[Trollbabe] First session, trying to follow a player agenda

[Arturo G.]

Hi, folks!

This is a report about our first Trollbabe session. I'm, not sure if we were using all the rules properly. Anyway, the session was quite satisfactory. However, there were some things that trouble me.

There were three players: Luis, Kender (real name also Luis, thus, I will use his alias) and Jorge.

Luis had never played to roleplaying games before I enrolled him last year in my more or less regular Tuesday-evenings group, where we have been trying different indie-games.
Kender and Jorge are long time roleplayers. Kender first exposition to a story-oriented game was during a playtest of Hierarchy (by Troy Costisick) some months ago. He liked the experience a lot, and when we meet at PuCLN (the national Spanish game convention held some weeks ago) he wanted to play to many other games I was showing (PtA, Universalis, InSpectres, Polaris). He also brought his friend Jorge to the table (and some other players he met on the way). I think they liked mainly all the games they tried, and they wanted more.


I explained the rules and they created their trollbabes. We were using the modified social rule commented in other threads here in The Forge.

• Luis's trollbabe was a very sexy one with and edge in human magic (number 4). Luis was already trying to show his own agenda. He talked sometimes about the interest of his trollbabe to get engaged in sexual encounters with male humans or trolls.
  
• Kender created a big physically impressive and fighting trollbabe (number 7)
  
• Jorge another more oriented to trollish magic (number 4)

Kender and Jorge decided to begin together in the Green Goo Swamp, and Luis decided to begin in the surrounds of Otun's Belch; swimming nude in a retired lake. He was already driving the game to his first scene. Thus, I started with him.


The Stakes
I had three prepared stakes.
1) During a seasonal migration of a troll tribe, one of the members got lost. He is alone and hungry. He has begun to catch and eat cattle from the near village. Probably he will begin to eat humans soon.
Stakes: Goomish, the Troll.

2) The daughter of a merchant in the town/city dreams with romantic adventures in far places. Her father is aware and lock her at home until she forgets her crazy ideas. She will try to use any means to fly from the town/city, but she is afraid of flying alone.
Stakes: Sheila, the Merchant daughter.

3) In a troll community, the shaman is worry because the "life-fountain" is getting dry. He doesn't know why, and she is getting frighten for the community and for her position in it.
Stakes: Negum, the trollish shaman.

Question: Do they look like proper stakes? I avoided to think in possible consequences. Indeed, in the third case I even had no plan for the possible reason of the fountain to get dry.


As Luis was beginning in a retired lake I chose Stakes 1 for him. And I chose Stakes 3 for the other two.
Now I think that being so clear the agenda of Luis, I should have taken Stakes 2 for him, complicating the Stakes to include an on-going romantic affair or something like that, to try to engage him in the merchant's daughter motivations.


Luis story

Luis's trollbabe was swimming in the lake when she saw a troll running and hiding in a rock hideout. Without having time to get dressed she followed and joined the troll in the hide. He was frighten and flying from some angry men. Immediately, she decided to abandon the troll before she can get into trouble because being with him. As she tried to fly one man detected her but she used her magic to avoid him creating an illusion of a naked woman to distract him (Luis agenda obviously included naked people around).

As Luis show no interest in the troll, I tried to approach him through the men side. When she was approaching a village looking for food (and men) she detected an ambush. There were two men guarding the path to the village, actually waiting for the real troll. She managed to arrive unnoticed at their back. As they were plain ugly villagers she didn't like them. With magic she forced one of them to kill the other and she used more enchantments to help her to kill the other. Luis showed no interest on talking with them or getting an explanation about the ambush reason.

Trouble: Luis asked me what a trollbabe eats. I said without thinking that everything. They are like man and trolls at the same time. Then, he decided that they eat also human flesh and she did a little picnic with one of them.
Afterwards I thought there is an important reason to say that Trollbabes do not eat human flesh. It may bring conflict directly to them, easily diverting the Stakes to them.

