[Power 19] Minions

[EdEdEd]

Hey folks. I've been playing with an idea for a while now, and a friend pointed me toward this forum as a good place to get feedback, so, here goes. I've got the power 19 here, but as far as a brief introduction, Minions is a game where players don't play individuals, but represent members of a vast team of identical soldiers. The archetypal example would be the dozens of minor lackeys that James Bond dispatches on his way into the evil geniuses lab/island/moon base, but there are plenty of other examples and I'm trying to keep it fairly universal. Anyway, the central idea is that you aren't meant to play an individual, but a part of a unit, and the characters die and get replaced fairly constantly. Right now, it's still in the early stages, and a bunch of stuff is likely to change, but I'd really like to get some feedback on the feasibility of the idea. More to the point, would you be willing to play a character with very little personal identity, one who you knew for a fact was going to die pretty quickly in the gaming?

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1.) What is your game about?
Stepping into the boots of the nameless, faceless legions. The extremely minor characters who invariably sacrifice their lives. The worthless minions who are only there to make the main characters look powerful. This is a game about letting the little guys win. It can take place in many different genres, but it's always about being minions.

2.) What do the characters do?
Characters do whatever it is they need to do to serve their cause. In most cases, this will mean going on a mission against a superior force; something like finding and stopping the spy who's broken into the secret base, or defeating the supervillain who's broken out of prison (because all the heroes are out of town).

3.) What do the players (including the GM if there is one) do?
The players first create the world they're living in and define the sort of team they'll be playing. Then, the GM creates a problem within this world that they must solve. The players work as a team to try and complete their mission, while the GM tries to make their task more difficult. The game is fast-paced, fairly combat-oriented, and generally meant to last one session.

4.) How does your setting (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?
'Minions' can be played in any number of settings. The examples that are provided with it all play off of faceless legions in popular culture; from Star Trek redshirts to Lord of the Rings Orcs. They're all examples of armies where the individuals really don't matter... they're just there to get killed.

5.) How does the Character Creation of your game reinforce what your game is about?
There is no Character Creation.
Players work together to define the universe and then create the team that inhabits it. Players do not make individual characters; because they're a faceless legion, they all start with the same character sheet, with the only difference being their name, their seniority, and anything that gets added during play.

6.) What types of behaviors/styles of play does your game reward (and punish if necessary)?
Teamwork is rewarded, and going it alone is pretty severely punished. Taking risks and sacrificing yourself, especially to serve your cause, are rewarded. Good storytelling, too, is rewarded.

7.) How are behaviors and styles of play rewarded or punished in your game?
A task which is only modestly challenging as a team is prohibitively difficult when attempted alone; teamwork and fair play are by no means required, but success without one's team to back oneself up is very rare. Any combat between a lone minion and an NPC is practically suicide.
Death isn't a good thing, but it happens very, very often. The punishment, however, is a slap on the wrist, and dying in a good way (to serve your cause), or dying in an extremely well-narrated way makes death slightly beneficial; the more you die and the better you die, the more bonuses you store up for future minions.

8.) How are the responsibilities of narration and credibility divided in your game?
For the most part, the GM handles the narration, setting up the scene and most of the action, and the players describe what they do as they do it. In combat, narration is generally handled by who is successful in attacking or defending. Anyone who dies gets to narrate their end, and the very end of the game, the wrap-up narration is handled by whatever player has the highest seniority (i.e.: who has gone the longest without getting killed).

9.) What does your game do to command the players' attention, engagement, and participation? (i.e. What does the game do to make them care?)
It... is... awesome? I don't know, this is a weird question.
It's quick-paced, light, and easy to walk into and out of. It can also turn very amusing, very quickly, depending on the sorts of players involved. And while you're meant to care about completing your mission, or defending your cause, mostly I'm concerned that people enjoy the gameplay.

