Zombie Outbreak

[dreamofpeace]

Hello, my name is Manu and I'm addicted to role-playing games :-)

I want to describe a great gaming experience I had and the game it's inspired me to try to write, and ask for your help in designing it.  My latest draft is here: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9Pwq-FbdThteUpOOG55SzJmTnM/edit

A few years ago I was a bit tired of prepping for games, and wanted to experiment with more spontaneous, collaborative play.  So I suggested a zombie outbreak game.  A player suggested "why not on a cruise ship?", so I printed out a deck plan of a cruise ship, brought a copy of Risus, and we played.  The only modifications to Risus I made were to discard the inappropriate cliché rule, and use a hero chip mechanic: do something entertaining, get a chip; use chips to reroll, or to modify the story by adding or changing things.  We then proceeded to have one of my all-time favorite games.  Exactly why and how is something I've thought about and tried to replicate for years, but never quite succeeded.

So what happened that I liked?  Well of course it was nice not to have complete responsibility for the story, and players loved contributing events.  I still have no idea why, but people seemed to really get into their characters and played them to the hilt: the Captain who was clueless was really clueless, and did clueless things that got him in quite a bit of trouble, which was great; the lounge singer had some awesome scenes where he cowered in terror and managed to inadvertently take some zombies out with a short-circuiting microphone, while the rebellious teenager had some wonderful confrontations with her parents.  When the lounge singer's player desperately needed to make a roll his player would often cry out, "Vegas, baby!" (it was the singer's dream to "make it to Vegas").  There was a lot of comic relief; at one point, we were laughing so hard that people from other rooms came in to see what was going on.  We told them, "it's spontaneous collaborative zombies!" 

Another point really stands out in my mind.  During the climactic scene, the heroes were going down; the Captain was trying to keep the ship from blowing up while zombies were coming into the room, kept from reaching him by a valiant last stand by the other characters.  Finally there was just the teenage girl left, standing between the zombies and the Captain with her axe.  Unfortunately all her clichés were down to one die except for "rebellious teenager", which didn't really help when it came to fighting zombies with an axe.  The "head zombie", who had a kind of mental control over the other zombies, staggered forward to grapple with her.  So what did her player do?  She used a hero chip to state, "the head zombie is my father!"  This made "rebellious teenager" appropriate so that she could use all that cliché's dice, and mustering all her teenage angst she cut the zombie down, sending the rest of them into disarray and giving the Captain the time needed to repair the ship.  The group absolutely loved it, and so did I.

I liked this experience so much that I've repeatedly tried to write some rules that would help facilitate that kind of play, but through playing them with local groups they never really worked, or had at best some limited success.  I recently re-read Ron's "Story Now" post and something clicked: perhaps more focus on premise is one of the missing keys.  Anyway I've written a draft of my latest attempt, which can be found here: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9Pwq-FbdThteUpOOG55SzJmTnM/edit.  Note this is a draft and I don't have any fancy layout skills.  I appreciate any feedback or advice Ron and the rest of y'all can give me!

Best Wishes,

Manu

[Ron Edwards]

I know you! You were the guy who prompted me to write about IIEE after "GNS and other matters" was posted! Welcome, it's great to see you here.

There's lots to talk about in your post and also in the game draft. I'd like to see what others make of them first, then I'll hop in.

Best, Ron

[dreamofpeace]

Great, and thanks for the welcome!  Are you sure that was me or was it another Manu?  If it was me, what did I do?  Just curious :-)

[Ron Edwards]

I remember the surname too, so if it wasn't you, that'd be weird.

From October 18, 2001: The four steps of action (for Ron); best understood in the later context of On the time of narration, which includes a link to that thread and an important partner thread as well.

But don't let me distract us further from zombie carnage, the topic at hand.

