[Super Action Now!] turn-based confusion (monkey god, future midget, wuxia star)

[David Berg]

10 days ago I sat down with Dan and Merlin to play SAN!  It was the first time any of us had played.

Character creation
We started with character creation.  With no situation discussed, it was a little too "out of nowhere" for us initially.  Eager to get on with defining my abilities, I quickly settled on "Midget from the Future" as my "I am a:" definition.  I then wasn't particularly inspired by this.  Fortunately, Dan had an idea that my character was the last midget from an age of eugenics, coming back in time to prevent the eradication of his kind.  This gave me some more material.

It didn't take Dan long to come up with Monkey God.  The potential for hilarity was pretty obvious there, and I wished I'd come up with something that good.

Merlin wanted to do martial arts film stuff, but also mock martial arts film stuff, so he decided to be somewhere between a ninja and a ninja actor, with a Shortcoming of "poorly dubbed speech".

Here are our characters' highlights:

Hi, my name is Monkey and I am a monkey god
Drive: steal "bananas", sow chaos, protect monkeys
Knack: steal anything that can immediately be swallowed (must swallow when stealing!)
Shortcoming: can't resist food & drink
Powers:
-Turn into anything 4d10
-Create duplicates 4d8
Special Traits:
-Animate monkey corpse 4d10
Gotcha: If killed, breaks into 1-100 tiny copies of self
Traits: brawn 3, brains 2, finesse 5, talent 5, personality 1
Swag:
-banana peels 3d12
-rotten tomatoes
-misc fruit

Hi, my name is Horthrex the Unflappable, Vice Duke of the Wee and I am a midget from the future
Drive: Shrink those who oppose me
Knack: Escaping through secret tunnels
Shortcoming: Can't hear adjectives describing size
Powers:
-Barnacle 1d20 (can cling to living things)
Special Traits:
-maniacal cackle 5d6
-boring stories 5d8
-fear of griaffes 5d20
-command small things 5d6
Gotcha: If touched by fruit, turns into frenzied giant
Traits: brawn 1, brains 5, finesse 1, talent 3, personality 1
Swag: shrink ray 5d12, evil lair 5d6

Hi, my name is Wu Li master, the Dancing Wren and I am a martial arts star
Drive: Have dramatic movie moments
Knack: fighting NPCs
Shortcoming: poorly dubbed speech
Powers:
-bullet time (affects all in combat with him and anything in 5' radius)
Special Traits:
-must monologue before striking 3d8
-must make sound effects while fighting 4d10
-enemies won't harm me without first speechifying for too long 4d12
-use objects to fight with 3d10
Traits: brawn 4, brains 3, finesse 5, talent 3, personality 3
Swag: extend-o-spear 3d12, flat shoes of slo-mo jumping 3d10

All of this was fun to come up with and write down, but we hadn't thought much about using it.  Which was a mixed bag, as some stuff never got used, but other stuff found hilarious surprise application.

Situation set-up
Dan suggested an island setting where Monkey lived, and Dancing Wren could parachute in on some secret mission, James Bond style.  And Horthrex could be working on his plans.  We elaborated to say that Horthrex was building a giant shrink ray, and abducting monkeys to experiment on, while Dancing Wren had been sent to stop him.  So my character concept shifted from being a pompous, ridiculous scientist to basically being a supervillain.  It was at this stage that we actually wrote up most of the Special Traits above, and defined our Drives.  We also talked about putting everyone at odds, and covered all our bases, though I can't remember what sort of antagonism we laid out between Monkey and Dancing Wren.

We then made up our Twist from a Hat elements:
-volcanic eruption 3d12
-falling coconut 5d20
-submarine 2d6
-monsson 5d20
-fried plantain stand 3d8
-Indiana Jones boulder trap 2d20
-gutter salesman 5d20
-random lightning strike 5d8
-Reggie the giant, retarded ape 2d20
-Arnold Schwarzenegger 4d12

I'm not going to provide a transcript, just some overall observations:

We played one short intro scene as Monkey met Dancing Wren on the beach.  Then we played a giant brawl in Horthrex's sanctum until an apt ending arrived.  Actual play took about 1:45.  Rules talk, char-gen, set-up, brainstorming, etc. occurred before and during dinner -- that process was an additional 1:15 or so. 

Turns
From the rules:

Tracking objects
We actually spent a huge amount of play interacting with all the setting features that got narrated in.  Good action comedy needs props, and we added a bunch during scene framing, and a bunch more with Twist and Endowments during play.

I kept a list in the center of the table for everyone to refer to, which was key.  Just about every action involved rolling some dice from the present objects.

