[Trickster] Power 19

[ObLaDan]

So.  After lurking here for quite a while, I gave in to temptation.  This is my first try at making a game.  Inspirations include Southwest Native American folklore (Coyote) and Jim Henson's The Storyteller (The Soldier and Death).

Trickster

1.) What is your game about?
Folk heroes (of the Coyote and Anansi variety) creatively using the means available to them to make it big, possibly failing in drastic and humiliating ways.

2.) What do the characters do?
The characters lie and cheat in order to steal each other's stuff.  For now, "stuff" is the official game term for any genre appropriate tool the PCs use to get what they want.  Magic rope, the love of the Queen, musical skill, whatever.  They use their stuff to get more stuff, and eventually use all of their stuff in one elaborate plan to get the win condition (the hand of the princess, forty barrels of gold, whatever).

3.) What do the players (including the GM if there is one) do?
They compete amongst themselves for stuff through a system that encourages (essentially requires) bluffing.  Then they're forced to use all of the stuff in their endgame narration.  If they can't, or if the other players manage to sabotage the attempt, they get significant setbacks and have to catch up with everyone else (or watch as second place wins).

4.) How does your setting (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?
I might come up with an "official" setting, but for now I think I'll let the players wing it.

5.) How does the Character Creation of your game reinforce what your game is about?
Each player takes one to three 3x5 note cards and writes stuff on them.  That's their character's stuff.   I'm thinking about letting people define their characters with a few traits, but stuff is the most important thing.  Theoretically, this will make how the characters achieve their goals a more involved part of the game.

6.) What types of behaviors/styles of play does your game reward?
Lying (and maybe cheating).  The kind of scams that only show up in folk tales and urban legends.

7.) How are behaviors and styles of play rewarded or punished in your game?
Bluffing is the only way to succeed.  Creative and intricate plans are required to win.

8.) How are the responsibilities of narration and credibility divided in your game?
Players take turns going clockwise around the table, narrating their character's attempts at stealing the other characters stuff, or (maybe) getting entirely new stuff by stealing it from an NPC.  Players have control over their own characters, and control of any NPCs or obstacles that show up in a turn is randomly determined (but you can't play them during your own turn).

9.) What does your game do to command the players' attention, engagement, and participation?
Players are competing with each other.  There's some natural tension created by bluffing.

10.) What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?
I'd like the basic mechanic to be based on the card game Bullshit.  For those who don't know, going clockwise around the table (and in numerical order of the cards), you place a number of cards from your hand facedown in the middle of the table, and say what they are (eg. "two threes").  If no one calls bullshit, they stay; if someone does call bullshit, the cards are revealed, and if you told the truth, the accuser takes the pile, and if you lied, you take the pile.  Winner is the first to run out of cards.  Some folks allow cheating - saying "two threes" and putting down three cards, the top two of which are threes.

In BS, you deal out the entire deck.  I'm not sure whether I should do that, or have some cards dealt out at the beginning of each conflict.  There's also the option of having multiple decks involved somehow.  Maybe you make an attempt at the win condition when you run out of cards, and on a failed attempt you draw a new hand from a new deck.

11.) How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?
Lying helps you win. 

12.) Do characters in your game advance? If so, how?
In the short term, characters advance by accumulating stuff.  More stuff helps you win, but makes narration more complicated.

Characters can also advance by getting away with lying, which gives their players a smaller hand.  I'm thinking there's going to be some kind of table (ugh, yeah, I know) that increases the penalty for calling BS on someone with a small hand, or someone using their stuff in the conflict.

13.) How does the character advancement (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?
There's no long term character growth - as supported by the source material.  The way stuff acts in the endgame reinforces characters actually pulling off the unbelievably intricate tricks that they try.

14.) What sort of effect do you want your game to produce for the players?
Intrigue and back-stabbing, ala Risk.  Anticipation from wondering whether your bluff will be called.  The thrill of getting away with something that you're not supposed to.

15.) What areas of your game receive extra attention and color? Why?
The endgame mechanic is going to have to be really tight, and I intend to fill the text with as good of examples as I can come up with.

16.) Which part of your game are you most excited about or interested in? Why?
The endgame mechanic.  I love the idea of having everything you've done so far in the game become part of one insane plan.  Unfortunately, it's not developed very much yet.  I'd like there to be some way for other players to have an effect on the success or failure of the attempt.

