[Divinity Horizons] Epic Playtesting

[Sovem]

So, last night we had a terrific playtest of Divinity Horizons. My wife and my two long-term gamers were there, as well as a newcomer to our group. Divinity Horizons (DH, from here on) has been through many playtests already, and the rules have been through multiple revisions. They're looking very close to completion. Last night also marked the first game where I really focused in on what I wanted as the theme and mood for the game; those two things had been glossed over and even ignored in some of our prior playtests in favor of rules-testing, and the games suffered for it. But last night I really tried to emphasize the theme of heroics and the mood of this great, big, mythic world and it went great.

If you have not read the Power 19 for DH, check my sig below for a link.
I will try to stay away from talking about the rules specifics as much as possible, as I find that it is difficult to read an actual play post to a game you don't know the rules to.

First, the Dramatis Personae, if you will.

Andrea, my beloved wife, reprised her role as Polarus. Polarus came from a "Berlin"-like divided city right on the border between the Ondron Commonwealth and the Tantalus League. She escaped over the "wall," but her family did not. As such, she's fiercely dedicated to the League; she wants vengeance for her family. Her character has a piece of the dead god Casimir, giving her Dominion over Seas and Division.

Bain, one of our long time players, made a new character, Marcus. His character was a fallen-from-grace, self-exiled ex-Tribune (general) that had recently received a Halvard shard, giving him Dominion over Swords and Stone. He has returned to offer his services to the League, but only by re-earning it; he refuses to use his reputation.

Brandon is our other long-timer; he played Torm. Torm had grown up in the Ondron Commonwealth, but bad decisions by officers in charge of his home town caused him to feel betrayed. He's dedicates himself to hurting the Commonwealth and has become quite notorious, but he's not sure if he's actually on the League's side, yet.. He's got a Paeril shard, Dominions: Frost and Wolves

Finally, Peter was new to our group and DH, though certainly not to roleplaying. He played Phylexis, a honey-tongued rabble-rouser. Freedom of the people is his creed; he sneaks from town to town in the Commonwealth, seeding dissent and stirring rebellion. His shard is from Tyrrol, giving him control over the Dominions of Shadows and Mirrors.


I was very pleased with everyone's characters and the character creating experience in general. Everyone came up with fairly detailed backgrounds on their own, without any prodding from me. Their Traits were, for the most part, a natural extension of their backstories, and everyone filled up their character sheets pretty quickly. They even helped each other come up with more mythic or appropriate sounding Traits, too. The introduction of my regular players to Wushu and DH was a slow, drawn-out experience; so it was good to see how quickly Peter was able to jump on board, having only read Wushu once a long time ago and knowing only the basics of DH that I sent him the day before. His Traits were right on, and he even helped with the naming of other player's Traits. That was very encouraging.

I let everyone have a very free reign with creating their characters; I had only two requests. One was that they were at least neutral towards the Tantalus League. The second was that they all come up with a reason why their characters would be at this certain island, where the story would be taking place.

This did not work out so well as I had hoped, and it was my fault. I made that request because my players, traditionally, have a lot of fun putting thought into their characters, but they hardly ever put any thought into how their characters might fit together. Many times I'll have the problem of the typical "loner in the shadows" type character. I was trying to skip over the burdensome and wearying task of trying to force the group together through contrived means and deus ex machinas; most of which take up much of the game session.
This was a bad call on my part. I should have just said "let's talk about how your characters can come together" or something. All I ended up doing was inadvertantly forcing the players to come up with the contrived means and deus ex machinas so that they were all on the island, and I still had to waste a lot of time getting them to come together. Disappointing, that, but everyone was a good sport and didn't seem to mind. They were just anxious to get rolling.
Four Amalga all showing up in the same place is extremely unlikely, and the players just wrote it off as "Well, we're the PCs, so we have to get together." They'll discover that Fate wasn't working entirely on its own soon enough.

So, the reason they were at this island was that it was the victim of a recent attack. When the low gods died, sometimes pieces of their souls that didn't find a human host would clump together and form dangerous, gargantuan monsters. This island was attacked by just such a monstrosity.

