Sorcerer One Sheet: Christopher Gives It A Try

[Noble]

I was thinking how to fit Crucible into a entertainment industry setting but then I realized... that's why Miller wrote the damn thing -- 1953 was prime time for the Red Hollywood scare.  (yep, I know this is old news to fans of the Crucible... I'm just catching up here, forgive me)

Side note: I started with the Premise, thought it would be Los Angeles and the Entertainment industry, thought, "Too obvious," and ended up in Salem.

Be as "kooky" as you want, Christopher.  I think we're all ready for some narrative enemas.  It's worth to note that the session you attended was the most plot driven of anything we've done in a long while.  Last month had a dark fantasy game set in Wales where I spent three hours of my session trying to convince my character's wife to save our marriage.

I'm more than a little jazzed about the humanity - love thing, especially tying it into a setting where magic is debasement of one's self.  How much would I be willing to sacrifice to further my emotional well being seems to mirror Dimmesdale's own journey in the Scarlet Letter.

I think an hour or two or more of character creation would be a great thing; sort of what you did at the L.A. con only on a larger, deeper scale, unfettered by the constraints of a four-hour time block.  

- Ian

[Robert Leal]

First, I wanted to say hello.  This is my first post on the Forge, though I've been lurking and reading for some weeks.  I just picked up a copy of Sorcerer and Sorcerer & Sword on Wednesday at my local gaming store and am excited about the ideas both here and in the books (I also have some questions, but I'll share them in another post).

While the discussion has moved away from the one-sheet to how to get the group together, I just wanted to throw in a thought I had when I read the first few posts yesterday:

What about the Indians (more properly Native Americans, though the colonials would call them savages)?

Given your source material are they a topic you want to avoid?  There's a large body of literature about Native American beliefs, magic, and the spirits that could be used if you wanted to include them.  At the very least, there is potential for encounters in your suggestion of a "Grey Man" in the woods.

That question, coupled with your premise and concern for love, reminded me of a book I read a few years back that might provide an unusual event or character to include to comment or reflect on the idea of love.  The book was called "The Unredeemed Captive" by John Demos.  It is an eminently readable book that talks about Puritan children taken captive and assimilated by Native Americans:

"The setting for this haunting and encyclopediacally researched work of history is colonial Massachusetts, where English Puritans first endeavored to 'civilize' a 'savage' native populace.  There, in February 1704, a French and Indian war party descended on the village of Deerfield, massacring some inhabitants and abducting others.  Among the captives were the eminent minister John Williams and his five children.  Williams would eventually be released, but his small daughter Eunice remained with her captors.  Years later, to the horror of her family, she joined them, embracing Catholicism and taking a Mohawk husband....a gripping narrative that opens a window into a North America where English, French, and Indians faced one another across gulfs of culture and belief and sometimes crossed over." (from the back of the book).

The account is touching and terrifying, and I thought of Eunice and her family when they are reunited--who really experiences love, Eunice who remains with her husband, her family who loves her but expects her to return to their faith and ways, etc.  The family and community's responses to Eunice's emotions (and questions of their validity), faith, and lifestyle are fraught with tension.

I'm not sure how it could (or would) be worked into what you already have, but stories like hers are an interesting phenomenon and could be included as a useful commentary--showing someone like Eunice with a successful, loving relationship in violation of everything her (dysfunctional) community sees as necessary for a successful relationship (religion, civilization, proper roles for husband and wife).

Add Indian magic into the mix (or the belief in Indian magic--wouldn't it be ironic of the Indians with their "spirits" have no demons and it is the Puritans who really have the devils amongst them) and you could really complicate things (how about a rescue operation to "save" the lost child which pits the characters against Indian spirits, similar and yet strangely different from their own demons).

Of course, all this may not be the direction you want to go, in which case just ignore me until I write for advice on running this for myself. :-)

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Robert, hi Ian! Welcome to the Forge!

Regarding New England (and nearby) relations between native peoples and Puritan or Catholic Europeans, I just thought of two references that - unfortunately - I dislike for a couple of reasons.

(comics) Indian Summer, by Hugo Pratt and Milo Manara
(book) Black Robe, by Brian Moore (also in film version; haven't seen it)

Both are excessive. I mean excessive, talkin' pornography here, in two different ways. They do have very different themes, but neither of which I especially care for.

However, both present a tremendous view of the physical, visual elements of the landscape and lifestyles of the time, as well as at least addressing the cross-culture contact and blending of the very different peoples. Both are tremendously well-written, well-conceived, and in the case of Indian Summer, beautifully illustrated. (Side note: I am no foe of T&A and especially not of graphic sex - but man, this stuff did hit my limit due to the emotional context of the scenes.)

