[Henbane] play test

[Chad]

OK we had our first full group play-test of Henbane last night, and I can honestly say, it was a lot of fun.  It was disturbing and hilarious all at the same time. I'm jazzed.

The Characters:

There were four players, and myself as GF. They decided to pass as a a troupe of entertainers who travel from village to village in a small caravan, putting on shows and such - to cover up their true purpose - witchcraft!
Marisa, played Martja Shadow Smyter; a puppeteer who delights in frightening small children with her fiendish puppets, She decided to make a puppet here familiar, which rocked. Christof, played Elija false-foot; a truly 'flamboyant' [read camp] acrobat and juggler, with a small jacket wearing monkey, as familiar, (called Chi-Chi). Paul played Henna Greedigut - a cheerful cook, who loves nothing more than feeding pies that contain the villagers own children, back to the villagers. She has an er.. tapeworm has her familiar and managed, on several occasions, to plausibly include it in her activities. Totally gross but funny. Then there was the surly Mr Dark Tune. A pied piper/ story-teller type character that was musical accompaniment for the party.
The Wyrding Scene:
The Wyrding Scene worked much as I had hoped, and within minutes the players were bickering about who's evil plot should be executed. Although they were reluctant to add to wyrding, at that point. I think this was purely because they were new to the game and were feeling unsure how to proceed so left it to me. I think next time will be different.
In the visionary montage I included Rev, Ezekiel, lustfully eyeballing a mute girl. A kindly village herbalist, who's herbal remedies were especially potent, due to the prayers that accompany them. A dark staircase, and some general geography, as well as a glimpse of a nobleman who lived in a fort nearby.
They players decided that the herbalist would be their greatest obstacle and the Rev. Ezekiel their best aid. They planned to turn the village against her, using the Rev - then to expose the Rev for molesting the mute girl.

The Game:

At day break they marched over the village bridge, music and fan-fair - acrobat in the lead, juggling and dancing to, ehem.. the Chicago theme tune played by the piper. Followed by the puppeteer with a marionette in each hand, dancing along - delighting parents and snarling at small children. Henna greedigut followed in tow with a platter of seductive cookies, for the crowd (laced with tapeworm eggs). Much excitement and jubilation. The Rev, Ezekiel quickly brought the joy to an end - proclaiming it to be sinful, unGoodly merriment, the crowd disbanded reluctantly. Leaving the Rev. glaring at the crew of entertainers. Some conflict followed - but the players won and managed feed the Rev. Ezekiel a cupcake. He let them stay for the night. Pretty soon they were entertaining the village with puppet shows, music and tricks.
Paul (Henna greedigut) decided that she would work some witchcraft, using the cupcake the reverend had eaten. A hunger spell that could only be sated by more cupcakes. A really interesting conflict followed. The Rev alone in the rectory trying to find something to fill the burning hunger that now consumed him, after a lot of bread water and prayers, he realized - cupcakes! those delicious cupcakes.
That part of the game marked a certain level of excitement in the player group as they saw how the mechanics could be engaged, in an interesting narrative episode without their actual character presence. Soon the Rev was on their doorstep, begging for more cupcakes (Consuming Hunger +2 consequence) Anything for more. Using this leverage and innuendo they managed to convince him that that the village herbalist was spreading rumors that he had been touching the mute girl. How did she know? She must be a witch.
After a hair raising spiritual battle, framing of an attempted murder and much incitement of fear and frenzy; soon the village have the (previously loved) herbalist on a stake with the Rev preaching death. All the while Henna greedigut is feeding them pies stuffed with village children, who they haven't in all the excitement, missed yet.
As she goes up in flames, a tongue loosening spell is unleashed and the mute girl yells rape at volumes that only a voice that has been muted for a lifetime can attain....
Im not going to go into the rest, a lot happened - but I am sure you get the picture.

The problems and good stuff:

There were some major problems with the card economy of the game, things I didn't pick up before during the smaller tests. There just aren't enough cards in a deck to maintain the 'ongoing hand' that I wanted. In fact, the notion off a hand of cards that will be maintained for the duration of the game is just ridiculous because within three conflicts everyone's hand was so full of cards the odds just became insane - major oversight. This was easily fixed: after each conflict is resolved all the cards are shuffled back into the deck. Each conflict begins with a new hand which is maintained only for the duration of the conflict.  (I am starting a new thread about card dynamics in First Thoughts to examine the card economy)
The feedback from players was amazing. Despite the card problems initially, they were totally buzzed.
I noticed we forgot to include a wyrding element (the dark staircase). And wonder if there isnt a way to incentivize the inclusion of a Wyrding Fragment during player created scene setup. Also the familiars were totally marginalized in play - amounting to little more that charsheet values for Dark Coins. This bothers me.
The escalation mechanics worked much better than I anticipated. Coupled with the 'discovery draw' it created a level of complexity and unpredictability that had some totally unexpected, results. I think Wits and Gall need to be switched, so that Gall is at the very bottom of the conflict ladder. This is because the players seemed to want to attempt to Wits conflicts but were disinclined to do so because the 'trumping' card rule becomes disabled when you step down. I think if Gall is at the bottom, it will allow players to escalate to Wits - giving them more options before attempting dangerous magic.

