[Rajah Spiny Rat] Revelation of a newly finished game contest entry...

[Vulpinoid]

A few months ago, an idea was proposed over on Story Games for a "Random RPG Cover" contest. Each contestant was given three titles, three pictures, and three quotes from which they could make a game catch-phrase. With a good 30 or so starters, it looked like it could be a fun challenge.

For the past 2 months I've been working away on this project...taking some old concepts I've been working with, refining them, playtesting a couple of times, refining further, writing two hundred stanzas or so of poetry in the pseudo-conventions of a Sanskrit epic, compiling a few dozen illustrations and then trying to lay out the result in the time I had left.

All the while watching many of the other entrants in the contest withdraw due to lack of time. I almost gave up myself when getting a new job during the duration of the contest, but they say pressure makes diamonds.

I'm reasonably happy with my result, but there are certainly a few more refinements I'd like to make after a few more rounds of playtesting.

For those who might be interested here is Rajah Spiny Rat.

(This is a compressed black and white version with 72dpi images...certainly not a print ready manuscript, but enough for people to look over, possibly even play or provide feedback.)

I'm hoping to get some decent playtest sessions with this set of rules, for a final refinement of the game shortly (the final version will be available for free through my website).

Enjoy.

V

[Vulpinoid]

I've been told that a few people might be having trouble with downloading the game.

With humble gratitude to Joshua Mackay, a copy can be found through his blog.

Rajah Spiny Rat

V

[Patrice]

It's very interesting Vulpinoid. Strange thing, as I was shuffling through your game (just shuffling, didn't have time to read it at length), I noticed the verses you've put upon some pages. It's a shame the game's not using those as seeds for story elements during the game, but feeds a background with them instead. Your game is very Indian, and the tangling of the fonts you're using and the whole lot of specific terms renders it very tough to grasp, as is most of Indian culture. My guess is that you've tried to provide immersion through it, and of course do provide a block for people unwilling to invest themselves so far in the Setting. Did you do it on purpose? Or rather, to get to the nuts of my idea: Did you provide such an immersion and level of Sim detail because you felt that it was lacking in the Narr perspective you've given to the game?

Yes, I've almost finished my year's duties and I'm back to The Forge, cheers .

[Vulpinoid]

Cool...someone's actually had a look at it.

Thanks for the feedback Patrice.

If the game feels "Indian" then it's certainly met one of my design goals.

I've tried to experiment with a couple of concepts in the design of the game. Because I feel that it's only through experimentation that our hobby will actually move forward. Sometimes the experiments work, and sometimes they fail...but you've gotta try something new if you want a chance at moving forward.

The purpose behind the verses was twofold.

My initial plan was to weave a tale in the style of the Hindu epic poems, then simply use sidebars to explain the rules of the game. The poem would begin by introducing core characters (avatars and antagonists), form stories, resolve some conflicts and move onward to a climax. The sidebars would mirror this progression with character generation, story development, conflict resolution, experience/character development and eventually the climax of an epic tale.

The rules ended up taking a bit more explanation than I'd originally hoped...which has obviously pushed the poem into the background.

So the second purpose of the poem was to give an impression of how to tie aspects of the rules into a narrative. The game has been specifically designed to avoid those arguments about in game fluff or trying to invest too heavily into the background. Except for the primary antagonist (Rajah Spiny Rat), and the names of the capital cities, everything is all developed through play, and through the interaction of the players.

The map at the back is designed to give a common starting point for imaginative exploration, the poetry is written to give an idea of how things could be tied together.

I'll write more shortly..I'm at work between jobs.

V

[Vulpinoid]

Now that I'm home from work...I forgot what I was going to write.

On further thought, I guess you could interpret the poem as an attempt to enhance the immersion of the game. I've had a couple of people in the past comment that my games sometimes seemed a bit clinical and not too immersive, so I had intended from the outset to design an evocative concept, more than a concrete setting.

I'm planning a revision of the game shortly, once the contest feedback has been returned. But a few changes will definitely be made to the layout and I'll probably modify some of the dharmic paths once they've had a decent exposure to a few different play styles.