After the characters discovered that they were all here to help, they went to visit the local magistrate to find out all they could. They learned that the island was attacked by the Gymantiks, twin monsters made entirely of living marble. One is a giant mantis with the "tail" of a wasp, the other is a giant wasp with the razor-scythe arms of a mantis. The monsters pretty much ravaged the entire island and kidnapped several hundred islanders, presumabely taking them back to their hive for food. They learned that the Gymantiks live on the cursed marble isle of Gemenon and found out where the island was located.

Torm had come to the island because he was offered a great deal of information he could use to hurt the Commonwealth if he would resuce this guy's son that got taken by the monsters, so he went and got the scent from the boy's clothes.
In the meantime, the islanders learned that the characters were Amalga. They began begging them to help, asking for them to rebuild the town or to help look for survivors buried under rubble. Marcus was all ready to go and help, but the others reminded him that the kidnapped villagers were still alive last anybody saw, and they needed to go help them. He reluctantly agreed (but secretly helped the woman who believed her family to be buried alive beneath her home). Excellent. I was seeing, already, where the character's values lay and what their priorities were.

They arrived, some time later, at Gemenon thanks to a fishing vessel and Polarus' control of the sea. The island looked like a giant iceberg; it was composed completely of white marble, with no plants or animals visible. There were some strange looking humanoids moving around the shore, but nothing else. As they drew closer to the isle, the Divine Stream began feeling stranger to them. They could still operate as normal, but things definately felt a little "off," like a mild sense of vertigo that just wouldn't go away. They were entering a Nexus--a place where the Physical and Spiritual realms blended together more than usual, and natural laws do not always apply.

Phylexis used his control over mirrors to make their boat appear much farther from the island than it actually was. They snuck up and found those pasty humans to be nearly mindless. To Torm's wolves, they smelled like stone, and they paid no mind to anyone. They were there mainly to freak the players out and show them that they were definately in a strange place.

Torm's wolves caught the scent of live humans coming from very far away. The characters all started heading up the island towards the peak at the center. Along the way, they were ambushed by a group of mad, cyclopaen orangutans made of limestone. The first combat. It went very well, though there were a few problems. The good news, first:
Everyone had a good time warming up their creative muscles, inventing clever, cinematic ways of taking the apes out. Peter was a little hesitant at first but, after only a single round of watching everyone else, he was able to jump right in there and started narrating very appropriate in-character reactions to the apes. It does make me worry just a little bit about people who don't have the benefit of watching players who've played DH before, but the finished book will have very large portions dedicated to examples of play and example stories, which Peter did not have. Hopefully, that will take care of it.

The incident with the orangutans was supposed to be a quick warm-up for the big, epic battle at the end, but it went for a lot longer than I anticipated. In the end, I had to reduce the challenge rating so that the scene wrapped up quicker. [Warning, a little rules-speak ahead] I placed the dice cap at 5 to keep action quick and the rounds moving, but everything took a lot longer than it should have. The problem is: my players are a little too good at narrating cinematic combat! I have trouble making them stick to just 5 details a round. They filibust every time. I could, of course, raise the dice cap, allowing them to take advantage of all those wasted details, but then what would I got to for the epic scenes? I don't feel comfortable with a dice cap of more than 8, especially with 4 players. Not sure what to do there. Maybe just lower the challenge ratings for scenes I want to be shorter.
This is, probably, just a problem with my players, and not necessarily an issue with the game. I can't be sure, though.

So, the battle was fun, nevertheless. After some more hiking, the character finally found their way to the entrance of a tunnel that led to the center of the isle. The whole top of the island was hollow, it seemed. They followed the scent to a giant cavern, open at the top like a volcano, and filled with stalactites, stalagmites, and columns of marble. Around the walls, they saw they kidnapped islanders, stuck to the walls with what appeared to be secretions of marble. Upon seeing the characters, they all began calling for help. One of them began coughing and hacking, then exploded as dozens of hawk-sized, marble wasps burst from his body. Uh oh. But, before they could help the others, the Gymantiks woke up.

The players now had multiple options. They could attack the Gymantiks; each one was a seperate nemeses ("boss", if you will). They could try to deal with the 'little' wasps, the gymantoi, which would be harrasing all of the characters. Or they could try to rescue the people. A lot at stake. A great deal of danger. And the heroes jumped right in without a moment's hesitation.

