Quirky Metagame Mechanic

[Cameron]

This came up a while back. I'm working on a crime drama game and I was thinking of optional metagame mechanics that would add another degree of fun to the game. Specifically, I was thinking of something that would help facilitate quirky conversations between players, like in Pulp Fiction, Get Shorty or Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.  I proposed an optional mechanic where extra experience points or the like would be given out if the player could convey one randomly generated topic while superficially speaking about another seperately generated topic.

I have the beginning of a good sized list, but I need some more suggestions.

The superficial topic:

2 of Clubs: A movie
3 of Clubs: Food
4 of Clubs: Travel
5 of Clubs: An event in the lives of both player and character
6 of Clubs: Cartoons
7 of Clubs: Television
8 of Clubs: The opposite sex
9 of Clubs: Past criminal exploits
10 of Diamonds: Music
Jack of Clubs: Current events
Queen of Clubs: Family
King of Clubs: Plans for the future
Ace of Clubs: Someone deceased
2 of Diamonds: A child or children
3 of Diamonds: Something uniquely American
4 of Diamonds: Commercials or advertisements
5 of Diamonds: Religion
6 of Diamonds: Politics
7 of Diamonds: Bills
8 of Diamonds: A celebrity
9 of Diamonds: Cars
10 of Diamonds: Amusing bodily functions
Jack of Diamonds: Alcohol or drugs
Queen of Diamonds: A mutual friend
King of Diamonds: Reading material (books, magazines, etc)
Ace of Diamonds: Male pattern baldness
2 of Hearts: Sports
3 of Hearts: Dreams
4 of Hearts: Gambling
5 of Hearts: Someone you hate
6 of Hearts: Technology
7 of Hearts: "Talking Shop"
9 of Hearts: Appearances
10 of Hearts: A funny anecdote
Jack of Hearts: A dirty joke
Queen of Hearts: Something unfamiliar or alien
King of Hearts: Something unexplainable or inexplicable
Ace of Hearts: A surprise
2 of Spades: A memory
3 of Spades: Health

The REAL topic:

2 of Clubs: The bleak inevitability of the criminal lifestyle
3 of Clubs: Regret
4 of Clubs: A law of thermodynamics
5 of Clubs: The fickleness of fate
6 of Clubs: The road less traveled
7 of Clubs: The struggle of man vs. nature
8 of Clubs: Social contract theory
9 of Clubs: Honor among thieves
10 of Diamonds: Things aren't like they used to be
Jack of Clubs: The metaphorical walls that people build to protect themselves
Queen of Clubs: Mistrust
King of Clubs: Marxist class struggle
Ace of Clubs: Utopian society
2 of Diamonds: Predestiny
3 of Diamonds: Guilt
4 of Diamonds: Oedipal complex or penis envy
5 of Diamonds: Social constructions of madness
6 of Diamonds: The existence of absolute good and evil
7 of Diamonds: The morality of capital punishment
8 of Diamonds: Why do bad things happen to good people?
9 of Diamonds: Independence
10 of Diamonds: Fear or insecurity
Jack of Diamonds: Measures of worth
Queen of Diamonds: Overcompensation
King of Diamonds: Nostalgia
Ace of Diamonds: Obligation
2 of Hearts: Man's inhumanity to man
3 of Hearts: Existentialism
4 of Hearts: Nihilism
5 of Hearts: Gender roles
6 of Hearts: Hypocrisy


I'd love to hear what topics other people can come up with. Alternately, I'd like to hear how you'd incorporate a discussion of honor among thieves into a conversation about amusing bodily functions.




_________________
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[ This Message was edited by: Cameron on 2001-10-15 15:54 ]

[Laurel]

Rather than using cards to spawn the quirky quotes, perhaps you could go for something more akin to topics scribbled on paper and then folded thrown into a bowl so that players could grab one when they felt inspired- and if the group laughs or applauds, you give them a "quirky" reward that's more in the spirit of "quirkyness" than XP.  For example, gag gifts from Spencers or cheap props from a dollar store that can be rewarded at the end of the game session.

