TROS, Calvinball, and IIEE

[rafial]

So we just completed Alan's Fire upon Fenwyck campaign which was one of the side by side TROS games that made up the latest round at UGX.  And while I really enjoyed the story we produced, TROS itself left a bit of a bad taste in mouth.  And here's why:

The TROS rules, and especially the combat rules, wound up taking on a dangerously Calvinball like feel.  Granted, only the GM and one player had had prior TROS experience, so we were learning the system as we went, but combats kept stopping for exchanges of cryptic and mutally contradictory quotes from the rules to try and determine what should happened next, which reminded me all to much of my glory days as an SFB player (the ultimate in Calvinball gaming).

The worst offender was the concept of Terrain rolls, which seem to exist in the book only as a confusing chart, and a paragraph which fails to explain said chart, combined with alot of mutally contradictory lore on the forums.  In actual play, it seemed to me like I never saw a Terrain role applied the same way twice.

From at least two of the players, I sensed active frustration at the system as their plans were thwarted by "well you can't do X again because Y, which hasn't been mentioned before".  One player seemed to give up trying and just rolled dice as instructed by the experienced TROSer and myself (who was Calvinballing my ass off).  The other continued to struggle on.

And in this struggle, I got a sudden vivid illustration about the importance of explicit IIEE.  Karnor, our big all whomping knight character had just finished off a foe on the previous exchange, and announced he was moving to engage another foe who was already fighting a PC, so as to gang up.  TROS handles multiple participant battles by breaking them down into small one/two on one little melees, but doesn't have much to say on how those independent melees interact.

The GM announced that the foe was making a Terrain roll to avoid being engaged by Karnor, and immediately rolled dice, at which point the player became visibly frustrated and said "well we haven't thrown red or white to engage yet."

At this point I actually found myself concocting a Calvinball justification for what just happened because I really just wanted to see things move along, and using that to mollify my fellow player.  But I felt really dirty afterwards...

So what's the point for discussion?  Why did I post this (other than to vent?)  Well, I'm trying to figure out if I was abusing the system, or if the system was abusing me!

[ZenDog]

The worst offender was the concept of Terrain rolls, which seem to exist in the book only as a confusing chart, and a paragraph which fails to explain said chart, combined with alot of mutally contradictory lore on the forums. In actual play, it seemed to me like I never saw a Terrain role applied the same way twice.

I have to agree with you there Playing in my game we were in a situation where the player was suddenly faced by three spearmen at once and wanted to back himself into a door way so they couldn't surrond him. We both checked our books read the instructions for manouvering, looked at the chart. No idea what to do.  He was defending so that is 'normal' but facing 3 opponents which according to the chart is N/A and not very helpful. Given time and a clearer head I could of just decided on an apropriate TN but mid combat, end of a long session I just said fuck it you back into the doorway cursing the enemies for cowards as you go.

Is that calvinballing or IIEE (can you please explain not come accross these phrases before)

Anyway there have been a few occasions in our two sessions where I've consulted the rules only to be left scratching my head (I wasn't sure if againts two opponets once he splits his CP can he then split the split and have a defense and attack against both enimies).

None of this has actually dampneded our enthusiasm though (I think I'm spoiling the player by sending too easy mooks at him he was slaughtering one per round and killed about 8 spearmen before he fell to the druids curse).

Maybe it's less frustrating for us learning the rules with a one on one game

[Alan]

Hm.  I was seneschal.  If this is true, I did a very poor job of teaching the rules and I apologize.  I pride myself on being fair and applying rules consistently, and on clarifying procedures before I actually put them into play.  So the bit about Calvinballing stings.

I did a lot of research to hash out how rules, such as Terrain rolls worked.  I consulted with Jake and Ben on many points such as this one.  Maybe I should have emphasized that my rules summaries took precedence over the rule book, being clarifications straight from the game designer.  

I think that one confusion came because there is a difference between where the Terrain rolls are presented in the game text and where they actual fall in precidence.  Let me explain: In the game text, Terrain rolls are presented AFTER Initiative, but in fact, after communicating with Jake, I learned that they take functional precedence - the result of a Terrain roll can make throwing Inititiave pointless.

