[Dogs in the Vineyard] Point Hollow

[jenskot]

[jenskot]

[jenskot]

[jenskot]

[Paul T]

Thanks for writing this up, John!

The game was a blast, and I'm really looking forward to the next session. Your prep and presentation are simply fantastic--I'm glad you've been improving and updating your techniques as you've gone along! I was meaning to ask about your sheets for the game, and here you've gone and posted them up. Awesome!

I have a few comments about the game:

* I like how the system forced my character to do some pretty irrational, desperate things. When Sister Annie was trying to seduce him, not only did he give his Coat to her (to get the Coat's dice), but I even had Cyrus misdirect her and then try to run away so I could escalate to Physical! That was fun. And funny.

* That last bit in the writeup where you say "After being stabbed with a pair of scissors, Cyrus retrieves his coat and promises to deal with Annie later" isn't quite as I remember it. She attacked Cyrus with the scissors, yes, but no blood was drawn. Also, I'm pretty sure Cyrus didn't make any promises to her in that scene. (These details are probably unimportant, but I thought I'd mention them just in case.)

* The ratio of free roleplaying to conflict felt good to me! I prefer having some more talking and roleplaying, to learn about the characters and the Town, before jumping for the dice. And you did a great job of pulling out the dice every time a conflict was developing--it never felt like you went there too early or too late. I'm guessing that the second session will see more conflicts initiated by us, the Dogs.

* One thing we discussed was the escalation rules from Afraid, and whether we want to use them or stick with Dogs' default rules. I wonder if there's been some discussion of this elsewhere! I can really see both sides of this argument, although in play I actually liked the way the Afraid escalation rule felt very much (even though I kept forgetting about it).

* You know how I wrote "prostitution 1d6" under Relationships, on my sheet, but left parentheses around it? I think we can remove those parentheses.

* I was tempted to use that d6 to take a Relationship with Duty (the girl, not the noun), but she kinda scared me when she got all Michael Jackson on me. Ha!

[Paul T]

Oh, hey, a question:

I did find myself kind of unsure of how much I could define the Stake(s) when I was initiating a conflict, though. Because sometimes the implications of the conflict kind of changed between the opening of the conflict and its resolution. For instance, if I have a conflict with Sister Annie where she's trying to get me to take her daughter to the town square (say), but my last two or three Raises are all something like "Get ye back home to your husband!", it seems that, when she loses or Gives, what really should happen is that she should agree to go back home to her husband, not just give up on trying to get her way.

Does that make sense? I felt a little uncertain in play as to how this was supposed to pan out.

Specifically, in the case of this AP report, I'm thinking of that conflict where Sister Annie was wearing my coat. Yes, I wanted my coat back, and yes, she wanted to seduce me, but really what I'd come to do was to get her to stop her whoring. But in play, I felt like we weren't syncing up a hundred percent, and I'm not sure whether the consequences of the conflict include any lasting repercussions of that sort.

I can't even remember who reached for the dice first in that case, me or John. But since Annie and I both had an agenda in the, uh, "discussion", should that have been handled as two separate conflicts (1: Does Sister Annie seduce Cyrus? and 2: Does Cyrus get his coat back?)?

In actual play, I felt like what was established in the fiction was sufficient for the purposes of the game and the story. I almost feel like we can just roll the dice without naming anything consequences upfront and let the Sees and Raises tell us what's going down, and who's trying to achieve what. But the rules suggest that the What's at Stake should be a little more defined.

Any recommendations from the seasoned Dogs players?

[jenskot]

[Paul T]

Thanks, John.

I'm still mulling this over. Let's play the next session and see how it goes!

[David Berg]

One note on gameworld color in general and environmental detail in particular:

John didn't offer a ton, but whenever I asked for some, he didn't mind answering, and in fact his answers were quite satisfying.  I hope this continues.  This is my preferred way to play: players slow the pace and pursue vividness because they want to experience it; GM responds by giving them the experience they request.


Re: conflicts vs just roleplaying:

1) Disclaimer: I'm more used to speaking in-character as a means of moving play along, and less used to rolling dice before someone's life is at stake.