17.) Where does your game take the players that other games can't, don't, or won't?
Crazy impossible plans that work.  Bluffing as a part of the system.

There was a 24-hour rpg called "Affairs of State", or something like that, that had a similar idea of making bluffing part of the system, but I think I've diverged enough to merit a new game.

18.) What are your publishing goals for your game?
A PDF and a book through Lulu (under Creative Commons).  Maybe free in html format.

19.) Who is your target audience?
People who enjoy folktales.  People who enjoy bluffing games.


Questions:

Any ideas on how to implement the BS system and the endgame would be welcome.

Does it need a GM?  I don't think so, but I have no idea whether the system will encourage player generated adversity enough.

I need to come up with a way for stuff and traits to affect the outcome of conflicts.  It might be fun to have them just deter challengers by upping the penalty for calling a bluff wrong, but I still need a specific way to implement this.

I love the deal making and breaking of games like Risk.  Should I try to incorporate that into this game, or would that be too many things in one game?

Thanks for your time!

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

The characters lie and cheat in order to steal each other's stuff.  For now, "stuff" is the official game term for any genre appropriate tool the PCs use to get what they want.  Magic rope, the love of the Queen, musical skill, whatever.  They use their stuff to get more stuff, and eventually use all of their stuff in one elaborate plan to get the win condition (the hand of the princess, forty barrels of gold, whatever).

-How do you help the players decide what the charcters want? What happens when they get it?

I might come up with an "official" setting, but for now I think I'll let the players wing it.

-A setting doesn't have to be a specific time or place.  But some info on beliefs, geography, religion, and such would be helpful to the players, I'm sure.  I encourage you to include such thing to give them better handles to grab on to as they play.  Especially the first time around.

Each player takes one to three 3x5 note cards and writes stuff on them.  That's their character's stuff.   I'm thinking about letting people define their characters with a few traits, but stuff is the most important thing.  Theoretically, this will make how the characters achieve their goals a more involved part of the game.

-How are players limited to how much or how little stuff they can start with?  How does stuff affect contests and conflicts?

Lying (and maybe cheating). 

-That's cool!  But I wonder what sort of mechanics you have to make sure that the characters' lying and cheating doesn't break down into the players lying and cheating?  The characters can be all sorts of underhanded, but the players still need to abide by the rules, IMO.

Players take turns going clockwise around the table, narrating their character's attempts at stealing the other characters stuff, or (maybe) getting entirely new stuff by stealing it from an NPC.  Players have control over their own characters, and control of any NPCs or obstacles that show up in a turn is randomly determined (but you can't play them during your own turn).

-Just to be sure, there's no GM, right?

I'd like the basic mechanic to be based on the card game Bullshit.

-Ha! I love it! That's great! LOL

In BS, you deal out the entire deck.  I'm not sure whether I should do that, or have some cards dealt out at the beginning of each conflict.

-Start with just a set number of cards.  Say sever or so per player.  This way, you can make mechanics that force them to draw more- which is a kind of set back in a way.

The endgame mechanic is going to have to be really tight, and I intend to fill the text with as good of examples as I can come up with.

-Yeah, at least two or three examples.

A PDF and a book through Lulu (under Creative Commons).  Maybe free in html format.

-Very TSOY.  Nice.

Peace,

-Troy

[ObLaDan]

At this point the game is muddled ideas flying around my brain.  I'll do my best to explain.

-How do you help the players decide what the charcters want? What happens when they get it?

All player characters want the win condition.  The win condition is defined by the group before play (and character creation).  When they get it, that player wins.

-How are players limited to how much or how little stuff they can start with?  How does stuff affect contests and conflicts?

I don't have much in the way of a conflict resolution system right now.  It's a pretty important decision to put off, isn't it?  ;)  I need think about this, I'll post later.

-That's cool!  But I wonder what sort of mechanics you have to make sure that the characters' lying and cheating doesn't break down into the players lying and cheating?  The characters can be all sorts of underhanded, but the players still need to abide by the rules, IMO.

By cheating, I meant only the multiple-card dropping from BS.  If that's included in the game text at all, it'll be as an optional rule.

-Just to be sure, there's no GM, right?

Yeah, if I can get away with it.  Which I think I can.

-Very TSOY.  Nice.

You noticed!

Thanks for your feedback.  I'll return when I have a conflict resolution system that's more than "play BS and pretend you're folk heroes."