First Sorcerer (victorian england)

[Asteele]

Sorcerer Actual play.

Ran my first game of sorcerer Tuesday, was me as GM and two players.  J and S.  This was meant to be a short series (2-3 game sessions) so I moved us through character creation perhaps a bit faster than is usual.  I through the table open to what the setting would be and what "demons" would be.

The players decided that the game would be in Victorian England, and that "demons" would be actual biblical demons summoned up from hell to damn sinners.  "Humanity" therefore was a type of soul, and zero humanity meant that you were dead.

Characters
Jack Alberdeen: The detective after jack the ripper.  Sta 1, Will 6, Lore 3, Cover 6 detective.  Demon, parasite (a possessed hand) had hint, boost, psychic force.

Don't remember: A con-man who runs fake seances.  Sta 3, Wil 2, Lore 5, Cover 5 (supernatural, flim/flam artist).  Demon: A possessor with boost, claws, and hop.  Currently in the body of a local lordling whose home the character is staying at.

Jack's kicker was that Jack the ripper had just killed his fourth victim, and that he begins to suspect another sorcerer may be involved.

The other character's kicker was that he is visiting one of his marks and discovers that her husband is a demon.

Play went pretty well, both characters met up to banish the ladies husband (assuming he was possessed) only to discover that he was a passer and disappeared completely leaving a pregnant wife behind.  Meanwhile the ripper's fourth murder was a sailor, not a prostitute like the others, strange occult symbols were traced in the flesh, this was true in the earlier bodies, but the corner had been falsifying the documentation.  Hopefully next week these plot threads will get brought together for a conclusion.

Overall the reception of the game was positive.  I had to juggle a little to spin a game as soon as we determined the time period and premise.  But things seem to be chugging along well.  So far there has been no combat, mostly plotting and such.  If they had failed there cotain roll on the demon they may of been a fight.  (they had concealed there contain ritual as a summoning ritual for a second demon that the first demon and his wife wanted to summon)

Rule clarification.  Are you allowed to have your demon boost your will, and then use the new increased score to get a high psychic force dice total.

Rule clarification 2: In the sorcerer book it says that higher sided dice lead to luck being less important, that seems counter intuitive, I was wondering if someone could explain the mechanic here.

[Justin Marx]

On the second mechanic question, because Sorceror uses compared die for victories, higher sided die means that there is more liklihood of getting higher results if you have more die because the range is so much larger. When the die are smaller ranged, then it is more likely that people will have similar results (if you're using d6's, its likely that with a few die each both contestants are going to roll 6's). In which case, it goes back to the next lowest dice, which because of the smaller range are just as likely to occur again. If by luck you mean that weaker traits have a greater chance of beating stronger traits, then the second option is much more random. With high sided die, if you roll more die it is more likely that you'll beat your opponent if you have more dice, which is more deterministic and less 'lucky'.

Or perhaps I'm wrong and I should just shut up and wait for Ron to arrive.

Justin

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Have you seen any Humanity checks or gain rolls during play yet? If so, what were they?

Also, does "damnation" in the sense you're using it in the game mean anything to you, as a person, and the members of your group? If not, that's OK, but you're playing sort of "Hollywood Sorcerer" rather than the most intense kind.

Now for the rules.

Rule clarification.  Are you allowed to have your demon boost your will, and then use the new increased score to get a high psychic force dice total.

Psychic Force is always based on the demon's score, not yours. Even if it confers the ability to you, the dice rolled still come from its sheet. So no, Boosting your Will does not increase the Psychic Force ability. All it will do is drop the demon's Power to 1.

Rule clarification 2: In the sorcerer book it says that higher sided dice lead to luck being less important, that seems counter intuitive, I was wondering if someone could explain the mechanic here.

The book doesn't say what you've written in this quote. It says that using higher sided dice means that ties will be less common. If one person rolls lots of dice against another person rolling only a few dice, then the first person, if they win, will probably get more degrees of success if everyone is using d10s or d20s, as opposed to d4's or d6's.

The basic chance of victory vs. loss, however, remains exactly the same, dictated by numbers of dice rolled, no matter what dice are used, as long as they're all the same. (Note: even-sided dice only. d7's didn't exist when Sorcerer was written)

Best,
Ron

[Asteele]

Have you seen any Humanity checks or gain rolls during play yet? If so, what were they?

Only the ones during character creation.  It has come up twice, but each time the player chose to take the action that allowed them to avoid making a check, this is somewhat odd because the series of games is so short, that reaching zero humanity is less of a threat.  We're probably playing hollywood sorcerer.

Psychic Force is always based on the demon's score, not yours. Even if it confers the ability to you, the dice rolled still come from its sheet. So no, Boosting your Will does not increase the Psychic Force ability. All it will do is drop the demon's Power to 1.

In context this is what I thought you had intended.  Psychic Force (at least in my editition) doesn't say this in its rules though, instead it is based on the users Willpower, which in general can be someone other than the demon.  Or am I misinterpreting, that users can be the sorcerer, and not the demon?  Is there an official errata somewhere by any chance in case there have been other rule clairifications?

The book doesn't say what you've written in this quote. It says that using higher sided dice means that ties will be less common. If one person rolls lots of dice against another person rolling only a few dice, then the first person, if they win, will probably get more degrees of success if everyone is using d10s or d20s, as opposed to d4's or d6's.

The basic chance of victory vs. loss, however, remains exactly the same, dictated by numbers of dice rolled, no matter what dice are used, as long as they're all the same. (Note: even-sided dice only. d7's didn't exist when Sorcerer was written)

Sure.  I was interperting the "if you want higher scores generally and ..." clause to mean that higher scores won more often, I just got it wrong. 

[Lamorak33]

Have you seen any Humanity checks or gain rolls during play yet? If so, what were they?

Only the ones during character creation.  It has come up twice, but each time the player chose to take the action that allowed them to avoid making a check, this is somewhat odd because the series of games is so short, that reaching zero humanity is less of a threat.  We're probably playing hollywood sorcerer.

Hi

What do you mean 'came up in character creation'. How did this happen? Is that implicit in the rules?

When you say they each took action that meant they didn't need to make a check,  was this choice balanced so you didn't know what they would choose, or did you have a pretty good idea what they would do? Did they choose quickly? Choices are valid of course, as they reveal the player and character, however, did you suspect a gamist motive to their selection?

Regards
Rob

[Asteele]

Happy to respond.

You make a Humanity check for summoning your first demon that you have at character creation.

As to your second point, what I mean is that both players were guarding their humanity (refraining from performing damning actions) because they didn't want to have to make humanity rolls.

The prime example was that there was a debate about if they should contact or summon the husband-demon so that they could try to force it to tell them what was going on, but they decided that the humanity risks made the attempt to dangerous to try.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

A certain amount of caution or strategy in deciding to Contact (Summon, etc) demons is a good idea for a Sorcerer character.

As play continues, your job is to provide as much adversity to the characters as possible, relative to their Kickers (and everything else), so that these decisions continue to be part of play.

Best,
Ron