Best, Ron

[dreamofpeace]

Hey that is me.  Wow, What a memory you have!  I am truly impressed.  Well, that's kinda cool :)

OK back to zombie carnage :)  I don't know if this is helpful, but I was thinking a bit more about what I liked in that game (and in other similar ones), and how to describe it.  The way I would describe it is that I like moments of drama where a character has to risk everything; not just their life, but in some way the essence of who they are is on the line too.  So that if they fail, it's not just some guy or gal dying, it's actually making a deeper statement about the world.  I'm not sure if I can explain it better than that, but it's a start.  Maybe this is just stating Premise again in my own words?

Best Wishes,

Manu

[Ron Edwards]

That is definitely a case of stating Premise in your own words, with a certain focus on characters, which is the typical way to do it.

It also leads me to recommend to you Zombie Cinema, which is probably the best RPG expression to date of the fact that zombie movies aren't about zombies, but about genuine and understandable human conflicts. You've nailed it perfectly, and focused it a bit, with your sentence "when are you no better than a zombie yourself?" Your game is also oriented more toward character identification and is built more experientially, less schematically - when you check out that game, you'll see what I mean.

Now for some points to consider maybe.

Your prior separation of scenes into types, as well as the identification of a Problem for an episode, is a lot like framing in Primetime Adventures, and based on my experiences and observations of that game, I think it opens the door to a lot of pre-play wrangling during (and replacing) play itself. You can say "Let the problem emerge in play" until you're blue in the face, but the moment someone at the table says, "OK, this will be an Action scene," apparently it's very easy for groups suddenly to debate and storyboard and plan and negotiate not only the in-play situation, but the various actions and decisions of the characters too. It's pretty toxic, actually; there are multiple Forge threads about it.

If I'm not mistaken, and given my memory of Risus, the play-experience you described did not include that particular device, either for an Episode or for scenes. Are you including it because you expect people besides yourself to have trouble of some kind that you didn't? And if so, with what?

Best, Ron

[dreamofpeace]

Interesting; yes I certainly don't want meta-play wrangling instead of play, and you're right the Risus game did not include different scene types.  Oh and thanks for reminding me of Zombie Cinema!  I've played it about half a dozen times, with most of the games being very enjoyable.

As to why I chose to differentiate between different scenes, I wanted to do 2 things:

(1) have a mechanism that would encourage a good story structure so that everyone is clear where the story is going.  This is to deal with the problem I've experienced where play would sort of go nowhere.  By that I mean there would be scenes but some players wouldn't know what to do with them, how to hook them up to what came before and what's going to come next.  I have experienced this with zombie cinema and some of my earlier attempts, where players were occasionally just stumped about what to put in a scene.  Having the climax list and choices about what type of scene to have wouldn't totally solve this, but I thought it might help to give some direction.

(2) have a mechanism to reward players for focusing on their character's Issue, or just exploring their character - like a refresh scene in Lady Blackbird.

Those were my goals, but I'm certainly not attached to differentiating scenes.  Can you recommend other mechanisms, or do you think my goals are off-base somehow?

Best Wishes, Manu

[dreamofpeace]

Another question, just to make sure that I'm understanding your point correctly, I was just skimming through Left Coast and noticed that it also had a few different types of scenes.  Is the problem you're referring to a function of having different scene types, or the fact that some of them occur in the pre-game stage in ZO?

Best Wishes, Manu

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Manu,

Something I usually want to make clear: don't take my views as coming from On High. They're better than mere opinion, I think, but are still filtered through individual experience and sometimes preferences. And most importantly, every so often when we've all agreed Not Ever to Do X, some crazy lizardfucker shows up and makes a great game centered on doing it.

OK, to start from the last first, I don't like designated scenes in Left Coast either. I still owe some major feedback on that one too, aside from a long email I sent last year.

Regarding story structure, I think that a game based so strongly on character issues only needs pressure on those issues, acting more like a pump than a shaped container. For structure, you might consider permitting some metric for such pressure - like Static in Lacuna (Second Attempt), or Tension in Dead of Night, if anything. Your game design is more in that territory than in PTA or Left Coast territory, because the nature of the external adversity is so well-understood by everyone at the table. So I don't think cues for what's going to be "up next" are as useful as in-game situational moments, like the bit with the zombie father.

