The formula in the rules is for the GM (or solo player) to use when the adventure calls for a 'level # Save Roll'. It is easier for me to remember 'level 1SR =20 and each level above is +5'.
As a GM I just set the number and the players roll. Of course I don't tell them the target number.

It's probably the most robust game system available today. It's virtually unchanged since 1975.

I have a house-ruled version of the streamlined and sexy 4th edition here: http://sites.google.com/site/thedarkisles/pdf-files

Quote from: hogscape;318567It's probably the most robust game system available today. It's virtually unchanged since 1975.

I have a house-ruled version of the streamlined and sexy 4th edition here: http://sites.google.com/site/thedarkisles/pdf-files

Been going to say it's prehistoric/ better off with an early D&D but I haven't tried one of the newer versions - might've got much better. Guess that's out the window.

Hello, all. I've been lurking here off and on for over two years, so I figured now was as good a time as any to join and make my first post.
I couldn't resist as T&T is my favorite game.

Obviously, I'm very biased, but I think T&T is nigh brilliant.
When I first discovered it though, I hated it. I thought it too simplistic and missing loads of stuff. I also thought, simply, that it was incredibly silly. I've long since changed my mind on all counts.

It's core is strong and adaptable, and I've discovered over the last few years that it will handle anything I or the players throw at it.

Combat is fast and easy. The system is designed to be group vs. group more or less, but I don't usually run it that way. We normally run combat the way that most folks do with most games (1-on-1, or 1-on-2, etc.). Since the abstract mechanic is the same, it makes no difference. However, when large group combat is necessary, I can run three PCs and a couple of extra (men-at-arms, hirelings, whatever) vs. 30 or 40 opponents, such a combat only takes a few minutes. That appeals to our pulp-action, weird fantasy, sword & sorcery appetites.

Since the Saving Roll mechanic gives you a by-the-book way to break out of the 'box' of the standard combat procedure, all sorts of combat tricks, stunts and the like are right there at hand. Describe whatever desperate, crazy or brave maneuver you want to use to end your opponent's threat or life, I assign a SR level, you roll it and it's done. Narrate to taste. Miss and you take the full brunt of your opponent's combat roll. Easy, quick, wild, and filled with Sam Peckinpah-esque blood-spray.

Though it wasn't initially intended or designed to be thus, the Saving Roll is used by pretty much all T&T gamers/groups as a sort of universal mechanic. Obviously, it's still there to get you out of last-minute tight spots, but it can be used for anything and everything. Plus, it actually lends itself to be a mechanic to tie into whatever else you may wish to add. Fear and insanity, sorcerous corruption, whatever.

I had to realize a number of things to fully appreciate T&T for what it is. The main thrust of that was to cease looking at T&T through "D&D eyes". The Types are not Classes, they're much, much more broad. Stats aren't cold measurements, they're also representative of your ability to utilize the raw attribute (Having a 37 in Strength doesn't make you a muscle-man necessarily, just that you can use what strength you possess to a greater extent, like Bruce Willis' John McClane in the film Die Hard.) Therefore, your attributes can be viewed as your skills. This doesn't mean you can't or shouldn't have skills in your games. Indeed, 7th edition (now 7.5) introduced Talents, a very loose and easy T&T skill system. I use a simple skill system much like Talents. Just a simple little modifier to an appropriate Saving Roll. T&T works well with skills and well without.

The magic system is no better and no worse than any others I've had the pleasure or displeasure to deal with, but the short and to-the-point spell descriptions are a boon to me, though perhaps not to many.

The Monster Rating system is a god-send. One stat tells me all I ever really need to know about a monster. It makes 'statting' the town guards quick, maybe almost as quick as they fall under the swords of the players. Town Guard: MR15. Done. I want them to last a little longer without being significantly tougher? Give them a CON score to go along with their MR.
If I want to beef up monsters, no biggie. A couple of Saving Roll-based abilities or, taking a cue from 7th ed., certain abilities that are 'fired' on a certain amount of a pre-set number on it's combat roll. Again. Easy. No muss, no fuss and get on with the Adventure!.

I like all the editions for various reasons. I like 1st ed., 1st UK ed., 4th ed. (2nd and 3rd "editions" were really just printings), 7th ed. for some things it brought, and I think hogscape's excellent Dark Isles is not only super-cool but also a very good example of what can be done with T&T's open and imminently adaptable toolbox. The long-lasting Fifth Edition is where my heart is, however.
Not many rpg can claim to be around virtually unchanged for so long. And, on top of that, all the major (actual) editions of T&T are in print to this day. 1st ed, UK 1st ed., Forth Edition and Mythical Sixth Edition are available from Outlaw Press. Fifth Edition is still in print (and has never gone totally out of print since 1979) and still available from Flying Buffalo, and 7.5 is, of course, currently in print and available from it's company, Fiery Dragon Productions.

