Suspect Behaviour (quite long, really; sorry about that)

[Tim Denee]

the butler], did you hear anything the night of murder?
Pluck: No, nothing.
Inspector: Madame Smith?[the wife]  Mademoiselle Smith?[the daughter]
Mrs Smith: Yes, I heard my husband cry out at around 11:00 pm from his office.
Miss Smith: I heard the same.
Inspector: Monsieur Gold [the guest], where were you that night?
Gold: The guest house.
Inspector: Which is located where?
Gold: Near the front gate of the property.
Inspector: Did you hear anyone leaving or entering?
Gold: Yes, I heard a car drive out at about 10:30.
Inspector: When did you hear about the murder?
Gold: Susan

[Ferry Bazelmans]

This sounds like a lot of fun, but I think you'd have to lay down the law pretty sternly on the players if you don't want this to turn into a free-for-all, yarnspinning experience.

I'd love to see what this develops into.

By the way, what if it was a player's duty to construct his story so that others are implicated, while he has to try and wriggle out of implications put upon him. That would create a ever tightening web of lies and deceit for the Detective to navigate.

Gimme more! :smile:

Crayne

[Mike Holmes]

On 2001-12-20 08:11, Crayne wrote:
By the way, what if it was a player's duty to construct his story so that others are implicated, while he has to try and wriggle out of implications put upon him. That would create a ever tightening web of lies and deceit for the Detective to navigate.

That's what I thought that Nomad had suggested, essentially. The players play their characters, and, of course, in the process they'll be defending themselves (as suspects are wont to do), and trying to implicate others as a form of defense.

Great concept, Nomad. I love Poirot.

Here's an idea. Rotate who is the Detective through each player. They have one hour to get through their investigation (the length of one Poirot episode). This starts with creating the setting and characters and assigning them to players as well as designing their clues. The players then write their guesses and the questioning begins. Within the hour, the Detective must finish up and determine whodunit.

After he completes his description of the events, reveal the votes. If the Detective picked the suspect with the highest votes, he gets three points. On a tie vote, the Detective wins if he guesses any of the tied suspects. Each player who wrote the name of the character that the Detective found guilty gets one point.

Rotate Detectives and do another round. After all players have been the Detective, the player with the highest total score from all rounds wins.

Optional Advanced version: The Agatha Christie style is to almost always have an obvious contender for the guilty party who almost always turns out to be a Red Herring. So, instead of trying to find the character with the most votes, the Detective is trying to find the person with the second most votes. He scores double points if he pointedly exonerates the character with the most votes, and then getts the character with the second most votes. Again, in the case of ties, any order is acceptable. Much more challenging version, and very fitting of the form, IMHO.

Just some ideas,
Mike

[hardcoremoose]

This is not at all meant to discourage Nomad's excellent idea.  I'm just saying this because, well, I read it over at Hogshead and it seemed interesting.

Sometime next year, James Wallis' Youdunnit is expected to hit the shelves.  It's a whodunnit game where everyone tries to pin the blame of a crime on everyone else, while shrugging off any allegations that come their way.

Maybe this is the next big fad in gaming!

- Moose

[ This Message was edited by: hardcoremoose on 2001-12-23 20:32 ]

[Paul Czege]

Hey Nomad,

I wouldn't be discouraged by the Youdunnit game that Hogshead has plans to publish if I were you. They've got products on their publishing schedule that they've been developing for years. Priorities change, people flake out, shit happens. You can't possibly know whether they'll actually publish Youdunnit next year. You've got a cool idea. I think you have to trust that you have a unique vision for something and pursue it, despite that Hogshead might have a similar product on their schedule. And I think that Moose probably agrees, and if he were in the same situation I think you can guarantee that he'd pursue his project, despite what Hogshead was doing.

Paul

[hardcoremoose]

Quite right Paul!  I wouldn't have this problem if I could read French, but since I can't, and since Hogshead really likes to drag their heels on these things, I've been forced to take a different approach.  Thank God for Ron Edwards and Sorcerer & Sword.

- Moose