[DitV] Some observations about Haven Branch

[Claudia Cangini]

Hello, this AP post is about Haven Branch (posted in http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20149.0) which, incidentally, is the first Town I wrote for DitV.
The game lasted several evenings and it seems everybody had fun (I had for sure).

I hope some observations about our game could prove of some interest (Warning: the following contains information that should be avoided by those wishing to play Haven’s Branch)

- I’m really new to game mastering but have a theory about mastering DitV: the most important thing is a good knowledge of the starting situation, especially the part about history and personality of NPC. This town seemed to confirm my theory.
I have to premit I’m not so good at improvising, I’m more at ease when I come at the table with at least some plans.
Writing allows me to focalize my ideas and so I wrote quite a lot when preparing the branch. Especially Joshua’s history came out quite long. Rereading it I thought “I’ll probably never use it, but I needed it anyway to know how to portray him”.
Instead one of the players’s Dog, who has a trait of strong dislike of Mountain People, was very suspicious of him from the beginning and, before the play was ended she decided to question him thorougly about his past.
With some terse exchange an unexpected scene ensued ending with the Dog almost befriending Joshua.
It was a cool scene to see and it left me satisfied that my preparation proved useful.

- Also furthering my belief in the above theory is the fact that even the most stereotipical characters become more real when the players are confronted with simpatethic, believable NPC.
When I’m able to portray an interesting, hued NPC, the players become engaged and show more facets, which makes things much more interesting.

- I’m trying to convince my players to come out of  the “Game Master = enemy” stance with mixed results. Finally in the last evening I tried to use some aggressive scene framing to have different people talking to different Dogs one on one.
I really didn’t meet any resistance and players seemed ready to follow the lead.
Since in previous games the division of the Dog’s group seemed to be a problem I’m glad of the change.
I hope this came from the realization the game master was not “out to get me”, but simply directing scenes in a movie-like sense for everybody’s fun.

- The first time we played DitV, we were all very new to the game and it wasn’t me game mastering. After this experience I know I would have asked more of the players when creating characters.
Some of them created interesting characters with some kind of fault that left nice adventure hooks for me to work with (heck, Michele’s character was practically a whole platoon of hooks!). Instead Francesca and Angela made balanced and fight effective characters giving quite few chances for me to engage them in the story (or so it seems to me, surely a better game master would be able to work with it).
I think this is once again a consequence of a defensive stance from the players (“let’s avoid giving the game master any weakness to exploit!”)
As a result Michele, Moreno and Silvia’s characters had a somewhat more central place on the stage, and I think in the end were more amusing to the players.
For me also was much easier to find bangs for them. I had even to avoid using some wonderful bangs I found for Michele to avoid him stealing the scene!

- This gets me to another thougt. I started lurking the Forge a few months ago and found it very enlightening. It’s helping me immensely in bettering my gaming experience but it also had a side effect: it made me much more picky!
Now that I know what I like and dislike about gaming I’m less and less patient towards the parts of it I don’t enjoy. This is affecting me as a player but also as game master.
I recognize I like playing in games where the players have a good chance of contributing to the shared imaginary space. In the same way I love to game master games where the players are committed to such contributions and I don’t have to “entertain” them all alone. I enjoy immensely when the players surprise me and this are the games I wish to be in.

- Also about my game mastering experience, a huge merit for its enjoyment goes to DitV.
In the past I’ve always been a player and never a Game Master. Partly because I instinctively love the acting and immersion that goes with being a player but also because I always thougt that being a Game Master was too much difficult for me.
But I discovered Game Mastering DitV wasn’t hard at all.
You didn’t have to keep in mind any great storyline to follow managing somehow to come to some great finale with (or despite) the players.
Actually I found out all you have to do to Game Master DitV is just to prepare an engaging set up and then react to the players. I had fun game mastering.

Also another important aspect that made game mastering DitV possible for me was its simplicity.
I played in many games but could never bring myself to really study one of those huge rule books.
I’ve probably been quite annoying from time to time to have at the table, never remembering all the rules and numbers and having to ask. I loved to play, but play for me was a hobby and a pleasure, it couldn’t be a boring duty.
Luckily DitV is simple enough that I was able to master it properly with just few sessions as a player

Seen all of the above I think it would be proper to thank Mr. Baker and those who came before him making DitV possible.