One more concern of mine, though, is that this issue tends to take over a storyline instantly. As soon as "Indian stuff" (to use the least approved term) comes into things, wham, that's what the story is about. I'd suggest keeping that material way shadowy-background, or being willing to see the game veer far from the Scarlet Letter context and directly into the (say) Black Robe context.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

(book) Black Robe, by Brian Moore (also in film version; haven't seen it)

The film is great, though it sounds like it may be vey different from the book. My favorite scene is where the Native Americans are marvelling at this magical method that the White Man has to communicate without speech. They are, of course, looking at a book.

Oh, and now I'd advocate the email thing more than ever, given Chris's statement about his players wishes. I also didn't mean that this should just be one on one, but make it a mailing list so that everyone can see the discussion. This should have most of the advantages of the face-to-face version, while having all the added advantages of written communication.

Why rush? Why, because I'm an American, Ron. Givitomenow!

Mike

[Christopher Kubasik]

Ian --

"narrative enemas"   That was fucking great.

And actually, I didn't make a direct reference between Hollywood and Salem.   My thought was, "People who come to Hollywood and screw themselves over this way do it with a predetermined intent; they know the model for the story they're about to live, and this city has a whole machinary, that they know exists when they move here, for making it happen."  So, it's too obvious.  Where might I set such a story where the characters get invovled with shit for love not *knowing* how bad it can get?

As an example of the above: Just heard the tale of a couple here in town, a Producer and and Actress with a few credits.  Married, with a child.  The father has an affair with the nanny, tries to paint mom crazy (mom, afraid of being alone with child  is a bit nutty) and get a clean divorce with custody, a love letter to nanny is found on hard drive, custody scheme goes south, nanny leaves him, mom leaves him -- and seems to be getting  her life together.

I mean, it's all right there.  Blunt and obvious.  To them I'm sure it was highly dramatic, but hearing the story I was simply amazed at how trite and cliched the whole thing was.

So -- what might actually give us a setting where people arrived in a new place and got what they didn't expect?  I hadn't thought of colonial times in a while.... so presto!

Mike,

Remember, I don't know what my player's wishes are yet, and, according to Ian (one of the playes), his wish is my wish, so I'm all set.  (And part of my concern was the session Ian described -- so I was judging the biosphere of earth by taking a core sample from upstate Texas).

My plan at this point is to create a Players Guide (with the help of y'all), post it on line for the group to peruse (to see if they're either interested in the game and setting -- obviously, Ian already is), and then gather with the interested parties in a kind of relaxed coffee shop mode to create characters, get feedback and suggestions on the background, incorporate character ideas and background ideas into my material, and then get together for play.

Robert,

Thanks for the post.  Indians will be "there," but as outsiders.  I think this feeds into the feeling of isolationan I want the community to carry, hence the need for love.

Ron,

Good points.  This is going to be the colonists dealing with a strange new world, loney, cold, passionate, religious, bitter, loving and so forth.  Best to keep it grounded.

Everyone,

It started as a one sheet thread (and I'll be adding more stuff this weekend (like what are the descriptions for Will and Cover to give it the right colonial feel and whatnot)), but I'll probablly keep it going as, "The Guy New to Sorcerer Sets up a Game" and then move a new thread into Actual Play once I get to that point.

This, I hope, will help all potential players get a handle on, and get ideas for, their own new games.  I can tell it's a great game, but it'll have its own hinks and kinks on the road to play, so any newbies can probably benefit.

And now, one more question (to Ron in particular): I could do a lot of research.  But it seems to me that if we all agree on the narrative "feel" of the story, we'll be better of than if we read up on too much stuff and doing an oddball "living history" scenario.  Right?

What are the thoughts about "research"?  How best to handle, if possible, setting up different places/times without filling the head up with more facts than are nescesary (and thus heading into Simulationist-Land).

Thanks,

Christopher

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Christopher,

And have we batted that issue around. I think it was Paul Czege who last raised the question of historical accuracy as powerhouse of Narrativism vs. end-in-itself of Simulationism.

Here's my take on it for your purposes - what's the entire point of an historical setting for a story, anyway? There is one, all right. We never tire of that context in story-telling; there must be some means of "highlighting" a particular issue by focusing on the features of a given culture and time as we like to perceive it, which also gives it a certain "this could really happen back then" oomph.

