[Orpheus] Can a player improve a game?

[R. Jason Boss]

I've put off making an AP post here long enough and I have some grist for the mill here in my head, so time to dive in!

I am a player in a game of Orpheus (White Wolf game, circa late WoD 1.0 era, heavy metaplot, characters work for corporation with tech that lets them go out of body to interact with ghosts etc.) with three other players and a GM.  We've played a handful of times now but I'll be focusing on our most recent session.

The players are:

Glen, a slightly curmudgeonly engineer who brings a problem-solving/investigative approach to most games we play, RPG or otherwise.  Veteran wargamer and D&D dungeon master.  He plays Sam, a former PI who now is on the Orpheus payroll and balances his wife and kids against the horrors he learns about, his long hours on cases, and the harm they could be (and have been, now) exposed to as a result of his meddling with the dead. 

Des, new to RPGaming and the SO of the GM of the game.  She is easygoing and so far while not 100% on mechanics issues pretty much a natural in terms of entering into interesting character situations.  Her character, Anna, is a dead reporter and acts as a permanently "post-life" consultant for Orpheus.  In a previous session she had most of us riveted with a scene where she decided to manifest physically to her former fiance for the first time since her death.

Irina, our youngest player and my SO, who has a modicum of gaming experience (about 2 years of playing off and on so far).  No longer the "newbie gamer" of the group, Irina has a firm grasp of the mechanics of whatever game we are playing and is usually eager to engage with other characters or the situation given half a chance.  She plays Christine a former police officer and DARE educator who joined Orpheus after a run in with a gun-toting student (near-death experiences are common to character backgrounds in this game).

I'm Jason, a long-time D&D and WW gamer.  I've been RPGaming for about 20 years, starting with the D&D boxed set series back in the day.  I've always been interested in "other" games but never found much support from my groups (usually due to scheduling issues and pre-existing campaigns, not to mention my desire to play - I used to run a lot of the games we would play in younger days).  I play Jacob, a repentant snake oil salesman looking to make a semi-honest buck off of his unnerving new ability to talk to dead people and reconnect with my estranged family after years on the road (and the run).

So that's the gaming group and the "Crucible" as IC groups of Orpheus agents are called.  The system is what you might expect if you are familiar with WW gaming but not Orpheus specifically.  Chris, the GM, is the younger brother of Glen and has been enthusiastically running WW games since his introduction to RPGaming maybe a decade ago now.  I personally feel he would prefer something coherently Nar based on his reactions to certain stimuli in game, but I'm getting ahead of myself.  Next post will cover the session.

Jason

[R. Jason Boss]

[reserved for my post in progress! : )]

[R. Jason Boss]

Oops, can't edit posts.  I knew that.

Anyway, as I mentioned we've played 5 or 6 times so far.  I'll focus on the most recent session.

As the story begins, it is time for the office Christmas party at Orpheus HQ, and we have all decided to attend.  The previous installment of the largely investigative chronicle so far resulted in us feeling pretty okay for the time being with the rather mysterious organization we work for, despite a variety of conspiracy theories that had been coming to a head up to that point.  Now we were waiting for the other shoe to drop.

At the party, the lone GM-controlled member of our Crucible, Tom, a soul-scarred veteran Orpheus agent whose last team got annihilated by a grim reaper-like entity a few months before, let on that he had called in some favors and now had the passwords to get into the Orpheus mainframe in the lowest sublevel of the complex.  Our group had been toying with the idea of using our abilities and security clearance to try to get to the bottom of some of our questions about the company's OP but had shelved it thus far as too risky. 

With security focused on the party and much of the staff attending, two of us (Anna and Jacob) left with Tom to check out the sublevel (in ghostly forms) while two remained at the party to allay suspicions.  Unfortunately this split-up resulted in a lot of confusing and erratic cutting between scenes later on, but it seemed sensible at the time.  For reasons not entirely clear to me Sam also left the party and went to another area of the building soon afterwards, which was also problematic as Irina is rather a "team player" and as a result was stuck alone at the party when Sam headed out.

Orpheus HQ came under heavy attack, resulting in a power outage and security lockdown, further isolating the group members for a time.  Ghostly shock troops, some corporeal and others not, starting killing people and tearing the place up.  Anna and Jacob were in the sublevel with Tom and needed to get back to where Jacob's body was resting, Sam hid himself in a disused corridor and left his body to investigate the commotion back at the party, and Christine tries to shepherd the masses locked into the party area (a converted gymnasium) out of the way of ghost-hurled sporting equipment.

Christine probably had the rawest deal in this session.  Her character was not able to save anyone in the gym and no mechanics were used for this.  When she hid among the bodies and went out of body to confront the assailants she was spirited away swiftly by another agent before she could engage them, and when she was reunited with Anna and I for some exposition from other Orpheus folks we found the conversation entailed not a ton more than, "We have to get out of here," and some rough ideas for how to do so.  We also realized that Tom's body was trapped and that he was most likely going to die, through he would remain as a spirit, possibly.  Nothing we could do about that situation.

