The Forge Archives

The newest version of Capes, Superhero Storytelling, is online.  The new system is substantially simpler than the version it replaces... lots of rules that seemed to have a reason for existing when I wrote them had gotten to be extraneous, and have been clipped.

Now the system represents the balance of a conflict (combat or otherwise) with a set of Complications.  Opposing sides roll dice, and get to add points to their own particular tally on a Complication.  Whoever has the most points at the moment controls that Complication, for now.

There's some fun complexity about when a Complication Resolves, but that's not what I'm going to talk about here today.  Instead, say you have a Bystander Complication which has 10 points Villain Control and 7 points Hero Control.  The villains have control, so they define the Situation.  They say an orphanage is burning down.

It's fairly clear what happens if a Hero spends four points in this Complication.  He gains control of the Complication and can define a new situation regarding it.  For instance, he can break a hole in the side of the building and start shepherding orphans out to safety.

Now what should happen if a hero spends just two points?  They have not gained control of the Complication (Villains: 10, Heroes: 9).  They do not get to define a new situation.  But neither (IMHO) should their efforts just be ignored.  What sort of suggestions and constraints should I give the players for how to narrate something that brings them closer to control, but does not actually accomplish control?



p.s. For those following particular rules questions from previous threads... I sidestepped the difficulties in defining what Issues are, with regard to Complications, by the simple expedient of making Issues a player goal, rather than a static object of the mechanics:  They exist inasmuch as the players are thinking "I only need another two-point Stake in Duty to fill out the set that will make an Issue in that Drive".

Quote from: TonyLB
Now what should happen if a hero spends just two points?  They have not gained control of the Complication (Villains: 10, Heroes: 9).  They do not get to define a new situation.  But neither (IMHO) should their efforts just be ignored.  What sort of suggestions and constraints should I give the players for how to narrate something that brings them closer to control, but does not actually accomplish control?

I think that not many constraints are necessary here. If the player puts those two points in, and wants to break open the side of the building and start leading orphans out, let him.  If the Editor then resolves the complication before the hero can take it over, then the natural resolution is that the building collapses before you got all of them out.

Since resolving a complication is also an action, it's easy to not only use impersonal forces, but the actual villains and heroes getting involved. The villain focuses his laser beam eyes on the building's foundation, it collapses, and orphans are crushed.

Really, the only guideline needed is that the inhibit/assist mechanism stays coherent: if Smoggy is bound by the electrical cables, and the editor doesn't take control back of the complication, but narrates ripping off the cables, there's got to be something else that keeps that -1 penalty on. Maybe Smoggy gets electrocuted really bad as he's ripping them off, which causes him to act dazed for a while, and so on.

The Smoggy/Electrical-Cable example is a nice one.  I agree that the person applying the Wonder could be given narration rights to change the Situation that was established by their enemy, so long as somebody also gets Narration Rights to impose a new Situation that applies a similar penalty.

But I'm not sure I agree that those narration rights naturally belong with the person who creates the Wonder.  Yes, they are the ones who made the Wonder, but they are not the ones that control the Complication.

In terms of game mechanics it doesn't make any difference.  But the color that attaches to the game mechanics is pretty vital.

For instance, suppose that Smoggy breaks out of the Electrical Cables, but doesn't quite control the Complication.  Now the Editor changes the Situation by saying "The flying electrical cables tear apart two nearby buildings... the falling bodies of innocent bystanders are obscuring Smogzillas vision, which accounts for the continued penalty."

This has pretty clearly violated an unspoken understanding about what restraints should be placed on the narration.  I just want to figure out a way to make that understanding not be "unspoken" anymore.

Hmm. So, thinking about this more carefully, there are three levels here:

<veil-of-smoke target="Ron Edwards">
1) Stakes: there are orphans trapped in a dangerous building
2) Consequences: Currently, they are likely to all be burnt to death.
3) Trappings: But Silverstar is working on routing a water pipe to put the fire out.
</veil-of-smoke>

It seems that #3 should  be changable by any expenditure onto the complication, #2 can only be altered by the person in control, and #1 can't be altered much without changing or removing the complication.

Obviously, there are some grey areas between the different levels, but this seems like a pretty good split.

I have been reading the newest version of the rules...  Prepare yourself:

1. Everything looks good until Complications.  You state:

Quote from: Capes RulesA given Scene will never have more Complications than it starts with: the only way to add a new Complication is by Resolving an old one.

