[DitV] Second attempt at Dogs

[Wade L]

I'd already tried to run Dogs once.  It consisted of a single town spread over two sessions.  Play was hardly a catastrophe, but it didn't feel like it clicked, either. You can read up on my previous experiences in this thread http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=16880.0 if you so desire.

  So I gave running Dogs another shot.  To increase both my chances of a good outing, and the amount of information I might be able to take away from things, I ran the same town(Tower Creek Branch, from the rulebook) with a completely different(and one smaller) set of players.  As you'll see, these players seemed to enjoy things much more, and certainly seemed to take to a Conflict Resolution system more naturally, although they took Dogs itself in a direction I hadn't anticipated(but perhaps should have).

  First things first, I'll give some info about the players, background info both gaming-wise and religion wise, because the latter part clearly had a big influence on the game:

O is the oldest in the bunch(mid-30's), and the most experienced gamer by at least a decade.  Runs more games than he plays.  Runs mostly World of Darkness games recently, but heavily modifies the settings and only occasionally uses the rules, ignoring them when they get in the way.  Likes headtrips, and I think for him the best game sessions are those that are deeply disturbing.  Vocal and staunch atheist.

U is the youngest of the players, in her early 20's, and O's girlfriend.  She gamed before meeting the rest of us, but most of her gaming experience has been with O running games, or with the Vampire LARP.  She tends to be the most "power gamer" of the bunch - she likes to use the rules to prove her character is superior.  She used to be Mormon, but left the faith around the same time she met and moved in with O.  Her views on Mormonism are currently very negative.

A is also in her early 20's.  She's played in a fair variety of games - D&D, World of Darkness stuff run by O, a variety of games ran by myself.  She's an ex-Catholic who has a Fine Arts(painting) degree and is in the process of completing a Religious Studies degree, and any content with a religious cast to it is likely to get a reaction of "Cool!  This is just like in the 17th century, when..." type of reaction from her.

Should note that, once again, all of these folks play in the Vampire LARP I run, and that's where I met all of them, too.

We gathered to play at O&U's apartment, around 9pm.  Lots of general chit-chat as people sat around and gossiped in between snippits of me explaining more of the Dogs' setting(They'd already been e-mailed some excerpts from the webpage).  The resemblance to 19th century Mormonism was an easy hook for all three of them.  Much of the game stuff I was explaining would be met with comments like "Ohh, that's not like Mormonism at /all/" said in a very sarcastic tone.   And then we'd take a segue into the church's involvement with the Mountain Meadows Massacre of 1857, etc.

Eventually we got around to making characters.  We were done, from start to end, in just under an hour, with lots of tangenting and side-conversations in the middle.  Character creation was much less painful than with the first group, and they all seemed to grok to it pretty easily.  I don't their sheets on hand, but I'll share some general details and discuss their Accomplishments at the same time.

O played Brother Jeremiah, a quietly fanatical, generally soft-spoken, naive, and nature-loving Dog.  He decided Jeremiah had come from a family that had splintered away from the rest of the Faith, and he had rejoined the true path when a cousin of his showed him the error of his ways.  Before he left, he killed his infant relative Jeb in his crib, because he couldn't bear to see an innocent child raised outside the Faith.  His Accomplishment challenge was "Do I cry for Jeb in his crib?"  O figured out the Conflict Resolution thing quickly(he previously had ran the Story Engine, which is apparently a Conflict Resolution system?), and the Accomplishment went very smoothly(he failed, incidentally, writing down "I didn't cry for baby Jeb 1d6").  He also took some Fallout from the Accomplishment, which he thought was just the coolest thing in the world.  Loved the system, although clearly already setting a certain tone about the character and the Faithful...