10.) What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?
   They're based around one or two six-sided dice (depending on the complexity of the task); players roll, trying to get equal or less than their level in a particular skill. Now, the odds are stacked against them-- most of the time, they're trying to roll a one-- but they have the option of paying their way down by sacrificing their hit points.
...also, rolling a 6 is grounds for instant failure, probable injury (lowering the level of one skill), and possible death.
Combat is in the same style, with NPCs and attack and defense rolls and yadda yadda yadda. It's still about hit point-trading and dangerous odds.

11.) How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?
Not only are the resolutions weighted against the minions, emphasizing their individual uselessness, but they are constantly and literally giving their lives for their cause.

12.) Do characters in your game advance? If so, how?
Oh yes, and rapidly. Whenever things are calm, minions may trade in hit points to either buy new equipment (giving them new skills) or upgrade equipment (giving them better skills). This sort of thing would happen all the time... but of course, when the minions die, they lose it all. When players die they acquire one or more 'death points' they can pool and trade in for upgrades that will exist for all future minions, which is much slower going.

13.) How does the character advancement (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?
Well, the fact that you're only ever buying equipment reinforces the idea that your minions are entirely average; they have no special skills of their own, only the equipment their bosses give them or they pick up along the way. Furthermore, they are once again literally trading their life for their cause. And of course, advancement has to happen as rapidly as it does, to make up for their mayfly lifespans.

14.) What sort of product or effect do you want your game to produce in or for the players?
Let's go for something along the lines of 'manic glee'. It's a slightly ridiculous concept, and while it's not played for laughs, per se, it's hard to take seriously.

15.) What areas of your game receive extra attention and color? Why?
Well, the rules for getting hurt and getting killed will be flush with examples. And I'm planning on throwing in plenty of idea seeds for minions and missions and whatnot, both because that sort of thing delights me, and because it's a game not meant for long campaigns in one universe, so the more different ideas one has, the more replay value the game.

16.) Which part of your game are you most excited about or interested in? Why?
I'm excited about the way minions die and get replaced. Ideally, I want it set up so that death isn't so common as to be frustrating, nor so rare as to undermine the whole point of the game (I do not want it to be a supersquad of elite soldiers). I want to make people enjoy getting killed, and I'm excited to see that happen.

17.) Where does your game take the players that other games can't, don't, or won't?
It makes the individual players valueless. There are many games where everyone is on a team, and they can't do things alone, but most often they end up specialists working together. This makes you a group of undifferentiated characters. You're not the hero... you're not the main character... you're the little guys.

18.) What are your publishing goals for your game?
Well, I hadn't really thought about it, honestly. I'll get it finished and playtested and edited to death, then I'll decide.

19.) Who is your target audience?
I think it's mostly for a medium-sized gaming group, especially one with a few newer members, that doesn't want to play something long; either because they don't meet often, or they're not that serious, or even if they're just in between different games and want a change of pace for a week. It's also a great game for introducing someone to the group (or to rpgs in general), since they can't ruin things by going off and getting killed.

[Vulpinoid]

That sounds like a fun beer-n-pretzels game

V

[Willow]

Two questions-

Have you read My Life With Master?  It's all about playing a minion, albiet a named, unique minion.  (One step up perhaps- the henchmen).  It may have some useful things to think about as you work on your game.

Have you thought about emergent protagonism- that is, that while these characters start out pretty much all the same, maybe they develop personalities and their own stories through play?

[Greg 1]

This is a very interesting and original idea.

Minions is a game where players don't play individuals, but represent members of a vast team of identical soldiers. The archetypal example would be the dozens of minor lackeys that James Bond dispatches on his way into the evil geniuses lab/island/moon base, but there are plenty of other examples and I'm trying to keep it fairly universal.

Is it vital that they be identical, as opposed to just low-level?  It might make for some variety in minion plans if not all minion parties are the same.

Anyway, the central idea is that you aren't meant to play an individual, but a part of a unit, and the characters die and get replaced fairly constantly.