In a way, I'm advocating embracing some of the risk you're trying to fix. After all, if that player in the Risus game hadn't flashed on that particular creative insight right at the right moment, then your Totally Awesome wouldn't have been, or at least wouldn't have been for that character. Why not simply say, look, this is the kind of expectation I'm talking about, get your mind properly lubricated toward that end, let's go?

Best, Ron

[dreamofpeace]

Hi Ron,

No worries about me taking your voice as holy writ, as in most things I'm taking Bruce Lee's attitude of "absorb what's useful, discard what's useless" :-)

One of my concerns about the game was that having the different kinds of scenes automatically takes you out of the game when you have to think, "should this be an info scene or action scene?" instead of just focusing on the story.  While this isn't exactly what you identified, it's close enough that you have certainly reinforced it.  Definitely something to think about.

I don't know either Dead of Night or Lacuna, so thanks very much for pointing me towards them; I just ordered the pdf of DoN.

Another question: what are your thoughts about defining the Problem in this type of game through the use of a random mechanic, like the cards in zombie cinema or - I forget the name, In A Wicked Age? The one where you have pieces of paper with parts of a prophecy.

Best Wishes,
Manu

[dreamofpeace]

I picked up Lacuna 2nd attempt also and have had the time to at least skim through them (they both look like great games!).  The Static and Tension mechanics remind me of similar ones in The Shotgun Diaries and Geiger Counter.  I once tried something similar where I tied the crisis level to actual real time, every so many minutes (in the real world) the danger level would increase unless players did things to lower it, and if it reached a certain level Bad Things Would Happen.  It didn't work very well because players basically ignored the clock and then got annoyed when bad stuff happened :)  I'm guessing that the main problem there was tying the danger clock too closely to the real world, so I shouldn't be too scared to try it again without that element.  Anyone else have experience or opinions on this?

[dreamofpeace]

Another feature I'd like feedback on, from Ron or anyone else, is the Climax List.  Do you think this mechanic is useful in this kind of game, or unnecessary, or might it actually get in the way?  The first time I used it was in Collaborative Cthulhu Risus (you can get it free here: https://sites.google.com/site/risusverse/file-cabinet/CollaborativeCthulhu.pdf), and the few times (emphasis on few, it was like 2 or 3) I played it I was quite happy with the result.  However in a Cthulhu game there are a wide variety of opponents and ways games can end - well, compared to zombie stories, anyway :)  Does the fact that everyone knows the zombie genre so well mean that such a Climax mechanic is out of place?

Best Wishes,
Manu

PS I've managed to find some of the Forge posts on PTA (I had to use Google as the Forge wouldn't let me search, couldn't remember my old password), and the discussions on scene framing are providing a lot of good food for thought.

[Ron Edwards]

I could be very wrong about this - please disregard as necessary.

1. You had a great experience with play using a zombie motif, in what was apparently a pretty unconstructed game - no pre-set elements, no scene setups, and so on.

2. You are now designing or writing in some way to ensure that this happens, with what appears to me to be a great deal of front-loaded elements.

Whereas in the Risus zombie game, the various cliches and pre-set elements resulted in the emergence of interpersonal connections, some drama, and stuff like that; in the game I'm reading here, they seem to impose them, in the sense of "now it's time to be dramatic." Instead of seeing creative and like-minded friends produce stuff that you all collectively enjoy, it's as if you are seeking to make less-reliable game participants produce such stuff anyway.

The trouble is, I have no real recommendation. Plenty of games exist with lots of imposed plot structure, which are really fun, so I can't say, "Don't impose 'this is the climax' moments!" or anything else so bipolar regarding any technique. The only thing I can think of that you already stated, in your text, what seems to me to be the heart of your game, here:

Who are you, when the veneer of civilization is stripped away? When the world's gone to hell, can you survive - and retain your
humanity? When are you no better than a zombie yourself? After a good session of this game, you will have helped create an entertaining story that deals with these or other such questions in a way you find interesting.