Torm ran right for the big mantis. They tusseled a bit, neither one really coming off the worse. Polarus and Marcus went after the gymantoi and the people, respectively.
Peter sadly informed me that he had to go. But, because he didn't want to mess up the climatic scene, he came up with a delightful way to bow out. His character is very much about freedom of the people, and he has a lot of anger issues. So, seeing the helpless islanders really drove him crazy. He launched an all-out attack against the big wasp, really laying on the narrative smack-down and saving no dice for defense. He nearly took out that Gymantiks in one turn, badly injuring it and throwing it to the ground. But, having saved nothing for defense, the wasp drove him into the negative and scored the right to a coup de graces. Phylexis knew he was almost a goner, but he leapt to deliver the final blow to the wasp, anyway. It snatched him up in its mandables mid-leap and swallowed him whole. (Amalga can heal from any wound so long as they still have a god's shard in their body. So, Phylexis won't be gone forever, so long as his allies manage to get his body out of the Gymantiks!)

Down to three Amalga, the stakes were even higher. Every round, another islander would burst open, pouring gymantoi into the air and raising the Threat rating by 1 (in other words, things were getting worse). The three players know their characters are in trouble if they don't do something, quick. Then, Brandon has an idea.

You see, in DH, when an Amalga would be killed, they can choose to "risk Torrent." They channel massive amounts of the Divine Stream through their bodies to keep them active, but if they lose control, their shard(s) will rip out of their bodies and cause massive amounts of damage for several turns. Nobody wants to risk that here, because they could kill all the islanders if they experience Torrent. But Brandon wants to know if he enters Torrent inside one of the Gymantiks, if their stone body will protect everyone else. My mouth falls open. Yeah, it would.

So Torm does the same thing Phylexis did. He allows himself to get real beat up, then launches himself down the mantis' throat. Frigid, feral power erupts inside the monster, ripping it to shreds from the inside. One Gymantiks down, but also another Amalga down (he needs 3 rounds for his Torrent to calm down and his Spirit pool to refresh back to normal).

Marcus decides to split his attention between the wasp and freeing the people. Polarus, likewise, focuses on freeing the captives, and comes up with a way to get the larva out of the poor islanders' stomachs.

At last, the final islander is freed, but Marcus is also down, having gone for a serious offensive to finish off the damaged wasp and rolled very badly. Now, it's up to Polarus.

Fortunately, her Passion was "Seek my destiny." Standing between the monsters and the innocent, helpless victims, knowing her team mates will never heal if she can defeat the wasp and gymantoi, she realizes that this moment is pivotal to her destiny. We see the power of having a Passion really shine, here, as she was allowed to roll 10 dice instead of the normal 8. She takes the wasp out in an incredibly cinematic fashion, splitting it in half with her Division. Phylexis' body falls to the ground. The gymantoi swarm over her. It looks like this could be the end.
She looks down, and her breath is turning to frost. Torm is back. Laughing, the two make quick work of the remaining gymantoi and save the day.

As Torm is looking for the son he was sent to find among the rescued islanders and Polarus is helping to two fallen Amalga to recover, the wolves catch the sound of muffled crying coming from across the cavern. Torm looks over and sees a tiny crevase where the sounds of a little girl's whimpering are coming from. He starts to head over there when a deep thumping sound shakes the cave. Again, they hear it. And again. The columns of marble begin to melt, merging into the ground. What is going on? they all wonder. Then they see: the marble is travelling into the Gymantiks. Their wounds heal, their bodies righten. One of them flickers its wings and turns to look at the Amalga.

And the scene fades to black.





All in all, I have to say it was one of the funnest sessions I've had in a long, long time. Would have been top ten worthy, if it hadn't been for the bumbling on my part in the beginning.

I found the Wushu system to be very appropriate for the setting, and the custom tweaks we made worked out better than I'd hoped. What pleased me most, though, was the way the players all worked together. They passed their turns around without any problem, helped each other think up cool uses of their Dominions... it was really quite the collabrative, creative effort.

So, things I need to work on:

~ Better character introductions
~ Work on timing of challenges and deal with over-filibustering, one way or another.

Hope this wasn't too long-winded. Questions or comments are, as always, much appreciated.

[Valamir]

Nice session. 

