[Me & the Rat] Ronnies feedback

[Ron Edwards]

ME & THE RAT, JASPER MCCHESNEY

Jasper McChesney's Me & the Rat makes a nice trilogy with Munch-Mausen Tales and The Rat-God's Girlfriend. It'd be a neat thing if all of them became products which mutually advertised one another, and I think all the authors should play one another's games and comment on them in Actual Play.

Here's the feedback which applies to all three games equally:

This game presents a hilarious basic situation, well told and full of possibilities for what to do and what might happen. It is less suited to development as a role-playing than to development as a card or other sort of token/item/board game, much on the Cheapass model. Whether it's cards, dice, put-together squares, or what, doesn't matter.

The actual system needs to take one thing into consideration: right now, this is a "conch" game. I use this term in reference to the conch in Lord of the Flies, which was used as authority to speak. Effectively, as it stands, this game represents an elaborate means of permitting one person to speak while everyone else listens.

I think conch games don't work. I think strategy games with light narration do work - Give Me the Brain, for very simple version; Before I Kill You Mr. Bond, perhaps Clue in some cases, and so on. I think whatever-we-call-them, "role-playing" games work as well.

But a conch game isn't either one. It's ultimately an unsatisfying activity that leads to limping-along, exhausted attempts to "make a story to win" crossed with "win in order to make the story." The closest any game I've seen come to success is the card game Once Upon a Time, and it suffers badly from a weak endgame for this very reason.

These aren't the only conch games in the Ronnies entries - All Growed Up, The Great Rat Raid, and others are similar. These three I've lumped together because they share so much in common regarding "rat" and "girlfriend," and I am certain that the three authors can benefit and hone the respective designs by focusing away from the "story" and more towards the fun competition.

In other words, use the great introductory text to draw people in, just the way Give Me the Brain does. "Zombies, working in an all-night fast-food place, and they just wanna finish their damn shift and go home!" Laughing yet? You should be, it's funny. But after that, it's a card game that works as a card game, with funny pictures to reference the introductory joke.

As I see it, that's where these three could go with the right kind of work.[/i]

And what do my notes say?

1. Five cycles, four characters?

2. Wouldn't it make sense to start with Benjy? He is the first-person implied in the title, after all.

3. Scenes aren't the same as cycles ... I'm sorta confused when doping that out.

4. The Token mechanics are very, very strong. You really do have a boardgame here. However, your play-advice actually works against this strength by trying to introduce any sort of thematic judgment of the characters. Since "the data" are only a McGuffin, this doesn't stand.

At first, I thought that the game would be improved by bringing deeper and more intense focus onto goals and motivations changing, but that throws the infinity-points into a tizzy. Then I realized I was all backwards - you have a strategy game here, so make that the point of play.

Best,
Ron

[Jasper]

Thanks for the analysis, Ron. I'll definitely be developing the game further. Regarding the Trilogy of Cheapass: I'm all for supporting each other -- Rat God's Girlfriend was one of the games I read immediately, and found quite fun; I'm digesting Munch-Mausen now.

I have to say, I was initially a little miffed when you wrote that Me & the Rat wasn't role-playing, but after reading your conch explanation, I see what you're saying. The interaction between players, through the imaginary world, is fairly limited -- really only when proposing alternate events in each player's turn, and there's not a lot there. It is mostly individual monologing, which seemed more interesting initially. Each of the characters is intentionally left vague, with the idea that they get defined through play. I.e. you might decide you want Benjy to lose because he's a wank. But when I added the final "victory point" tally-up, that more or less erased any chance of modifying a character's objectives. I've really thought about removing that element of the game...though it'd still be conch shell.

As for your specific questions:

1. Think of it as four main cycles (with different token distributions in each) and one end-game cycle (where no new tokens are given out).

2. Yeah, starting with Benjy would make sense.

3. Hm. Scenes are what happens on each player's turn (crafting a scene, complete with resource-exchange is the player's turn). Everyone gets one turn per cycle.

4. By "play advice," do you mean the "go ahead and ignore victory conditions to make a story" stuff, or the victory conditions themselves? Either way, I'm willing to agree.

If it is "just" a boardgame with some color (which I agree it is, or is trying to be) then I suppose I do still want victory conditions...removing them would allow some more charactr development, but that's pretty much beside the point. Agreement?

[Ron Edwards]

Hiya,

For the record, paraphrasing my comments in the other thread as "Ron says [game] isn't role-playing" is stretching what I did say very far. My point was stated as a personal preference, not a principles-announcement.

4. By "play advice," do you mean the "go ahead and ignore victory conditions to make a story" stuff, or the victory conditions themselves? Either way, I'm willing to agree.

I'm talking about the "go ahead and ignore the victory conditions to make a story" stuff, which I think is not good advice for your game.

If it is "just" a boardgame with some color (which I agree it is, or is trying to be) then I suppose I do still want victory conditions...removing them would allow some more charactr development, but that's pretty much beside the point. Agreement?

Total agreement.

Oh, I forgot to mention: your game is about a spy and a love affair. That made my day when you posted it.

Best,
Ron

[Kirk Mitchell]

I'm all for the mutual support thing. Perhaps a group publication in one book. Sort of like the No Press Anthology... but with rats. We should discuss this further. Lets tidy the games up first, playtest and then see how we go from there.

Kirk

[Jasper]

Sounds good.

[Joe J Prince]

Yup

Count me in.

Joe