2) In an effort to really play Dogs as intended, I put some mental effort into correlating dice to fiction.  Specfically, I tried to keep track of action types.  There were a few moments during conflicts when John pushed forward dice for a physical action, and then Paul pushed forward dice (either to see or to make the next attack, I can't remember) for a talking action.  And I went, "Paul, are you allowed to do that?  I thought this interaction has Escalated, meaning we're past the point of mere talk!"  See, I thought that was a big part of the symbolic point of the Dogs resolution system.  But no, John said that only the action you take to get "physical" dice needs to be physical, and thereafter you can "de-escalate" if you want.  So, this experience was mildly annoying to me, but certainly an acceptable part of learning a new game.  Now that I know what to do, though, I'm a bit fuzzier on why I should bother.

3) The conflict John described above where Cyrus convinces Enos not to kill Christopher wasn't actually a formal conflict.  No dice were rolled then.  (Dice were rolled much alter over the same issue.)  Also, I felt that the most important decision I made in the session was to not have a conflict when my former hero Colt lined up his shot to assassinate the Moutain People's leader.  So, my opinion at the moment is that we needn't worry at all about ratio of conflict to play time.  John's Point Hollow is a satisfyingly pregnant situation in which Paul and I can't help but make meaningful choices, whether the dice are involved or no.

4) Putting the fiction on hold while someone tried to think of an in-fiction way to express their (already-decided-upon) die-use sucked.  Presumably this is a learned skill that Paul and I will get better at.  Even John sometimes has observable lag time, but to a degree that is less distracting.  I wonder if perhaps it might be better to respond in the fiction first, and then decide what to do with the dice, as a way of concluding, "...and here's the impact of what I just did:"

Actually, John, did you do that?  Regularly?  Ever?  I can remember my own moments of awkwardness, and my moments of boredom while waiting for Paul, more clearly than I can remember the smoothest parts.  And certainly, overall, this was a pretty smooth session.

[jenskot]

Dave, thanks for posting!

One note on gameworld color in general and environmental detail in particular:

John didn't offer a ton, but whenever I asked for some, he didn't mind answering, and in fact his answers were quite satisfying.  I hope this continues.  This is my preferred way to play: players slow the pace and pursue vividness because they want to experience it; GM responds by giving them the experience they request.

As a player, this is also my preferred way of being exposed to color. Things start fuzzy and undefined but as I show interest and ask questions, the GM zooms in and those details become clear. As a GM I prefer this because I rarely know how much color a player is interested in. It not only varies from player to player but moment to moment.

I thought this interaction has Escalated, meaning we're past the point of mere talk!"  See, I thought that was a big part of the symbolic point of the Dogs resolution system.  But no, John said that only the action you take to get "physical" dice needs to be physical, and thereafter you can "de-escalate" if you want.  So, this experience was mildly annoying to me, but certainly an acceptable part of learning a new game.Quote from: David Berg on May 18, 2009, 02:55:05 PM

Also, I felt that the most important decision I made in the session was to not have a conflict when my former hero Colt lined up his shot to assassinate the Moutain People's leader.  Quote from: David Berg on May 18, 2009, 02:55:05 PM

I wonder if perhaps it might be better to respond in the fiction first, and then decide what to do with the dice, as a way of concluding, "...and here's the impact of what I just did:"

[Paul T]

Agreed!

A couple of comments:

* As far as escalating and "de-escalating" goes, the way it made sense to me was to think of it in the context of a story, like a film or a novel. If a punch was thrown, or a gun was fired in a scene, that conflict definitely escalated, you know? It doesn't mean if there was more talking afterwards.

Also, if you couldn't Raise within any arena you've already opened, there'd be this weird thing where, if you went from gunfighting to talking, you could do longer fire your gun. John's take on it--a Raise has to be something your opponent can't ignore, and that gets harder as things get more out of control--is probably the best way to look at it.