He tried to approach the village but the people thought she was the troll. Finally, she came into the village silently, jumping the back fence and hiding in the inn. She was still looking for an appropriate male to match (always following Luis own agenda).
I tried to clearly expose the original problem and stakes to check his interest. She heard people talking, explaining their problem with the troll, afraid of him eating the children and saying they needed help to kill the troll.

As Luis was not reacting at all to help them, I decided to try to approach his agenda. I said that the people had asked the help of Rudgar, a famous troll-slayer. Then Luis begun to look interested. The trollbabe begun to imagine romantic scenes of her seducing the (expected) handsome and strong man a troll-slayer should be. She waited hidden at the inn.

Next day Rudgar arrived. I wanted to follow Luis agenda but pressing him a little. Rudgar was indeed a tall strong man riding a war horse, with an impressive black war-axe. He was covered with black robes. The trollbabe used some magic to discover his face. I describe him as a slightly mature man with many terrible scars in the face telling about his life and experience. Moreover, he detected the trollbabe's magic smelling the air. She needed to fly from the village to avoid being confused with the troll by the crazy population.

After some thinking Luis accepted Rudgar as a proper male. She decided to wait for him in her own terrain. Meanwhile, she found the troll and tried to convince him to leave as she was thinking on him as a disturb for her plans with Rudgar. She tried to lie him about finding help in another community of trolls that did not exist. He noticed and the failed rerolls ended with a fight in which the trollbabe was incapacitated. However, Luis got the right to narrate (last reroll) and said that the troll was now worry for her, and brought her to the hideout in the rocks to avoid humans to find and kill her.

Then, I was not sure about how to play a recovering scene. As we were in a hurry because lack of time, I presented a new scene were Rudgar tracked the path to the hideout and found her. He knew she was not the troll he was looking for (we omitted the detail that the trollbabe had been eating already a man) and as he liked her he take care of her physical injuries.

As soon as the trollbabe recovered enough to talk she immediately tried to seduce him. But Rudgar was too interested in finishing his job first, hunting the troll. But Luis was in a hurry to accomplish his agenda. She needed to use magic and reroll to get what he wanted. We described the new injury as a result of the slightly rude manners of Rudgar in the still recovering body of the trollbabe.

Unfortunately Luis had no time for a couple of scenes more to know if the trollbabe was going to let Rudgar catch the troll, if she was going to help, or whatever.

Conclusion
I'm not sure if I was flexible enough, or too much flexible, trying to follow Luis clearly fixed agenda.
Anyway, if we continue with this trollbabe story I will be sure to have some more Stakes prepared which include complex romantic affairs, presenting him situations with a more complicated edge about sex and love.

Another reflection. In many conflicts the trollbabe was killing all the people involved in the conflict. No possibilities to establish a relationship. After that, we were mainly forgetting it. Luis didn't seem to be interested. Perhaps I did not stress the versatility of relationship enough. It was a pity he needed to leave. I was expecting him to create at least a relationship with Rudgar.



Jorge and Kender story
They arrived at a trolls village in the border of the swamp. I played the female shaman as a mystic. She thought that the trollbabes could be an answer to her prays. A troll warrior led them to the hidden life-fountain in the swamp in a moonlighted night. Some nice descriptions of an almost dried fountain nurturing from the top of a rock with no hole, and the water creating no waves in the pool below.

Jorge's trollbabe tried to magically restore the fountain energy eliminating anything that could be stopping it. I have not so clear what could be the reason of the fountain to be drying. I more or less decided there should be some magical opposition created by some evil force. A nearby hostile troll tribe, perhaps?
The dice rolled bad a couple of times. She ended in an injuring shock due to uncontrolled magical forces. However, they noticed the magical opposition. Thus, they asked the troll warrior about neighbours or other possible rivals of the trolls. I talked about the other rival troll tribe.

