[Capes] Class Struggle

[LordSmerf]

So we played Capes again.  We had fun, but things went much differently from last time.

We took for our inspiration this game the Justice League International of the mid 80's (one of our players collects and busted out some of her old JLI stuff for reference).

First, the cast:

I was the Editor and had two players.  We all know each other rather well and have played before.  One of them participated in my last Capes game.  Our characters were:

Coppertone
Coppertone is an alien sent by her world to take over ours.  Her plan was to use politics and take over slowly, but legitimately.  Things were going too slowly that way so she changed tactics and decided to use her alien super-powers to become a Superhero and win the hearts of the people so that they would wnat her to be their leader.  She has teamed up with The Red Menace because he genuinely cares for the people and is easily duped into helping her.

Tropes
5. The tang of ozone
4. Get back together with partner
3. Break up with partner
2. Costume damage
1. Paparazzi harassment

Powers
4. Flight
3. Invulnerability
2. Copper discs
1. Chameleon skin

Attitudes
3. Casual towards danger
2. Peacemaker
1. Well-reasoned optimism (when we came up with this the player asked "Why is optimism always blind anyway?")

The Red Menace
The Red Menace is the son of Soviet immigrants.  He was raised by his uncle Ivan who works in the uranium processing plant.  Uncle Ivan was always sacrificing for the little Menace, making sure that there was food on the table.  Now uncle Ivan has developed thyroid cancer from all the radiation, but the Red Menace has gained super-powers from secondary exposure from the now highly radioactive uncle Ivan.

Tropes
5. Malfunctioning Gadgets
4. Invokes communist rhetoric
3. Makes up with girl friend
2. Solidarity of the Working Class (invulnerability)
1. Breaks up with girl friend

Attitudes
4. Rampant nastalgic nationalism
3. Inappropriate cheerful determination
2. Perverse self-sabatoge
1. Pessimistic fatalism (hey, he's Russian and Communist)

So with just these two characters you can tell that this is going to be more of a Farce than a serious game.  This may in fact have done a disservice to the system since it is hard to address a serious Premise (Do you deserve the power you have?) with such ludicrous characters.

Well, i have to go.  But i will return to give you a blow-by-blow run down of the fight in the soup kitchen and the disastrous kitchen fire in Coppertone's apartment.  Oh, and i will introduce you to Comrade Consumerism!

Thomas

[LordSmerf]

So i am back.  And i see that i missed listing Powers for The Red Menace, so here they are:

Powers
3. Means of Production (Gadgets)
2. Abolition of Private Property (attacks against anything not owned by the governemnt)
1. Chains of the Proletariot

So, it looks like i am ready to give a break down of the session after which i will list impressions regarding the system.

Cover: The cover features prominently a hulking Russian stereotype.  Fur hat, fur greatcoat, stoic features.  He has in one fist a huge wad of cash that he is thumbing through.  Title: "Capitalist Pigs" (note this is the title i just made up, not the one we used in play which not only can i not remember, but was not as good)

Page One: We open things up with a distance shot of a line of people standing out in the snow in front of a building.  We see that the building is a loca community center run by Simon Stanowitz (Menace's Exemplar of Hope).  We see Coppertone, with her distinct alien features, holding a bowl in one hand and a ladle of soup in the other; we also see a huge pot of steaming soup on the table in front of her.  We see the swinging kitchen doors.  Inside the kitchen The Red Menace is happily scrubbing away at the huge stacks of dirty dishes.  Back in the soup line a scuffle breaks out over who was there first.

COMPLICATION (The Scuffle) is brought into play.  I did not insist on more nor did i add any myself, so this scene was all focused on a single Complication.  I set the target at 5 since only Coppertone was actually close enough to get involved.  Shoving happens, and one of the men goes down.

Monologue Phase:
-Coppertone activates her "Peacemaker" attitude in an effort to defuse the situation.
-The man who shoved the other down looks up and we see that he is the Russian stereotype from the cover!  He activates his power "Currency and Capital" whipping out a large wad of cash.  He also started with some extra dice.

Action Phase:
-Dice are rolled and Comrade Consumerism takes an early lead, throwing his wad of cash into the crowd increasing the chaos as everyone scrambles for cash.  He then pushes the pot of soup off of the table (getting a die for using a previously described element) as he yells "You fools should get out and WORK!  It is the power of the free market economy that those who deserve to eat do eat!"
-Coppertone responds with some calming words that unfortunately seem to fall on deaf ears.

Monologue Phase:
-The Red Menace hears the commotion and comes in through the kitchen doors.  Seeing the chaos he activates his "Rampant Nastalgic Nationalism" thinking "In Mother Russia we are always calm and orderly, this kind of chaos would never occur!"
-Coppertone switches over to "Reasoned Optimism" thinking "Surely this man will see reason and calm down."
-Comrade Consumerism talks trash...

