Blake's playtest game

[Mike Holmes]

Yeah, Fear/Reason has an ENORMOUS impact, doesn't it?  Sheesh.  I wonder how much of the game unfolded as it did directly because of a F/R of 2 rather than 1.

Indeed. We were going to play MLWM with a 1 ratio (3/3 or 2/2?). Josh hasn't had time to run it yet, however (which has left me time to run my SWHW game, yay!). So we'll have to wait on results. I have suspicions, but who knows. I think part of the problem is that we've had so few playtests to base things off of. For example a game with a lot of Minion co-operation and augmentation rolls may be very different. Hmm. Stuff to think about.

Mike

[Paul Czege]

Hey Blake,

One last clarification:

The intent regarding Endgame is that it begins not when a minion achieves the requisite level of Love, but when a minion successfully resists the Master and happens to have the requisite level of Love. Presumably, one or more minions could be carrying enough Love to trigger endgame, but gameplay proceeds normally until the Master commands one of them and blows his roll. At that point, the cycle of Endgame scene framing begins. The anticipated dynamic is for players to maintain an awareness of the Epilogue constraints their minion has satisfied, and to use their scene requests within the cycle to hopefully move their minion toward the Epilogue constraint they most desire. This is why I don't recommend freezing stats. The cycle is intended to be the dramatic final chance for a player to shoot for Sincerity, perhaps, and get the last couple of Love points they need for a happy ending, or maybe to kill off their last Connection and emerge into the setting as a new force of Fear after the Master's demise. And Director stance is available to players; I expect that if the player locked in conflict with the Master finds himself gaining Weariness at a rate that will soon preclude him from triggering the Master's demise, that a player who is satisfied with his Epilogue options will use Director stance to introduce his character into the conflict and render aid to the weary one. The satisfied player will be very motivated to do so, I think, by not wanting one of his Connections killed in another minion's scene, or for an Innocent to die. The player's motivation will be to cap Endgame before anything annoying happens to throw off his own Constraint math.

Also, my game text will likely advise the evaluation of Epilogue Constraints for the minion locked in Endgame conflict with the Master at the point where the player wins the roll that signifies the Master's demise, just to give that player the option to work his character's death or suicide or whatever into the resolution of that scene as, effectively, the first Epilogue. If the group waits until that scene is resolved before determining that the character must be killed, then the player may be frustrated he missed a chance for his minion to die killing the Master. Still, at this point, it's entirely up the the player. If he wants to kill the Master, and then have a separate Epilogue where he describes his minion being torn apart by the mob, that's cool too.

Finally, since we're on a clarifications train, if a player's final numbers satisfies more than one Epilogue Constraint, it's the player's choice which one to use. My recommendation is to let it go unspecified, and allow the player's decision to be revealed as a surprise to the group by their actual Epilogue narration.

And thanks again for playtesting. You guys are awesome.

Paul

[Blake Hutchins]

Hey Paul,

We didn't know about the augmentation/assistance rules - are they in the rules? - and so didn't get a chance to test them.

Your explanation makes perfect sense.  We had no problem with the Director Stance among players, fortunately.  Next time, we'll keep stats open and I'll use Endgame for a "reality check" to let players know whither they're bound if they haven't already figured it out.

We didn't actually trigger Endgame until Lucius resisted the Master, so that worked as designed.  Guess I botched that part of the explanation.  During the final showdown with the Master, I didn't give Lucius Weariness because doing so would have crippled him, given the number of times he was losing.

Best,

Blake

[Paul Czege]

Hey Blake,

We didn't know about the augmentation/assistance rules - are they in the rules?

They're under the subhead, Providing Aid:

"Minions can also provide aid to each other, contributing dice equal to their total Love minus Weariness to another player's roll. But they suffer the same consequence of failure as the Minion making the roll, whether that's an increase in Self-Loathing, Weariness, or being commanded by the Master."

Paul

[Blake Hutchins]

Way cool, Paul.  We'll use these next time, along with all the rest.

Best,

Blake