In no particular order:

Have you considered not having the players be "in a group"? If its that hard to justify why all these folks would be together, that's probably a good signal that they don't need to be.  I've found that certain games Sorcerer and 9 Worlds especially really shine if the characters are not only NOT a group but actually are or potentially could be rivals.  Letting the players be each others villains can be a very effective and rewarding way to play.  Trollbabe is especially good at having the characters be completely ignorant of each other's existance, essentially playing through entirely seperate (or sporadically entertwined) stories simultaneously.

I didn't see anything in this write up that fed into the idea of influencing the world.  Are there mechanics or ingame rewards that let players become movers and shakers on a national or global scale or are you hoping that that will naturally evolve out of the in game narration as a result of the power levels being thrown around?

This session seemed to be a bit on the "get a mission, kill the monster" side.  Is that typical for how you see the game working or is that just how this one went?

In the session you described the people begging the characters for help.  Was that just colorful narration or is that a defined feature of the game.  Games such as Dogs in the Vineyard and descendent Prince's Kingdom have the idea of civilians confronting the characters with needs and demands as a central feature of how play progresses and information is delivered.

I guess at the root of alot of these questions is the core question of:  how much of your goals for this game is enshrined in how the mechanics and system works and how much is left to the GM to introduce.  In the right hand we have really cool setting and things to do.  In the left hand we have a resolution system geared towards cinematic combat.  What's in between?  Anything other than the GM?

[Sovem]

Excellent questions! Now, let me see...

Nice session. 

In no particular order:

Have you considered not having the players be "in a group"? If its that hard to justify why all these folks would be together, that's probably a good signal that they don't need to be.  I've found that certain games Sorcerer and 9 Worlds especially really shine if the characters are not only NOT a group but actually are or potentially could be rivals.  Letting the players be each others villains can be a very effective and rewarding way to play.  Trollbabe is especially good at having the characters be completely ignorant of each other's existance, essentially playing through entirely seperate (or sporadically entertwined) stories simultaneously.

That is an interesting idea, but something I, as a GM, have absolutely no experience with. I'd be interested in trying it out, but I'm not sure if playtesting is the best time to try new GM tricks. As to the absurdity of bringing them together, I actually have an in game reason that ties in to overall chronicle I've envisioned.

I didn't see anything in this write up that fed into the idea of influencing the world.  Are there mechanics or ingame rewards that let players become movers and shakers on a national or global scale or are you hoping that that will naturally evolve out of the in game narration as a result of the power levels being thrown around?

More of the latter, really. More on that on your next question...

This session seemed to be a bit on the "get a mission, kill the monster" side.  Is that typical for how you see the game working or is that just how this one went?

I see slaying monsters as a good type of introductory game. I wouldn't say DH is all about combat, but make a list of mythic heroes in your head and count how many weren't warriors, at least at some point in their career. Most heroes of classical mythology got their start slaying monsters (it's probably where the stories of dragon slaying got their start). Slaying monsters is a great way to get your start as an Amalga; it starts tales about your deeds, sets up a reputation as a fierce warrior (or, in these characters' cases, a protector of the people), etc.
We will be moving in a direction that is more "setting influencing," as it were, next session. But there's always a place for the gorgon and chimera in every hero's heart ^_^

In the session you described the people begging the characters for help.  Was that just colorful narration or is that a defined feature of the game.  Games such as Dogs in the Vineyard and descendent Prince's Kingdom have the idea of civilians confronting the characters with needs and demands as a central feature of how play progresses and information is delivered.

It was the former. Though I've heard much about them, unfortunately I don't have the money to check those games out, at the time. It sounds like an interesting feature. I might have to consider making it more important.

I guess at the root of alot of these questions is the core question of:  how much of your goals for this game is enshrined in how the mechanics and system works and how much is left to the GM to introduce.  In the right hand we have really cool setting and things to do.  In the left hand we have a resolution system geared towards cinematic combat.  What's in between?  Anything other than the GM?

Hmm. Interesting question. After giving it some thought, I think I would have to say that it's a little of the former, but mostly the latter.
On the one hand, I feel that epic roleplaying should have as few rules as possible. The more charts and tables you have to look up, or spells and powers you have to refrence, the more games slow down--for combat as well as for social moving and shaking. In this case, Wushu meets the game's needs precisely, placing the emphasis of the rules on the story and the characteristics of the characters, rather than on physics or realism.
On the other hand, that same lightness of the rules means there's no room for piling on mechanics that encourage a particular style of play. We do have the Passion trait, which is seperate from normal Traits and encourages players to pick a goal or a drive and focus their characters in on that passion, but other than that, it's in the hands of the GM and the Players.