A played Sister Submission, a more typical gun-slinging outdoors survival type of Dog.  She decides that Sr Submission's father had been gunned down by a Territorial Authority Sheriff(perhaps justly, perhaps not) when she was young...her Accomplishment was "Do I get vengeance on my father's killer?"  Yes, she did, walking into a non-Faithful town and gut-shotting the Sheriff.  Also took some Fallout, which she decided to take as "Wanted by the Territorial Authority".

U's character was Sister Pennele, who came across as simultaneously socially inept and very manipulative.  Her Accomplishment was "Do I get my roommate at the Dog's Temple kicked out because they're sinning?"  And yep, she did, convincing one of the senior Dogs that her roommate was possessed because they were sleepwalking, but only after escalating to physical with the teacher by touching her to distract her and otherwise make her uncomfortable.

You can see the tone set just by the Accomplishments.  I realized after the fact that most of these weren't really things that happened during initiation, but instead "important events from my characters past".  So I broke the rules here, but I'm not sure how great a sin that was.

We then started play.  Oh boy.

They rode into town, were greeted by the Steward, etc...  One of the first questions was about babies and such, and the Steward made mention of there being a stillborn child in town.  Bam, the Dogs are on the case! (unlike the first playgroup, who followed a strict approach of 'wait until we have all the information first', also known as 'Don't interrupt the GM while he's giving flavour text!', sigh) 

They meet with the young wife and her husband, she asks them to name her baby, they do(U interjecting with plenty of flavour and some brief LARP-style acting of a blessing ceremony).  Brother Jeremiah then starts interrogating the wife on what could have caused the baby to be stillborn...wife says she was sure the baby was fine until during the night, when she had a nightmare she didn't remember, and knew something had gone wrong.  The second conversation is slowing a bit, I go "Conflict?", O is like "You bet!"  So I suggest "What's at stake is: Does she spill?" "Yep!" "Okay, she gives!  Here's everything she can think of about why the baby died...etc"

Roleplay carries on for about 2 more minutes, and then O say, "I think those were the wrong stakes.  New conflict, alright?  What's at stake is:  Does she finger her husband for causing the baby's death?"  And I'm like "Ohh...okay."  Both because I'm thinking "Alright, he's just started playing, and he's already calling for conflicts!" and because I totally get what he's doing "Br. J isn't trying to find out the truth - he's trying to get her to admit to a truth he decided the second he walked in the door!"  Great conflict plays out.  I become very glad I explained ahead of the time that if you want to be in a conflict, you gotta declare yourself in before things get good.  Conflict itself goes smoothly.  Br. J pushes the wife to say that her husband has a foul temper, and that the sin of wrath is what caused the King of Life to take the baby - the child was faultless, too pure to be born into a sinful household.  I escalate to physical when she just tries to walk out the door, crying - Br. J stops her.  I want to escalate to Fighting, but it doesn't feel right to have the wife take a swing.  So as one of the wife's raises, I declare "Her husband is full right up of you tormenting his wife, and takes a swing at you!  He wasn't in the conflict from the start, so I can't roll the husband in now.  But I'm letting the wife use him as a Big piece of Equipment, and roll that die into the conflict for use in her raise!"  I think that's kosher, right?  Worked well in the scene.  Br. J runs the wife/me out of dice, she gives, and admits that her husband's always had an awful temper, and that's why the King of Life took her baby from her!

Br. J "comforts" the wife, and then the Dogs drag the husband out into the street.  Declare that it was his sin of wrath that killed the baby.  And then shoot him in the head.  I didn't call for a conflict here, figuring it was a forgone conclusion, although I realized later that "Do the Dogs kill the husband?" could have been a great conflict - not him fighting for his life physically necessarily, but he can also try and talk them out of it, etc.  Ahh well, missed opportunities occur.  Anyway, BAM!  Husband is dead.

