Intrigue: A Card-Based Poltical System

[Toneblind]

Hello there!

Just joined the forum, and I thought I'd put up an idea for a system which focuses on political maneuvering and utilising the entire Tarot deck, not just the Major Arcana. It's just some ideas that have been forming in my head over the last day or two, so it's bare-bones (and probably not very good), but I thought I'd give it a try.

Base System
Every player and the GM begins with a hand of 5 cards from the standard minor Arcana of a tarot deck (56 cards, each ranging from 1-10, with the face cards Page, Knight, Queen and King, in 4 suits, Cup, Coin, Sword and Wand); this is known as their "Influence Hand", representing the fluctuating nature of courtly power and favours, as well as the character's own personal mental, physical and social assets. Every player also draws one card from the Major Arcana, which is known as their "Persona". A character's Persona is how they are generally viewed in the Court, not necessarily in their actual capacity but rather in the current demeanour, past actions and the rumours floating around them. Each Persona has it's own benefits and drawbacks.

Two types of conflicts - "Extended" and "Intense"
"Extended": Extended conflicts are the bread and butter of Intrigue - they are conflicts over important, long-term goals. It could be swaying the opinion of a potential ally, gaining the ear of the Church for a time, waging a war in a far-off country or even wooing a fair maiden. What it is, to an extent, doesn't matter in terms of mechanics - the base mechanic stays the same. A Gm or player can declare an Extended Conflict, and it is generally written on a card and placed in the middle of the table. Each person who wishes to be involved in this conflict then places a card on it, going in a clockwise direction from the oldest player (not character) in the conflict (as an arbitrary way of determining it). The object is to place a card of the same value as the last card placed on the conflict, at which point the object is no longer conflicted, but contested. 

The two players who are involved in the Contest each take a card from the top of the remaining deck and lays it, face down, in front of them. They then take turns 'bidding' Aspects, where each player involved puts an Aspect somehow related to the Conflict in the stake in turn. On their turn, a player may choose to 'raise', in which case they place another aspect in the stake, 'fold', in which case they lose the contest and half of their bid Aspects are exhausted (rounded up, minimum of 1), or call. Calling means that the players flip over their cards and add up their bid Aspects. the player with the higher value wins the contest, and the losing player exhausts all of his bid aspects.

A player can choose to back out of a, Extended Conflict when it is their turn to place a card on the Conflicted Object. If this leaves only one player in the conflict, they automatically win the Conflicted Object and gain it as an Aspect

The important thing to remember is that an Extended Conflict doesn't happen all at once, until it becomes Contested. Once the first cards are placed on the Conflicted Object, the cards remain there and the game continues. A new round of Escalation (placing influence cards on the conflicted object) can start at one of the following points:

•   After an Intense Conflict (see below)
•   A scene of suitable roleplaying (determined by the GM)
•   The beginning or end of a session
•   When a player involved in the Conflict reverses their Persona

This means an Extended Conflict can last over several sessions, which is fine. Political machinations are long-term things.

It is very important to note that placing an influence card on a Conflicted Object reduces the hand size of that player for the rest of the session. There are a few ways to increase your hand size, which we will go onto later.

"Intense": Intense Conflicts are periods of short, sharp action that affects how the world (and, more importantly, the Court) sees them. This could be a duel of honour, a self-aggrandizing hunting party or a graceful dance at a Courtly Ball. The basic system for this conflict remains the same - each player places a card on the Conflicted Object in turn, and once a player places a card with the same numeric value as the last card played down, the Object becomes Contested. A Contested Object goes through the same system of bidding, calling and folding as in Extended Conflicts.

However, there are a few changes in an Intense Conflict that should be remembered. When a player wins Intense conflict, instead of gaining that won Conflict as an Aspect, they instead increase their Influence hand size by one and draw a new card. Alternatively, the may choose to discard their current Persona and draw a new one from the remaining Major Arcana. Secondly, when a player places a card on a conflicted Object in an Intense Conflict, they draw a new card to replace it, rather than reduce their overall hand size.

Aspects
An individual character is based around their Aspects. These are words or phrases that define who they are; it may be material possessions ("The Landrigham Estate"), a honorific ("The Lion of Verdantland"), a personality quirk ("Ruthless cunning") or a person or people ("Loyal Spy Network"). Each is rated between +1 and +3, and adds its value, when bid, to a card drawn during a Conflict. An Aspect can become exhausted during a Conflict. An exhausted Aspect has it's value reduced by one for the next Contest it is bid in. Once an Aspect is reduced to +0, it remains that way for the rest of the session or until recovered. [Note: Still working on how an aspect is recovered]

Every characters starts off with X points to divide between Aspects, as well as a +3 aspect called "Life". You can put your Life on the line during any Intense Conflict; however, if you lose the conflict, your character, simply, dies and is removed from the game. An Intense Conflict such as a duel tot he death or a battle may require you to put your Life on the Line.

