[Chimera] Problems with conflict.

[Keith]

I've been looking at Clyde L. Rhoer's game Outside, http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19187.0 about kids using their imaginations as a form of power, and creating alternate worlds with them, and it made me think about how the game would go with grown-ups as the protagonists - about teenagers and college students and those growing up who are discovering their creativity and artistic side, the adult version of children contending with their thoughts.  I worked out the rough draft for Chimera, in which you play characters who do just that.


Long Story.  Skip down if you want to get straight to the rules.
Essentially, as Chimera's story goes, in late 60's early 70's, the government did experiments on individuals, trying to harness the potential for telepathy and other mental powers.  They kept the project secret and no one knew about it until a bunch of the test subjects escaped.  They told stories of government abductions, men in black who performed cruel experiments and tests on them, and other utter violations of the mind.  They told stories about how their brains had been scrambled, and how some of them could experience synesthesia now, and some had sharper senses, and some could do wondrous things with their minds... but none of them could prove it.  They had the same credibility that backwater hicks claiming to be abducted by UFOs had.  They were lumped in with the other conspiracy theorists.

The government denied it all, of course.  And they spent their lives searching for the escapees.

The government, fooling with powers it knew little of, had actually managed give the subjects' imaginations a voice.  Scientifically, they said it was a combination of several dozens of rumored mental abilities all directed with great ease, but the escaped test subjects knew it as their Chimera - whatever they dreamed and wished would happen, happened.  They imagined great flocks of birds flying through multi-colored skies, and imaginary friends socializing with one another.  All their inner thoughts and whims became creation.

The only catch was, no one else could see it or hear it.  Only those with a Chimera could.  Where the test subjects saw yellow dogs barking and knocking things over, other people just saw things fall over.  They could only see the result, not what caused it.  As such, witnesses brushed it off as smoke and mirrors, trick wires, hidden stage hands manipulating things.  It was a long stretch from the truth, but it made everyone a little more comfortable with what they saw.

Some of the test subjects who didn't escape submitted to the government.  In their prisons, they developed their powers, and bit their teeth, seething with hatred and contempt for what had been done to them, for being stolen and tortured day after day.  They created avatars of spite, malice, and suffering in their imaginations.  They called these avatars the Lies.  They fed power to the Lies, and made them stronger - for the government kept the prisoners medicated and weak, and drugged them up to keep them from using their powers against them - externally.  They had no idea the power was still going on internally.  The prisoners learned from the Lies in their mind, learned that a force called the Unreality, which had existed since man knew how to think and dream, gave birth to the Chimera, and that the government testing had just forced it to emerge.  The Lies told the prisoners that the Unreality grants them all their amazing abilities, but that it also keeps the Lies from manifesting into real forms, which is what they wanted.  They helped the prisoners escape, and showed them how to break the Unreality - stifle creation, banish imagination, make the artistic suffer and the banal king.  For the Lies were strong, living batteries of power, and they alone could fuel the prisoners, even if the Unreality was broken.  The prisoners nicknamed themselves the Silencers, with vows to silence art in all its forms, and destroy the others who harnessed the Chimera, in gratitude to their newfound masters.

Meanwhile, the escaped test subjects had no way to prove their Chimeras were real.  If they exposed themselves too much, the government might hear of it, and come look for them.  They changed their names, hid their families.  Cut off all their old ties.  And they tried to hide their powers.

For a few decades, they were successful.  Then they had children.

The Chimera passed on through heredity.  The children grew up, went off to high school, and each learned they had their own unique power which their parents kept secret from them.  It was hidden from sight from those without the Chimera, and the new batch found wisdom in keeping it secret, especially when they started to notice men in black coats drive by their houses at night.

The new holders of the Chimera called themselves the Newfound.  Their parents scramble to hide them away, the government seeks to continue its experiments and silence those could reveal it, and the Silencers gave birth to a new generation fed from the Lies, all following the same goal - stifle art, and kill the Newfound.

The Rules
Here's where things are getting sticky.  How it works is that everyone gets these small slips of paper, and everyone writes down one word each on each slip of paper.  These slips are all mixed up in a hat, or bowl, or something like that, and then when the players go to use their Chimera, they draw a certain number of words at random from the mix.  They get to make a certain number of statements equal to the number of words they drew, and they have to incorporate each word into the description of their imaginary powers.  Here's a quick demonstration to show you the specifics.

Step One - the GM announces a conflict.  A conflict counts as anything that the players can't do on their own, and thus need to use their Chimeras to help them.  The GM describes the situation that poses the problem.

