Truckers

[Jack Spencer Jr]

I had recently gotten a weird idea of an RPG based on the folklore of truckers and the CB-era and such. I haven't read up on my road lore, but I do have a spiffy set of mechanics (and yes I have seen Wraiths :) )

First of all, this is designed to be an email game. This is very important. One player is the referee. He really doesn't need to do much more than just regulate the rules listed below.

Players play truckers getting into scrapes everywhere from one-eyed trailer park protitutes to alien abduction (which is more outlandish to you?) Their only means of communication is via a CB radio. To emulate this, the following rules apply.

Communication unfolds over a number of Turns. On each turn, the ref processes and posts everyone's communication.

Each player is limited to only 50 characters per Turn. This excludes any of the "excepted phrases" which I need to decide on yet. If a player does exceed 50 characters, the ref with cut off the message at 50 characters adding a staticy (crackle) at the end.

A playe may exceed the 50 character limit if they put the code word (snik) with the paranthesis in their message, preferably at the begining of the message so the ref doesn't have to go hunting for it. However, after using a (snik) on a Turn, that player may not send a message on the following turn. Their message will be reduced to (crackle) on that turn. It is generally a good idea for this player to send a message that consists only of (crackle) so the ref will know they are still about and paying attention.

Play is going to be a lot like De Profundis especially the "speed" rules mentioned therein where one player starts "moving" as far as plot and the others slow down during that time.

This is all I have at this time. I found a trucker story site here and will try to read up some more on it.

[Eric J.]

This looks pretty fun.  However I have two questions:

1.  What counts as a character?  In programming it counts as every space and every new paragraph.

2.  Does each player send an e-mail to every player, or just the ref?  Is  abbreviation a factor (okay, that's three, so seu(sp?) me.)

[Jack Spencer Jr]

1.  What counts as a character?  In programming it counts as every space and every new paragraph.

That works. Each space works. The idea is to place a limit on the amount of what can be said. Jared Sorensen had an idea for a game where you could say anything so long as you said it in one breath. It works kind of like that. I suppose if things really got moving, the ref could let a 52 character message slip by, or maybe it'd be more dramatic to have it cut off like that. Who's to say?

So every space counts, aside from as-yet defined excepted phrases. I really can see why someone would want a new paragraph, but I think I'll go by the rule of thumb, if you can count a space, it counts against the 50 character limit. New paragraphs I may put in the excepted phrases. I'm not sure at this point. Also, I may have things like leaving out punctuation as well, so we'll see how it hashes out.

2.  Does each player send an e-mail to every player, or just the ref?

They send their messages to the ref, who then has the wonderful job of counting to 50 and them sending the messages to the group en mass. I see one of these free on-line things like Yahoo Groups being useful here.

Is  abbreviation a factor?

I would imagine so. If you can relate an idea or concept with fewer characters, then it works. However, if no one know what the abbreviation means, then it's not very helpful, is it?

[Maurice Forrester]

You'd have to use those CB codes as abbreviations like "20" for location.  There's a bunch of others.   Sounds like a fun idea.  Listen to some Red Sovine and C.W. McCall for inspiration!