[Sovem]

When I prepared this post, I was just thinking, "I'm posting an Actual Play report." I forgot all about the Playtesting forum.

Ron, does this thread need to be moved? Or is it ok here?

[Valamir]

On the one hand, I feel that epic roleplaying should have as few rules as possible. The more charts and tables you have to look up, or spells and powers you have to refrence, the more games slow down--for combat as well as for social moving and shaking. In this case, Wushu meets the game's needs precisely, placing the emphasis of the rules on the story and the characteristics of the characters, rather than on physics or realism.

I'm going to challenge your paradigm a little bit here. 

First "few rules" is pretty misleading.  A game's system is the sum total of everything at happens at the table from the time an idea pops into your head until the time everyone else at the table agrees that idea happened and has altered their perception of what's going on in the fictional world to account for it.  There are certain things that have to happen in play...those things are the game's system.  They consist of both the actual written "rules" and also all of the unwritten "rules".

Cutting down the number of written rules doesn't necessarily make the game any easier to understand or quicker to play...often alls you've done is shifted the burden to the unwritten side.  Some of the pitfalls of the unwritten side are:
1) old gaming habits -- in the absence of written rules telling us how to play, we'll play the way we always play...which may not match what you envision for the game.
2) Charisma based decisions -- in the absence of written rules elaborating how something works, players have to figure it out for themselves.  Which may result in the most popular / best debater / most aggressive player getting to determine how the game works.
3) Figuring stuff out can be a lot of work -- If I'm the GM and I know the game says that players can change the world...but there is nothing in the game telling me what that means or how to do it...then I've got to figure all that out for myself.  Similarly the players have to figure out what they can and can't do to change the world.  That's hard.

So while having LOTS of rules for no better reason then having lots of rules will slow the game down...having the right rules for the right things for your game can actually make things faster.

Secondly, having the right rules doesn't have any relation to charts or tables or physics or realism.  Number and type of rules is a seperate variable from physics and realism and both can be dialed up or down independently.

Third, what seems easy to "just do" as the GM to you, may only seem that way because you are the ultimate authority on how things are supposed to be and how they work.  Often times the "right rules" aren't about you thinking about anything new, but rather instead thinking about all of the things you actually do at the table automatically and without thinking about it...but which aren't written down...and then writing them down.  Nothing at all has changed...its still exactly the way you play...but now everyone else can see what that looks like too.



I'll just do a bit of brainstorming here.  The notion that your setting is a young world where <poof> the gods have died and people are only now beginning to rebuild their world anew is a neat one.  There are power vacuums as the old god-based power structures have collapsed and new power structures must rise to take their place.  I like it.  But what does that mean to me as a GM?  How do I convey that to players, how do they see it happen.

Here's an idea...its only half thought out...I have no idea how it fits specifically in your world...but it should give you an idea of what I'm thinking about.

Your setting has some kind of social structure.  There are poor nobodies on the bottom, and high grand poobahs on the top.  Lets call this "status".  It could be a number "I'm status 5" or it could be a description "I'm a Skilled Laborer" or "I'm a wealthy land holder" or it could be a title specific to a given culture "I'm a Belevant of the Third Circle"  Whatever.  There's a hierachy, and we know that in your world a person's place in the hierarchy is currently pretty fluid...because things are in fluxx.

So it makes sense that if you have a given status that you have some ability to direct, influence, command, or order around some number of people of lesser status.  Lets call them underlings.  For simplicity lets say that's a pyramid so you get 1 underling 1 step below you, 2 underlings 2 steps below you, 3 underlings 3 steps below you and so on.   Basically, as you increase in Status you get 1 additional underling at each lower status.  Of course those people have corresponding underlings of their own, so as you go up you balloon rapidly into a large number of people you can directly or indirectly control.

Now lets not fill all those people in...that would be tedious...lets instead leave the actual names in the tree undefined...to be called on when desired.  Lets say that calling on someone in the tree gives you access to favors from those people and, if needed, mechanically works like a passion.