GM: "Across the street, you hear gunshots - police cars flock around the First National bank, and inside, you can see masked robbers holding several hostages.  One of them is holding one and has a gun to her head.  The robbers go about piling money from the vaults into their bags, while the police negotiator yells orders through a megaphone.  You hear that the SWAT team is on its way, but it doesn't seem the hostages have much time - a gunshot, and then the woman falls over, bleeding.  The man quickly grabs another hostage."

Step Two - each player writes down five words that have something to do with what the GM just described.  They write each word on a separate slip of paper.  For this scenario, they may write "dollar," "arrest," "captive," "bullet", things of that nature, which all have to do with what was just said.  The players shouldn't use words that were actually mentioned, but should find synonyms.  They then fold the slips of paper and mix them all up together in a bowl.  This mixture of words is called the Lexicon.

Step Three - each player determines initiative.  Each player draws one word, and the GM does too, and the player closest to the letter A goes first.  Initiative goes in alphabetical order.  They then mix these words back into the Lexicon.

Step Four - the players take turns doing their actions.  Player three goes first (he got "cuffs").  He declares who he is targeting - in this case, the bank robbers.  Since the bank robbers are controlled by the GM, Player three is targeting the GM.  Both Player three and the GM draw five words.  They reveal them to each other, one at a time, comparing words.  They compare one word versus one word, and whoever got the closest to A gets one Success.  Then they go to the next word, and look for another Success.  They continue through all five words, and the person with the most successes is the winner.

Example: Player three draws five words, "danger," "pistol," "sneaky," "news," and "car".  The GM's five words are "safe," "quarter," "siren," "threat," and "innocent".  Neither player looks at their words yet, they simply draw them, so neither player knows they have the words they have.  They both pick one and put them side by side, and unfold them.

The GM opens "threat".  Player three opens "pistol".  Pistol starts with P, and threat starts with T.  P is closer to A than T, so Player three gets one success.
Next, the GM opens "safe".  Player three opens "sneaky."  Both start with an S, so they move to the next letter - the A from Safe beats the N from Sneaky, so the GM gets this one.
They continue, and player three wins. (Danger beats Innocent, Car beats Quarter, and News beats Siren).
The used papers, even the Successes, are then folded again and mixed back up in the Lexicon.

Step Five - the winning player gets to draw a number of words equal to the number of Successes he just gained (in the above case, four).  He can look at them now.  He also gets to make four statements (he can make a number of statements equal to his Successes).  A statement is a quick, open-ended, general action.  It has to be open enough to counter, defend against, or contradict, and can only focus on one main subject (such as an NPC) or several insignificant subjects (background noises, extras who don't matter and won't contribute, etc.)  The player gets to choose what his action is, based off the words.  He does not have to use a word per statement - he can use the words however he wants, in whatever statement(s) he wants, and can even change their form and tense (such as changing "car" to "cars", or "run" to "ran").  If the word can be used as a different type of word, such as a noun also able to be used as an adjective, then changing the form is allowed as well (changing "fast" as in speed into "fast" as in not eating, for example).  Clever word play, if agreed upon by everyone, is also allowed.

Example: Player three's four words are "car," "safe," "adrenaline," and "nerves".  He makes the following four statements, directing the flow of his attack.
1. Thomas [his character] stares forward, past the barricaded police cars.
2. His adrenaline is pumping, and he wants to make sure the hostages are safe.
3. He glares hard at one of the bank robbers, starting to make the man's skin feel tingly.
3. He makes the man's nerves start to expand and contract, causing his body to go haywire.

Notice how, even though severe alteration was done to that NPC, his fate was still left open - maybe the power stops in a few seconds, or maybe the man finds some way to evade it.  Also notice the focus of each statement to a certain subject.  The drawn words do not have to be that subject, but they can be.

Step Six - the words are discarded, and the next player takes his action starting at Step Four.

Now, here's the problem - I don't know how to end it.  How do you know when the conflict ends?  It's set up in such a way as to be able to easily reverse what was done by another player, and easy to continue and counter, and I can't really find a way to end it.  Also, with the players drawing words for their actions, the available words will deplete fast - how can I get a steady stream of words added?

Another neat thing I added is Bursts.  I'm not sure how these are created yet, or who creates them, but they work like this - instead of a word, it's a short phrase instructing the player to behave in a certain odd way.  It's a bad thing, and hurts the character's ability to get successes that scene, and to do things.  It represents a "hiccup" in the Chimera, a bizarre mutation or abnormality that screws things up for a bit.  How it works is you take one of these three actions:

"Act it out..."
"Draw it out..."
"Sing it out..."