Persona
As mentioned above, every character has a Persona – how the Court views them. This is represented by one of the 22 Major Arcana in a Tarot deck. It is worth mentioning again that the cards do not represent what they do in terms of official function, but rather how they present themselves and the opinions of others towards them (for example, someone with the Persona of the Fool is not necessarily a Jester, or even be particularly jovial, but rather they are seen as care-free and reckless by the Court as a whole) due to past actions, rumours or just the twists of fate. Each Persona has three facets – a Blessing, a Curse and a Reversal.
Blessing: Each Persona has its own intrinsic benefit which is always active until the card is reversed.
Curse: Every Persona is also its own drawback, the views of the world acting against the character. Reversal: The twists of fate conspire to give some small, temporary blessing to the characters action, but at the same time increases the scope of the card's Curse for the rest of the session.

Example Persona
Justice
Blessing: You may count the numeric value of a card placed in an Intense Conflict as either one higher or one lower for the purpose of beginning a Contest.
Curse: You count your card in an Extended Conflict's Contest as one lower than it actually is
Reversal: A card in the Sword suit counts as having any numeric value for the purpose of starting a Contest. However, all face cards count as 10's during an Extended Conflict's contest.

Whenever you reverse your persona, you also increase your Influence Hand size by one. Certain players may want particular abilities granted by Personas, or find no use for their current Persona. If so, they may discard and redraw their current persona after an Intense Conflict, as the views of the world shift from the intense action. Certain Extended Conflicts may also warrant the Conflicted object being a new Persona instead of a potential Aspect.



Thoughts
Perhaps a possible system of consequences and flaws for losing Conflicts
Ideas for the Blessings, Curses and reversals of the different Personas
Character development system



So, any thoughts? Any good at all?

[Mike Sugarbaker]

This sounds pretty interesting. I'd move forward with playtesting it. The main thing that jumps out at me as possibly being a concern is deciding when to play a card that turns an extended conflict into a contest - do you ever have a rules-based incentive not to? If you want these to be "slow burners" instead of exploding immediately, you need to make sure people don't just charge into them like Leeroy Jenkins.

Where is this coming from for you - is there a particular flavor or genre of fiction you want to create? What sorts of systems have you played/been inspired by? (You should have a look at Capes if you haven't.)

Also, is there a real-world name we can call you?

And welcome!

[Toneblind]

Firstly, thanks for the comment, Mike! I hadn't really considered the Leeroy jenkins effect you mentioned, but that is a concerning thought. Maybe the level of card that is used to initiate the Contest requires a certain number of Aspects be exhausted, but the Aspect gained from it is consequently higher. Since only relevant Aspects can be bid (and in this case, exhausted to initiate it), players may have a stake in keeping it low, to allow them to use their higher Aspects in the Contest proper.

maybe something like this...

Initiaing Card

Aspect Exhausted

Aspect Gained

Initiating Card/Aspects Exhausted/Aspect Gained If Won
1-7/+1/+1
8-10 Page or Knight/+2/+2
King or Queen/+3/+3

Or perhaps initiating cards of different levels require certain rounds of Escalation to be used. Of course, any suggestions people have would be appreciated!

In terms of inspiration, literary works of poltical machinations are a big part of it for me (such as a Song of Ice and Fire, although I admit it's been years and years sinc eI last laid eyes on it) and the television program Kings was a big inspiration. Game-wise I'm not sure what I can cite outside of Spirit of the Century in terms of inspiration, but I'm sure if I dug around I'll find something I've unconsciously riffed off in my collection. I've not played Capes, but I'll check it out, now.

Oh, and you can call me Will (sorry, so used to just using nonsensical screen names)

[chance.thirteen]

An idea out of the blue might be to allow playing an Ace to start or initiate a new conflict, creating a new opportunity or situation to intrigue over.

[Toneblind]

I've been having a think about the possible risk of Extended Conflicts becoming a race to turn it into a contest. Currently, I've got a few thoughts in mind

• Leave it as it is. It doesn't matter if it's a race, as long as the Conflict occurs
• Place some manner of risk or penalty on certain cards. The higher the card, the higher the risk/penalty
• Place some sort of 'minimum time', a certain number of rounds that must occur before high value cards can be played, balanced with a reward for higher cards
• The longer a Conflict goes on, the higher the value of the Object becomes

The thing to bear in mind about particularly the time-based thoughts is that you have to play a card during each round of Escalation. Failing to do so means you are out of the Conflict, and if an Object only has one person in a conflict over it, that person automatically gets it. So it becomes more of a time management/risk management decision, reconciling the dwindling size of your hand with how much you want a particular Object.