But it is not clear how you determine the starting set of Complications, there is no hint that such an explaination will show up later in the text either.  Note: I think that this is all pretty cool, but i also liked the way things worked before... :)

2. I still think that you should specifically note that not only does the game not distinguish between beating someone up and talking to them, it does not distinguish between throwing someone through a wall or being thrown through the wall yourself.  A good place to note this would be:

Quote from: Capes RulesNote particularly that the rules don't distinguish between, for instance, punching a minion and talking to him about the immorality of his actions. The end result of one may be an unconscious minion, the end result of the other a reformed man, but mechanically both of them remove the minion as an obstacle. They're handled in exactly the same way, so you can feel free to do what makes sense to you at the time.

3. I thought the old dice system was very cool.  Without having played the new one i can not really say whether i like it any less though...

4. Having all Complications automatically begin Resolving once you reach the scene target is a very elegant solution.

5. The Level 3 Wonder: Strength Through Adversity is mechanically dangerous.  Using it does not correct the Net Wonder Penalty, thus it could be used each and every round (perhaps even more than once) so that you simply win because you have so many dice.

6. Issues.  Elegant solution to the discussion, and a nice Advancement system as well.  My nit-pick here is that the costs of Advancement spiral rapidly.  It takes 3 points to go from 1 to 2, 10 points from 2 to 3, 21 points from 3 to 4, 34 points from 4 to 5, etc...  This is not necessarily bad, and without actual play there is no way to know how long this might take, but these are some big numbers...  One alternative suggestion would be to pay as you are (one of each level up to...) with the target being the value you are getting rather than twice the value you are currently at...

7. Scene Length calculations.  Very, very cool.  This is really great.  I especially like preemptive staking of Hope generating longer scenes.  My only major problem is that each point Staked here increase the scene length by 2.  In your example you have a 24 point Target for a scene involving two characters.  That seems to be way too high, of course without playing this i am just expressing my "gut reaction" here...

8. I believe that providing some sort of token bonus during the LetCol section is really a good idea.  Maybe a 1 point Inspiration for being voted best question or best answer...  Give people something, but not so much that it really effects the balance of the game.  Provide a reward though, that is good incentive to work hard here since most people will really be worried about "winning" not about what prize they get...

9. I still think that the game benefits from some sort of rule (or strong guideline) that every Wonder Point you spend you have to define your actions in an equal number of "frames" or "panels".  This really plays to the style of comics...

Overall i like it.  You have a couple of really good solutions to stuff we argued about extensively in previous threads.  I have listed the things that jump off the page at me above.  Many of them explicitly, and all of them implicitly, are accompanied by the disclaimer: "Without playing, this is just what i think from reading."  The rules seem much more streamlined without losing a lot of the cool stuff from the first draft.

Now for the big question: Do you think that this system will focus on your Premise?  Do you feel that the rules provide adequate and powerful incentive to play for the Moral story?  Do you feel that the rules as-is promote non-combat play?

Thomas

Mmmm... delicious double posting goodness...

Quote from: LordSmerf3. I thought the old dice system was very cool.  Without having played the new one i can not really say whether i like it any less though...

Well, brace yourself, because I'm thinking of changing it yet further:  The current system generates 0.6 successes per die earned, which has been leading both to reduced strategic options (i.e. it's always worth spending your fives, because the unspent 5 is worth 40% less than the spent one) and to dice inflation (need roughly 50% more dice to achieve a given level of effect than you would if they were worth 1.0 successes).

I'm examining the possibility of reducing the system to the following:

[*]1-2: Discard immediately[*]3-4: Discard in order to gain a Wonder point, or keep for your pool[*]5-6: Return to Dice Pool for a Wonder point[/list:u]The benefits of this plan are (a) it's simpler, (b) it has an important role for any roll, (c) it raises the value of each earned die to (statistically) 1.0 successes over its life-cycle.

I'll run this through its paces at my next playtest, probably sometime this week (if I can get it organized).

QuoteThe Level 3 Wonder: Strength Through Adversity is mechanically dangerous.  Using it does not correct the Net Wonder Penalty, thus it could be used each and every round (perhaps even more than once) so that you simply win because you have so many dice.

Yep.  That's the intent.

I think you may be overestimating its danger, however.  Let me use the new numbers, because it's much simpler to think about these things when each earned die equals 1.0 successes.  The dice spent vs. dice gained works out like this:
Penalty   Dice Spent Dice Gained     Profit
  1         4             3           -1
  2         5             6            1
  3         6             9            3
  4         7            12            5
  5         8            15            7
It's not until you get to a Net Penalty of three that you're meaningfully swelling your dice pool.  That's a pretty serious penalty.  It hurts your dice generation through Tropes badly.