[Chad]

OK, so we had our first full group play-test for Henbane. It was a lot of fun. You can read about it here in Playtesting : http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19516.0

Some cool stuff happened, and I am very pleased; but my "player and GF will maintain a hand of cards for the duration of the game" thing is totally broken! I didn't pick it up in the smaller tests, but with the full compliment of players, for the sustained play of a session it soon became clear that the idea was silly. The deck was running out of cards and some player hands had 12 -15+ cards in a hand! Not good.

The problem is easily remedied; instead of an ongoing hand, the cards are shuffled back into the deck at the end of each conflict. So, each conflict begins with a fresh hand. Players, may however, keep drama cards earned, until these are played. So those folks who were considering running a game (Chris, Ivan), please be ware of this, rather serious, bug - I will update the Beta PDF to reflect it asap.

Some other interesting things also came to light. I am not sure if they are good or bad, and more than likely will depend on the groups preference.
Firstly; when playing from a single deck, and because of the native conflict 'trumping' cards rule - it soon became clear to my players that if you have the ace of cups (or swords or whatever). You are guaranteed a win. During play, I would be met with sly grins as players discovered an ace in the deck - knowing with certainty they would win the next round.
Well, almost. They win if I don't escalate! Which I did every so often -just to keep them on their toes. Of course, that new ace of cups is worthless against sword card during a hand conflict.
Now this doesn't bother me that much. I actually (after some thought) I find this kinda cool. It might bother some GM's, that players have an advantage of this kind. What do you think?
There is a solution to this problem, if it is a problem. - A second deck of cards. The GF has his own separate deck - effectively doubling up the aces in the game, along with everything. The player will know they don't have the only card of a sort. I don't like the solution very much, because it means the expense of a second tarot deck. Perhaps as an optional rule?

The Discovery Mechanic:
(previously discussed here: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=19422.0)

I tried both ways, and Marks method became hard to implement, because when I did get the king or queen in my hand, the conflict would end before I used it, or I just didn't get my hands on it at all. Such a pity, I thought it was well integrated. The draw variation however, worked and was visible - immediate cause and effect. The agenda got changed on one occasion to "are the witches exposed?". They managed to avert it luckily. This had a positive impact - player became a lot smarter looking for ways to manipulate rather than resorting to sweeping, or obvious magical effects.
I do feel that using the native 'trump' cards for the discovery is too harsh. I think, having a discovery happen if a King or Queen card of any suit come up will be a bit fairer. Alternatively, I have been thinking of illustrating a custom Henbane Tarot deck at some point. In which case I could create additional 'witchfynder cards' that are shuffled into the deck...Although I don't want to create a proprietary deck, or anything like that - it might be a nice touch.

[Ron Edwards]

Hiya,

What do you think of this idea?

Don't re-shuffle the cards after every conflict, but do discard all hands at that point. Draw from the deck for the next conflict, and continue in this fashion.

In other words, work through the entire deck before re-shuffling the used cards.

What I'm really talking about is a pretty fundamental existing dichotomy in hand-based card games. On the one side, when cards are fully re-combined between every time the players get a new hand, the probabilities for what you'll get as a draw are the same for every round, i.e. every set of hands in opposition at any one time. With a 52-card poker deck, you know that every time you get a hand, there's 4/52 kings in there, for instance.

On the other side, when utilized cards from a given hand are discarded but not returned the deck immediately, the probabilities are different. For one thing, obviously, the later hands are drawing from a skewed distribution. For another, the group will collectively see every card in the deck from the moment the full deck is started until the moment it's all used up. In other words, again using a standard deck as an example just because it's easy, at some point the Queen of Spades will enter play at least as an option.

It seems to me that with two full Tarot decks, that's a lot of diversity ... and it might be neat to allow later hands to be working with more constrained subsets of the deck, instead of the same chance for (for instance) Death to appear occurring in each and every draw.

Best, Ron

[Ron Edwards]

You'll see that I just merged the First Thoughts thread into this one. First time I've tried that, and it works ...

It was a bit cavalier to do it without asking you, Chad, but really, I think we can have a full-bore cards/play discussion right here, using your playtest as a starter, without retrograding back into First Thoughts. No big deal.

Best, Ron

[Chad]

Hi Ron,

Thats a very interesting option to explore. It would create a more 'structured' cycle in the game, as everyone worked through the deck. Also if an ace of some kind gets played out, everyone will know thats the last time they will see, say, an ace of cups until the deck has run out, which might be a very good thing. Play would become a lot more considered. In addition, I think those kinds of cycles could become really interesting in and of themselves, as each would create an entirely different flow of chance in the game. As you say, with the shuffled deck, after each conflict, the odds would remain much the same each time cards are drawn. Very cool.

Thanks!

[Joe J Prince]

Hi everyone

Henbane is looking great. A tapeworm as a familiar - genius.