My research revealed that the order of a TROS round goes

1. Declare Stance
2. Bleed
3. Refresh Pools
4. Terrain Rolls
5. Initiative (If needed)
6. Exchange 1
7. Exchange 2
    Return to 2.

The above is from the handout I know Karnor's player referred to a lot.  Now you mention it, I see I didn't indicate where Engagements are determined.  That's before 1.

What happened in the situation you quote was this:  I thought that Karnor had committed to engaging Gaspar, thus establishing how engagements would divide up and outnumbering the villain.  (Step 0.5)  At that point, I used the same rules for avoiding being outnumbered that I would have allowed a player (and which Karnor had benefited from in the past).  Gaspar rolled Terrain and maneuvered to keep his second opponent between himself and Karnor.  As the Terrain roll was successful in excluding Karnor, there was no point in throwing Init dice.  

Now, Karnor's player had previously spent a whole round without rolling dice, because I ruled he could just finish off an enemy he had just knocked down, but not out.  We went around the table and each other player had a full round to play while Karnor essentially sat out.  You'll recall he asked whether he had missed a turn.

Then when he did get a chance to engage, I used the Terrain roll to make him essentially "lose" another turn.  (Something that happens to NPCs when they are victims of the same kind of Terrain roll.)  I wonder if that isn't what frustrated him.  

Because it was late (and because it was our fifth session and I thought people had started to catch on to the rules), I skipped explaining what happened in favor of moving play along.  

Can we ask Mark (Karnor) to comment?  Did you feel like the rules kept changing?  If so, I'll take more care explaining from the beginning next time I run a game.

[Alan]

From the Glossary of Ron's Gamism essay:

IIEE: Intent, Initiation, Execution, and Effect - how actions and events in the imaginary game-world are resolved in terms of real-world announcement and imaginary order of occurrence.

Calvinball: a potentially-dysfunctional technique of Hard Core Gamist play, characterized by making up the rules of a game as it is played, especially in the immediate context of advantaging oneself and disadvantaging one's opponents. "Tagged you! Tags mean you're out!" "It's Tuesday! Tagging doesn't work on Tuesdays!" This term, obviously, is pulled from the comic strip Calvin & Hobbes.

[ZenDog]

Cheers for those explanations Alan.

[Hafaza]

Thanks Alan for running a great game.

My frustration in moving Karnor to engage was in no small part due to my ignorant perspective of the game. I do not own a copy of the book. With that in mind there will of course be many incidents similar to the one related, where experienced players coral the less experienced into actions that just move the plot along. My frustration here and in such similar situations is never with the GM or the other players. I see the characters we sketch as communal, so have no issue when other players point out cool things for me to do or to guide me in other ways.  (After Karnor got his sword stuck in femurs and hips more then once Dan began to call him "Hip Chopper". Forever after when asked what area Karnor was attacking, it was always, "What's my name"?)

Really, I was frustrated with the mechanics of terrain roles. Here there was an opponent actively engaged with another combatant. My gut feeling was that at the very least his terrain role should have been modified in some way to account for his attention to the man attacking him. Alan is of course correct in noting that Karnor benefited from a terrain roll earlier in the game. But those were in fact opposed terrain rolls that he won, correct?

In the end all concern was dashed as the villain met his just end at the hands of almost all present. But to sum up:

Rafiel – I trust all the people I play with to give me advice that is for best for the game and story. It has never crossed my mind that that you or anyone would manipulate my character for ends other then that, nor will I entertain that thought in the future. I value your input as well as that of others.

Alan – No, I did not feel like the rules kept changing, and even if they did, hey, you are the GM. Running a game is hard work, and I trust you to guide me though areas I can not navigate on my own.

[Callan S.]

I have to agree with you there Playing in my game we were in a situation where the player was suddenly faced by three spearmen at once and wanted to back himself into a door way so they couldn't surrond him. We both checked our books read the instructions for manouvering, looked at the chart. No idea what to do. He was defending so that is 'normal' but facing 3 opponents which according to the chart is N/A and not very helpful. Given time and a clearer head I could of just decided on an apropriate TN but mid combat, end of a long session I just said fuck it you back into the doorway cursing the enemies for cowards as you go.