The trollbabes paid a visit to the other tribe. They arrived in the middle of a secret ritual to the life goddess. Then, they decided to use magic to suddenly appear unnoticed in the middle of the trolls circle at the end of the ritual. There was a lot of confusion. One conflict to convince the shaman leader that they were sent by the goddess. Kerder used Fight in some very funny ways. At the trollbabe was also injured but she had made clear that they were champions of the goddess.

I introduced the idea that the trolls had no idea about the reason of the fountain to be drying. They were noticing it because the female trolls were not having children anymore, because of sudden aborts. The trollbabes decided that it was a problem of inbreeding. And the solution was to mix the two troll tribes to create a more powerful an lively one. The trolls understood it like a call to plunder their neighbours and steal their troll-women. Some more nice conflicts with the ruling shaman to control the situation. Convincing the shaman of the other village was also not easy. But it worked at the end.

Conclusion
Although the conflicts were personal, involving the shamans, I think that we derived to a higher scale, as the trollbabes decisions were affecting two villages/tribes of trolls. The Stakes moved from the original shaman to the two rival tribes. Consequences: The two tribes joined to create a more lively community and restore the life-fountain power.
Now I think that convincing the shamans to decide the destiny of the whole tribe was out of the personal scale. The rest of the community should not follow so easily the shamans guide and more troubles should arise from that.
The original Stakes, focused in the troubles of the first shaman and her position in the tribe were lost.

The trollbabes made some relationships but they never needed to use them. They spent some items for rerolls, but it was pretty clear that the session was ending and the players were not worry. Perhaps we play too short and too fast. Most conflicts were solved using the fastest pace.

Mechanical question
What happens when two trollbabes who are together and get into a conflict, they state exactly the same goal? Are their successes counted together (e.g. in a exchange by exchange pace) to reach the success? Or do they proceed separately until one of them achieves the goal?

Arturo

[TonyLB]

Well, Luis is obviously the most fascinating of these cases.  Sorry to Jorge and Kender, but I cannot resist the allure of excess and eccentricity!

So, a question:  When obstacles appeared to Luis's agenda, how did he react to them?  When Rudgar (I'm supposed to think of Rutger Hauer, right?) declined the seduction in pursuit of his duty, did Luis seem (a) Pleased at being challenged, (b) Upset at being thwarted, (c) All of the above or (d) Something else?

[Arturo G.]

Hi, Tony!

Although Jorge and Kerder built a nice story they reacted more or less in the expected way. Thus, I dedicated more space to Luis.

I think Luis is more used to deliver his own agenda because of the games we have been playing previously, like Universalis or Polaris. He was more or less looking for conflict, but conflict relative to his interests. I think his reaction was mainly (c). He likes to tell his story, but also playing a game. I think he understands that conflict and not getting directly what he wants is part of it, and a good way to further develop the story. We have talked about it sometimes, especially when playing The Pool for the first time.

His way of playing other games like DitV is also remarkable. He grabs an idea about what the game and his character is about, sometimes with an edge of excess, and plays it to the end.

At the beginning I was even a little disappointed because I was feeling he was doing a kind of disrupting play, avoiding to get into the pre-planned stakes, like in the old times. Fortunately, I instinctively shifted gradually to try to follow his agenda. However, I could do it much better.

Arturo

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Arturo,

You're right - there is a problem here. However, the problem might lie with you and your GMing. I think I can help by clarifying two rules terms in detail, and if we work it out here, I think your next session will be a lot easier.

Here we go!

1. The Stakes of a scenario in Trollbabe are not the player's problem. There is no reason, at all, why the player has to care about the Stakes or have the trollbabe care, or have the trollbabe respond to elements of the Stakes in a certain way. In fact, the player doesn't even have to know what they are.

The rules that matter here are:

a) the trollbabe may not leave the adventure until the Stakes are resolved. The player should know this and not have the trollbabe just get on a ship and go away.

b) the actions and conflicts that a trollbabe deals with will, indeed, affect the Stakes, even if it has to be indirectly.