Plus, given that people know that sort of penalty gives you those benefits, why would they let you achieve it?  The Editor doesn't have to foolishly run out and take minor levels of control in every single Complication.  He can plow all his points into one, Resolve it, and move on to the next.  

QuoteI still think that the game benefits from some sort of rule (or strong guideline) that every Wonder Point you spend you have to define your actions in an equal number of "frames" or "panels".  This really plays to the style of comics...

Agreed.  This fits particularly with something I'm about to say (separate post) in response to Statistical.  It will be in the next revision.

QuoteDo you think that this system will focus on your Premise?  Do you feel that the rules provide adequate and powerful incentive to play for the Moral story?  Do you feel that the rules as-is promote non-combat play?

Yes, yes and Not enough, respectively.

Still working on non-combat play.  Again, my next post will have relevance.

Statistical:  I like your categories for explaining the different Scopes of Outcome.  I think that they do a good job of addressing the question of how to draw boundaries between giving Narrative Freedom and maintaining the Authority of the person Controlling the Complication.

The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that there are fun possibilities hiding in the question "Who Narrates the outcome of a Wonder?"  If it's possible to give people a framework (like the one you describe) that lets everyone agree on how to narrate both success and failure, for themselves and for other characters, then you can use the assignment of narration rights as a tool, rather than a straitjacket.  At its easiest, maybe the person who does the Wonder gets to narrate their own actions, and then choose who narrates the outcome:

[*]If a hero gains Control of an "Information" Complication, he might reasonably ask the Editor to narrate the results of his success, assuming that the Editor is the one who has secrets to divulge about the planned story.[*]Alternately, if the player has a strong idea about where the story should go ("He should be plotting to release pirhanas into public swimming pools!") then they could narrate that result when they gain Control on "Information", making it into a Perception-dictates-reality result in the style of Donjon.[*]The Editor might well describe a mighty blow that throws the hero across the room, then ask the heroes player to narrate what happens when they reach the far side... it's then up to the hero to describe whether they fall to the ground spitting up blood, or nimbly bounce off the wall and regain their footing.[/list:u]But there are, I must confess, more intriguing possibilities.  Thomas has advocated before for dividing each Wonder's description into multiple frames (equal in number to the cost of the Wonder).  This would be an even more useful tool if narration rights were assigned on a per-frame basis.  

So a hero doing a five-frame Reversal could narrate a frame of the hero flying under the surface of a filthy river, then ask the Editor to narrate a frame of the depradations of the evil muck-monster and a frame of its terrified victims, then the hero-player could use a frame to show the hero bursting back out of the water in time to counter the muck-monsters power, and describe a frame of the muck-monster recoiling in pain and fury.  Five frames, three by the hero, two by the Editor, but clearly along the arc of progression laid out by the Wonder-creating player.

This also strikes me as very empowering for non-combat applications.  "Okay, my romantic speech is a four-frame Wonder ('Sequence'?).  Here's my first two frames... yadda, yadda, yadda... Editor, could I have a reaction-frame from the love interest before my final frame?"

EDIT:  "Final Frame" strikes me as very important.  Perhaps, whoever creates the Wonder, the side that controls the Complication it's applied against gets to control who narrates the Final Frame?

Ok, let us examine Strenght through Adverstity...

With a -1 Wonder Penalty you need to spend 4 dice.  Statistically these will be evenly split between 3/4s and 5/6s so 2 of those dice will be lost and 2 will go back to your dice pool.  So the "profit" (which i define in the increase in the Dice Pool after the action is taken)  is actually 1 die.  With a -2 Wonder Level penalty you need 5 successes, we can assume that the extra success is a 3/4.  So you spend 5 successes and two of them (the 5/6s) go back to your pool, in addition you gain 6 extra dice.  So you rolled 5 and got 8 for 3 profit.  Now, this ignores the 1 in 3 chance of a die simply being lost.

My problem is that even with a -1 Penalty using this Wonder round after round allows you to build up 4 points of control somewhere at almost no cost to your dice pool.  One of the most interesting tactical situations is that as you play you lose dice.  Your pool dwindles as you use it.  This Wonder allows you to use pure mechanics (not the narration/description stuff of Level 1/2 Wonders) to sustain the number of dice in your Pool...