It's not going to be everyone's cup of tea, that's for sure. Though it can run any style I've tried it with, there are times I'd just rather use another system, even knowing I can use T&T for it.
If you're ok with a somewhat wild-n-wooly game and your a-ok with pretty abstract mechanics and whether you want your games full of the gonzo humor that seems to be T&T default it'll work, though it's worked perfectly well with my standard campaign for years, which is extremely grim and dark. I've done swashbuckling and Leiber-esque S&S and your run-of-the-mill standard high fantasy to great effect.

So...yeah... there's my long-winded way of saying I think T&T rocks. (If you've even bothered to read this far and I don't blame you if you didn't.)

Quote from: Diavilo;318616Been going to say it's prehistoric/ better off with an early D&D but I haven't tried one of the newer versions - might've got much better. Guess that's out the window.

7 makes no changes to the combat nor SR mechanics. Lots of little differences to magic, a couple to monster handling, more types, and of course adding talents.

Fundamentally, T&T tends to be dismissed unfairly by many because the intended method of play is to use SR's and creative play to bypass the bland nature of combat. Ken's descriptions of the early games seem filled that way.

But if you've tried the early versions, and hated them, 7 probably isn't much better; the core of the game is still the same: Dice-pool combat, SR's, and silly-named spells.

As for using 7 with earlier edition solos: Not a major issue. Some might be actually a bit too easy, easily fixed by adding 10% to MR's, or a couple d6 to monster/NPC stats.

I'm mostly pleased with my purchase of the 7th edition. It streamlines some explanations and adds a little more character distinction than race and weapon selection.

I'm finding it the game for dungeon delving again, mostly by running a game for my nephew and niece. I'm going to start anew a new more heroic/less delving game for them centered around whatever PC's they come up with for 7th edition.


It's still one of my favorite games.

I keep pimping it, but here is my 2 part review on the current edition of T&T:
http://wargamedork.blogspot.com/2008/09/tunnels-trolls-75-unboxing-and-first.html

http://wargamedork.blogspot.com/2008/09/my-playtest-review-of-tunnels-trolls.html

Quote from: Silverlion;318791I'm mostly pleased with my purchase of the 7th edition. It streamlines some explanations and adds a little more character distinction than race and weapon selection.

I want to be excited about 7E but once I bought it I looked through it a time or so and it just went back into the box. Not sure why, but I just like my familar 5E a lot better.

Quote from: Silverlion;318791It's still one of my favorite games.

You're on the money with this, however! T&T is a great system!

Really, whatever version you play (my current fave being the 6th released by Outlaw Press), you are still playing the same great game - Monster Rating, Dice+Adds, fists full of six-siders, openness and enthusiasm...

Quote from: MattyHelms;320746Really, whatever version you play (my current fave being the 6th released by Outlaw Press), you are still playing the same great game - Monster Rating, Dice+Adds, fists full of six-siders, openness and enthusiasm...

Indeed well said.

I'm considering T&T again for my nephew and nieces game. Probably 7th but I was running 5th (with the magic stat house rule so my niece's PC would suck as a wizard.)

Of course that depends on them, because frankly I'll enjoy whatever they ask me to run I imagine.

What would it take to update MSPE to T&T 7.5?

I don't think ditching MSPE skills in favor of Talents would be that difficult. What else would need to change?

Character advancement.
And all the rules that are integrated with the skills.

All you'd really be getting, if you dropped the skills, would be more elaborate ranged combat tables, and the timed combat rounds and movement rules required for that more elaborate ranged ombat to make sense.

I don't know. Seems to be that dropping the skills would lose you a lot of what makes MSPE cool, without really simplifying it much. Just a thought. I don't think it would be much more complicated than indicated, though.

Quote from: vgunn;323698What would it take to update MSPE to T&T 7.5?

not much.

Quote from: vgunn;323698I don't think ditching MSPE skills in favor of Talents would be that difficult.

not difficult at alll... but not a good idea, either. they work the same way as 7.5 talents, for the most part, anyway.

Quote from: vgunn;323698What else would need to change?

Add speed. change stat advancement from level gets
+2 to purchased stat gains; use 7.5's stat x 10 to get +1 to that stat.
Skills should continue to use the extant system. (it can be simplified to a number of SR's, tho...)