So now when my Amalga rides into a town I can have a conflict with the local mayor, and if I have an open slot on my tree for someone of the mayor's status I can turn the mayor into an underling.  I can now give him orders, have him do stuff for me, get mechanical dice benefits from his aid, whatever (subject to whatever mechanical effects are desired).  In addition, the mayor himself has underlings, so I indirectly gain access to his entire power structure as well...I can reach down into his tree through him.  Of course the mayor is probably already the underling of someone...like maybe the governor...who isn't going to take too kindly to me usurping his chain of command...hey...now I'm embroiled in region spanning politics...cool...If I gain another point in status I could become the NEW governor and kick the old guy out altogether...of course the Duke might be pissed at me then...

So nothing more complicated so far than introducing a system for gaining influence over NPCs and determining the status and power of the NPCs that can be so influenced; which would increase as the character's own status and power increases.

If you want to get more mechanical you can introduce tests to see whether any given NPC will actually do what you tell them complete with modifiers for how they're treated, or passions they have in line or in opposition to yours, subject to how involved you want it to become (I would, but YMMV).

Point being, that even without getting any more mechanical, there's now a structure in place that...even if its largely breezed over during play...provides guidance to players and the GM into the sorts of things that can be done by characters to influence the world.  There's a direct tie on the character sheet between the character and the power structure of the world, and a direct correlation to how the character's rise in power gives them access to higher levels of authority.

That make any sense?

[Lance D. Allen]

Sovem, (I still want to read that as Sovern, with an r and an n, rather than as an m)

Ever since your first posts here, I've been keeping an eye on this project, and to be honest, I'm incredibly impressed by what you're trying to do. I'm going to highlight some of the things that Ralph has said that I think are especially important for you to pay attention to;

Third, what seems easy to "just do" as the GM to you, may only seem that way because you are the ultimate authority on how things are supposed to be and how they work.  Often times the "right rules" aren't about you thinking about anything new, but rather instead thinking about all of the things you actually do at the table automatically and without thinking about it...but which aren't written down...and then writing them down.  Nothing at all has changed...its still exactly the way you play...but now everyone else can see what that looks like too.

This is why third-party playtesting is so vital. I'd written a game, and played a few successful sessions of it. The very first person to try to play the game without my presence had some serious disconnects, and wasn't able to figure out various things. He also asked questions that I frankly didn't have answers for.. which made me seriously question how the hell I'd managed to get 3-4 functional play sessions out of it. The reason is because I knew what things meant, how things were supposed to go, and so I just did them naturally. Those things weren't made explicit in the rules or the text, and so without me being there, the game was difficult, if not entirely impossible to play, and what play did occur didn't match my vision of the game.

Y'see, there's this fictional GM called Herbie that Ron Edwards mentioned in a couple of his essays.. Herbie can run anything, and make it fun. Maybe you're Herbie, 'cause what you've described here is pretty bad ass. From your comments in response to Ralph though, I find myself seriously doubting that I could reproduce these sorts of things, let alone having it progress to changing the course of the world. This is where Ralph's comments about how being 'rules light' -vs- 'rules heavy' really come into application. There's a lot of basic assumptions that you've probably got internalized about this game that make it easy for you to provide mythic-level play.

Of course, without access to the text, I've no idea if what I've said is true or not; It's all speculation. But I suspect, from your comments, that it's pretty accurate speculation.

[Spooky Fanboy]

1) How do you determine what Dominions a player has, and what qualifies as a Dominion?

2) I agree that character advancement should be through ripping out reclaiming shards.

3) What effect, again, do Passions have on dice?

4) Is there a playtest document for this game? 

[Sovem]

Lessee...there's too much to quote in both Ralph and Lance's posts, so let me see if I can just respond in general..

About what makes sense to me vs. what will make sense to others: You guys are absolutely right on that one. I know an understanding of what can or can't be done is crucial to every RPG, but with Wushu, it's critical. Wushu depends entirely on everyone around the table knowing exactly what can or can't be done. This is usually accomplished by everyone having watched the same movie, or read the same book, and therefor having the same expectations.

That is why I intend to make the entire first half of the book an epic novella. It will introduce people to the world, give them an expectation as to what a typical DH game should be like, and show them what kinds of things Amalga can do before they ever read the rules. Then, at the end of the book, I will have many Examples of Play with full rules play-by-play explanations.

Do you think that will be enough?