Now, all by themselves, these rules are not enough to have the trollbabe's actions matter to the Stakes. That is why the following rules work the way they do.

2. Anyone may state conflicts in a given scene, player or GM. Conflicts are unavoidable - once declared, they must be faced.

I'm getting the idea that you threw a scene at the player, but didn't say "Here is a conflict and you are in it." I'm also getting the idea that the player didn't know that he could do exactly the same thing to you. Is that true?

Let me know what you think so far, Arturo. Are these rules-clarifications making sense?

Best, Ron

[Arturo G.]

Hi, Ron!

I think you are right and the problem is in my way of GMing. This is one of the main reasons I started this thread.

I understand rule (1), but I didn't really know how to achieve (1.b) that trollbabe's actions affect the Stakes.

I'm getting the idea that you threw a scene at the player, but didn't say "Here is a conflict and you are in it."

If I'm understanding you right, I was somehow framing scenes which were containing inherently a conflict, but I was expecting that the players discover it by themselves, deciding to get involved on it. Instead of clearly stating the presence of the conflict from the beginning.

But, what to do if the player does not seem to like the kind of conflicts I'm putting her in, because they are not related to her interests? I think I may get always goals like: "I want to flee from here", "I want to quit these people", "I let the men pursue the troll, it is not my business" or any other thing that means "I want to skip this conflict".

If I make them clearly notice the implications of them letting other characters do whatever they are going to do to some other characters, they would be anyway affecting the Stakes with their decisions?

I'm also getting the idea that the player didn't know that he could do exactly the same thing to you. Is that true?

I tried to state it clearly, but it is also clear that they were not doing it except a couple of times. When they wanted something which could be in conflict with the interests of another character I needed to say: "You want this, but these people seems to want another thing, this should be a conflict";  letting them to formalize it.

Am I missing the real meaning of what is and what is not a conflict?

Arturo

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Arturo,

Conflicts in Trollbabe are best understood as conflicts of interest - the trollbabe wants one thing, someone else wants something else, and they both can't get their way at once. When I say "someone else," sometimes that can be an inanimate object that, in narrative terms, might as well be a character, like a "cruel" mountain pass or a "stubborn" tree-stump.

Let's take this concept to the scenario you played. It seems to me as if the player's choice to have the trollbabe romantically interested in the troll-hunter completely confused you. You didn't see how it related to the Stakes, or anything else, and it seemed to you as if the player were "leaving the scenario." Which is another way to say, you didn't see any conflicts available in that situation.

Which strikes me as pretty strange. The troll-hunter was relevant to the potential outcomes of the scenario (the Consequences). If he were seduced by the trollbabe, that might mean he gets distracted from his job. If he were not seduced by the trollbabe even though she tried, maybe he thinks she's a troll too and needs killing as well. These are just two of potentially hundreds of ways the attempt to seduce him would fit, quite relevantly, in the Stakes and Consequences you'd prepared for the scenario.

And it all goes back to the rules about conflicts. If the player wanted conflicts about this relationship, then he does! The dice must be rolled. If you state a conflict within a given scene, it's a conflict! The dice must be rolled.

Perhaps you were thinking of conflicts as "things that must move my concept of the story along," rather than simply as what they are - conflicts, at that time, in that place, right now, and apply their outcomes to the overall scenario later, when working up the next scene - i.e., put that issue completely out of your head, as a GM. Completely.

After conflicts are resolved, then yes, as GM, it's your job to keep having the Stakes drive toward the Consequences. Fine! You are in charge of setting each and every scene in the game. You can take suggestions, but it's up to you. It is literally impossible to have the scenario veer away from the Stakes and Consequences, because that's your job - always to bring them into the situations. And as I say, I find it impossible to imagine how seducing the troll-hunter, successfully or unsuccessfully, would not immediately affect his ability or desire to hunt the troll(s) in the situation.

And let's be very clear about some terms this game. Maybe that's part of the problem. In Trollbabe ...