Dan's powers
Maybe the incredible breadth of his chosen powers should have dictated fewer dice or smaller dice or something.  I found the rules unclear on this point.  Anyway, in addition to dodging Inconvenience, he also had a brilliant moment where, during framing a scene initially cast as an intro to Horthrex at his evil machinations, he contributed "Fly on the Wall".  He then waited until a convenient moment and, on his turn, used his "turn into anything" power to say, "That was me!  The fly turns into a monkey!"  I dunno if that's a rules abuse.  But it was funny.

Ta-da!
Overall, a good time.  It feels a little weird to consciously seek and track laughter, and there were a lot more moments of, "Dude! Nice!" (with a big smile) than belly laughs.  We never really got into a smooth groove of feeling natural, but we generated a good number of hilarious moments nonetheless.  Dancing Wren dodged at attack because one of the techs manning his wires jerked it... Horthrex wound up siccing the chopped-up bits of shrunken undead monkeys on Monkey... a giant boulder somehow followed Horthrex into his escape tunnel... many more things I now forget.

The ending: the monsoon and volcanic eruption destroyed Horthrex's base while Arnold helped Monkey escape; a submarine with Dancing Wren's production staff showed up to argue with him about the script, and he took shelter there during the final catastrophe.

[Marshall Burns]

quote author=David Berg link=topic=28722.msg269573#msg269573 date=1253054763]
However, it occurs to me now that I might have simply misinterpreted the rules, and that Dan is allowed to "establish an intent" counter to an action I took on my turn while it's still my turn...?  In post-game discussion, Dan and Merlin were highly in favor of this.
Quote

[David Berg]

It seems that there was at least one general pattern we whiffed on: BRINGIN' IT with respect to rules arbitration. 

I think we did a pretty good job of BRINGIN' IT in terms of using the fiction to bash each other's characters.  But none of us were paying any attention to "Hey, that should cost you Drive points!" or "That's too broad to be d20s!"

For this particular session, I have a feeling that would have been best done before play.  We didn't have the brain space during play.  Of course, pre-play, rules arbitration just felt like "getting it right", not like BRINGIN' IT.  Maybe the actual process of char-gen could be made somehow subject to the same sensibility as play?  Competitive, or funny, or good-naturedly antagonistic?

Or maybe brain-space could be cleared during play if it was easy, fun, and consistent... like a TILT power called PATCH! to call and amend a rules violation.  So, like, the first time Dan divides into a ton of monkeys, everyone laughs and we let it ride.  But the second time he does it, it's a little less funny, so Merlin or I get inspired to spend a TILT point and call PATCH!

On arbitrating Inconvenience:

It's hard for me to imagine "watching each other's Iconvenience like hawks" in this session.  Maybe part of that is because we were writing Inconvenience down at the bottoms of our sheets, facing away from each other, in small letters, and Dan's handwriting is awful.  Maybe it's actually important to the game that Inconvenience be more visible?  Or maybe we just need a fun way to encourage players to look over each other's sheets cuz it's worth it -- something like "A Twist costs zero if you can derive it from a character's current Inconvenience!"

On spotlight-hogging:

"Feel free to try, cuz if you bore them, they'll interrupt you!" sounds good to me.  "You're just encouraging the other players to focus their wrath more on you than each other" might be a nice way to explain how this dynamic shakes out.  The CHANGE! option is an especially nice one for signalling "I bitchslap your contribution!" 

Although, I think Dan and Merlin and I felt (at least subconsciously) like the game was creatively taxing enough that making each other "try again" would have crossed a limit.  That's speculation... what's fact is that we didn't use a single CHANGE.

Possibly relevant: I seemed to be the only one who remembered all the TILT powers.  Dan and Merlin tended to announce stuff with, "I'm spending TILT!"  Or saying, "TWIST!" for everything, whether it was a TWIST or not.  Might be good to have some sort of central shorthand list of TILT options on the table?

Just for thoroughness, here's a note from an email:

Re: Drives: "trigger" is supposed to mean "makes you want to act." The "satisfy" thing is outmoded.

And, also from email, a clarification that I need further clarified:

Brawn 1d6 = skinny pencil-necked geek
Brawn 5d6 = Incredible Hulk
Stapling 1d20 = stapling (highly specific) sometimes helps me accomplish things. (not very prevalent)
Stapling 5d20 = Through stapling, which strengthens me, I can do all things. (very prevalent)

Maybe use another example with a small-die Trait that isn't a core attribute?  Maybe 1d8 and 5d8 abilities?  I can't tell why the statement that "I can use Stapling for everything" doesn't knock it down from being d20s, cuz presumably the reason "Stapling" got d20s it cuz it's so specific.  Actually, I have no confidence in that.  I am just confused.

[JoyWriter]

What if you write it for them upside down on the top of their character sheet?

[David Berg]

Relevant quote from Merlin, before I forget:

"The best parts weren't when we specifically tried to make each other laugh.  The funniest stuff just happened... when we just played the characters and used the stuff on our sheets and the twists, and it was funny in the situation at that moment."