They then go and have supper at the Steward's place.  The Steward is understandably a bit cautious, but I decide he concludes that this whole "Sin of Wrath" thing maybe means the husband beat the wife, and that's why she gave birth to a stillborn child, that makes sense...  He brings up the whole "Bless my new wife to conceive" thing after supper...the Dogs give him a stern look, and then agree to do that - but then pretty much tell him that he should spend the next three nights only with his new wife...and that they'll /know/ whether it's working or not after three nights...and if it isn't...well, then some Sin must be causing the wife to be without child, and I think everyone knows how they treat sin, right?  A very nervous Steward retires to bed(how's that for performance anxiety?!).

The Steward's first wife approaches the Dogs and tries to play up the "There's no baby because of sin" angle, trying to convince the Dogs to prevail upon the Steward to set aside the new wife.  The Dogs get all cagey, like "maybe that's the reason, or maybe it's your fault!" and they start to think amongst themselves that they might just have to shoot the Steward and both his wives!

They also meet Brother Cyrus, the local Sheriff's deputy, and scare the bejeezus out of him.  I'm thinking "How is he ever going to try and convince the Dogs to approve his marriage to the Steward's second wife...if he utters one word of unorthodox practices, they'll shoot him in the face!"

No conflicts in these above scenes - partly because I didn't think of them(instead of the first wife being all "Here's what I think you should do", it probably should have been "Conflict: Does the first wife convince the Dogs to make the Steward set aside his second wife?", I think?), but also partly because it was nearing 2am, which was when we wanted to finish up.

Now, Br. J's been in the lead most of the time.  The two Sisters have certainly approved of his actions though.  But by the end her, Sr. Submission is getting a bit edgy, as she realizes that Br. J might end up having them execute every last man woman and child in the town.  She talks to Br. J for awhile, trying to convince him to see reason...maybe that the problem has been solved, and they should leave this town, possibly returning later?  It's argued out in character for a bit, and I say "This IC argument is starting to drag", and A's like, "Okay: Conflict: Do the Dogs leave town now?"  And we're all like "Cool!"  U doesn't participate in the conflict, since she decides Sr. P will just go whichever way the winds are blowing.  Conflict takes awhile to resolve, as they pretty much bring in every trait even tangentially related - more out of a desire to use the system than sheer determination to win, I think.  Stuff gets stretched pretty far("Well, I've got the trait 'At one with the animals 1d10', so I'll use a animal metaphor in my argument to bring the Trait in", or "IC: Blah blah blah, just like when I shot my father's murderer, blah, blah blah... OOC: So I'll bring in the trait "I got vengeance on my father's killer 1d6', and since I talked about shooting, "I'm an excellent shot 2d8!"), but I just say "If someone at the table calls bullshit, you gotta explain until they're satisfied or you agree the trait doesn't apply", and occasionally "If this was a conflict with /me/ I'd call bullshit, but if you both wanna let is slide, I won't interfere!"  Eventually, A wins, they leave town, and we call it a night.

In our wrap-up discussion, the players really expressed enjoyment for the game.  They loved it, and thought they'd like it even more if played more.  I think they figured out Dogs' mechanics pretty quickly, aside from a real tendency to stretch when it came to traits that I'm not sure that I liked.  Cool, especially compared to the first playgroup I ran Dogs with, who really didn't seem to jive with conflict resolution.

Of course, I was both intrigued and, I'll admit, somewhat horrified by how they played their characters(you wanna bet I was chanting the "Don't play God" GM advice to myself during sections).  O&U thought it was pretty natural.  I said I think often some people choose to play Dogs straight, as people who, you know, are right, and are doing the right thing.  O thought that the natural flip-side of sincere piety and belief was bloody-handed fanaticism, and that it wouldn't be true to the Faith if one didn't portray both sides.  Plus, I think part of it was O wanting to make sure the game was, well, disturbing.  And the easiest way he saw to make sure that happened was to introduce it himself, and early on(and practically without provocation).