My concern with the time-based mechanics, however, is that since you can only have a maximum of 4 'matching' cards in any given Conflict (4 kings, 4 queens, 4 pages and so on) it may become impossible for someone to begin a Contest over an Object.

An idea out of the blue might be to allow playing an Ace to start or initiate a new conflict, creating a new opportunity or situation to intrigue over.

Hmmm... an interesting thought. Would this be playing an Ace in a Conflict or a Contest?

[Toneblind]

Hey there, another post, and it's a bit of a doozy



What is Intrigue about? The answer to that I'm finding difficult to summarize (as it was never my strong point to begin with - incoherent and random thoughts, yes, but nothing as precise as summaries), but it seems more and more that the premise of the game, along with its thematics and genre are becoming more relevant. To that end, I want to try and break down what I think this game is, what I want it to be and then, hopefully, be able to succinctly describe the mod, attitude and style I hope to go with for this game. For my sins I realised an inspiration comes from a game that I have not actually set eyes on for a long time - John Wick's wonderful Houses of the Blooded, which I initially bought mostly because I saw a 500-page .pdf for $5 (which in real money - pounds sterling, of course - is the equivalent to tuppence ha'penny, in my oh-so humble view). If you will allow me a brief digression, I will gather my thoughts on my own game by describing how I felt about HotB

In short (but not in summary, it must be stressed), I loved it

But I wasn't sure I actually liked it.

the game was wondering, the mechanics inspired and the themes and concepts behind it were, to my mind at least, unique. It was a game of raw passion and beautiful violence, a game that wove you into a grand tapestry of love, blood and music. If it was a novel, I would have read it over and over. It was magnificent. On the other hand, and I do apologise to Mr. Wick for this, wherever he may be at this point, in terms of a political game, a game of intrigue and subtle manoeuvring, it was not what I wanted. The passions and emotions of the Ven run hot and open at all times, where I feel that the sort of game I wanted, the sort of game that I hope that Intrigue will turn into, is a game of cool decisions and careful planning. It's a game of concealed emotions that smoulder white-hot, out of the views of everyone else. I've only played a little of HotB, but what I have played has been a gloriously operatic.

But that was the key, I felt; Houses of the Blooded is an opera, and that's not what I want for Intrigue. To that end, a large part of the thematics is that Intrigue is a game of 'hidden intentions'. Every character has a mask they wear in their Persona. Often, they do not simply choose their Persona - it is the collected views of the rest of the Court, formed by the whispered rumours and the character's own past being twisted (or, in some cases, fairly represented). Often, people play up to their mask - the Fool is light hearted, and therefore gets away with his mocking satires and subtle jibes, while the Chariot is an innovator and sculptor of society, daring the whole world with his ideas and being duly praised for it - but their masks are not necessarily the true representation of who they are. The Fool is free to wander around, his eyes always keen and watching for weakness, and his jibes gently undermining the authority of their targets in the eyes of Court. The Chariot's bold designs are well-met, but the grandeur and the ceremony are all there to obfuscate the way the designs benefit not only the world as a whole, but him in a much greater, more immediate sense.

So, to return briefly to the idea of Houses of the Blooded being an opera; what, then, can we call Intrigue? I feel that it is more akin to a waltz. It's pampered and pressed and delicate in its application while Houses is broad and bold and wondrous. The characters in Intrigue do not make a big show of their revenge. Sometimes it's a hired knife in the back. Sometimes it's a brief, bloody duel on a mist-shrouded field just after dawn. But it's never truly public. There's always the shadow of doubt of who hired the assassin, or why they accepted the duel. The love is courtly, refined, and more often than not staged, or the object of their affection a mere prize to be won – infatuation, not true love. True love is kept to back rooms and sordid meetings; it should be remember that intrigue is another word for affair. But I think that's enough comparison to Houses (and I must once again apologise to Mr. Wick if I have misinterpreted you game in any way), at least for now.

Let us now consider the main themes that I want to try and put forward in Intrigue. I feel it should be a game of:

•   Political manoeuvres
•   Risk and gain
•   Rising ambition
•   Trust and betrayal
•   Courtly love and sordid affairs
•   Long schemes punctuated with short, sharp bursts of action
•   Power structures

Think The Godfather (particularly the first film), think Kings, hell, even think Richard III. But, alas (and I do not that word lightly), these comparisons do not truly help, do they? What I feel I need to do now is start focusing on the premise.