Then after that, I struggle to find anything which makes that jump out in play. In your previous game experience, the combination of a particular cliche and a creative moment on a player's part helped bring it in. What about that Risus game, in terms of setup, made that possible? Because I'm not seeing anything that gets me pumped about it in your text, although that comes with all the provisos about reading vs. play.

Best, Ron

[dreamofpeace]

Hi, sorry it took me so long to reply, I've been distracted by those zombies known as state and city taxes.  I'm afraid they've infected me, as I certainly feel rather zombie-like at the moment :)  I also took the time to review the Big Model a bit more and read some of the discussions on PTA on the Forge.

First, thanks for taking the time to give me all this feedback; I'm learning a lot and I'm grateful.

Back to the carnage:

"Whereas in the Risus zombie game, the various cliches and pre-set elements resulted in the emergence of interpersonal connections, some drama, and stuff like that; in the game I'm reading here, they seem to impose them, in the sense of "now it's time to be dramatic." Instead of seeing creative and like-minded friends produce stuff that you all collectively enjoy, it's as if you are seeking to make less-reliable game participants produce such stuff anyway."

OK that's an interesting observation.  If I hear you right, you're saying that rather than encouraging play of a certain type, the rules actually get in the way by trying to make it happen.  For example, if an artist becomes fascinated by a certain tree and wants to paint it that's one thing, having two brass-knuckled bruisers standing to either side of him to make sure he paints it is a different experience entirely :)  Is it the strict differentiation of scenes that imposes the strait jacket, the pre-game setup, both of them together, or something else?

"The only thing I can think of that you already stated, in your text, what seems to me to be the heart of your game, here:

Quote
"Who are you, when the veneer of civilization is stripped away? When the world's gone to hell, can you survive ... and retain your
humanity? When are you no better than a zombie yourself? After a good session of this game, you will have helped create an entertaining story that deals with these or other such questions in a way you find interesting."

Then after that, I struggle to find anything which makes that jump out in play."

That's a very helpful observation, I think.  You've certainly identified what I want to be the heart of the game.  The way the scenes are set up could work for a romantic comedy instead.  Not that there's anything wrong with that :)  But I want the rules to encourage and make it easy to have a certain kind of play.  There's nothing like Sorcerer's humanity mechanic, for example.

"In your previous game experience, the combination of a particular cliche and a creative moment on a player's part helped bring it in. What about that Risus game, in terms of setup, made that possible?"

That's a very difficult question, I honestly don't know and have been trying to figure it out for a long time.  My best guess is that several factors contributed.  First, we talked about it online a bit first, in a light-hearted way (like the "Blood Boat" song my friend made).  Next, I wrote a funny prologue for the game in script form that we read at the start of the game (I'd forgotten to mention this in my first post above), which helped to create both a feeling of tension mixed with laughter.  With respect to the system, Risus is pretty wacky even with the inappropriate cliche rule taken out (the list of suggested cliches was light-hearted too), and giving the players the ability to change details with chips probably encouraged some creativity.  I suppose I could go with this and make a zombie comedy game - Dice of the Dead? :)  But I didn't want to be limited to that...

Best Wishes,

Manu
     
edited to fix display - RE

[dreamofpeace]

OK so here's the direction I'm thinking in now: drop the tightly focused story structure.  Have rules for Cooperating (rolls that help get supplies) and Helping (other characters with rolls that go poorly), and two features called Dread and (until I get something better) Ice. 

Dread will be similar to Lacuna's Static, where things will gradually become more dangerous.  Dread can be lowered by characters doing positive, selfless, life-affirming things.  Your Ice increases whenever you reroll; Ice helps with Fear checks, but as Ice increases the Icy character no longer Cooperates, then no longer Helps, and finally no longer cares about their fellow humans at all.  Until fully Iced, Ice can be lowered by the character having a scene where they deal with (not in the sense of resolve, but in the sense of experience) the issue they're struggling with.

Does anyone have any feedback on these game mechanics?

Best Wishes,
Manu

edited to fix display - RE