I realise the setting might be considered a bit too exotic for a lot of tastes, but when I got this as a possible topic for a game I thought of the unexplored potential in the Hindu mythos. Japanese and Chinese culture seem to be the defaults for exotic settings (although ancient Egypt got a decent run a while back, and Greece seems to be decent it's share of the limelight recently)...but hell, fifteen years ago, I wrote a Japanese style game and setting and was told that it would never work (within the year L5R came out...and look where that went).

There are so many cultures that haven't been explored.

I wouldn't mind doing something based on Aztec or African mythlore some time soon.

V

[Patrice]

The map is a daring attempt, it took me a while to figure how to read it, I suspect because of the layout mainly, but it's a very intersting part. I was maybe reacting about the epic veda-style poem because of what you've explained about your first idea and what eventually came out. One idea that hit me as I was reading was "shame the story mechanics aren't using this poem". I have no precise idea in mind, but using the poem as Polaris or IAWA does would be giving it more consistency than just fluff. The poem and the map are really cool aspects of your game.

On the other hand, I understand your purpose with the font you've chosen and the whole bunch of Indian words and references but reading it took me back to the sensation I've had as I was trying to study Indian astrology (yes, I did that) and it's very tough if it's mandatory to grasp your game. There's a difficult choice here but I guess taking more freedom with the Indian background would allow to streamline the game a great deal. Oddly, maybe someone knowing less about it would come with a far more simple game.

[Vulpinoid]

I guess the core Indian aspects in the game are karma and dharma.

Karma, because characters accumulate benefits and penalties based on the actions they perform during the course of the epic.

Dharma because characters who choose to accept their path gain the power to pursue their destiny.

I used the Indian elemental terms (Agni, Akasha, Ap, Prthivi, Vayu), but as I got toward the end of the game development even I was starting to get a bit frustrated with using the Hindu terminology for the sake of using Hindu terminology. I really think it helps the feel of the game...but I've come to the conclusion that maybe it's not worth confusing the majority for the sake of a bit more immersion for the minority. The only catch here is that a few other games use Air, Earth, Fire, Water and Void, so the elements don't really add anything "Indian".

But having a nice set of mechanisms for Karma and Dharma might be enough. I'll certainly consider using the English names for the elements and subtitling the Sanskrit/Hindu names, or only using the Sanskrit for the element's associated Dharmic path.

Again, thanks for the feedback.

V

[JoyWriter]

I'm afraid the link is still bust from my end, the pdf reader complains that the file is not formatted correctly. Is it possible that you switch the file to some "compatibility mode" format?

[Vulpinoid]

I'm trying some alternate upload sites now.

[JoyWriter]

I tried again and it worked <shrug>.

Interesting game, although most of my reactions are basically surface at the moment. I agree that the font is a little hard to read. It's good for the big writing, but in the smaller text the spacing between the line and letters seems to change. I think this makes the poem less important than it should be, because it's too hard work to read. I'm sure there is some variant font that is almost as colourful but more legible.

I like the idea of playing up imaginary ambiguity about whether these are animals or not, which is beside the point I suspect but nonetheless fun for me. I also like the layering of different forms of identity; just enough to make evocative characters, and largely orthogonal enough so that you don't feel your repeating yourself. There also seems to be some real substance in here on pacing and story creation but I'm too occupied to dive into that for a bit.

So on the superficial level that I can muster, I'd have to say I don't like "author" as a substitute for GM/storyteller. At least with the latter I can imagine people asking questions and butting in. Is there some hindu equivalent to the north-african story-teller? Cause if it's succinct that would be a better GM name.

[Vulpinoid]

I was going to give the GM/Storyteller the title of "poet", or possibly even pick an equivalent sanskrit term (I'm sure there's a term in hindu myth for a philosopher/poet)...but as you can see from an earlier post, the use of Hindu elemental terminology was something that can get confusing (or annoying), and I didn't want to just keep throwing in Sanskrit words for the sake of having them.

I'm glad you enjoyed the ambiguity of the animals, that was something I toyed with on a couple of levels. I really wanted to clarify the status of the creatures, but eventually thought that it would be best left in the hands of the players.

The layering of identity forms is going to play a big role in my Quincunx project, so if you think it works well here then I'm really happy because this is going to be key in the next game. Though I remembered a key aspect as I was concluding the game design contest. The characters are defined by paths, each of the paths has a basic benefit, a pair of possible advanced benefits, a moral choice and a curse.

