Polaris in a Play-By-Post Format

[Garvey]

I didn't see this discussed anywhere, but I may have missed it.

I'm thinking of setting up a Polaris play-by-post game, and I curious if this has been done before and what rule changes might be required to accommodate it. 

Playing Polaris as written requires that only scene is being played at a time, with only one player playing the Heart.  This seems inefficient for a play-by-post game though, so I was thinking that either 2 or 4 scenes should be played out at the same time. 

For 4 scenes at the same time, you always have a scene with each player as the Heart.  I worry that this might cause a strange disconnect though since there is no down-time between scenes, and because the game might wander off in 4 different directions.

For the 2 scenes With four players (A, B, C, D, sitting clockwise around a table), you might have a scene where either A or C is playing the Heart (and the other is their mistaken), and a scene for B or D as the Heart (with the other as their mistaken).  This way you have some downtime between scenes and you simulate the turn taking that happens in Polaris, without slowing down the game terribly (which would happen if only one scene happened at a time).

Are there any other modifications that might be needed for a play-by-post format?  (I'd think that a limit on how much is narrated in one post might be useful as you can't interrupt the same you can in a face-to-face game).

[Garvey]

To respond to my own thread...

So, I found the "Tragedy at the Top of the World" PbP thread and followed to rpg.net and checked out those threads.  It appears to be a very linear game, which is cool.  Anyone else try Polaris as a PbP? Any attempts at a less linear game?  Any suggestions from those that played in the rpg.net game?

[Ben Lehman]

Hi, Garvey --

Here are my short thoughts on the matter:

1) You'd do well to break up each post into small, interruptable chunks, with the understanding that someone could interrupt any of them with a key phrase at any time.

2) I'd be leary of running more than one scene at a time.  Certainly not for when you're starting out.

yrs--
--Ben

[Valamir]

From my experience following efforts at playing Universalis by Wiki, the interruptions are the key technical hurdle to overcome.

Given that in either game a player can essentially jump into the middle of someone else's narration to take things in a different direction (in Polaris by using conflict phrases) one has to understand up front when playing in an asynchronous format that nothing you write is "true" until everyone else reads it and decides to not interrupt.

If they do interrupt everything after the point of interruption has just been discarded (possibly to be picked back up later, but likely to be rendered completely moot by the conflict).

Thus my recommendation is to write in "bullet points" with the idea that every bullet after the first is completely provisional...as in..."this happens as long as no one has interrupted any of the earlier bullets"

[Mikael]

We are playing by email (not Polaris, but close enough for reference) and we have several scenes going at once. Seems to work really well for two people, probably would for up to four as well, if you don't mix characters too much. PbeM offers something like a sweet spot for the system with the time to think about the most awesome reply, combined with the relatively quick pace of short statements.

[Ben Lehman]

I'm totally deferring to Mikael and Ralph's greater experience in the medium, by the way.

yrs--
--Ben

[Garvey]

Thanks for all the advice everyone.  We'll probably start slow with a single scene at a time and then blossom out as everyone gets a feel for how the game works.  We won't be starting to play until December, but I'll be sure to let people know how it goes and what we learn as we progress.

If anyone else has any advice, I'd love to hear it as well.  :)

[Garvey]

Since its been mentioned elsewhere, I thought I'd announce it more generally.

We've started our Polaris Play-by-Post game. Right now, we're sticking to two concurrent threads at a time, though once we get a little more into it, I'm sure we'll expand to 4 threads at once.  Polaris seems really ideal for a play-by-post game, and its been working really well, though the game has a bit of a learning curve to it.

For those interested, the game is being played here:
http://samaritan1975.proboards20.com/index.cgi?board=polaris

We also have a wiki for the game, which has the character sheets (with lots of custom wiki code), and cleaned up game logs:
http://www.redkingdreams.com/wiki/index.php?title=Polaris

Once we get through a bit more of the game I'll probably write up an Actual Play post.  Right now, we're still at the start of the game though.