So I suggest focusing on that goal precisely. I suggest that you and any of the players should do all the deep research that you care to, based strictly and only on the concept that its manifestations during play are for purposes of reinforcing that goal. This results, necessarily, in learning more than you use, and making aesthetic choices about what you learn.

In other words, exactly the same situation as writing an historical short story, novel, or screenplay.

I'm going through this right now, in my preparation for Dust Devils. I have kind of a thing about the tendency to consider all the "cowboy days" one and the same (from 1820 to 1920, no less) and all the "cowboy places" one and the same as well. So when I run western stuff, I do a lot of friggin' work to prep, and only a certain percent of it gets expressed in play. Part of this is that I might decide, "OK, 1860 or so," and that requires contrasting it with all sorts of other decades - hence, learning about them but not using them. Another part is that I might decide to emphasize, via locale and NPCs, certain 1860 elements over others. Simultaneously, I hope, some of the players are doing the same (they showed a surprising interest in doing so using the Glorantha material in our Hero Wars game, for instance).

Oh, and let's not forget the nuances of literary or film layering. For instance, Dust Devils is highly informed not only by western history, but also (perhaps primarily) 20th-century cinema set in that history. Similarly, most of the literature and sources you've talked about are not themselves colonial, but 19th-century fiction set in the colonial times. So all the research I'm talking about applies to the conventions and issues raised by those art forms as well as to the historical period itself.

Best,
Ron

[David Howard]

So when I run western stuff, I do a lot of friggin' work to prep, and only a certain percent of it gets expressed in play... Another part is that I might decide to emphasize, via locale and NPCs, certain 1860 elements over others. Simultaneously, I hope, some of the players are doing the same...

...Dust Devils is highly informed not only by western history, but also (perhaps primarily) 20th-century cinema set in that history...

If I might share something, which I think was the nadir of my GMing experience:

I once ran a swashbuckling/Three Musketeers sort of thing, using the old Flashing Blades rules. I did a lot of research, set the game in London, 1650, post-Civil War and all that.

One of my players decided to be a pirate. He slipped into his character background that he had smuggler friends in the Scilly Isles, old shipmates there, and so forth.

And then as soon as possible, he sailed for the Scilly Isles.

Now, nothing in the background research I had done even mentioned the Scilly Isles. I had nothing on 17th-century smuggling. So I was (literally) at sea with all of that. It fell apart fairly quickly, as the pirate character's player kept intoducing elements (from the Hornblower series, now that I look back on it) into my cloak-and-sword/palace intrigue background, and essentially (the player was a GM in another group) running the session.

Now, both Sorcerer and S & Sword emphasize working with the players, letting them tell their character's stories, etc. But here was an example of a player railroading the GM. Short of sinking his pirate ship, how do you keep a player like that in check? How do you respond to a player whose research is different from yours as a GM?

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[Christopher Kubasik]

I'm sure Ron's going to have a lot of suggestions along this question, but I'd offer quickly that:

1) Having a one-sheet really helps in this regard.  Once everyone is clear on it and signs on, it means everyone kind of knows what the game is going to be about.  The one sheet might offer broad lattitude (Europe, 1888), or my limited colonial town.  In this way, I envision the One Sheet is like the Accords of The Questing Beast.  (Which is another game discussed here on the boards.)

2) You'll note in the conversation about that Josh, I think it was, had two character creation sessions. The idea is to make sure everyone knows what they're getting into, everyone agrees on it, and everyone likes it -- ahead of time.

3) In many regards, in the kind of game Sorcerer (et al) advocates, there's not going to be the GM's thick binder of notes detailing a world the players must encounter, discover and explore.  Given points 1 and 2 above, the players already know a heck of a lot about the game right from the get go.  At least from a geographical and historical point of view, and probably a sense of what kind of adventures we're looking to make.

4) If the character's aren't exploring the GM's world, what are they doing?  They're resolving their Kickers.  They've got a problem (which they chose) and must resolve it.  How the characters resolve it is what the story is about.  The GM's job is to keep choices (as defined by the premise) flying at the characters/players, and widening the problems (emotional, physical, spiritual, intellectual) that entangle the characters/players as they pursue the resolution of their Kickers.

5) If all these things are in place, and a player says, "I think the solution to the mystery of my wife's ghost is in Italy," because there's been all these John Keats quotes floating around the game, even if the GM never thought anyone is going to Italy, he's not taken aback.  All he needs to do, and the player needs to do, is keep the game focus on the Kicker and the Premise.  In this way neither of you needs to know everything about Italy (though, if you've got a break between session, it would hurt to read up a bit).  Instead, the group filters what it does know about Italy through the needs of the Premise and the Kicker.  If the guy says, I go to the house where Keats died, you just need enough of the house to, say, match a few details of the characters house where his wife died to join them   narratively and no one need by the wiser for it.

