Inquisitive

[The Engine]

Ok, Yeah. That's something that needs to be outlined explicitly in the text.

[Ar Kayon]

This game looks sexy; I didn't even look at the mechanics yet.  I especially like the language you use to describe skills.

[Michael Pfaff]

Chris,

Can you give me a transcript here of an example of play. I always understand game mechanics better when I'm seeing specific uses of them instead of a laundry list of rules. You can make the example as complex or simple as you like, but it'd be cool to see all the different elements of your game here. A real example from a playtest would be even better.

Thanks.

Mike

[The Engine]

Chris,

Can you give me a transcript here of an example of play. I always understand game mechanics better when I'm seeing specific uses of them instead of a laundry list of rules. You can make the example as complex or simple as you like, but it'd be cool to see all the different elements of your game here. A real example from a playtest would be even better.

Thanks.

Mike

Well, I don't have an exact transcript. I need to start recording my sessions; I haven't thought of that before. I should be playtesting it some more in the coming two weeks and I'll be sure to record that. I've got Dragon Naturally and it's great for transcripts and things. I'll get that up here.

Right now, I'm working on character creation. I want it to be it's own session and I want it to be structured. Ideally, it'd be a series of vignettes of the actual training process of Shepherds and some of the actions there will get flagged as Traits for each character. Kinda like Phases in FATE, but actually roleplayed out in thirty minutes or so. Your character sheet would be blank for the first few and you'd be able to do whatever you wanted action-wise. If you needed to hack a computer, all of a sudden you get the Hacker trait, write it down. If you needed to shoot a gun, now you have the Loose the Arrows of the Lord at rank 1.  This will help keep the Traits concrete, as Simon suggested, since the Traits will be tied to actions that have actually happened.

I'm looking at having one for a combat training session, one for when the characters are in their rooms at night in social situations, just a number of events the character go through together to solidify their relationships and themselves. The game will have several dozen, so the GM can choose from them in a modular fashion, creating his own little details.

Does anyone know a game that currently does something like this I can look at?

That's how I want to do character creation. I'd also like to have city creation, so players would create the city they live in, taking details from it and assigning them their own Traits. I'm really looking at FATE's fractal system for that, but I'm a little scared of it. It's looking like a big project, but letting the players play in an alternate version of the city they live in where a totalitarian theocracy has been established seems cool to me.

But I'll get a detailed play example up as soon as I can.

-Chris

[Ron Edwards]

Hey Chris,

I suggest checking out the game HeroQuest, which includes several options for character creation, one of which is nigh-exactly what you're describing. The rules for this are well-written and well-structured in terms of how the initially nearly-empty character sheet interacts with play to become filled out.

Best, Ron