Chthonian - Indie Gaming Monday (7/15)

[Zak Arntson]

Okay, after some Dreamcast Bomberman and general BSing, we got down to business and finished up the middle act of the Chthonian adventure. You can read the first session here. Also, Rabidchyld played the entire thing, readable here.

Starting up
Basically we recapped the prior events, discussing them a bit, and allowing me to throw in some facts they may have forgotten.

Lesson One: Start the game slow, flex your muscles a little. None of us had roleplayed in a while, so we it took some time to get comfortable. This is fine and nothing to get frustrated about. The initial "so ... this is what happened last time" trailed off a bit with some tangents. We're slowly getting into the feel of things.

Lesson Two: A Hook isn't needed during the midgame. Even though we were continuing a game from over a month ago, the Players were still interested. I ascribe this to our great Hook and second Action Scene from last time.

Research & Mini-Boss
Met up with the Doctor's TA and completely bungled any sort of smooth talking/persuasion to further investigate. The Players surprised the hell out of me when they said, "We're going to break into the biology building again tonight." Well, this is action/survival horror foremost and real-world second, so no problem there. Just surprising.

Lesson Three: Light comedy works as a great breather and contrast to the upcoming horror. A Character tried to "accidentally" jostle the TA and get his keys. Using his Fight skill and burning his Descriptor ("Panic"), he still completely bungled things. Another Character then tried to help him up, also trying to steal the keys. He also rolled completely shitty. So the first Character pushes the TA, screams and runs out of the room (leading to Lesson Four), and the second Character picks up the TA a little too awkwardly and sends the poor (and now pissed off) guy falling down a short flight of steps.

Lesson Four: Players may enjoy you narrating their actions. I opted to have the bungled roll make the Character flee. He said, "I'm using my Panic descriptor" and rolled real bad. So I looked at him, "You push the poor guy over, scream and run out of the room." A bunch of laughter later, I realized it was okay to narrate that. Of course, if he had protested we would've worked out something he'd be happy with.

Okay, so the Characters have broken into the building and are standing at the closed door of the Doctor's office and someone's inside. They're trying to decide on a plan but can't agree, which is fine with me. I use two different methods:

Lesson Five: Switch quickly from Player to Player during decision making to increase tension. This helps a lot when the Characters split up physically.

Lesson Six: Let the Players talk things out among themselves not in-character. In fiction, characters always seem to act cooler and talk smarter than in reality. That's because the writer has a ton of time to perfect dialogue. Why not extend this to roleplaying? My philosophy is to allow all the Players to pitch in and discuss even a single Character's action, with that Character's Player having full control. Everyone gets involved, the focused Character (and thus the Player) looks better, and it's fun. Just make sure you don't have any Players bullying others (not a problem with my group, but it could be a concern).

So we wind up with one character going upstairs in search of a labcoat. Two characters rigging up a fire alarm to go off locally (without alerting the other alarms) and two more concocting a "knock on the door and rush the guy" approach. This is where Lesson Five really helped, I'd turn to each Player and get a few sentences, describe a brief outcome/facts and move on.

The player who goes upstairs meets a grad student dissecting a dead dog. Splatter humor ensues with the grad student pulling unspeakable things out of the dog, all the while jamming to techno music on his headphones. Another moment of comedy to increase the coming scare.

So finally we have three characters bickering outside the door. My original thought was to react to their plan, but it's taking too long for them to agree. So boom! The doorknob starts to turn.

Lesson Seven: When in doubt, fan the flames. If things aren't pacing well force a reaction out of the Players and damn your clever plans. Improvise as best you can and keep things moving.

The lab assistant opens the door, everyone runs except the labcoated character. The char and TA start arguing and the character sees a furry hand open a cage door (inside the room). The character points excitedly and (me wanting some action) has the TA attack the character. At which point all the Players get really excited and burst into action. So, not only are they dealing with an inhumanly strong TA, but after a few rolls I add a freaky baboon into the mix.

Lesson Seven-and-a-Half: You're already fanning the fire, why not add some gas? They were worried when the TA started fighting, but then a baboon appears. Yikes! So they brain the baboon and I use the opportunity to have the TA fall to the ground. The TA's limbs disjoint and it rises up like a spider and scuttles into the room, leaping out the window. Sanity checks all around.

Lesson Eight: Freak 'em out. This is horror. The TA was simply really strong. The baboon was brained without much damage to the characters. But then, the TA was on his back, his limbs cracked, and he's very, very inhuman. Getting a bunch of vocal "ewwws" was great.

So the characters investigate the room, learn some more about what's going on through research notes and a computer. And more Lesson Eight stuff (in the form of dead caged rabbits and a live mouse that's killing itself trying to squeeze through the cage to attack the characters).

