[Galactic] Playtest in Madison - 1

[Matt Wilson]

Today I spent a few hours in Madison with Sarah, Chris and Daniel setting up for what looks like a kickass game.

I'll say right up front that I'm extra pleased with how it's going so far. Everything that happened at the table was definitely fun, and we were just doing the preparation. There were a few minor questions, but I pretty much read from the playtest doc and didn't encounter much confusion. Okay, there was a teeny bit, but it looks like some good graphical examples in the finished product will take care of that.

First we made up captains.

• I'm the GM, so I didn't make one.
• Chris came up with Jesper, a sort of rascally mad scientist. His virtue is that he's Inventive at d10, and his vice is that he's irresponsible at d8. His starting connection is "The Syndicate." 
• Sarah's captain is Peychen Woo, a sort of spacefaring Indiana Jones type. Her virtue is that she's tenacious at d10, and her vice is that she's reckless at d8. Her starting connection is "The Technology History Research Group."
• Danie;s captain has no name yet, but he's a military commander. His virtue is that he's charismatic at d8, and his vice is that he's violent at d10. His starting connection is "the Caliban Defense Force."

Then we made up supporting crew.

• Jesper's crew are a pilot played by Daniel, and Samantha Bady, his parole officer, played by Sarah.
• Peychen Woo's crew are Tesh Berghoff, played by Chris, and 'Geeky Xenobiologist,' played by Daniel, who's having some trouble coming up with names.
• Unnamed commander's crew are Moth, played by Chris, and Alissa Mazuri, an engineer, played by Sarah,

Since they'll be maybe reading this, I can't say what the crew's secrets are, but suffice to say they're very cool.

Then we made up a bunch of factions. This part was fun, with a lot of cross-table chatter. Maybe by that time everyone was really getting into it, or else making factions is more fun than making individual characters. I don't want to name them all, because there are eight, but I liked that we were making factions that related to other factions and even to the captains.

Then we made the galaxy map, during which there was very litty penny bouncing, I'm happy to report, and which resulted in a pretty cool arrangement of planets. Sarah decorated all her worlds with clouds and moons and stuff.

I kinda want to wrap this up, and Meredith is waiting for me to watch Entourage with her, so let me just post a couple really interesting goals for the upcoming adventures. I can't wait to work with these in preparing.

• Prevent a war.
• Rekindle love with an old flame.
• Get the girl off the planet and out of syndicate hands.

What's particularly cool about the above is that I they don't know who the 'old flame' is, or who 'the girl' is, and neither do I, yet. It's very much like the next week on bit in Primetime Adventures, or the story cues in Stranger Things.

Maybe, just maybe if I were really solid with the game, and less rusty with the whole GM thing, I could probably take 15 minutes and whip up some prep to run the above. As it is, we're hopefully meeting up again in two weeks when everyone's schedule permits.

[John Harper]

Well, I'm jealous. Galactic sounds like ten kinds of fun. Which is good, since I have recently stolen lots of good ideas from it.

Questions:

1. Do you know how many sessions you're going to play, and does that affect your prep at this stage?

2. Did the faction creation phase set any of the captains on collision courses with each other? Is it supposed to do that? For some reason, I have that notion in my head.

I'm very curious to hear how much time you spend on your GM prep for this game, between sessions, so keep us posted.

[Matt Wilson]

Uh, the answer to both is no. No collisions were intended, and it never came up.

I did forget to mention one thing -- or did I? yeah, looks like I did -- that came up as a possible "needs fixin'" area.Chris was asking afterward about how and why he's supposed to get the crew secrets in play, and when do you reveal them, etc.

And I do think secrets need some kind of a reward associated with them, so I considered maybe something along the lines of the keys option that you and Wil brainstormed. The more you play to the secret before revealing, the bigger your reward when you do.

But not totally sure yet. I have a couple weeks.