About Ralph's idea for a social mechanic: awesome. You're totally right; from the comments I'm seeing about this game so far, I think a mechanic like that is totally needed. I don't know if any of you know Wushu well or not, but in Wire-Fu, Dan Bayn has a neat little mechanic for Honor. The higher your Honor score, the more people you can tell what to do, but also the more obligations you have to the people. If your Honor score is low, you can do whatever you want, but no one's going to listen to you, either. Maybe I can think up something like that, or somehow combine that and your idea, Ralph?


In summary: this need for so many examples of the world is why I still don't have a beta copy of the rules to pass around for others to playtest. I really need to have that epic and examples of play done before I ask any third parties to try it out for exactly the reasons you guys have pointed out.

[Sovem]

1) How do you determine what Dominions a player has, and what qualifies as a Dominion?

There is a list of low gods who are deceased. When creating your character, you chose one of those gods to start out with a piece of their soul. Every low god has two Dominions, and the Dominions of low gods are always physical, tangible things (with the slight exception of Casimir)

2) I agree that character advancement should be through ripping out reclaiming shards.

Excellent. It's good to hear that others like that.

3) What effect, again, do Passions have on dice?

Passions raise whatever Trait you are using by the Passion's rating whenever the actions you take are consistant with that Passion. If it would raise your Trait over 5, it instead raises your dice cap.

4) Is there a playtest document for this game? 

Unfortunately, not at the time, for the reasons described in my above post.

Thanks for the questions!
John

[Spooky Fanboy]

Lessee...there's too much to quote in both Ralph and Lance's posts, so let me see if I can just respond in general..

About what makes sense to me vs. what will make sense to others: You guys are absolutely right on that one. I know an understanding of what can or can't be done is crucial to every RPG, but with Wushu, it's critical. Wushu depends entirely on everyone around the table knowing exactly what can or can't be done. This is usually accomplished by everyone having watched the same movie, or read the same book, and therefor having the same expectations.

That is why I intend to make the entire first half of the book an epic novella. It will introduce people to the world, give them an expectation as to what a typical DH game should be like, and show them what kinds of things Amalga can do before they ever read the rules. Then, at the end of the book, I will have many Examples of Play with full rules play-by-play explanations. (1)

Do you think that will be enough?

About Ralph's idea for a social mechanic: awesome. You're totally right; from the comments I'm seeing about this game so far, I think a mechanic like that is totally needed. I don't know if any of you know Wushu well or not, but in Wire-Fu, Dan Bayn has a neat little mechanic for Honor. The higher your Honor score, the more people you can tell what to do, but also the more obligations you have to the people. If your Honor score is low, you can do whatever you want, but no one's going to listen to you, either. Maybe I can think up something like that, or somehow combine that and your idea, Ralph? (2)


In summary: this need for so many examples of the world is why I still don't have a beta copy of the rules to pass around for others to playtest. I really need to have that epic and examples of play done before I ask any third parties to try it out for exactly the reasons you guys have pointed out. (3)

1) I would appreciate something like that. It would be a pleasant change of pace that PCs can do what's detailed in the setting fiction.

2) Yes, some Social-Fu would be nice. Maybe that can be adjusted upward/downward during play,  for a sort of "traditional XP lite?"

3) Actually, beta tests are great ways to not only ask questions, but also for people to offer suggestions. Some of those suggestions might work. Incidentally, have you shown any of this to Dan Bayn? He is, by default, the WuShu guru.

[Lance D. Allen]

Hey again,

I knew there was a point I forgot to make.

I don't know if it's the case in your games or not, but trying to get all the players up to speed by getting them to read the book is... sometimes impossible. A very real and from my experience extremely typical scenario is where only the GM has read the book before play, and others will either openly refuse, or passively refuse; ie, agree to read it, but keep putting it off.. And unless you're going to sit there staring at them until they read all the source material, you can't make them. Usually, many players will turn this around once the game is begun, and they start to be engaged by the setting and style, but for the most part, many gamers expect that the GM will feed them whatever source material (and rules, for that matter) they need to know during play.

I wish I could remember the thread where this phenomena was discussed in relation to layout, art and marketing.. But the general idea was that setting fiction, art, layout, etc. was generally intended to get the purchaser of the book excited, and that it would generally be their excitement about the game that would convince or fail to convince the rest of the group to play.