The way the game is currently written, a character suffers the curse from a path if they forsake the path completely...they may only "buy off" the curse if they return to the path and regain mastery over it. If a player chooses to temporarily forsake their path, they suffer a generic 1 die penalty.

Earlier version of my game notes indicated that players should suffer the curse in any scene where they forsake their path (instead of the 1 die penalty). Such a curse would be temporary and would disappear by the end of the scene, it would remain permanent if the character had achieved at least level 2 in a path then completely gave it up. This would allow characters to test the waters with different paths before fully embracing the benefits an penalties contained.

I didn't get time to re-implement this throughout the game in the allotted 2 months.


For those others who might still be having trouble, I've managed to get another copy working...sort of...

Link to a free Lulu pdf download of the rules.

This version's a bit annoying due to page size issues and the Lulu belief that all e-books should be in portrait form (despite monitors being landscape), but it's still another versions for people to try if the first two are causing grief...

Again, thanks for the feedback so far...

V

[JoyWriter]

Well I've now got a third of the way in. I love the dharma thing, but I don't get set pieces: At the moment they are just discretion for the author to hit an avatar's dharma of their choice directly, or check their opinion on another dharma. I get the impression there is more to them than that in the original inspiration. How can you distinguish set-pieces if the author-player relationship does not exist? I suspect that "guru scenes" and set pieces that open up new dharmas should both show the Authors impression of the dharma, either through the riddling of the guru or as a sort of epiphany in the set piece. Apart from that they remind me of "key scenes" in TSOY.

The karma/dharma mechanic is seriously lovely, and echoes the stuff I was looking at last time I worked on my big adventure game, but in a different way: Do you focus on the past or reach out to the future? Both will decide the conflicts you have. Good stuff.

Does this system sit on top of the antagonist/avatar relationship as an additional source of conflict, or do they merge in?

I also don't quite get the story mechanic: It's very different to my natural style. Say someone tries to get into a fight, and has agni of 3, does that mean they are "trying to find a story about fighting", and so may not succeed, or is that handled in other ways?

If so, I can't quite see where the narration comes in: Is it that unlike other tests, this first test doesn't vary the narrative control, but simply acts as a threshold for finding out what is going on. An investigation test rather than an active test.

Now it could be that my example is flawed in that it doesn't cover the normal activities encouraged by the game, which is that they observe the town first and then act. But I can't see a reason why they would: If these avatars are supposed to make their own radical way in the world, surely the towns they enter should be reacting to them.

In other words, what is the motivation of the characters for interacting heavily with the town? Aside from challenges to their dharma.

It seems to me like the impetus for beginning and links to adversaries need to be tied into this. In all honesty this may be covered later in the text but at the moment the motivational element baffles me! What stops the avatars rushing through a whole town, what links them there and makes them stay? If it is to establish themselves in some way, it feels to me like this should be included.

I know for my own game I had to answer the following question; "why on earth are these guys doing quests for peasants? Or simply involving themselves in their struggles. Why do they value it?" I decided to try to build the actual players motivations for playing into the character's ones, insuring that there were justified internal causes for all the stuff players were getting their characters to do.

So why do the players challenge the workings of fate within a town, is it that it always relates to one of their antagonists?

Also on the resolution system, what is the distinction between plot dice, recovery dice and active dice? How do you anticipate this being distinguished in actual gameplay? I imagined a bowl of dice in the centre of the table and people keeping dice on either side of their character sheet, or possibly in two bowls by the side of it. But once recovery dice and plot dice come in, I'm not sure where they are supposed to go, or how the player is to consider them.

[JoyWriter]

I think I get it a bit better now, I have to say I ignored your reading advice and went front to back! My prefered reading pattern is pages 1->22, then 47->69, then read the mechanical bits in the middle with that context in mind, then read the appendixes.

Here is my query; if interaction with the stories is central to the game, why do you need to roll for it? Because acting without activating any of the stories interferes with the dynamics of the game, and you open that up as an option.

