch of friends that would love it, but they can't buy the books anywhere. The only way to get a copy of any of the books is to have someone you know scan/photocopy their copy and send it to you. This is probably illegal, but until someone reprints ITL it's what we do.

Like I said earlier, a company called Dark City Games has released a mechanically compatible ruleset via PDF, called Legends of the Ancient World. It's a free download at their website (the link's on the left hand side, under 'Rules'). Their schtick is to sell adventures for the ruleset. I can't speak to the quality of any of their for-profit stuff, but the freebies are (IMHO) pretty decent.

 

[Rothe]

I wish someone would persuade Steve Jackson to give up the copyright, or at least reprint. I have a bunch of friends that would love it, but they can't buy the books anywhere. The only way to get a copy of any of the books is to have someone you know scan/photocopy their copy and send it to you. This is probably illegal, but until someone reprints ITL it's what we do.

Check out the links I posted, I'm sure with some looking around you'll find the information you're looking for as there are several sites out there with much information on TFT:ITL.

 

[Sir Brennen]

I played the original Metagaming box versions - Melee and Wizard - which combined became TFT. Old copies of "The Space Gamer" occasionally ran articles for the game.

The game was fun, and, as mentioned, simple. I remember playing one game of Wizard (basically a magical duel game) where a junior high buddy and myself taught my 8 year-old sister to play (she kept bugging us in that kid sister way.) She attacked his character with a summoned wolf (which he kept trying to disbelieve as an illusion), set him on fire, then beat him to death with her staff while I sat back and laughed hysterically.

There was also an intermediate game Steve Jackson developed between TFT and GURPS. It was called Man-to-Man and was really the GURPS beta.