I have a habit of focusing a lot of my ideas on a single image that sticks in my mind. It's generally pretty pretentious, I will freely admit, but at the same time I feel at least at this point it will help me focus on the way to describe my game to an unfamiliar audience (as everyone will be). The image I have in my mind is as follows:

The back of a throne, ancient and stony, with only a suited arm of the one sitting on it visible; the hand is holding onto a crown, simple but lovingly crafted, allowing it to dangle from two fingers, almost nonchalantly holding the symbol of a nation's sovereignty.

OK, pretentious image over. I want this game to be a mixture of the modern and the anachronistic, timeless themes melded into something that the readers will ultimately just get. So, the basic question I'm going to ask is "what would an absolute monarchy in a fully developed first-world country look like?" Again, I'm using Kings (a wonderful, all-too-brief, show on HBO, which transplanted the biblical tale of King Saul and David into a modern setting, beautifully written and chock full of endearing, hidden melodrama) as an inspiration. Modern Courtly business, the minds that shape the nation around them with complete authority within their domains, is conducted in a place not unlike a mixture between a board room and a lecture theatre. There is a long, central table encircled by chairs for the king's Favoured, while the king himself is raised upon a dais and seated on his throne, the same throne that has been used, allegedly, for a thousand years. Courtly pleasure is still as rich and decadent as it has always been – it is the host's pleasure to make things perfect for their guests, and the nobles take their opportunity to wheel, deal and conspire in quiet corners away from prying ears.

Swords and flintlocks are still the order of the day when it comes to duels of honour – few and far between though they are, it is the law for every noble house to have a pair of finely balanced blades and expertly crafted pistols for the use in such combat, as well s for the 'defence of the realm and all who dwell within it – and it is for this reason in particular that duels have dwindled over the years, and the nobility prefers the efficiency and discretion that can only be had through a hired knife or bullet.

So there we have what I feel is the second component of Intrigue. It is a game of 'modern anachronism', of past and future intermingled. Everyone is haunted by their past actions, and look to mould their futures and the future of the Nation.

But what, I hear your cry, is the point of all this? Why all the subtle plots and ploys within a system that is inefficient and obsolete? Why hide you true intentions behind pageantry, pomp and circumstance? I feel the reasons for this are fourfold. Firstly, the nobility (and more often than not this includes the players), are greedy. The feudal system rewards those of higher status, particularly through birth, and allows them to play without having to pay. The nobility are also ambitious, but this is separate and distinct from mere greed. They feel that they can have the power and use it better than those who currently have it, even if it does mean cutting deals and taking risks to get that power. Thirdly, the nobility is paranoid – they do not trust each other (aside from, perhaps, a few notable exceptions), and so keep their affairs, business and true intentions hidden from most everyone behind veils of banquets and concerts. Finally, and most importantly, the nobility is bored. Often, and as cliché as this analogy may be, they view courtly politics and intrigue as a game, a laugh, a joke. They do not have to worry about the actual running of their domains, for the most part, with the power of bureaucracy at their disposal. Democracy, as they see it, is no fun; all bread, no circuses. So, there we have the third part of Intrigue. It is a game about 'nobility', in all the meanings of the word. They have the noblesse oblige to their subjects, they have codes of honour (and know how to circumvent it), and they have a birthright of power.

So what, all told, does that make Intrigue? It is a game of hidden intentions, of modern anachronism and nobility. How can I explain it in one nice, succinct summary (that word again), that will give the proper emotive emphasis to the game? As I write this, I do not know, but perhaps inspiration will strike me at any time. Unfortunately, I believe I have failed in my attempt to summarise the intent and premise of Intrigue

I thank you for reading this; it turned out a lot longer than originally intended. All I really ask is - did any of that make any sense?

-   Will

[Mike Sugarbaker]

(Just chiming in here before the deadline to say YES. A thematic intent this clear, and clearly communicated, is a rare thing indeed. Keep going!)

[TJ]

If you haven't yet read or played In A Wicked Age by Vincent Baker, you should check it out.  It's Nest Of Vipers oracle seems particularly relevant to your premise.

Additionally, are you familiar with either Vampire or Amber Diceless?  Both of those games include intrigue as primary themes, but incorporate them in different systemic ways.  I've played both of them for many years, and although I never felt that either game took quite the "right" approach to intrigue, there may be nuggets of advice you can mine from them.