For example, I would find it quite interesting if players were able to have their avatars do all kinds of other activities, without hitting the main stories of the village. Depending on the specific mechanics of the open dice pool, you could use it to implement breathing space for your own plans. In other words once they reach a certain level of influence they start bumping into all the other stuff that's going on, and you reveal them anyway. I'm not suggesting you give the new plot it's own set of plot dice, rather that it starts interacting with the other plots once it's size (measured how?) reaches the size of the open pool for the town.

Alternatively, if you just make it about existing plots, I think the external journey needs a bit more work. Internal journey's awesome, especially if the dharma descriptions are beefed up a bit, for extra inspiration. But I think the game could do with some explaining of the old "plot hook" methodology, as well as more ways for avatars to be naturally interested in the towns.

Also, on gaining plot dice/active dice from the communal open pool, what kind of narrative elements do you associate with that? If I'm not mistaken the element was taken from the fame mechanic in your other game, so perhaps favour of the gods? Or if that is off colour, how about something relating to the growing majesty/impressiveness of the character.

Apart from that this is looking pretty play-testable!

[Vulpinoid]

Awesome...someone's actually reading my stuff, and digging deep into it.

You've raised some great issues, a few of them had started to make themselves felt when I was reaching the end of the writing process. But by that stage the design contest was rapidly reaching it's conclusion and I just wanted to get certain concepts out before spending a week or so purely on images and layout.

My self imposed restriction of trying to tie page mechanisms with page poetic narrative hindered me a bit in this regard as well.

I'll discuss your issues in a round-about kind of way.

Rolling for the chance to interact with a story was purely intended as a pacing mechanism, but in play I've actually found that this pacing mechanism isn't necessary. Players will go for what they want, and I've been finding that throwing a stumbling block in the way is more of a frustration than a development tool. If we assume that the players antagonists are somehow related in each of a town's stories then avatars will naturally be drawn into each of the plots.

I definitely agree that avatars should be able to influence a town without running into the existing plots lingering in the shadows. In fact, in the settlements where there aren't many stories in place, there is quite a bit of breathing space for players to really push their own agendas. But eventually they'll run into something that's happening, especially if their plans start getting too grand.

I guess I need to expand that a bit more. I really want the characters to play a balance of causing change versus reacting to the changes caused by other chosen avatars of the gods.

As for the rationale and narrative elements for drawing open dice...yes, it was taken from the fame mechanism, but consider it to be a character drawing on the resources of the world around them to gain more influence in that world. If the situation involves a character making a motivational speech, then the act of rolling a 6 might draw an ally to their side. If they are conducting a raid on a local merchant, the bonus might come in the form of an enchanted sword, or some other item of wonder. Tying the act of claiming of a die to a narrative event shouldn't be hard. Player might even write the intepretations of their dice on a secondary character sheet so that they can continue to incorporate these objects/allies/clues into the ongoing story. I'm not sure if this added bookkeeping would hinder or improve the game though (I guess it depends on the group).

If this idea was used, then an opponent's dice might already be described in this manner, dice associated with specific stories might also be pre-assigned specific descriptions.

This might also give avatars a vested interest in the situations unfolding in a town. They might specifically seek a certain die, unsure what story it is initially associated with. If this is linked with the notion that avatars will never know which stories are specifically linked to their antagonists, but they do know that they need to eliminate their antagonists to gain a quick bonus...players will want to ferret out the stories that are benefiting their enemies, while generating stories of their own.

Now I'm just starting a brainstorm...and waffling a bit, so I'll stop.

Good food for thought, thanks.

V

[JoyWriter]

If this idea was used, then an opponent's dice might already be described in this manner, dice associated with specific stories might also be pre-assigned specific descriptions.

I think that's an interesting idea, it could actually form the equivalent of a town map, with a visible sheet with dice piled on it. Then if the plot description has say five dice in that area, which has 6 dice on it, then you could say that after gaining 1 dice in the area, you can't gain any more there, but any sixes you get after that point lead to conflict, with the plot being revealed and the dice in that area removed to form a plot pool. So you still get the dice from your 6 you could just take a dice from some other place of the GMs choice. If the different map areas have "secondary elements" then you could get a pretty characterful town that way, as well as reproducing the old "element searching" thing. Just the addition of a map opens up so many opportunities as well, strategically!