Session over, fun had by all.

Post game
Our post game was real quick. I asked how it went, they all said good and we went home. The one Player who's expressed an "eh" attitude had more fun this time. His comment was "there was more action this time around." So that's been noted. Knowing what your Players want is a good thing.

Lesson Eight: Work "realism" levels before play. At one point I was wondering whether to have the police show up. So I flat out asked the Players, "what kind of realism do you want? Should we worry about leaving evidence?" What was a fine question to me jarred the Players. Next time, I will talk with them before the game to make sure we are all on the same level of actions & game-world consequences.

Lesson Nine: Don't be afraid to tweak the system. This is playtest, so we're still working on the system. If the system isn't meeting your needs, change it. This is part of System Matters. It Matters so much that I fiddle with it during play for maximum enjoyment. A good system goes a million miles towards good gaming, but every group is different. Oh, and it's in playtest, so there's still a bunch of wiggle room.

Lastly, a note to Melodie (and other playtesters): Difficulty 6 should probably be the maximum (instead of the 6Ex stuff). I was watching Players with 6+ dice still flubbing their rolls. Also, you should have the Temporary Sanity/Safety recovery checks at the end of each stage/act rather than scene. This is more stressful and the Players were happier with it. It's great to have Players who want their Characters to suffer!

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Zak,

Great post. I'm interested in the interaction between Lesson Four and Lesson Eight, as it points up that some things are useful to discuss out-of-character during play, and some things are better handled or determined before play, explicitly or implicitly.

I'm interested in others' thoughts about that.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

As Zak said, potentially jarring. Going from IC to OOC is one thing, as long as it still focuses on the play. Going from IC or OOC to talk of the Social Contract in play really takes you out of the game. I'e seen sessions disintigrate because of this. My policy is to never discuss Social Contract except between sessions. If something comes up that needs to be addressed, I use my GM wand to make a ruling, and add that we'll discuss it after the game.

As Zak said, better to hit those points before play if you can.

As far as OOC discussion of action, that will jar some players as well. If it's OK with all players then, sure, go for it, but this should be determined up front as well. Even if it's OK for all players in a game, however, the player in question should be explicitly empowered to shut off the kibitzing and go directly to declaration of action. Most players realize this intuitively, but others do not. Sometimes an agreed to signal, for instance a raised hand, can be used to make this power explicit and clear.

Mike

[Zak Arntson]

Ron,
Do you mean the length of time between Lesson Four and Eight? Or the actual connection between the two? I'll interpret you as connection and run with it. And oops, I have two Lesson Eights. I'm guessing you're not talking about "Freak 'em out".

To reiterate:
Lesson Four: Players may enjoy you narrating their actions
Lesson Eight: Work "realism" levels before play

I'm not sure how these are connected, other than pre- and during-game discussion. As GM, I felt it appropriate to narrate a Character's actions during play (and the first time I did it, I asked if it was okay, so I did so with Player blessing). This can't be done pregame, except to prep the Players and discuss how much authority a GM gets. I ascribe to the "GM's word is final, but the GM had better play nice" philosophy. I will narrate bad rolls to the hilt, and give more leeway for a successful roll, but this is a group-by-group thing. The System helps (in that you have "No, and", "Yes, but", and "Yes, and" results instead of whiffs and bonks).

For a more headstrong/entrenched-in-traditional-gaming group, I would definitely recommend discussing the GM-narrates and group-collaborates-on-a-character's-actions-approaches. Discussing this during play wasn't a problem for us, but I can see how it could be. "My character wouldn't run away! He's tough as nails!" The official Chthonian line (currently) is: The group can discuss, the Player has final say in his Intent, the GM has final say on Effect. (I can't remember the other two. Dammit, I gotta make a cribsheet on this stuff)

On to "work realism." Realism levels have been discussed a little before play, but not much. Basically I told them "This is a survival horror video game/Call of Cthulhu tribute. There will be cops and campus security, but once the scene is over, you're probably off scott-free to concentrate on the adventure". If the adventure centered on the law, it would be a different story. But Chthonian's all about kicking monster ass and freaking out with style.

There are a few times when I know that Player knowledge will help. On matters like electrical wiring. So we go OOC for a second and quickly resolve the matter. I am sure to make it quick, to get back to the game, but there's definitely not a "GM knows all" attitude.

I guess it all goes back to the jazz metaphor. The bassist gets things moving, but he sure as hell can't play the drums. Best let the drummer decide when to hit the snare.

Mike,
I didn't perceive any jarring due to OOC concerns. Decisions tend to be made with Exploration of Situation (with a dash of Character) in mind, with more aesthetic sense aimed at a cool scene instead of immersion. With that, all Players were perfectly happy chipping in with comments, advice, etc.