My point is this; If you're counting on everybody being on the same page by providing source material, you're gonna get a lot of misses with your hits, and the typical gamer will just blame the game. On the other hand, if you can find rules to follow that will encourage the style of play you're looking for (as it seems the basic wushu mechanic does, at least somewhat) then you'll have a better chance of successful play emerging, whether or not they've read the book or seen the right movies.

[Sovem]

1) I would appreciate something like that. It would be a pleasant change of pace that PCs can do what's detailed in the setting fiction.

2) Yes, some Social-Fu would be nice. Maybe that can be adjusted upward/downward during play,  for a sort of "traditional XP lite?"

3) Actually, beta tests are great ways to not only ask questions, but also for people to offer suggestions. Some of those suggestions might work. Incidentally, have you shown any of this to Dan Bayn? He is, by default, the WuShu guru.

Glad you like the ideas. And I'll definately be looking more into the social mechanics.

I have been in talks with Dan since the beginning of this project, though I haven't heard from him in a while. I've sent him a note saying the Playtest is up, so hopefully he'll comment on that soon.

[Sovem]

I don't know if it's the case in your games or not, but trying to get all the players up to speed by getting them to read the book is... sometimes impossible. A very real and from my experience extremely typical scenario is where only the GM has read the book before play, and others will either openly refuse, or passively refuse; ie, agree to read it, but keep putting it off.. And unless you're going to sit there staring at them until they read all the source material, you can't make them.

I know exactly what you mean, there. But I really don't know what else to do. Like you said, you can't force anybody to read stuff. That's why I'm insisting on having awesome art, and I'm going to do my best to describe what characters can do in the rules by breaking up the nigh-unlimited potential of things Amalga can do into six Finesses: Creation, Destruction, Focus, Maneuver, Manipulation and Preservation...these are not actual Traits, as they simply wouldn't work in Wushu, but they are as close as a "list of powers" as the game will have. Other than that, I don't know what else to do.

[Lance D. Allen]

I've got a game I've been working on probably about as long as you've been working on DH, possibly longer. I haven't had the benefit of good solid playtesting tho', as I'm continually leaving the game in an unfinished and unplayable state. But what finally made it click for me is sitting down and realizing that the best way to get the sort of play you want is the reward system.

Basically, I sat down and I thought about the questions "What do I want players to do in this game? What do I want characters to do in this game?" My answer was a lot vaguer than yours, and it was simply that I wanted both players and characters to set goals, and then accomplish them. The goals could be anything they wanted, so long as they were interested and invested in doing it.

Once you have the answer to that question boiled down to it's most essential parts, you build a reward system that rewards them for doing that, and empowers them to do it more.

My answer was a reward system that gave points to the players that they used to set goals. They then got more points for accomplishing those goals. Those points could be used to improve their characters, but more importantly, they could be used to set more goals. Setting and accomplishing goals is the only way to gain the points, so if the players wanted to keep advancing, they had to keep setting and working toward goals.

Now obviously an identical system wouldn't work for you. You've got a different answer for what players and characters do. But building your reward mechanic around those things would be a good way to encourage that sort of play. Wushu already seems to have some of that built in.. The more detailed your description of what you do, the more dice you get. Elegant way to encourage descriptive conflicts.. And from this report, it seems to have really worked, because your players have taken to playing that way for it's own sake, narrating above and beyond the dice they get. So you've already got part of it. Now you just need to figure out how to encourage the rest of it.

[Sovem]

The ideas and advice I've gotten from this thread are invaluable. My wife and I have been kicking around y'all's suggestions and questions all day, and we've got the basics of an idea that will hopefully solve some of the problems (and make the game even better).

The idea is to add two new values to every character: Destiny and Renown. We only have a few vague ideas as to what those traits will do, but we know that Destiny, at least, will determine when your spirit is "bright enough" to gain a new shard--IOW, determine how many godshards you can have and when you're entitled to a new one.

Destiny will go up whenever you change the setting in a significant way. It will start with small changes, and have a sliding scale that gets progressively harder to increase your Destiny. Renown will be a much more temporal trait, waxing and waning as you do things to win renown or to lose it.

I will post more on this when we get our ideas a little more ironed out. Perhaps in the First Thoughts forum? Or can I keep discussing it here?
I can't thank you guys enough for all your questions and ideas. Keep'em coming!

Thanks,
John