Meanwhile Sam, using a ghostly "human torch" type effect, drove off some of the attackers from the gym and went sort of superhero on us, running through the complex slagging ghost beasts and trying to save fleeing people until he encountered a Reaper of the kind that had mauled Tom's old group.  This he managed to escape from by using a different ability to collapse part of the building around it as he ran, buying time for a few more stragglers.

Anna, being a spirit already, left the building with some others who weren't still bound to a body, transporting them to safety outside the perimeter of the attack.  They did encounter some sort of ghostly beast and fought it off, though her attacks were ineffectual.  Here had I been paying close attention I probably could have helped her achieve more limelight, but I was distracted by Glen and Irina seeming to not enjoy themselves much. 

Christine had almost no agency throughout and that continued to the end of the session.  Her character returned to her body accompanied by an allied agent and then met up with Jacob in the parking garage.  Glen's Sam was getting a lot more spotlight as far as I could see but he was frustrated at what he perceived as his inability to confront the real threat.  He also generally has issues anytime major in game events take place that are seen as "bad" but are inevitable in the GM's plan.  In this case, the bombing of the building and death of a number of previously supporting GM characters.

Jacob, fleeing toward the garage with two other NPC agents, probably had the best scene in the session.  I sent the escapees with my body ahead and considered going back to look for Sam, the only of our Crucible unaccounted for.  Jacob has a Flaw called Coward.  Flaws in the new core WoD system are a little like Keys in TSoY.  Rather than providing character points at generation they gain you XP in any session that you ping them significantly.  I decided that since the rules allow for "ripcording" back to the body I would run back for Sam as I could still run away at any time without too much risk.

My Cowardly conman was confronted with a Reaper intent on claiming the spirit of the recently-dead NPC agent, still struggling to get himself together after the trauma of death.  I decided to think of this as "buying off the Key" and said Jacob won't be a coward anymore.  He interposed himself between the agent and the Reaper, drove it back with his Wail momentarily, took a devastating hit from its scythe, and ripcorded out once the other spirit was safe.  The table was pretty happy with the action and Chris agreed with my idea of "buying off" the flaw for a new one suited to the event, to be discussed later.

Afterwards, Sam managed his own solo escape (while I'd regained all my lost Willpower by pinging my Virtue of Charity simultaneous with buying off Cowardice, my character ended up unconscious, back in his body) and we all fled away from the wreckage of Orpheus, uncertain what will come next other than a cryptic vision implying that we will be implicated in what happened there...

So, I felt this session suffered much more than usual from the "20 minutes of fun in 4 hours of play."  Usually, I don't feel it as much as some of the other players as I am trying to stay engaged and help others do so, but I was feeling it as well for chunks in the middle.  We're pretty used to illusionist/participationist play but this was harder to work with, I thought.  Christine especially was unsatisfied.  In her words, "I like the stories Chris tells but unfortunately this week I had to enjoy your character being a part of that story instead of mine," rather than each of us having the opportunity to shine.  Glen's Sam had more stage time than I did, even, but remained unfulfilled with his flaming rampage against the attackers.

I'm specifically looking for ways I can help my fellow players stand up and be counted, as I feel that Chris is looking for cues from them but isn't sure how to articulate this for their benefit.  I was very low key about taking the spotlight even for a few moments, but even that left Des and Irina especially in the dark.  I'm thinking of helping them take a hard look at their Virtues, Vices, and Flaws (and taking a flaw if they don't have one, even if it means making one up) for starters.  I'd also like to give some unobtrusive advice to Chris (which can be done, he respects my opinion and solicits it from time to time on such things).

I'm also open to questions about the game and group.  I haven't posted much so I expect I'm leaving out some useful info.  Ready to learn, though.

Jason

[DevP]

So how did this game compare with the ones previous, if some of the players happened to like the previous sessions better?

One problem is that there was a Big Event set to happen - the attack - and the characters were poorly situated for it. Not in the tactical sense, but it seems in the sense of being able to riff off the even. But then again, the players being confusedly separated could easily have provided a good situation for the charcters, so I'm not sure.

Did Chris (the GM) really take well to you focusing on the Flaws/Vices/Virtues like that? Because that's a really decent built-in flagging tool right there.

[R. Jason Boss]

Hi Dev,

I think the difference was that this was the first big turning point / twist in the plot (/metaplot) so there was a lot going on that was "bigger than" the characters.  In previous stories we were basically playing CoC-style (I think, not a lot of CoC play myself, though I am familiar with the game to an extent) investigative stories with foreshadowing of metaplot injected here and there.  Also, our character's families / lovers / pets etc. being threatened / injured / potentially generally screwed with has been a growing problem and lent immediacy to the situations.

