[The Pool] Various Questions

[Halzebier]

Hi there!

I've never played The Pool, but I'm planning to and reading up on it. A couple of questions remain and since the Random Order Creations forum is inactive, I suppose this is the best place.

(1) Hidden Conflicts

I wonder how to handle hidden conflicts, i.e. classic perception rolls. Say, an enemy scout wants to spy on a character.

My guess is that I simply state what's going on ("A goblin scout tries to spy on you.") and ask for a roll. If the character fails, the player will just have to live with knowledge his character doesn't have.

I'd be somewhat worried about a simple "Something is stalking you." because that blows the game wide open, but then, these are probably old-school GM misgivings. Still, I fear it will be difficult to prepare stuff (situation, relationships, NPCs with motivations, potential locations) and be prepared to throw it to the winds (MOV: "My character sniffs the air and silently informs the others that we're being stalked by some filthy undead thing.").

(2) Trait Ratings higher than +1

In Ron's review of The Pool, he says the following:

It turns out to be silly to buy traits any higher than +1.

Why is that? I don't understand.

One thing which occured to me is that you could buy a +2 or even +3 trait designed to replenish your pool after a crash, i.e. as broad as the GM allows and inherently harmless (to avoid getting hosed, though a creative GM will find a way), e.g. "likes to tell everybody about his tour in Vietnam +2", "bites his fingernails +1" etc.?

Granted, these are not good traits - "obsessed with Vietnam" and "displays neurotic behaviour under stress (e.g. biting fingernails)" are probably better -, but I fear that I wouldn't see them as problematic. They just sound like harmless colour.

Regards

Hal

[Andrew Cooper]

I am far from a Pool expert but I have played.  I'll tell you what I did and you can do what you will with the information.

1.)  Hidden Conflicts - I didn't have them.  Not only that, I never had the Players roll unless they were actively doing something.  Let's take your searching for the Goblin scout example.

If the PCs are traveling through the woods and Player A says, "I want to scout around and find anyone that might be following us.  Let's roll!"  That's when I brought out the dice.  If Player A then rolls and succeeds, then he gets the following choice.  a) Take a die and let me narrate.  b) Determine whether there is someone following, who it is and whether or not he sees them in his narration.

If Player A chooses option B then the Goblin Scout is only there if he decides it is.

If Player A fails his roll or chooses to let me narrate then I can decide whether or not the Goblin is there and whether the Player sees him.

This is different that the standard RPG in that the Player actually can have some input in whether or not the Goblin even exists and is following them.  The GM has to relinquish some of the control over the SiS that he normally has.  Don't try to make set plotlines or events that absolutely depend on certain NPCs or events.  In the Pool, a Player can end up bypassing events or removing NPCs quickly and disrupting the GMs well-laid plans.  My suggestion instead is to use one of Ron's R-maps and simply play from that information.

2.)  I'm with you on this one.  I think 1 or 2 Traits with a higher than +1 helps recover dice if you happen to lose all yours in a failed roll.  Having more than 1 or 2 is at that level is unadvisable in my opinion simply because a bunch of +1 Traits are useful in more situations than just a few +2 or +3 Traits.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

For your #1, I think the lesson is, "Most perception rolls are not conflicts anyway." Many of them are basically the D&D holdover to see whether the group is "surprised," which in practice means, fail this roll and you'll get a penalty on your next roll, but after that all will be normal. It's amazing how deeply this particular ritual has sunk into the expectations of gamers, such that they can't imagine playing without it ... yet also how in practice it's a totally irrelevant and uninteresting aspect of real play. Especially when player surprise is somehow supposed to be coordinated with it.

Anyway, Andrew's solution (which is pretty much the rules for Trollbabe) is fairly extreme. When GMing The Pool, I like to keep the player-input into "what's going on" limited to Monologues of Victory, and to keep all input about the setting and situation outside of rolls & resolution to be mine. So as I've written many times, to me, The Pool is not Universalis nor in any way "group improvises a scenario together."

So instead, what I do is simply make sure that unless it's a conflict, there is no roll. In the case of (say) being surprised by attackers, the statement "maybe you're surprised!" is not a conflict. "Maybe they beat the shit out of you!" is a conflict. Now, let's say a player-character has a Trait like "Alert" or something like that. Great - take the bonus. Whoever narrates might clarify how his alertness factors into the outcome, whether failure or success. So you see, the "surprise" is involved in the SIS, but it doesn't play that hitchy roll-before-we-roll effect that it always seems to in the earlier model of play.

For your #2, I cannot remember off the top of my head why in the world I said that. At the moment, and specifically in terms of someone whose Pool has gone to zero, it seems to me that a few +2 or +3 Traits would be awful good to have around. Maybe I was talking about character creation, in which a bevy of Traits was nice to have rather than one solid max-y Trait.

Best,
Ron

[Halzebier]

I think the lesson is, "Most perception rolls are not conflicts anyway." Many of them are basically the D&D holdover to see whether the group is "surprised,"

Agreed, this really is ingrained. However, there are types of perception rolls where an NPC wishes to spy on the characters without revealing himself, drop poison in their drink etc.

These examples look like conflicts to me, even if the players are not specifically on the lookout.

(On a side note, I'm tired of GMs screwing players who fail to continually and specifically state out loud that they're being careful, checking for traps etc. I hate to admit I've been guilty of this myself.)

So I guess I'll either have to explain what's going on, call for a roll, and trust the players to differentiate between player and character knowledge -or- I have to decide that the NPC succeeds (in which case this shouldn't be a stretch of the imagination once it comes out later).

These are quite influential decisions, but there's no getting around them I suppose.

Maybe I was talking about character creation, in which a bevy of Traits was nice to have rather than one solid max-y Trait.

That makes sense and I plan to flat-out ban +3 traits (and perhaps allow only one +2 trait) for my first game, because I'd hate to see one-trick ponies.

Regards & Thank you for your answers, Gaerik & Ron.

Hal

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Hal,

Agreed, this really is ingrained. However, there are types of perception rolls where an NPC wishes to spy on the characters without revealing himself, drop poison in their drink etc.

These examples look like conflicts to me, even if the players are not specifically on the lookout.

Oh yes, they certainly are. And guess what - you can treat them exactly like fights, up to and including damage. All the details simply get treated through narrration.

So I guess I'll either have to explain what's going on, call for a roll, and trust the players to differentiate between player and character knowledge -or- I have to decide that the NPC succeeds (in which case this shouldn't be a stretch of the imagination once it comes out later).

Right! That trust issue is a big one. Really, in a game like The Pool, there's hardly any room for anyone, GM or player, to pull that kind of bullshit, covert form of game manipulation through "player vs. character knowledge" stunts. It's so obvious when someone does it, that everyone else basically looks at them and says "Lame," and he backs down.

And if your group as a whole does not have that shared commitment to a fun & consistent imaginary set of events going on, well, I think it's better to pull the sheets off it and expose it for what it is, because no rules-set can ever solve that.

Best,
Ron