Stakes = what people in the scenario are fighting about (e.g. who will be chief)

Consequences = a specific outcome at the current scale, which may or may not be directly expressed by the Stakes

So the Stakes should be pretty obvious pretty soon just by watching the NPCs interact with each other and having them interact with the trollbabes. The Consequences do not have to be stated explicitly and serve mainly as a partial GM guide for what happens next, scene by scene (I say partial because other things can prompt new scenes too).

What I'm seeing is that you did not take the conflicts that the player was interested in, and then relate them to the Stakes (i.e. other NPCs) in the next scene, nor to the Consequences (what might happen to someone) in the next scene.

Does that seem accurate?

Best, Ron

[Arturo G.]

Hi again, Ron!

Only partially accurate. I think things are clearer now in my mind. However, the actual play experience was different. I will explain you immediately.

Conflicts in Trollbabe are best understood as conflicts of interest - the trollbabe wants one thing, someone else wants something else, and they both can't get their way at once.

Thus, conflicts of interest between NPCs, who do not directly involve a trollbabe, are not "conflicts" for the trollbabe.

Let us think on the first scene I framed for Luis. The trollbabe was swimming in the lake, and the troll appeared. The trollbabe followed the troll, but when she noticed there were men pursuing the troll, she decided to leave trying to avoid the men seeing her. This is a conflict between the trollbabe and the men. But is a conflict which is no more related to the problem between the men and the troll (the Stakes). I was expecting her to get implicated on it, but she wanted only to avoid to get implicated. And there was no consequences of this stated goal: "leave being unnoticed", which may relate to the Stakes easily.

Was the scene improperly framed, or the original intended conflict improperly presented, or just improperly chosen?

It seems to me as if the player's choice to have the trollbabe romantically interested in the troll-hunter completely confused you. You didn't see how it related to the Stakes, or anything else, and it seemed to you as if the player were "leaving the scenario." Which is another way to say, you didn't see any conflicts available in that situation.

This is what was different.
I introduced Rudgar to try to follow Luis's agenda. In that moment I began to become relaxed, because I knew perfectly that the new situation would lead to conflicts and consequences easily related to the Stakes. My problems, and that feeling about the player, were exactly before that moment.

Perhaps you were thinking of conflicts as "things that must move my concept of the story along," rather than simply as what they are - conflicts, at that time, in that place, right now, and apply their outcomes to the overall scenario later, when working up the next scene - i.e., put that issue completely out of your head, as a GM. Completely.

I'm afraid that concept is still leaking somehow into my brain through little holes I have not yet managed to properly repair. I think that my old ways to move the story along are pervading the way I'm framing scenes and introducing conflicts nowadays.

But I was glad to notice that once I managed to align my mind with Luis, I could easily interact with him through the game. Adding NPCs and conflicts both, interesting for him and related to the Stakes. All my hesitations appeared before that moment.

After conflicts are resolved, then yes, as GM, it's your job to keep having the Stakes drive toward the Consequences. Fine! You are in charge of setting each and every scene in the game. You can take suggestions, but it's up to you. It is literally impossible to have the scenario veer away from the Stakes and Consequences, because that's your job - always to bring them into the situations. And as I say, I find it impossible to imagine how seducing the troll-hunter, successfully or unsuccessfully, would not immediately affect his ability or desire to hunt the troll(s) in the situation.

As I was saying previously, in the troll-hunter case it was pretty clear. No problem. I introduced him with that purpose in mind.

Now I'm thinking that the key is to keep eyes more opened to players interactions in the first scenes, and use elements of the scenario (or include them on the fly, as I did with Rudgar) related to the Stakes and also to the player agenda.

For example, in the first scene, Luis would have been more concerned about some men hunting a troll if one of the humans (or perhaps the troll?) would have been more attractive to match with. In the second scene, the ambush, it could be the same, but I could also have done it indirectly in the next scene. The best fighters of the village (including an interesting male to match) could have found the killed men and could be tracking the trollbabe. This would lead to any kind of consequences related to the best fighting men of the village, the ones who shall be hunting the troll afterwards. Well, now I'm having more ideas.