Having a hard time riffing off of the event was exactly (at least part of) the problem.  Chris was genuinely and openly pleased, maybe even excited, to see my character's conflict and decision-making and how it arose from my Virtues/Vices/Flaw.  So you are thinking my plan to talk to the other players about homing in on their own V/V/F and making them work for them, perhaps combined with collectively reminding Chris about them and framing it in a "this is what I want my character to be doing, or what I want challenged about them at least" is a good start? 

I think we can probably chalk it up to Chris' enthusiam for the big curtain call leading to a bit more railroading than he intended and as we move on make sure the lines of communication are open enough that we can avoid this problem in the future.  Based on what I've read here so far I'm guessing that as a WW/WoD game Orpheus is probably already incoherent; so I'd pretty much like advice on drifting it. 

Thanks a lot for the comments and questions!

Jason

[DevP]

I think that's good language for it - "riffing off the plot events". V/V/F are good tools, but they're not the only things players are flagging, and while some players may want to flag different kinds of things (I noted that not everyone took a Flaw). So maybe players want different things, like a chance to show off a particular trait or to test a particular ability or just to be a badass. I figure the plot events are tools that could be aimed at whatever it is a player wants to highlight (in your case, the V/V/F issues), and not used for their own sake.

There will be a little bit more rails-y activity when a GM-driven game starts getting into some plot-rich action, and that's pretty normal. Chris could try to get past the setup for this as cleanly as he can, and make sure most of the focus is on how you knock it all down (or get knocked down trying).

[R. Jason Boss]

Agreed.  Thinking about it in retrospect makes it pretty clear what each of us wanted individually (except maybe Des, since she is pretty new and I know her the least, but even so she would have been happy with feeling effective and involved at least).

Chris: Finally, I get to show them all what's been brewing and turn the game on its ear!
Irina: I'm psyched to see what happens next and how my character can interact with it!
Glen: I'm looking for an opportunity to put my powers to use against our foes (once we know what/who/where they are, dammit)!

I'm game for whatever as long as either I or others are fully engaged, personally. 

I try to work these things out through various one to one conversations as I'm not sure our little social group is ready for me to bust out the overt social contracting just yet.  I'm suspect that Chris would feel that he is doing a bad job and getting ganged up on, when in the big picture this session was more of an anomaly than the norm at all.  I'll talk to some folks and see how it goes as we head into the next session.

Thanks for the input, it helps!

Jason

[Wade L]

I own all the Orpheus books.  They're an excellent read.

  However...well, there is that big ole metaplot thing going on.  I don't think it'll "spoil" you on stuff when I mention that the whole attack on Orpheus HQ is a metaplot-ordained event(and, indeed, the whole topic of the first supplement).

  As such...a lot of the problem may have emerged if the GM was uncomfortable executing a scripted event.  I know for myself, when I've run stuff like this...  As GM, you're cruising along, things are going well, players are engaged and you're having fun...and then you're like "Man, now I've got to run this metaplot bit...I've got to make sure it comes out somewhat like how it ends in the book, otherwise the next five books in the campaign will be useless to me!"  At the same time...when players react strongly to the metaplot stuff that is being pushed on them, the GM might worry "Oh no...they don't like this metaplot twist - I'm trapped!"  The players sense the GM's anxiety and there's a bit of a feedback loop...

  I know that on several occasions, running scripted stuff like Orpheus' metaplot, I as a GM have often been thinking to myself "This is dumb and railroady...but hopefully we can just play through it and get to the next session."  Even once, I've sensed player discomfort mid-game and actually said "Okay, I know this metaplot development bites...but can you just roll with it for me and let it happen, so we can get past this to the rest of the campaign?"

  The funny thing is that for me, at least - this isn't a "railroading" thing or anything like that - it's a comfort level thing.  I'd imagine the exact same plot twist, were it developed from scratch by the GM instead of pulled dutifully from the book, would feel much more natural for your GM.  But discomfort may have led to stiffness leaving some of the players to believe that they weren't really having any type of an impact that mattered to them - sure, they could do things, but maybe they couldn't do the things they cared about...

  What can a player do about it?  I think if you're going to go with this kind of thing, the best thing you can do is roll with it and boost the game.  You do not want your GM for feel he is being "ganged up on".  Instead, look at what is cool about the twists and turns your characters are going through.  Instead of lamenting not being able to focus on what you thought was important, dig into what is being sent your way.  To mutilate an old saying - "Happiness is not pursuing the plot you find interesting...happiness is finding the plot you are given interesting."

  You commented in your second post that your group was "pretty used to illusionist/participationist play"...but I have a feeling that what you are asking for advice on is how to pull the game away from illusionist/participationist play.  Unless done with the consent of everyone at the table(including your GM), that can only end in tears.