Then add a Complication (a finish to the statement) such as, "...like a duck."  So, for example, you could have "Act it out like a duck," and both the character and the player would have to act out their actions as a duck, waddling and quacking.  Yep, even the player!  These are written on the same slips of paper as the words, so you can't tell which is a Burst and which is a word.  I don't know exactly how Bursts are put into the Lexicon, how new ones are made, or what penalties they provide yet, so if anyone has any suggestions for that, too, that'd be helpful.  Again, they represent the Chimera going haywire.  (Also, draw it out means that instead of talking or gesturing, you have to draw everything, like in Pictionary).

In summary: How do I keep words in the Lexicon while they're being actively spent, how do I end a conflict, and how can I use Bursts?

Wow, that post was longer than I expected.  Thank you for reading it, and all suggestions are welcome!  For those of you who read my post on my other game, Neverwake, that game is pretty much done, and just needs to have a few odds and ends typed up, in case any of you were wondering ;-)

Thanks again!

- Keith.

[Paul Strack]

Some random ideas:

After the contest (Step 4), why discard and redraw new words (Step 5)? Why not have the player keep a number of words equal to their successes, and use those for the narration. For variety, let the player/GM keep any of the words, not necessary the "victorous" words. That way you won't skew the narration to be so alphabetical.

As for ending the conflict, how about when you run out of words? In particular, when the 5 word per GM/player exhausts the lexicon, that ends the conflict. This also mitigates the benefit of going first. If you are first, you get to frame the initial action and get a better selection of words, but if you are last, you are likelier to finish the scene.

Some quick numbers: Say you have 4 players + the GM. Each puts in 5 words. That's 25 words. 4 words get used for "initiative" (21 left). You will use up 3-5 words per "round". After about 3 rounds, you will have 10 or fewer words left in the lexicon, so that the 4th round ends the conflict. That ends up being roughly 1 round per player before you run out.

I am pretty sure with 5 words per player + GM, it works out to roughly 1 round per player regardless of the number of players. You could have longer conflict by adding more words.

As for bursts ... you could have each player add 1 to the lexicon. During conflict (Step 4) they count as failures against normal words. Burst vs. burst is still resolved alphabetically. If you manage to win the conflict, you have to keep at least one burst, and make it one of the "words" in your narration.

[Keith]

After the contest (Step 4), why discard and redraw new words (Step 5)? Why not have the player keep a number of words equal to their successes, and use those for the narration. For variety, let the player/GM keep any of the words, not necessary the "victorious" words. That way you won't skew the narration to be so alphabetical.

Good point.  From now on, the words that give you your Successes are the words you use.

As for ending the conflict, how about when you run out of words? In particular, when the 5 word per GM/player exhausts the lexicon, that ends the conflict. This also mitigates the benefit of going first. If you are first, you get to frame the initial action and get a better selection of words, but if you are last, you are likelier to finish the scene.

I'm thinking something the lines of this, but a little differently - I don't want it to end because of not having any words.  I want it to end because the players solved the problem - but I still want the word-drawing and mechanics involved.  I think what I'll end up doing is giving the conflict itself a set number of... something.  We'll just say a Conflict Number.  When the players make statements, it lowers the Conflict Number.  When the CN hits 0, the conflict ends.

When the GM beats the player and gets the chance to narrate, this adds +1 to the CN, regardless of how many statements the GM gets to make.  And, whoever lowers the CN to zero gets to narrate what happens to the parties involved in the conflict.

As for bursts ... you could have each player add 1 to the lexicon. During conflict (Step 4) they count as failures against normal words. Burst vs. burst is still resolved alphabetically. If you manage to win the conflict, you have to keep at least one burst, and make it one of the "words" in your narration.

That sounds good.  Burst vs. Burst, I'll count as no Success for either side - failure versus failure.  If a Burst is drawn, you use it in your narration.  Good so far =D.

I'm still open to more suggestions while I work this thing out, though.  All feedback is appreciated!

[Thunder_God]

What if someone's successes leave only Bursts in his Word pool?

[Clyde L. Rhoer]

Hi Keith,

First I want to say, what you have sounds really awesome! I love the color and mechanics.

Here is a couple ideas about bursts.

