[TORG] Why don't wizards run around in tin cans?

[Stephen John Smoogen]

On Tue, Aug 4, 2009 at 12:35 PM, Dominick Riesland<rabbitball at gmail.com> wrote:
> Let me clear up an assumption, most likely triggered by my
> dramatization of the question. I am not talking about what a magician
> can *buy* versus what he can *cast*. But consider this. A warrior will
> strive to wear the most protective armor out there, and if magic can
> help increase that, and he can afford the magical enhancement, so much
> the better.
>
> Why don't wizards operate on that same assumption? Why do we not see
> standard wizards, both in Torg and in traditional fantasy, clamoring
> for the hard crunchy shell that keeps the soft chewy center from being
> Purina Dragon Chow?

I think the reason that most players doing Torg don't do a tin can is
some aspect of role-playing. Wizards don't normally wear armour so it
just doesn't pop into the mind. I think that was pretty much somthing
that was in Kansas Jim's game until the first mage ran into a dragon
mouth at mach 1 or so.. then the other mages became tin cans quite a
bit.

The player in my campaign didn't go tin can because he realized he
could make spells with better armour than armour. So if he was going
into combat the light armour spell would come out manipulated to more
than the bricks tou+armor was.

As far as I can tell.. in normal torg there are no tradeoffs.. one
could make them up by putting in that various armors increase backlash
or something.. but its not in the core system. However, mages usually
have Tou7 anyway.. so not having armour would seem to be additionally
crippling.

-- 
Stephen J Smoogen.

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp. Or what's a heaven for?
-- Robert Browning