In the end, things were tinged with a bit of disappointment, because I think Dogs can be used to discuss many interesting things, not just as a platform for standing up and proclaiming "Religion is evil!!!"  But I'm far more excited by the fact that they seemed to jive with the whole conflict resolution thing.  I'll definitely have a willing audience to introduce more Forge games to in the future, so yay!  Even if I don't think Dogs is the best fit for them - although they really, really liked the setting...but I think only because the setting represented something they hated, and it gave them an opportunity to showcase that.

So, two things I'm looking for from the readers here...

One...any advice or comments on what I did in the session would be much appreciated.  I'm still really taken with Dogs, and I figure the better I get at running the game, the more fun I'll have with it in the future.  And the best way to do that is to learn from what I have done, in addition to what others have done.

Two...any thoughts on what might be a good next indie gaming step for these people(and me!)?  They seem really gung-ho on Dogs right now, and turning this one-shot into a longer series wouldn't be hard at all...but I am not sure what direction things would go in.  Play might get deeper with time and choices might get more interested, or it could descend into outright mockery of the Faith.  (As it is, I will say that things were played pretty "Straight" - there was intensity to scenes, and I think the characters were very real and understandable at least to their players - this wasn't just 14 year old D&D "Now I get to be EVILLLLL!" replacing "EVILLLLL" with "RELIGIOUSSSSS!")  I am unsure whether continuing Dogs is a good idea or not?  And as for other indie games...I'm trying to think of what might appeal.  Perhaps just rolling with the desire to be disturbing(My Life with Master?), or maybe try and give them something Dogs-ish in its looking at moral choices, but without the weight of religion distorting things for this player set(any suggestions on that one?  Just do Dogs in an alternate setting?).  As always, opinions welcomed.

And thanks, as always, for letting me share my experiences with you!  The last time I posted on actual play was extremely helpful to me, and very encouraging.

[lumpley]

Don't be scared off of Dogs by anybody's anti-religion thing. Dogs can handle it.

I'd encourage you to make up your own town for next time, but if you're looking for a town for the time after ... try Fort Lemon. That'll touch O's little infanticide-committing heart.

-Vincent

[Daermon]

If you're looking to get away from people using Dogs to bash religion, for whatever reason, then I suggest you try them on The Shadow of Yesterday.  I mean, it's post-apocalyptic, so you've got that dark and disturbing slot covered but with an absence of religion.

Besides, I recommend tSoY for everything.

[cjr533]

Very interesting indeed.  One of the issues i had when I first played DitV was that I was not really aware tht the Faith is not 9th century Mormonism, so I spent a lot of time thinking of Scriptures and referring to events inDeserte (i have a fairly reasonable knowledge of Mormon Theology and the setting).  thsi really pissed he refere off eventually, and sort of broke the game. In my one attempt at running DitV, it was derailed by a player deciding to shoot a cup of coffee from a non-faithful's hands (I tied to keep quiet thinking that coffee was not specifically banned this early in Mormon thinking - I had learnt from the game I played in, and now owned the rules) - and accidentally shooting the son of the coffee drinker.  That was pretty horrific, but his complete lack f compassion and regret disturbed me more. Still, hey, it' a game.

Afterwards I asked the player why he had acted like this, and he basically said "religious fanatics act like thta".  No they don't, well not normally in my experience.  He was determined to play his character as Torquemada or some other unfeeling sadist, because tht is hisperception of religiou people.  OK!  Now the uK is overwhlemingly secular, and I am perhaps unusual in having an active faith, but even so I think I can very strongly identify with what you experienced inthis Actual Play.  Do some people reall misunderstand the nature of religious faith as making one  one dimensional character, with incredibly dogmatic responses?

In some ways perhaps referring back to real Scriptures, or say the early Mormon faith might help by providing the players with more moral guidance - I wouldlove to explore the various controversies of the Deseret Period in a game,as I fin it one of the most fascinating aspects of American history - or the ealier strugle in Ohio or Nauvoo, or even New York State.  But DitV is NOT about Mormon history, and it would derail the game totall I think by removingthe central ide - you make the moral decisions yourself.