Is there a reason to avoid death?  If not, is there a danger that the game will lack tension?

Right now, it's still in the early stages, and a bunch of stuff is likely to change, but I'd really like to get some feedback on the feasibility of the idea. More to the point, would you be willing to play a character with very little personal identity, one who you knew for a fact was going to die pretty quickly in the gaming?

Maybe.  The premise is fascinatingly different, but I'm not quite clear on what the players do.  If there is little personal identity, then there may not be much opportunity for roleplaying.  If there isn't much difference in skill, then they may not be much opportunity for tactical thinking.  I'm a little scared that it might devolve into throwing wave after wave of disposable faceless mooks at the NPCs until they eventually get worn down.

[EdEdEd]

Oh, awesome, I'm glad this is being well-received.

Is it vital that they be identical, as opposed to just low-level?  It might make for some variety in minion plans if not all minion parties are the same.

That's why I let player advancement happen ridiculously fast; everyone starts on an even keel, but you can turn yourself into a specialist right away buy buying relevant equipment... although it makes you weaker, your future incarnations can get the same equipment at a discount. Hmm... perhaps if I let players buy something at the very beginning at a significant discount. Let them self-specialize right away, with a fairly slight cost, so they aren't that much at a disadvantage to an average mook. Provides more immediate variety, without losing the identical aesthetic.

Is there a reason to avoid death?  If not, is there a danger that the game will lack tension?

Well, in addition to losing any equipment you've acquired, you lose your seniority. All the players are in order of seniority from the beginning (determined randomly, or however they all prefer). When you die, your new guy ends up with the least seniority... whomever is in the lead has more narrative power, and a few other things are determined in order of seniority, which makes it bad for the individual, but not so much for the team.

I do have another idea, admittedly inspired by playing Roanoke this weekend: letting the GM keep a death toll, and having the ending of the mission (how much the minions are rewarded, et cetera) determined in part by how low they keep that death toll (like Roanoke's Doom Points). It's an inkling of an idea right now, though... any suggestions on that end are welcome.

Maybe.  The premise is fascinatingly different, but I'm not quite clear on what the players do.  If there is little personal identity, then there may not be much opportunity for roleplaying.  If there isn't much difference in skill, then they may not be much opportunity for tactical thinking.  I'm a little scared that it might devolve into throwing wave after wave of disposable faceless mooks at the NPCs until they eventually get worn down.

Precisely my worry. Wave after wave of men may do for rampaging killbots and similar problems, but I doubt it would make for the best game night. I have thought about encouraging role playing through voluntary 'minion archetypes' (the guy with two weeks to retirement, the guy who believes in his cause to a creepy extent, the guy who is genre savvy, and what have you), but that's another recent and fairly undefined idea in the back of my head right now.

Have you read My Life With Master?  It's all about playing a minion, albiet a named, unique minion.  (One step up perhaps- the henchmen).  It may have some useful things to think about as you work on your game.

Have you thought about emergent protagonism- that is, that while these characters start out pretty much all the same, maybe they develop personalities and their own stories through play?

Ah, My Life With Master, I have not yet read it, but I've heard of it, and am probably going to pick up a PDF once my job starts paying me. I'll claim it's for research purposes, but it looks pretty fascinating in it's own right too.

As for emergent protaganism (which makes me think immediately of henchmen 21 and 24 from The Venture Brothers, mooks who eventually got whole sub-plots and B-stories of their own), unfortunately the system as I have it now makes it really hard to let a minion survive long enough to become a major player in his own right. I'd have to throw in a whole new mechanic... "Oh, rolled a six, instant failure... unless you can come up with a relevant life experience that would give your character the insight to get out of this situation!"

... which isn't that bad for something off the top of my head, although I do want to avoid getting what is a beer-n-pretzels sort of game too complicated. Man, now I got stuff to think about! Which, I suppose, is what you people are all hear for. Thanks, everyone!