• Bursts could allow a player to draw a new hand of words.
• Bursts could add new words to the pool.
• Bursts could allow the player to draw extra words from the bowl so they can stack their hand.
• Bursts could allow the player to make or draw a pool of words, that they can use to replace a word in their hand.
• All the above

I think the key should be that Bursts should be something the player intiates to receive a benefit. This would allow players who are more willing to be strange or creative an advantage. This would also make being strange or silly a choice and not force. Also I think Bursts should have a chance of drawing the attention of nearby Men in Black, or Liars. This will hopefully keep anyone from taking advantage of Bursts to Prima Donna.

I've got a couple of questions also. You show in your example that the winning player leaves their narration open. What I don't see is a rule that enforces that, an explanation of what is meant by leaving the narration open, or an an explanation of why I want to leave the narration open. Would the situation still be open if I used the nerves of one Robber to shoot another Robber in the head? Would having a Robber shoot at another, but leaving the result of what happens to those bullets open be more what you are going for?

I understand that you're just giving an example so you may have parts of your ideas for the game that you haven't revealed yet, but what about the scene creation engages the players in the situation that the GM creates? What about the game causes me as a player to want to care about the bank robbery? This maybe an unfair question at this point, it was the first thing I thought of when you described the GM creating a scene.

As far as scene's ending what are you wanting to achieve with having the scene end? What I mean is- there seems to be two choices you can be trying to achieve. The first is to have a sense of completeness. All the players are satisfied that they got to do what they wanted. If so the scene can be complete when everyone agrees it's complete and you can refill the bowl as needed like say a deck of cards. The second is to ramp up tension. This choice would be saying, hurry, you only have so long to get it done. Then I think the idea of the scene being over when the bowl is depleted is best. However this could lead to some sense of bitterness in some situations I think, so maybe there can be a mechanic that has some semi-important to important cost that can extend a scenes length.

[Keith]

I think the key should be that Bursts should be something the player intiates to receive a benefit.

I agree.  I've changed up the rules now, just a bit, but I think it covers pretty much all bases.

Conflicts are assigned a Conflict Number.  This starts at 15, and each complication or layer of complexity added to the situation adds another 3 points.  Bonuses or advantages your characters may have over the situation take away 2 points.  So for example, if you're in a conflict involving a large-scale gunfight, your CN starts at 15.  Then the GM adds +3 points because it's "dangerous to move around", and another +3 because there are "lots of enemies".  Then, players get a -2 because "there are plenty of places to take cover."  Thus, it becomes 15+3+3-2=19.  Group consensus dictates if the bonuses and penalties stick or not.

Anyway, once you have your CN, everyone draws initiative as detailed in the above post (everyone goes in alphabetical order).  Then, you mix your initiative words back in the Lexicon.  Then, the player describes what he wants to do.  A loose, sketchy idea, not involving the Chimera - just something like, "I want to knock the gun out of his hand," or, "I want to get that window across the room open."  He doesn't say how yet - that's what the word drawing is for. 

Then, the player and the GM draw five words.  Compare words, one at a time.  Successes are the words that are closest to A alphabetically, as detailed in the above post.  You keep the words of yours that were Successes, and use those in your Narration.  Each Statement you make (equal to your Successes) takes -1 off of the CN.  When the CN reaches 0, the players win the conflict and get to narrate what happens with what was at stake - what they were trying to do.  If the GM gets Successes, these are added to the CN.  If the CN ever reaches twice its initial number (for example, a CN of 20x2=40), the GM wins and gets to decide what happens to the stakes.

Used words are set to the side.  When the Lexicon is empty, the used words are replaced, re-mixed, and the conflict starts over.

If a Burst is drawn, it counts as an automatic Success.  If it comes to Burst vs. Burst, that's a Success for either side.  Also, what Bursts do, is let you take your total Successes gained that turn, and multiply them by two - this includes the Success gained from the Burst.  You only get this bonus for acting out the Bursts instructions for the rest of the conflict.

Bursts are discarded permanently once used, however.  Once a new Conflict starts, the old words are discarded, and new ones are added to the Lexicon.  New Bursts are also added - this means that each Conflict will start with the same number of words in the Lexicon.

I understand that you're just giving an example so you may have parts of your ideas for the game that you haven't revealed yet, but what about the scene creation engages the players in the situation that the GM creates? What about the game causes me as a player to want to care about the bank robbery? This maybe an unfair question at this point, it was the first thing I thought of when you described the GM creating a scene.