- Finally one thing I really appreciate in this group is the way everyone is respectful of other people’s fun (I strongly suspect this relaxed, non confrontational atmosphere comes from the fact there are so many women in the group…).
We don’t have prima donnas and it is becoming usual explaining and commentig yours and others action. This is often done with a touch of irony which I find commendable since it doesn’t diminish the drama of the situations but avoid anyone taking themselves too seriously.
I love hearing people say things like “Now you’ve mad Brother Emmanuel angry and he storms out. And he is the angrier since you actually correctly guessed his true reasons!”

Of course I made also some mistakes:
I should have given the players more difficult challenges in terms of life risking fights. I see some of them would love for their characters to be wounded or even die heroically fightinig the baddies. But 5 Dogs are SO MANY! I thought my groups were big enough but in the end they had too few dice to be worthy opponents. Next time I’ll remember: NEED-MORE-DICE!

[lumpley]

Claudia, this is fantastic. Thank you!

Occasionally I have to run the game for 5 players. I pretty much resign myself: it's going to be three of them on center stage, and the other two are going to be left out. There's not much to do about it, I think.

I'm glad you're having a good time!

-Vincent

[Claudia Cangini]

Claudia, this is fantastic. Thank you!

Occasionally I have to run the game for 5 players. I pretty much resign myself: it's going to be three of them on center stage, and the other two are going to be left out. There's not much to do about it, I think.

Well, it's a pity (but your words are somehow comforting...).

I'm glad you're having a good time!

-Vincent

Thank you for the feedback, Vincent.

[oliof]

If you have a lot of Dogs, confront them with a group. The elders that conspire with the steward, the book studying circle, the members of the school committeee. Groups are a bit hard to handle at first, but prove to be a good way to teach the Dogs the fine art of divide and conquer. And don't forget that the Dog's opposition gets those demonic influence dice when the dogs work to the core of the town.

[lumpley]

If you're worried about the famous "three Dogs can handily beat an armed mob" dice imbalance, I have a trick for you. Instead, say something like, "okay, the three of you vs. the ten of them in a gunfight. Br. Marlin, what's your priority? Sis Lizabeth, what's yours? Sis Prudence?" Then play out three individual conflicts with their individual stakes - keep them from circling us, gun down the ringleader, protect the kid - within the larger fight.

The same thing works for arguments, dinner parties, brawls, whatever. Find individual stakes for each of the individual Dogs - split them up mechanically even when they go everywhere together.

-Vincent

[Moreno R.]

Hi! I am Moreno, and I play in Angela's group.

If you have a lot of Dogs, confront them with a group. The elders that conspire with the steward, the book studying circle, the members of the school committeee. Groups are a bit hard to handle at first, but prove to be a good way to teach the Dogs the fine art of divide and conquer. And don't forget that the Dog's opposition gets those demonic influence dice when the dogs work to the core of the town.

Doesn't work. I know, because the first time we played DitV the GM (not Angela, we rotate GM duties) tried this "trick" with me (and with the other dogs with me) . And his "angry mob" of villagers (with full demonic influence behind) got decimated so fast that the other dogs told me that I was too cruel with them poor people...

Consider this: with 5 dogs there are 4 helping dices ready to turn back even the best raise.  The GM can raise at most with a 20, but the dogs can make a "group raise" (helping each other) that can arrive at 60. The dogs can raise without real opposition, killing and killing and killing all the heads of the mob, and give up the stakes after that if they begin to have too few dices, without any real risk, because they can do a follow-up conflict after that against a mob made of less than half of the people that was there before!

And think about the effect of having in the same conflict FOUR OTHER PEOPLE you have build a relationship (with big dices) with.

Even with a mob of 100 hired guns, you can't really "win" against 5 dogs that are really, really motivated to don't let you "win"

This is the reason that the usual "force tactics" used by so many GM really don't work in DitV. All you can do with these tactics is really making the dog's players stubborn, angry, and turn the game in a battle of dices that the GM hasn't any real chance of winning.

The only tactics that I have seen "work" that can really challenge a group of 5 dogs are the ones that don't challege the DICES of the Dogs, but the dogs as people. So that the players will not feel "forced" to do something, but will be stimulated to respond to the NPC as people.  So that the dogs will not stay always together (to better defend themselves against the GM "push") but will split up to follow their individual goals, and to have a more "interesting" play.

[Moreno R.]

Sorry, I meant to say that I play in Claudia's group. Angela is another player in the same group, I was looking at Angela's character sheet (for the next time I will be the GM in the group) before reading the forum this evening, so I suppose that the name got stuck in my mind...