I'm certain two tarot decks are the way to go. What would be ideal would be an inexpensive pdf tarot deck you could print more than once. There's gotta be one out there somewhere...;-)
Bwahaha, my ridiculously circuitous plan has come to fruition.

Perhaps players could retain cards in their hand equal to their name 'level' between encounters?

How about a blanket opposition score, like the Demonic Influence in DiTV, something like Community Goodliness. Ye Goode Father could then use this score to determine his starting hand for each encounter.

One idea I had regarding the wyrding scenes was for the GF to introduce certain Goodly NPCs or places (based on the cards) which are Pillars of the community - the source of Goodliness. Then the witches try to topple those Pillars by scheming, gossiping, invoking dark artes and foul-play! (Fowl?)
Perhaps exploiting the Pillars' sinful desires - like Macbeth's ambition.

Witches can declare an agenda within a dramatic encounter to erode a Pillars Goodliness, which in turn can lower the Community Goodliness as the Pillars come crashing down. Or witches can try to kill the Pillars directly, but this is much more risky, especially if there is high background goodliness.

I also think it would be cool if witches could gain followers in a similar way, by declaring a bewitching agenda against a non-goodly villager. Each follower could also reduce the Community Goodliness. Perhaps bewitching should require a ritual of some sort. Then a witch could even run their minion in dramatic encounters without the witch being physically present – maybe through scrying or the familiar observing.

Hmmm, this was supposed to be a  short post.
Ah well never mind.

Cheers,
Joe

[Chad]

I'm certain two tarot decks are the way to go. What would be ideal would be an inexpensive pdf tarot deck you could print more than once. There's gotta be one out there somewhere...;-)
Bwahaha, my ridiculously circuitous plan has come to fruition.

It all makes sense now - I am but a pawn. :)

Perhaps players could retain cards in their hand equal to their name 'level' between encounters?

Great idea. I have been thinking a bit about implementing  this, and it would be nice to try and tie those card uses into the Witch Name during play, as well. So, if a player wants to play one of her 3 stored 'name' cards during a conflict/round - then the agenda should tie into 'Hezbitsa shadow smyter, eater of Young, weaver of lies' (either the first appelation, or the second, or third) so these start behaving kind of like super traits of some kind. What you think?

How about a blanket opposition score, like the Demonic Influence in DiTV, something like Community Goodliness. Ye Goode Father could then use this score to determine his starting hand for each encounter.

Do you mean, in addition to NPC basic hand draws, or to determine the entire GM conflict hand? This is something I have been struggling with - for some reason, I am reluctant to draw a stack of card into my hand as GM. I am worried it might spoil the illusion somehow, yet its a necessity if I want to simplify things into a single draw.

Cheers,
Chad

[Joe J Prince]

Perhaps players could retain cards in their hand equal to their name 'level' between encounters?

Great idea. I have been thinking a bit about implementing this, and it would be nice to try and tie those card uses into the Witch Name during play, as well. So, if a player wants to play one of her 3 stored 'name' cards during a conflict/round - then the agenda should tie into 'Hezbitsa shadow smyter, eater of Young, weaver of lies' (either the first appelation, or the second, or third) so these start behaving kind of like super traits of some kind. What do you think?

Sounds good, it's only fair the witches prove themselves worthy of their monikers!

How about a blanket opposition score, like the Demonic Influence in DiTV, something like Community Goodliness. Ye Goode Father could then use this score to determine his starting hand for each encounter.

Do you mean, in addition to NPC basic hand draws, or to determine the entire GM conflict hand? This is something I have been struggling with - for some reason, I am reluctant to draw a stack of card into my hand as GM. I am worried it might spoil the illusion somehow, yet its a necessity if I want to simplify things into a single draw.

Hmm, I was thinking of using Community Goodliness in the same manner as the dramatic potential draw, adding to the GM's conflict hand. CG has a more concrete mechanical base, which the players can see operating and take steps to try and reduce.

The number of conflict hands the GM plays depends upon how many different agendas the NPCs have in any given encounter. So an alternative to the single GM stack would be for each major NPC to have his own hand. This could lead to the GM having a lot of cards and NPC stats to manage though.

One possibility could be to break the NPCs down into various types: Witchfynders, Witches, Goodly and Villagers. Then each conflict will see the GM running a maximum of four hands. To determine the base draws for each type either go for blanket scores set during the wyrding or assign specific trait levels to individual NPCs.

I'm thinking of My Life with Master again, specifically how Fear and Reason are used as blanket scores.

Do I make any sense?
What do you think?

cheers,
Joe

[Chad]

Oh yeah that makes total sense. I like the hand per agenda idea. It seems like an elegant way of handling it. The community goodliness score also seems appropriate way of quantifying opposition. Perhaps a good solution is to have the opening hand for the conflict determined by the Goodliness score, and then to have a dramatic potential draw for each additional agenda added? The draw can vary on the weight of the agenda, these then all go into a single GM hand which scales based on the content of the scene - rather than having separate hands.

I will give that a whirl.

Thanks Joe,
Chad