The bank robbery was just an example - the Conflicts used within the game will most likely revolve around things:

• engaging in combat / conflict with another User (someone who can use the Chimera).
• repairing the Unreality (the force of Unreality can break, and this = bad.  The players will encounter bizarre, freak occurrences at places where the Unreality is damaged, and will have to deal with it - maybe even odd creations crafted by the rampant Unreality).
• deal with those who have been touched by the Unreality (when the Unreality is harmed, it usually finds a person or subject to attach itself to.  When it does this, it tries to create the Chimera in them - yet some minds are unable to handle it.  It's a 50 / 50 shot, but either the person becomes a new User and needs to be monitored by the players to make sure he doesn't mess up, or his imagination can't handle it and he starts causing random disasters: uncontrollable fires, telekinesis, physical mutations.)
• deal with the Lies and the Liars (I like that term better, thanks Clyde!) who try to destroy Unreality in order to bring the Lies into existence.
• deal with the Collectors (the men in black) who are attracted to the Chimera being used, and try to find and nab Users.

You show in your example that the winning player leaves their narration open. What I don't see is a rule that enforces that, an explanation of what is meant by leaving the narration open, or an an explanation of why I want to leave the narration open. Would the situation still be open if I used the nerves of one Robber to shoot another Robber in the head? Would having a Robber shoot at another, but leaving the result of what happens to those bullets open be more what you are going for?

The narration is left open so that other players and the GM can easily contribute to what you've done.  If it's left unanswered and vague, they can counter it, manipulate it, add to it, etc.  It's the difference between saying, "I stab him with a ghost sword," and, "I create a ghost sword and heave it at his chest."  In the first example, that's it - the guy's stabbed and dead.  In the last one, the next player gets a chance to do things with the sword, or change the scene further, to do other things with the guy or the sword.  And also, the GM has the option, if he wins with the most Successes, to make the guy duck or avoid the blow somehow.  It's like in D&D when you say, "I swing my sword at him," then you roll to see if you hit.  You can't say for sure if you did or not, but you can declare, basically, what's going on.  In this sense, the other players and the GM act as the dice roll to see if you scored a hit.

In general, anything that would drastically alter the scene or conflict ("a yeti appears and eats the whole army", "the landslide traps all the killers in the warehouse with no way out"), kill another character, or create an advantage as such that players can't work with it ("sorry, I made a magic shield cover him that stops your attack," "both your arms become lumps of cement and you can't change it") have to either be discarded, or re-worked so that the other players can counter or manipulate them further.  As a general rule, creations and alterations made with the Chimera only last for a few turns / a few minutes.

General response round-up:

After the contest (Step 4), why discard and redraw new words (Step 5)? Why not have the player keep a number of words equal to their successes, and use those for the narration.

I have no idea, but I changed it.  Thank you - it was the most practical change I could make.

What if someone's successes leave only Bursts in his Word pool?

This left me as unanswerable at first, but then this combined with Clyde's post made me change the Bursts to being good things.

That's the system so far.  How does it sound?  Thanks again for the feedback!

[Thunder_God]

Used words are set to the side. When the Lexicon is empty, the used words are replaced, re-mixed, and the conflict starts over.

You mean it begins from the top all over again or it is resumed?

[Clyde L. Rhoer]

I don't have any additional comments at the moment, but I'd recommend checking out the movies, Scanners, and Dreamscape. These movies don't deal with teens, but do deal with people who have strange powers, and shadowy government folks.

[Keith]

You mean it begins from the top all over again or it is resumed?

Once a word is used, it's set to the side.  When there's no more words to use, all the set aside words are put back in the Lexicon, re-mixed, and the Conflict continues.  It's resumed.

[Thunder_God]

and the Conflict continues.  It's resumed.

This is what I was looking for, it could use re-clarification in the text.

Seems okay from a read-only view of things.

[Paul Strack]

Each Statement you make (equal to your Successes) takes -1 off of the CN.  When the CN reaches 0, the players win the conflict and get to narrate what happens with what was at stake - what they were trying to do.  If the GM gets Successes, these are added to the CN.  If the CN ever reaches twice its initial number (for example, a CN of 20x2=40), the GM wins and gets to decide what happens to the stakes.

Your revisions seems sound to me except for this part. With a high CN, it could literally take hundreds of draws for one side or another to get enough of an advantage to resolve the conflict. Theoretically, it is possible to have conflicts that never resolve. If you want to stick with this mechanic, you should lower the CN to make resolution likelier (in the neighborhood of 10, maybe?).

Personally, I prefer mechanics where the situation always resolves in a determinate amount of time. I would suggest making it a race: each side keeps a success tally and the first side whose total reaches the CN wins.