So what we have here is an interesting question - is it the PLAYER making the moral choices, or the CHARACTER? The character would have the weight of tradition, community consensus, scripture and revealed religion, precedent and the varying opinions of their teachers at the temple modifying their choices.  What we have is instead a player ungrounded in faith traditions applying modern ethical solutions or personal bias, tempered by thei personal understanding of what it means to be religious, to these judgments.

Fantastic game, interesting questions. Thanks for that!

cj x

[Darren Hill]

(Cross-posted with cj - coincidentally giving a different view.)
I thoroughly enjoyed your actual play write-up, giggling like a loon at parts. I've run this town, and it was fun, but man, I wish I'd had your players. (Not that I dislike mine, of course, but yours seem to have got into the game much more naturally.)
Don't worry about Dogs being the wrong sort of game for this group - it sounds like a perfect fit.
Don't worry about them being bloodthirsty fanatics either - if you can follow the town creation advice, and use the tendencies your players are showing (remember: escalate, escalate, escalate), I think they may surprise you at the moments when they act with humanity.

By the way, O sounds a lot like me. Mainly his love of headtrips and disturbing things and liking for fanatics. If so, he probably wants you to present screwed up situations with no easy answers, and where he can show just how wrong his character is, and feel satisfied when it leads to a bloodbath and his character's doom - or, just maybe, his redemption. (Mind you, I know I'm going on very little here.)

[Levi Kornelsen]

Huh.

The very first thing that my play group gelled on was the decision that in their Dogs universe, the beliefs of the Faith are true and right and just.  And that this is a problem, because those beliefs and human nature don't always fit, and that was totally awesome.

But, you know, I could run a group like this one just as happily, though if they stayed on the same keel, I would gladly have them catch themselves agreeing with cult figures at least once in a while, and realizing it.

[Arturo G.]

Darren said:

Don't worry about them being bloodthirsty fanatics either - if you can follow the town creation advice, and use the tendencies your players are showing (remember: escalate, escalate, escalate), I think they may surprise you at the moments when they act with humanity.

I strongly agree with this. I also need to get more used to this idea for my own play.
It doesn't matter what the Dogs are doing. Just take note and make their decisions harder on the next try. Look for the keys that may activate their opposite feelings. You can probably find a point were they will brake their preconceived ideas about their characters and begin to question themselves. And even if they still take the same kind of actions, it's also right. They have shown how their characters really are.

Cheers,
Arturo

[Wade L]

Well, thank you for the words of encouragement, folks.  If there's a common theme here, it seems to be "Dogs can take care of itself."  I think I may have been so worried about doing Dogs "right" that I'm trying to coddle the game, which probably isn't the best approach, to say the least.  I get worked up about playing Dogs the way it's meant to be played, but if Vincent hasn't sent his goons after me yet, I'm probably safe.  Heh.

So I'll give 'er a try a few more times, I think.  I'll try making up a town of my own for the next one - I'll be sure to post it, and the results I get from playing it, whenever that happens.  I always learn a lot from Actual Play responses.

One thing that did occur to me from the last game(and it made me sort of glad we and the Dogs called it quits before it came up)...  After how the Dogs were acting, I had a hard time not mentally switching the "What they want from the Dogs" for almost every NPC to "Get them to leave town as quickly as possible and not murder us all!"  Which, I'd assume, is a big no-no - and a great way to end up in the situation Arturo speaks about(http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=18240.0), too!