Quote from: TonyLBPlus, given that people know that sort of penalty gives you those benefits, why would they let you achieve it? The Editor doesn't have to foolishly run out and take minor levels of control in every single Complication. He can plow all his points into one, Resolve it, and move on to the next.

Unfortunately i can simply Overdraw my Drives to generate a penalty.  I can generate a -5 Level penalty simply by Overdrawing all 5 Drives.  The reduced Trope generation is a good point, but you have to admit that it is not a big deal if you are able to generate 5+ dice per round through Wonders.

Oh, i like a lot of what you said about Frames...  I think there is a lot of potential in Frame sharing and delegation...  So, good idea!

EDIT: Are you talking about the "Last Frame" of a Complication as it Resolves (since dice are not spent to Resolve Complications)?  It would probably be a good idea to figure out how to handle this...

Thomas

I'm talking about the last frame of every Wonder.

Generic rules example:  If you spend five dice on a Complication, and it doesn't get you control, then you get to choose who narrates the first four frames and roughly what they can do, but the controller gets to decide the last one.

Movie example:  Spiderman bounces up on the Unity-Day floats, maneuvering to rescue Mary Jane.  He doesn't spend enough points to control the Complication.  He describes terrific acrobatics, gets to within nearly arms reach of her... then the Green Goblin comes tearing in from stage right and smacks him into a plate glass wall in the final frame of the Wonder.


On Strength through Adversity... I'll playtest it.  Mechanically, it is one strategy of many.  If you let somebody execute it to their hearts content it will be powerful.  There are powerful counters, particularly in the early stages.  

Even when its running well, I don't think it's that much more effective than (for instance) ramping up active Powers and chain-smoking Second Winds to constantly renew your Tropes and Attitudes for more dice.

But I could be wrong.  It certainly wouldn't be the first time.

Story-wise, I agree that it would be nice for there to be some extra detail to help Strength through Adversity inspire the sort of "hanging tough, getting pummelled for the greater good" feel that I imagine for it.  

Quite possibly the right way to do this is to explicitly require people using this Wonder to give away more of their narration frames (as above) than they would normally have to do.

Quote from: TonyLBGeneric rules example: If you spend five dice on a Complication, and it doesn't get you control, then you get to choose who narrates the first four frames and roughly what they can do, but the controller gets to decide the last one.

I had not even thought of that.  I think that this is an excellent and elegant solution to the problem you brought up ealier regarding changing Complications as you spend points in them, Last Frame rights really should mitigate any problems.  Of course there still needs to be some consideration of how to handle narration of Resolution...

Quote from: TonyLBQuite possibly the right way to do this is to explicitly require people using [Strength through Adversity] to give away more of their narration frames (as above) than they would normally have to do.

This is also a very good solution i believe.  As long as the system is not too mechanically broken (and it seems that it might not be), the decreased narration privileges should be enough of a deterrent...

Overall i think we have now reached the stage where the only way to really advance the game will be through playtesting...  Congratulations, i think you have something on your hands here that is really exciting.

Thomas

Quote from: TonyLBWhat sort of suggestions and constraints should I give the players for how to narrate something that brings them closer to control, but does not actually accomplish control?

Thomas has already answered your initial question from one important angle: closer to control means more influence over narration of what happens -- and I think you have the seed of a brilliant idea towards implementing that with Frames, where being 80% of the way towards control lets you do 80% of the narration, but not the crucial Final Frame. This'll take a lot of thrashing-out to make it work, of course.

There's another angle as well: As I understand the rules, every time you spend towards Control of a Complication, you are performing a Wonder too -- and Wonders can help you even if they don't get you outright control.

Which leads me to some issue-by-issue thoughts on the latest draft:

(1) Buying Control vs. Buying Wonders?
As I read it, when you spend X points towards Control of a Complication, you buy a (X +/- modifiers) level Wonder at the same time. There's a strong element of positive feedback here: Wonders both strengthen your position in terms of Control and have tactical effects which (here comes the feedback loop) make it easier for you to strengthen Control later.
I'm all for positive feedback loops, especially in portraying comic-book clashes, which tend to escalate wildly; but I think this will take careful playtesting to make sure this mechanism doesn't reinforce itself too wildly. I'm particularly thinking that the higher-level Wonders may need to be toned down.
Then again, having such strong effects from high-level Wonders may be just the incentive you need for players to go into massive Debt to get them.