Action Phase:
-The Red Menace goes first.  He rushes forward grabbing the now empty pot from the floor and smashing it down on Consumerism's head screaming "Your lies are an affront to the working class!"  (Using the pot in another new and interesting way, +1 die)
-Consumerism goes second (which is fortunate because Coppertone had planned to hit the pot with the ladle which was still in her hand).  Consumerism throws off the pot and says "You fools!  You actually believe that 'to each according to his needs' rubbish?  I will show you what truth really is!"  He uses his "Currency and Capital" power to pull out a deck of credit cards which he proceeds to throw into the crowd increasing the level of chaos.
-Coppertone gasps in horror as The Red Menace howls in pain "No!  Your introductory rate will soon expire and your interest will exceed 20%!"

At this point my notes get sketchy.  I know that in here somewhere Coppertone activates her Flight Power, Comrade Consumerism pulls out his Golden Gun power, Red Menace activates his Means of Production power (with which he pulls out a money magnet sucking all of the money in the room to him, including Consumerism's Golden Gun - reversal), and Coppertone activates her Copper Discs which apparently explode.  In all of this Tropes are used, Attitudes are changed, and everyone ended up with 2 Debt staked.  Final outcome?  Comrade Consumerism flees in defeat and as he runs down the snow covered sidewalk Coppertone beans him in the back of the head with his Golden Gun.  The Scene ends with him lying facedown as the snow gently falls.

The Complication ended up being won 20 to 15, so there were a lot of points involved.

We moved onto a new scene.  Something simpler and non-combative.  Since i had no villain in play i simply took a number of dice equal to the Scene Target (which happened to be 10) to start with.

The Scene was framed by Coppertone's player.  We find ourselves in the 8th floor Apartment of Coppertone, there is signifigant evidence that a hasty cleaning run has been made to hide all the high-tech trappings of a Capitalist from The Red Menace who sits at the small kitchen table.  Wires extend from the closets and if you look carefully you can see the microwaveable pizzas through the window in the oven door.  Coppertone and Red Menace have a brief conversation in which Coppertone accidentally insults the tempermental Menace.

COMPLICATIONS (Hidden Captialist Paraphenalia) and (Relationship Tension) are brought into play.

Coppertone's Peacekeeper attitude comes in handy again and Red Menace swings into Perverse Self-Sabotage.  Coppertone's goal is to keep her partnership with the Red Menace.  The Menace's goal is to remain oblivious to the fact that his partner is a capitalist pig.  The Editor's goal was to generate as much chaos as possible.

To that end the oven had accidentally been left on and the quickly hidden foodstuffs began to burn.  Menace burned his hand just as he was about to see what was in the oven (thereby avoiding actually having to see what was inside), but in his rush accross the room to stick his hands out into the cold air he snagged a cable running on the floor and the closet begins to slowly open.

The oven gets turned off and the closet breaks under the pressure (despite Coppertone's valliant efforts to keep it closed).  Menace's respons to the broken door is "You were almost crushed by door!" and he totally misses the electronics now scattered accross the floor.  The Tension is resolved and replaced by Obnoxious Neigbors while the Hidden Capitalistic Parphanelia is resolved and replaced by Fire Hazard.

After some cool narration and character interaction both of these were resolved in favor of our heroes.

At this point we called the game due to a waning interest (there were mid-80's comic books strewn around the room, so the distraction was understandable).

Did we have fun?  Yes.  Did we address the Premise?  I think not.

A couple of notes:  I deviated from the rules in a few places:
1. I fudged the Victory Target numbers i couple of times.
2. I pretty much ran both scenes with fewer than the recommended number of Complications.
3. I totally forgot about Inspirations, so there is no telling what would have happened if we had been using them.

A couple of other notes:
1. It was sometimes hard to Frame things.  Not because we did not know what we wanted to happen, but because we forgot to use the Frame format.
2. We did not achieve a large number of dice this game so we rarely used high level Wonders.
3. I forgot to use Exemplars...  Silly me.
4. I feel that Drives and Debt are still to abstract.  I did not really feel that anyone was worried that debt was going up or anything.  There was no tension derived from the mechanic, it was almost purely a numerical exercis.

More in depth suggestions will be coming later, but they will probably go in one of the Game Design threads for Capes.

Thomas

[WiredNavi]

I may be wrong, but there's no mechanic for having anything directly occur because of a hero's Debt, right?  And they always choose to go into Debt.  If they go over a certain mark, they get penalized, but essentially the player is always in control of their Debt and any fallout from it.  If you actually want the players to be worried when Debt goes up, you may have to make it so that either A: Debt can lead to events occurring that they don't want, or B: Debt can rise without their say-so on occasion.

[Sydney Freedberg]

...If you actually want the players to be worried when Debt goes up, you may have to make it so that either A: Debt can lead to events occurring that they don't want, or B: Debt can rise without their say-so on occasion.....

Good point. I suggested a "type A" solution over in the current Capes design thread.

Now, Jinx, do you have any thoughts what a "type B" solution might be, i.e. Debt rising without players choosing it? Personally, I'd think something along the lines of a Sorcerer humanity check, where it's tied directly to some action of the player: Even if a player never explicitly chooses to lower humanity (Sorcerer) or raise debt (Capes), the change in humanity/debt reflects their choices rather than just being something done to them. But you may have something quite different in mind....

(P.S.: I'd suggest concrete design proposals be posted in the Capes: Losing with Style thread, by the way, just for clarity's sake, rather than here in Actual Play.)