I know I would have a hard time playing the NPCs when my thought was that "any sane, rational person would just lie low and hope the Dogs go away!"  Of course, I can just say the NPCs are hardly rational.  Okay, that works, but it doesn't feel right for all the NPCs.  Suggestions on how to handle that?  My guess now, after the fact, is that the approach is something like "Use the system, dummy!"  So instead of wracking my brains about how Brother Cyrus can get what he wants without the Dogs shooting him dead as a sinner, instead just launch the conflict "Does Br. Cyrus convince you he's true to the Faith?", or even "Does Br. Cyrus get you to refrain from shooting him?"  I suppose even better might be to have him make his case, and just wait for the Dogs to go and shoot him, and then launch those conflicts?  Or just go with the Dogs launching the conflict "Do we kill Br. Cyrus?"  Which really is the same sort of conflict, phrased differently...

Of course, we all know the Dogs will likely win any such conflicts, especially if they team up on him, but that's beside the point.  I guess I just want to try and find ways to play the NPCs that still pursue strongly what they want, but without coming accross as suicidal loons!

[Warren]

In my game, I get around this by remembering that the NPCs will be convinced that they are 'safe' - after all the Dogs are only shooting Sinners, and that's good right?

So they go - well I'm free from Sin*, I have nothing to fear, and they might even help me with X - espically if X is something like "I really think Brother X is making too much money - that's a sure sign of Sorcery, isn't it?". Hence they will still keep on running up to bloodsoaked Dogs however suicidal it may appear.

*Even those who believe in False Prophecy may consider themselves sin-free, as they honestly believe that the False Prophecy is something that is good and proper and sent from the King.

Warren

[Darren Hill]

One thing that did occur to me from the last game(and it made me sort of glad we and the Dogs called it quits before it came up)...  After how the Dogs were acting, I had a hard time not mentally switching the "What they want from the Dogs" for almost every NPC to "Get them to leave town as quickly as possible and not murder us all!"  Which, I'd assume, is a big no-no - and a great way to end up in the situation Arturo speaks about(http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=18240.0), too!

I know I would have a hard time playing the NPCs when my thought was that "any sane, rational person would just lie low and hope the Dogs go away!" 

I'd say it's perfectly okay to have a town react with horror and attempt to persuade the Dogs to change their actions, and even attempt to drive them out of town or kill them. (I've had a town turn against the PCs just like this.) The conflict system handles it just fine.
Conflict, Stakes: Does the Steward persuade you to allow him to set the sentence for the next sinners you find? (Note this doesn't stop escalation occuring in a conflict)
Conflict, Stakes: Does Brother Next-Sinner-On-Your-List convince the witnesses to this execution that you are False Dogs?"
Conflict, Stakes: Does the sorcerer persuade the entire Town to rise up in fear and outrage and drive you out of town?

It's better to show individual (or small groups) of townsfolk losing confidence in the dogs, and set up a conflict to see if the Dogs win them over. If the Dogs lose, the discontent might spread, or that small discontented group might ally themselves with sinners and get possessed, or whatever.

None of these actually block the Dogs from continuing to judge the town.
The 2nd edition of Dogs describes how you can attempt a conflict you failed earlier with the same stakes:

- Its stakes can be the same as the previous conflict’s stakes only if all three of its participants, its stage as set, and its opening arena are different. That is, if your character tries to talk my character into admitting her sin, but fails, you can’t just try again. That conflict’s done. What you have to do if you want a follow-up with the same stakes is come back another time or catch her at some other place, with your friends to back you up — and this time it can’t be just talking.

So, in the extreme case of the entire population rising up and driving the Dogs out of town, the players could set up another conflict outside of town where they attempt to win the confidence of the subset of the town standing guard to make sure they don't return, if they win persuading them to bring the Steward to them. Then get the steward to allow them back into town. And so on - this could be the meat of multiple contests, and it's an extreme case.

You wouldn't want to do this in every town, but given that Dogs pretty much have the dice advantage in every conflict (unless you get silly and say, "well there's 100 people in town, so that's 200 extra d6"), you don't have to fear that you're railroading them or forcing your views on them.
The Dogs would of course be perfectly within their right to say, "the entire town has turned against the faith, burn them!" The next town probably won't be as uppity...