Sure it's winging it.  Sure it's crazy.  But -- it's not "making it up" because everyone is still respecting the original agreement, and it'll work because everyone is still respecting the original agreement.

Remember, in Narrativist play, the implicit understanding is that all of our choices are made to make a better story.  Hosing the GM or other players doesn't serve that agreement.  This isn't always how players approach these games... But the steps outlined so far in this thread will help draw everyone into accord on this matter and make it clear what this new kind of playing is about.

Christopher

[hardcoremoose]

Hey David,

This question goes way beyond just the one-sheet.  The answers include discussion about Social Contract (which Christopher just described), practical GMing techniques (like Scene Framing), and handling of potantially dysfunctional players.  All of these topics have been discussed here before and you could probably find lots of reading material by doing a quick search on any of those keywords.

Personally, I think this would make a fine topic for its own thread.

- Scott

[David Howard]

I'm sure Ron's going to have a lot of suggestions along this question, but I'd offer quickly that:

If the character's aren't exploring the GM's world, what are they doing?  They're resolving their Kickers.  They've got a problem (which they chose) and must resolve it.  How the characters resolve it is what the story is about.  The GM's job is to keep choices (as defined by the premise) flying at the characters/players, and widening the problems (emotional, physical, spiritual, intellectual) that entangle the characters/players as they pursue the resolution of their Kickers....

Remember, in Narrativist play, the implicit understanding is that all of our choices are made to make a better story.  Hosing the GM or other players doesn't serve that agreement.  This isn't always how players approach these games... But the steps outlined so far in this thread will help draw everyone into accord on this matter and make it clear what this new kind of playing is about.

Christopher

[/quote]

You're quite right. I'm not familiar with the various theoretical stances except insofar as I have read about them in the Sorcerer rulebooks. But the idea that the GM and players are cooperatively building the story using the Premise and Kickers does indeed address my major concerns. I have come from the background of the GM-is-God kind of games, which I never did like, and which-- after playing one (1) session of _Paranoia_ (remember that, anyone?) led me to drop out of RPG for a decade.

Kickers are a useful framework for this kind of game mechanic, but it's just not what I'm used to. But I can see how the Kickers and the Premise can work to mold the player's actions and the GM's responses to each other in a way that no one is really ultimately "in charge".

Now, of course, (he coughs mildly) I just need to figure out how to put that into practice...

Dave
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[Christopher Kubasik]

Hi Scott,

I'd offer that the one sheet is slightly more than a social contract (though only slightly) as if begins feeding into the mechanics of the game -- which then limits and ecourages certain kinds of behavior.

For this reason the Kicker is a really big deal.

The issue for me is that normally people have a) the rules b) how they'd like the game to run in some sort of vaguely verbalized way.  When the two aren't integrated, it's usually bad news.

I've tried bringing this up at both at a thread on RPG.net and a thread here on The Forge, but in both instances the idea that rules and group planning would actually melt a lot of GM/Player problems was sort of dismissed.

Since this is a thread about setting up a Sorcerer game -- actively setting up a game with concrete group choices and a set of mechanics that help focus everybody on goal for play, I'm content to let these kinds of things continue here.

(If anyone wants to talk about how "You're doing everything wrong," or "My players do everything wrong," or what to do with the hypothetical dickhead who's like "this: _____" please -- start another thread.)

******

Dave,

I mean this sincerely, and with a bit of humor, as something I spent a lot of time working though:

You don't put something into practice by figuring it out.

You put something into practice not by figuring it out, but by putting it into practice.  I'm not being flippant.  I still am not sure how Sorcerer is going to run, I'm not sure I'm going to get players (pretty sure, though).... But all I can do is set up the game and then work from there.

Salute,
Christopher

[joshua neff]

David--

In terms of avoid that kind of player "railroading" (or derailing)...

As Christopher noted, I do at least one session, if not more, of group character creation, to make sure everybody's on the same page & we have a coherent cast of characters. (That doesn't mean all the PCs have to get along or have the same agendas, but the players do.)

Also, I'm really strict at the outset about what kinds of characters you can create. (In my current Sorcerer run, I told the players: "You all have to be freshman in college. I'll allow for one PC to be something else--a senior, a grad student, a janitor, a librarian, etc--as long as they're somehow connected to the university. But I'm only allowing one PC to deviate. Also, I want 2 of the PCs to start off knowing each other. And I want one of the PCs to be female." (My current group is all male.)