(2) Non-combat Wonders?
I still think the Wonder list is somewhat limited, and somewhat combat-oriented (although it's far more flexible than earlier versions). Yes, they're fairly generic, and even "Massive Overkill" could be applied to a social situation ("You're at the prom. Your pants fall off. Everyone laughs.") But I'd recommend that in playtesting, the Wonder list be treated as a set of guidelines of what's appropriate to each level rather than a fixed menu of what's available at each level, and that new Wonders be added to the final draft.

(3) Issues as Super-Complications?

Quote from: TonyLBI sidestepped the difficulties in defining what Issues are, with regard to Complications, by the simple expedient of making Issues a player goal...

I agree with Thomas that Issues get awfully expensive awfully fast. Also, I can't find anything about what Issues actually do besides act as a character advancement mechanism. I really liked the idea of Issues acting as mega-Complications to be contested over thelong term and where effects of Control permeate everything else (e.g. Peter Parker's up-and-down relationship with Mary Jane increasing or decreasing his self-confidence, or "city terrorized by crime" increasing or decreasing the tendency of Innocent Bystanders to panic and get in the way vs. actively helping the hero); this is a simple way to preserve all the world-defining goodness that was in Facts before they were discarded (rightly, I'd agree) as over-complicated.
It shouldn't take too many rules to add this dimension, I'd imagine, since it's basically saying "Issues are big Complications."

(4) Standard Complications?
I suspect you need not just examples of play showing Complications but an actual list of some "standard" ones (e.g. Clobbering, Innocent Bystanders, Moral High Ground, Information) with guidance on what winning or losing actually means in each case. Most of this is admittedly implicit in the mechanic that "Complications you win become Inspirations to help you in the next Complication"; most, but not all.
Right now, for example, it's implicit in your examples of play that losing "Clobbering" means the loser is at the mercy of the victor -- but not necessarily dead or lastingly impaired by injuries, as in many other RPGs; this is the kind of thing that should probably be made explicit at some point before the final draft.

Quote from: Sydney FreedbergI agree with Thomas that Issues get awfully expensive awfully fast. Also, I can't find anything about what Issues actually do besides act as a character advancement mechanism. I really liked the idea of Issues acting as mega-Complications to be contested over thelong term and where effects of Control permeate everything else (e.g. Peter Parker's up-and-down relationship with Mary Jane increasing or decreasing his self-confidence, or "city terrorized by crime" increasing or decreasing the tendency of Innocent Bystanders to panic and get in the way vs. actively helping the hero); this is a simple way to preserve all the world-defining goodness that was in Facts before they were discarded (rightly, I'd agree) as over-complicated.

One thing that might be interesting would be having Issues as uber-Complications in which whoever controls them can use them for dice once per scene (like an Attitude or Trope).  That would be pretty cool (i think so anyway), but it still does not solve the problem of Resolving Issues.  I think that until we figure out some effective way to handle that that Issues are not really viable...

Thomas

Well, I spent a goodly amount of time today solo-playtesting the rules while making up a new Example of Play.

Having playtested it... you guys were right.  The rewards in the Wonders are currently too rich.  They cause a cascading increase in dice that becomes very quickly impracticable.  Twenty-eight dice is just too many for the system to feel right with.

So I'm going to have to rework the numbers on the Wonders, then give it another go.  Which is painful, but not as painful as discovering these numerical problems in non-solo playtesting.

I've posted the Flawed Example of Play, because (while the numbers go crazy at the end) I think it gives a fairly good idea of how I see non-combat conflicts being resolved in the system.  Plus, it's the first example I've made that has the Frame-assignment of narrative rights in action.  I'm happy with how it turned out, at least in my mind.

Read the example of play.  Well done, it really gets a lot of the "feeling" of play accross.  I concur that there are far too many dice gained from Wonders which seem to lessen the value of Attitudes and Tropes.  I think that Powers, Attitudes, and Tropes should be the primar sources of dice.  In fact elminating all dice gaining Wonders other than those that reset abilities would probably contribute to the idea that Dice come through playing to your character's story instead of through good dice rolling.

One thing that i am hesitant about is the way Complication outcomes are determined.  At the moment they are incredibly vague, basically "if you win make up something that makes sense."  The problem is in cases where you have Clobbering and a Capture Character type Complications that get split between the two sides...  How do you resolve issues when you the goals of each side are contradictory?  From the example of play let us assume that Silver Star's Stealth Complication is resolved in her favor and she determines that she gets out of the building undetected...  What happens with the rest of the complications then?

Thomas