* Hey, it doesn't really matter, but I'm pretty I DO remember Enos and Cyrus having a dice conflict over whether Enos should shoot Christopher or not in the very first soon. But I think you bought into my arguments and just Gave a Raise or two in.

* Oddly enough, the next day I had to work with a new employee who I was supposed to train, and his name was Anis. I had "Enos" and "Anis" bouncing around in my head all day, trying to remember which was which, and trying even harder to make sure I didn't mispronounce the name so it sounded like something rude... yow!

As for the lag time, I'm not sure what to do about that. As John points out, it's got to go somewhere, so it's going to slow things down no matter where you do it. I know I'll be quicker now that I have a better idea of how the game works and of what my options are.

I definitely think that if you have the perfect Raise ready on the tip of your tongue, you might as well shout it out and then decide what dice to push forward. However, when Seeing, you've got to know the total before you do that.

My hesitation in play always occurred when I was thinking dice -> fiction, not fiction -> dice. I had to stop and think when I knew I didn't want to throw the conflict, but wasn't sure what my options were, so I had to mentally review my moves: escalate? give? bring in a trait? which one? use a possession? which one? ...and then weigh the options to see which made the most sense.

The most awkward part of resolution I find is when you're Seeing and you want to bring in a trait to use. You have to narrate something to bring in the Trait... but you can't decide fully what to narrate until you know what the dice have rolled. A couple of times I knew what I wanted to do, but when the dice rolled too low (or too high!) I had to change my idea before I could narrate. That certainly introduces a weird hiccup.

[David Berg]

Quote from: jenskot on May 18, 2009, 03:49:58 PM

	Logged

here's my blog, discussing Delve, my game in development

[Lance D. Allen]

A small revelation just came to me reading ya'll's discussion.

Something you can't ignore? What the hell is that?

You can ignore someone shooting at you, if you want. It's going to have an effect, but you don't have to respond to it.

So here's what occurred to me.

Something you "can't ignore" means something that you must respond to. Meaning that if you ignore it, then that is a response. It has a consequence.

If you yell to stop when I'm shooting at you, I can ignore it without any real effect. Your words are simply color.

If you yell to stop in the Name of the King of Life, then my shooting you anyway *means* something. It means that, right here, right now, shooting you is more important to me than the King of Life.

[Paul T]

Lance,

I like that!

Dave,

On the slo-mo narration thing: yes! Not sure how, exactly, though. Let's try it.

Yeah, I try to do that.  I just have a moment of dissonance as I hit some "sounds like the time for talk is through" moments in the fiction but still have this big ol' pile of dice in front of me.  Two parts to this:

1) Two big piles of unused dice tells my brain "no need to roll more of them just yet", and results in odd pacing and creative strain as we try to trade a series of "things you can't ignore" in a mere conversation.  This awkwardness strengthens my inclination to just do what makes sense to me in the fiction, escalate if it seems apt, dice be damned.  However:

2) It feels weird to readjust the sides' resources if I'm winning.  I mean, I don't really care about winning... losing is equally fun... but I feel like I'm playing the game wrong if I take that attitude to the resolution mechanics... like I'm not giving them a fair chance.

Are you saying that you hesitate to escalate yourself, because they are dice still on the table? Or because you think that your opposition might get lucky now, when they roll more dice, robbing you of victory?

I'm curious.

I DO think that the Dogs vibe is very much that it's generally the losing party that escalates--because, if you can get what you want without escalating, why would you? That seems pretty much like real life, I'd say.

I'm not sure if I understood you correctly, though.


Paul

[Jasper Flick]

The most awkward part of resolution I find is when you're Seeing and you want to bring in a trait to use. You have to narrate something to bring in the Trait... but you can't decide fully what to narrate until you know what the dice have rolled. A couple of times I knew what I wanted to do, but when the dice rolled too low (or too high!) I had to change my idea before I could narrate. That certainly introduces a weird hiccup.

I've encountered and posted about that same issue in Seeing when everything depends on the future. What it boiled down to was that you either aren't bothered by the backtracking, or go ahead and roll dice first if you're seeing.

Great AP folks!