Oh, and yeah, Marshall, we wrote the from-the-hat twists in secret, and pulling at random had a lot of "what'll it be?!" fun.

[Marshall Burns]

"The best parts weren't when we specifically tried to make each other laugh.  The funniest stuff just happened... when we just played the characters and used the stuff on our sheets and the twists, and it was funny in the situation at that moment."

Yes, 100%, yes. Now, see this:

Of course, pre-play, rules arbitration just felt like "getting it right", not like BRINGIN' IT. 

That's the thing: Bringin' It IS "getting it right." Bringin' It serves only one purpose, and that is as half of the "Engine," as it were, the thing that drives play. The other half is the characters, and specifically what they want. Each player has two responsibilites: 1. Play Your Character, and 2. Bring It.

You just advocate for your character, and make sure you give the other characters hell, and from that, funny stuff happens. It just does. This is the same damn reason slapstick, broad comedy, screwball comedy, and Looney Tunes are funny: Here's this guy, and he wants something, but all this crazy stuff keeps happening and getting in the way<know<contrivances

[David Berg]

Nah, man, I really don't think it's about spinning it.  Regardless of what you call the process of looking over each other's sheets before play and suggesting tweaks, it's not actually competitive or antagonistic in its current form.

What did you think about my ideas for competitive char-gen, the PATCH! thing, etc.?

Regarding the basic game engine, I'm with you, totally.  The more all the play procedures just make BIAPYC* as easy as possible, the better.

I still await your trait-ratings clarifications. 

*Bringin' It and Playing Your Character, obviously

[Marshall Burns]

Yeah, I'm workin' on it Been very very busy lately.

[Marshall Burns]

Ok, finally.

Regarding PATCH!: I don't know. I know I'd never use it. When a rule gets missed in my games (any game, not just SAN!), and we notice it when it comes up again, it's like, "Ok, we missed this the first time, but let's get it right now." Or, occasionally, "Y'know, let's just house-rule this out, ok?"

Regarding competitive chargen: I don't mean to be negative, but I have no idea what that would look like or how it would work.

Trait-ratings, now that's what's taken the most thought here. I've been trying to think back of traits that have been used in my games and trying to figure out why we made certain ones certain die sizes. In the process, I thought of a new rule that easily solves the problem and yet sustains the funny.

So, here's what I was thinking. your basic five traits, Brawn, Brains, Finesse*, Personality, and Talent are always d6s.
A generic trait after that is d8s. For example, the Unbelievable Bulk has Brawn 5d6, and "Bulk smash!" 5d8. Because, Bulk smash what? How? When? Why? Who? It's very generally applicable in that way; any smashing situation, it applies to. And that's what gave me the idea:
Specifying what, how, when, why, or to/for/at whom increases your trait by 1 die size, per thing specified.

So, "Bulk smash when angry" = d10. "Bulk smash cars when angry" = d12. "Bulk lift and throw buses at people when angry" = d20

I'm really liking this idea. What do you think?

*Finesse is gonna be changed to "Skill" in the next version. Because everyone I've played with manages to have a very different interpretation of what "Finesse" means from me. That, and it was only called "Finesse" in the first place because traits used to be called "skills."

[David Berg]

When a rule gets missed in my games (any game, not just SAN!), and we notice it when it comes up again, it's like, "Ok, we missed this the first time, but let's get it right now." Or, occasionally, "Y'know, let's just house-rule this out, ok?"

Sure.  I just thought that giving that process a funny name was in keeping with the game's spirit. 

Of course, lengthening the rulebook and formalizing stuff that doesn't need formalizing is probably bad.  I guess it depends on how much faith you have in random play groups to handle this sort of thing smoothly without your guidance.

Regarding competitive chargen: I don't mean to be negative, but I have no idea what that would look like or how it would work.

I dunno either.  If it's not inspiring you, then it's probably not a winner. 

The best I can do without hard thinking is mention that Amber uses an auction system, where players bid generic points against each other for highest values in specific scores.

If you get psyched about the idea, lemme know, and I'll try harder.

And that's what gave me the idea:
Specifying what, how, when, why, or to/for/at whom increases your trait by 1 die size, per thing specified.

I love this idea.  Intuitively, it seems like it would produce goodness, but logically, I really have no idea.  Methinks much playtesting required.

Finesse is gonna be changed to "Skill" in the next version. Because everyone I've played with manages to have a very different interpretation of what "Finesse" means from me.

Weird.  I like "Finesse".  I find "Skill" confusingly vague, and inappropriately bland.  Maybe "Slickness", "Grace" or "Touch"?

[whiteknife]

I really like that idea for assigning trait die sizes!

Well, that's pretty much all I have to say on that issue.