Now, once the game starts, I'm very free about what the PCs can do--the story belongs to the players as much as to me, & I want them to drive the story, not me. I'm just there to "keep the beat" & provide obstacles to their goals ("The Fifth Business" as Christopher calls it in his essays). I'm there to facilitate them creating a story, so if they want to take it places I hadn't thought of, that's cool. As long as everyone is enjoying themselves.

[Walt Freitag]

Christopher,

The attack on Deerfield, MA that Robert Leal referred to actually occurred in 1675, as part of King Philip's War. This war between (primarily) the Naragansett and the English settlers was by far the bloodiest conflict in North American history in terms of casualties as a percentage of the total populations involved, by about a factor of ten over the Civil War, which itself had a many times higher casualty rate relative to population than the next runner up.

And it happened less than two decades before the Salem Witch Trials. Coincidence? My wife, an amateur historian who can rattle off the names, ages, and fates of all the Salem victims and accusers from memory, doesn't think so. How could there be any question that the Devil had agents in New England, when "his worshippers" had (from the settlers' point of view) run amok abducting, killing, and torturing Christian men, women, and children within recent memory?

Salem itself was not attacked in King Philip's War, but like all the towns including Boston it was in a state of alarm. Natives, many Christianized, that had been living peacefully near the settled areas were rounded up, temporarily imprisoned, and relocated. (Some native war captives were enslaved to the West Indies.) I'll have to look up whether there were any Indian reservations anywhere near Salem by the time of the Witch Trials. (There was one about a mile from my house on the Massachusetts south coast.) There certainly were no natives roaming the woods and fields of Salem or Salem Village (now Danvers, where most of the accusers and victims actually lived) at that time, and there had not been for two generations. But people did travel, memories were long (as they remain today), and the Mohawk nation still thrived 150-odd miles away.

You might also want to look into Tituba, the West Indian slave woman whose voodoo-related stories and demonstrations (fortune-telling by gazing into a stirred egg white, for example) to the girls in the household of the Reverend (!) Parris kicked off the whole thing. It would be a shame not to make use of the voodoo connection, or the irony of the "heathen" slave owned by the town's spiritual leader.

Then there's the Mathers. I could write a book about the Mathers (in fact, many have). Cotton, the skeptic, the scientist, but if only he could prove that witchcraft was real, that the Devil was real, would that not also prove the existence of God? Drawn in like Eve to the Tree of Knowledge by the trickery of children. (Oh, those innocent children. Everyone knew children were pure and had no reason to lie. Many of them were trapped in their own stories, by the end, and none of them prospered after.) And Increase, the aged father, the devout and orthodox patriarch who ultimately showed far more humanity than the son.

So, if you want to know anything about the history, I'd steer clear of all the heavily fictionalized and politicized plays and novels that have been mentioned. The real story is so much richer. Ask a naturalized New England Yankee like me. (Like I said, memories are long here.) If you need more extensive source materials I can point you to some of the better books, but if you have specific questions I have a collection on the subject better than most libraries outside New England and I can look things up. Rule #1: No burnings at the stake! The convicted witches were hung, and one who refused to plead in court was pressed to death (which was the usual procedure when someone refused to plead in court -- without their "consent" they could not be tried, so rather strenuous measures to obtain consent were used).

- Walt

[Christopher Kubasik]

Walt,

Thanks for all the info.

And I've already started my research and have had Rule #1 burned into my brain at several web sites.

Salute,
Christopher

[hardcoremoose]

Christopher Kubasik wrote:

The issue for me is that normally people have a) the rules b) how they'd like the game to run in some sort of vaguely verbalized way. When the two aren't integrated, it's usually bad news.

I've tried bringing this up at both at a thread on RPG.net and a thread here on The Forge, but in both instances the idea that rules and group planning would actually melt a lot of GM/Player problems was sort of dismissed.

I wasn't going to reply, simply because I agree with you on this point (and man, I can't imagine the point being dismissed out-of-hand here), but the heck with it, here's a reply anyway.  

I've become a big proponent of up-front discussion between Players and GM - get everybody's expectations out in the open - so that everyone can work towards each other player's shared enjoyment.  GNS, the concept of Premise, the liberal use of one-sheets and group character creation, and the overarching presence of a Social Contract all help with that.  

It's scary shit though.  I ran my first Sorcerer game a little less than a year ago, for a group of (almost) total strangers.  We're still gaming together today.  I hope your game (and group) work out as well...I think they will.

- Scott