It helped to remedy this early on, a Character was trying to persuade the TA and we hadn't really got "into the groove" yet. I mentioned to the group that we can all suggest stuff; screenwriters get to think about dialogue, so why can't we? Things went uphill from there. In our case I think in-game occasional prodding worked better than a brief mention pregame and no discussion during play.

That's it for now.

[Mike Holmes]

Mike,
I didn't perceive any jarring due to OOC concerns. Decisions tend to be made with Exploration of Situation (with a dash of Character) in mind, with more aesthetic sense aimed at a cool scene instead of immersion. With that, all Players were perfectly happy chipping in with comments, advice, etc.

That's as I said. As long as everyone is OK with such activity (which your players obviously are), great. I have a few players who would probably leave the game if such were to occur, but that's just some players. There will certainly be groups for whom this will work. And I was in no way suggesting that you try to figure out OOC stuff like "how to be cool in play" between sessions. That must, of course, be done in play when it pertains (if it's done at all).

The part that I claim is more likely jarring is stopping play to discuss Social Contract issues like "realism". Which your experience bears out if I read you correctly. These are the sorts of issues that I was saying can be, and should be, addressed between sessions.

For the most part, I was just backing up your observations with my own experience.

Mike

[Zak Arntson]

No worries, Mike. I was just reiterating; and it's great to know other players have experienced the same kind of OOC/Pre/During Play issues.

And about the intuitive knowing of when/when not to be OOC, it's definitely a group-by-group thing. But why don't roleplaying games address this? Even if it isn't an explicit rule.

Chthonian will be so much richer with these discussions. I'm hoping to provide a Gaming Advice section that is geared towards the entire group, rather than just the GM. I tend to GM very openly, allowing for input before, during and after play, so Gaming Advice would be way more in tune with my style than an eyes-only/GM's-interest-only "GM's Adivce" chapter.

Regarding IIEE in Chthonian, I've started a new thread in Indie Game Design here.

[Mike Holmes]

But why don't roleplaying games address this? Even if it isn't an explicit rule.

This is an excellent question. In Universalis, these things are all very explicit. There is a mechanic for creating Social Contract agreements before general play, and another that allows for interjections in a formalized manner. Heck, we've even got rules for who can play what characters when.

I think that this is simply one of those things again where most people believe that there is a right way to do it, and that anyone who does it differently is playing wrong. Even designers fall into this trap, asuming that IIEE will just sort itself out. The argument is that each group has it's own playstyle that will take care of these matters satisfactorily. And this does work occasionally, but a well designed system can aid these thigs along. Fang is the greatest proponent of expicit handling of these things, and he's written quite a bit about it.

Mike

[rabidchyld]

Lastly, a note to Melodie (and other playtesters): Difficulty 6 should probably be the maximum (instead of the 6Ex stuff). I was watching Players with 6+ dice still flubbing their rolls.

I have been discussing the very same thing with my group.  They agreed that the 6Ex was way too difficult, because they are the masters of bad rolls, but the didn't want to abandon the concept, though.  We discussed lowering the number to 5Ex or even 4Ex, depending on the situation.  It made sense to me at the time, but we'll have to see how it goes in play.  

They also came up with a really complicated system of difficulties based on whether the creature was natural or supernatural and all sorts of other factors.  Like a normal rat would just be a 3, but a supernatural rat would be 3E2.  They went over each animal they encountered in the game and readjusted the difficulty level.  When they go overboard...they really go overboard.  

Also, you should have the Temporary Sanity/Safety recovery checks at the end of each stage/act rather than scene. This is more stressful and the Players were happier with it. It's great to have Players who want their Characters to suffer!

That makes more sense.  You're not going to encounter a guy turning into some creepy insect thing, freak out really bad and quite possibly develop a phobia of insects, then five minutes later be all better.  My players were more interested in gaining back safety than sanity.  To them, the point of a horror game is going completely insane from fear.  They are really looking foreward to getting disorders which may be helpful to them in the game.  

My philosophy is to allow all the Players to pitch in and discuss even a single Character's action, with that Character's Player having full control. Everyone gets involved, the focused Character (and thus the Player) looks better, and it's fun. Just make sure you don't have any Players bullying others (not a problem with my group, but it could be a concern).

This is a fairly new concept to my group, but they are adjusting to it beautifully and loving it.  There's more of a freedom to really think up cool and brilliant stuff, which makes the game more memorable.  

As far as social contract and realism levels, we will discuss those things before the game.  We didn't discuss it last time, and we didn't really have any problems,  but I think it will be worth mentioning before the next game so we are all definitely on the same page.  

Learning from others' mistakes....

melodie