What I'm seeing is that you did not take the conflicts that the player was interested in, and then relate them to the Stakes (i.e. other NPCs) in the next scene, nor to the Consequences (what might happen to someone) in the next scene.

I would say this is exactly what it happened at the beginning of the session.
In other games like PtA I'm not having this kind of problems as producer, because I have nothing really thought about the Stakes of the episode. Perhaps I only need to train more my abilities to have some Stakes in mind and still keep on being flexible to work with the players investments or ideas. If this is the problem I think Trollbabe is the proper ground to practice.

About some of your comments related with rules interpretation, I think they have helped to clarify me even more how things should work.

BTW, it is minor matter, but what do you think about the mechanical question at the end of my first post? When two trollbabes have the same goal in a a exchange-by-exchange or action-by-action pace, do they add their successes to get the two or three ones needed, or do they get the goal when the first trollbabe arrives at that number of successes on her own?

Arturo

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Arturo,

Again, I have been a bad correspondent regarding your Trollbabe questions.

Let me start by saying that you have apparently solved most of the issues you brought up very successfully, and I'm impressed by that. I hope that these experiences will inspire your work on future designs, as well.

You asked,

what do you think about the mechanical question at the end of my first post? When two trollbabes have the same goal in a a exchange-by-exchange or action-by-action pace, do they add their successes to get the two or three ones needed, or do they get the goal when the first trollbabe arrives at that number of successes on her own?

This is actually very easy. You must remember, though, that trollbabes never actually combine conflicts, in terms of game mechanics. Each one has her own conflict. Each one has her own dice, Pace, and re-rolls. Do not treat them as one thing. The only exception to this applies when trollbabes have named one another as Relationships, but that is only for Trollbabe experts, and not for this discussion.

Here's an example. Brulla and Azk are trollbabes. They are fighting a very nasty, human-eating, sheep-stealing, psychotic troll.

To keep it in line with your exact question, let's say that each player has announced that his or her trollbabe is trying to kill this troll, and the GM is perfectly happy to have the troll try to kill them both.

It doesn't matter if the two characters resolve the conflicts using different Paces or choices with re-rolls or anything like it. Here are the possible outcomes, when all is finished ...

Brulla and Azk both succeed in their rolls. The troll is dead and both of them were involved in killing him.

One trollbabe succeeded but the other did not. The troll is dead and one of them did not manage to help significantly, and was probably defeated by the troll along the way (or even killed, depending on the player's choices with the dice).

Neither trollbabe succeeded. The troll is alive and the two trollbabes were defeated to whatever extent the players' respective re-rolls took them.

Do you see how easy that is? There is no contradiction - because one succeeded and one failed, does not mean that the troll is simultaneously dead and not dead. Only one needs to succeed to kill the troll.

I am not going to give another speech about how "stakes" thinking has become abused and badly-applied over the last six months of dialogue on the internet. But for those of you interested in such things, I recommend to you checking out Trollbabe and understanding that the system does not entail pre-narrating outcomes prior to the roll. All it needs is to state what the characters' conflict of interest is about, and thus what "success" minimally means. I am convinced that a number of people have really screwed up their understanding of the activity and their current game designs by falling into this trap.

Best, Ron

[Arturo G.]

Hi, Ron!

I have been revolving around these issues for a long time, and I think your comments have put my mind on work on the proper direction. Trollbabe is helping me to clarify many things; including some faults on the playtesting of my own designs.

Anyway, more actual play is key to really understand all these issues.
I'm thinking that Trollbabe may be also suitable for play-by-post. Probably, I will also try it that way.

Thanks a lot, Ron.
Arturo

[Arturo G.]

Ooops! I was forgetting to tell you that the mechanical question has been perfectly answered. The example is perfectly clear.

Arturo