He was defending, so he's considered to be moving at normal speed. We go down to 3-5 opponents and find that as N/A

One way of looking at it is that when your facing three guys, your not moving normally.

How fast are you moving? The next column is the hurried column, which gives the TN of 8.

I say your problem is that you haven't written any cheat sheets before play started. The same sort of cheat sheets I write up for blue planet, for D&D grappling, for TROS and everything else. We all need them.

[ZenDog]

I say your problem is that you haven't written any cheat sheets before play started.

That would be one problem, my main problem though was only having read the rules through once, about three months before playing the game.

That was our first attempt at using a manouver. Now I would be more inclined to choose a reasonable TN for anything not covered in the text (or anything I couldn't find through unfamiliarity). However at that stage in that game, it was very late and we'd been playing for fair few hours, my brain wasn't really upto it, and fudging is my default GM style anyway.

Story first rules second is my GMing mantra.

I might knock up some cheat sheets for TN and skill check/atts etc so cheers for the idea Noon.

[Alan]

I say your problem is that you haven't written any cheat sheets before play started.

Hi Callan,

I had excellent cheat sheets for the players.  Mark used them quite a bit.  I think this instance was the first time in five sessions that an NPC had used terrain rolls to avoid being outnumbered.  Up to that point, only players had done that.

Hi Mark (Hafaza),

Glad to hear I wasn't inconsistent.  Actually, we debated using opposed outnumber rolls, but I though that just added to the disadvantage of being outnumbered.  Both NPCs and players all made unopposed terrain rolls to outmaneuver opponents.

[Jake Norwood]

He was defending, so he's considered to be moving at normal speed. We go down to 3-5 opponents and find that as N/A

One way of looking at it is that when your facing three guys, your not moving normally.

How fast are you moving? The next column is the hurried column, which gives the TN of 8.

I say your problem is that you haven't written any cheat sheets before play started. The same sort of cheat sheets I write up for blue planet, for D&D grappling, for TROS and everything else. We all need them.

Fighting characters are assumed to be moving "hurried" or "sprinting." That's in the terrain section. And a defending character is still fighting.

Jake

[ZenDog]

Fighting characters are assumed to be moving "hurried" or "sprinting." That's in the terrain section. And a defending character is still fighting.

But the text says

All characters engaged in combat are assumed to be "hurried" or even "sprinting" when attacking, and "normal" when defending.

Which is where I got confused because the table say N/A for 3-5 opponents vs normal.

Now if I hadn't read the rules just the once, months before playing, and if it wasn't so late, and I wasn't so brain dead, (it had been a long day and this was at the end of a four hour online session, in otherwords four hours of typing and looking at a screen), I would of firgured that 1 Vs 1 you might defend  at "normal" move but when it's 3 Vs 1 you'd better get a move on (so to speak), and I would of used the TN 8 in the table for 3-5 opponents Vs "hurried"

As it was both the player and I had no probs just deciding he could manouver into the doorway.

[Valamir]

Zen, there are two seperate things being shown on that chart.

1 is Terrain rolls for traveling across poor terrain.  You cross reference your travel speed with the terrain.  If you're fighting on poor terrain then you treat attacking as hurried or sprinting, and defending as normal.

The other is terrain rolls for multiple opponents.  If you're fighting you use hurried (att or def) you use Hurried.  If you're charging you use sprinting.  This is why they Sprinting TNs are easier against multiple opponents.

Two seperate things.  Same chart.

[ZenDog]

Two seperate things. Same chart.

Perhaps I'm not making myself clear I get that now, but tired and washed out I just read defending "normal" and took it at face value.


However the only text relating to the chart doesn't mention that (the chart having two sperate uses) and does tell you to use "normal" when defending. The text I quoted is a direct quote from the text of the book. Hence my confusion. Remember this was a case of looking in the index for the appropriate rule, reading the relevant text and consulting the chart in game.