the_gneech | Dec. 1st, 2005

Well, I finished reading the "Alternate Rules," which the justifiably infamous Ken St. Andre refers to as "T&T 7th Edition Revised" (presumably in a little dig at D&D 3.5) and my first thought is, "Uh, why the heck are you calling this T&T? It's a completely different (and not particularly better) system." I suspect the ol' trollgod is just one of those people who can't leave things alone -- and while I sympathize with the impulse (How many versions of Mid-Evil did I write?), I do wish he'd spent more effort on filling in the rough edges of the seventh edition rather than puttering around with a new one.

Y'see, the seventh edition rules, as written, cannot stand alone. They are only usable as a supplement to people who have and/or have memorized the fifth edition. [1] The kindreds, for instance, have stat modifiers listed, but not their special abilities. The protection value of armor is listed, but there's only a cursory explanation of how it's used, and so on. In other words, the seventh edition of Tunnels & Trolls is a "What's new in this version?" booklet, not a stand-alone game.

That's fine for me, since I have my beloved-and-battered old fifth edition book ... but it's not-so-hot for somebody who's never played before and might want to start. Not that I have any illusions that T&T is going to take the gaming world by storm -- it's purely a nostalgia trip for old-time gamers. But still, it would have been good form!

-The Gneech

[1] Note: There is no sixth edition. There are reasons for this, but I'm not going to go into them.