[Primitive] The island dwellers

[Kevin Allen Jr]

Last week, as the meet and greet game for a new gathering of players I ran a game of Primitive. I was playing with some folks that had never roleplayed before, and with the exception of one person at the table i've been playing with for years, all people that i've never played with before. I was trying out a new modual? scenario? whatever... that i plan on running at cons.

Tribe building took a little longer than usual, as i had to repeat how dynamic skills creation meshes with the rolling mechanics, and what makes for a good quality and what makes for a crappy quality. I knew this when i wrote it, but the rules of this game are standoffish to virgin roleplayers. The game itself isn't, its a great ice-breaker, but explaining the rolling mechanics and what makes for good pre-play choices just wasn't very welcoming.

The game focuses on a tribe of cavemen that come to shore when our players are fishing. The new tribe is sickly and ugly and scared of the islands in the distance. I have had some trouble getting players "hooked" in adventures previous, so this was a welcomed change. Everyone wanted to get over to those islands.

The players had a rather lengthy in-game argument about how exactly to get there. Those are very rare in this game, not being able to use words makes for short dialouges but the players each really wanted it their way and i wasn't going to stop them.

The game pretty quickly ramped up into the weird, with crab monsters, zombie cavemen, and hindu aliens in exile. The players all liked how the problem solving they had done previous in the adventure brought them to that point, and despite how unexpected everything was it felt organic.

Things learned:
The game does well with problem solving. Puzzles like how do we solve x when all we have to work with is y are lots of fun when you cant talk.
If it is weak, they will try to kill it (i know this isn't a hard and fast rule, but it was in full effect during this game).
Players like understanding things their characters don't, or better yet, that thier characters misunderstand. They had a lot of fun saying things like "man if i only knew what that thing was, this would all be in the bag."

It will be fun to run this scenario for new folks, i think it has a lot of legs to walk on.

[Paul Czege]

Hey Kevin,

The game focuses on a tribe of cavemen that come to shore when our players are fishing. The new tribe is sickly and ugly and scared of the islands in the distance. I have had some trouble getting players "hooked" in adventures previous, so this was a welcomed change. Everyone wanted to get over to those islands.

Interesting. I'm a bit surprised it worked. My experience with the presentation of such hooks to experienced gamers is that they avoid going where the situation seems to be directing them. Do you think interest in the islands was primarily driven by the players with no prior roleplaying experience? And if so, do you have reason to expect the scenario to work at conventions with experienced gamers?

Paul

[Kevin Allen Jr]

i had some weakly planned contingency scenarios if they just wanted to ignore the islands completly, but really play focused on that place.

If they went to the island one set of events would occur. If they expressed intrest in the island but didn't go, more things from the island would come to them and they would have to deal with it on the homefront. If they didn't care about the island at all they would have to deal with these sickly dudes, but by interacting with other places/encounters/scenes.

I thry to write Primitive adventures with a Main hook that can be addressed in a few ways and a back up hook in case the players don't care much for the first one. It's a pretty traditional RPG with traditional GM roles. The players understand that there are things like hooks that bring them into scenes and that those scenes will likely be satisfying. I think it's the players' responsability to read those clues from the GM and go with them. It is the GM's responsability to make sure those hooks will interest the players and not drive them inextrably from the story in a way they don't get to control.

A lot of Primitive's flavor is "we are in a world we don't understand" so there is a hearty desire for exploration and curious learning. Most hooks work pretty well in the game, and looser more player defined hooks tend to leave play groups scratching at the dirt wondering if they should be roleplaying berry picking and axe carving.

[Nathan P.]

Do you find that the fact that the characters can't communicate with each effectively (at first, anyways) makes it easier for everyone to get on board with the straight-up adventure hook? As a game goes on, do you find that it gets more involving the characters themselves, or do threats and conflicts remain mostly external?

I haven't gotten to play or run the game yet (other than our Gen Con game), but I is curious, I is.

[Callan S.]

I'd suspect that the players picked up on something that distubed/scared the GM and that's why they headed toward it post haste. Kevin, was there something on the island that you put there, that was even a bit disturbing for you? I mean, I imagine you'd make something interesting for you - that includes the unpleasant.