Another varient could be to use funny quotations from books or quotation archives and then reward players when they're able to figure out a way to use the quote in some kind of humorous but believable context.

Laurel      

[Manu]

That's very similar to the "tagline" concept from Dying Earth...but there's no harm in re-using great idea ! :smile:

[Cameron]

Actually, the reward I was going to use wasn't experience points but "Notoriety" which is somewhat akin to Drama Dice in 7th Sea.

Experience points are only handed out when players intentionally shoot themselves in the foot or introduce "comedy of errors" type complications to the plot.

As you can see by my lists, I got about halfway through the Superficial and Real topics before I ran out of good topics, so I need some more suggestions.

[Cameron]

Actually, the reward I was going to use wasn't experience points but "Notoriety" which is somewhat akin to Drama Dice in 7th Sea.

Experience points are only handed out when players intentionally shoot themselves in the foot or introduce "comedy of errors" type complications to the plot.

As you can see by my lists, I got about halfway through the Superficial and Real topics before I ran out of good topics, so I need some more suggestions.

[Ron Edwards]

Hey,

I agree with Laurel that the card mechanic is too layered. The key points are (1) draw and (2) neat topic. Why insert step (1.5) with the cards, when the only effect is to slow things down by forcing a translation to step (2)?

Best,
Ron

[Cameron]

On 2001-10-16 10:24, Ron Edwards Spoketh:
Hey,

I agree with Laurel that the card mechanic is too layered. The key points are (1) draw and (2) neat topic. Why insert step (1.5) with the cards, when the only effect is to slow things down by forcing a translation to step (2)?

The initial idea was something along the lines of "Talk amongst yourselves... I'll give you a topic... The holy roman empire was neither holy nor roman, discuss."

By handing players two totally incompatable topics, I hoped to generate some very interesting banter.  Like I said before, this is really just a silly optional rule that I was going to throw in to make things more fun. It's not intrinsic to the game. Ideally, I would have hundreds of suitably vague topics for discussion.

[Paul Czege]

Hey Cameron,

By handing players two totally incompatable topics, I hoped to generate some very interesting banter.

I think this is the clever part. I like it. And your topics are great. I think the "over-layering" that people are describing is that you draw a standard playing card and then consult a chart to find out what that card means. I think the topic should be marked right on the card.

Paul

[Mike Holmes]

I don't think that most people are getting that the idea is to pick two topics and somehow talk around the one deep idea using another superficial idea as a metaphor. That's it, right. I will do an example:

I draw the three of clubs,and then the six of clubs. I now must discuss The Road Less Travelled while only using food to discuss it.

Scene:
My character is Sal, a bookie, who is currently at a diner about to eat a chicken sandwich with Art, a Shyster who owes him money. What follows is Sal's monolog:

See Art, it's like this chicken sandwich. I'm going to eat it with a big glop a ketchup on it, and a lot of pepper. Why you ask? Because that's how I am with food. See, you, you got your club sandwich with mayo on it. That's how everybody eats that sandwich. But not me. Anyhow, that's how I know that you're good for the money Art, you always put mayo on the club sandwich. Me, nobody knows where I'm going next, cause I always make my sandwich in a fashion unfathomable to the next guy. And as a bonus, I get to taste things which no other guy may have ever tasted. Which has it's advantages. You see what I'm sayin' Art?

How many notoriety does Sal get for that?

Mike

[Ron Edwards]

Mike,

I get the goal. What I'm saying, and Laurel is saying, and Paul is saying, is to leave the pack of playing cards out of the process. Instead of having a pack of standard playing cards and a list to key out what "eight of clubs" means, just put all the topics onto little cards and draw those.

Best,
Ron

[Cameron]

Badda-bing-badda-boom you just scored yourself some Notoriety!

That's exactly what I had in mind.

Now to address the overlayering factor. It is certainly feasible to write the topics on the cards themselves. The players may well have to mark the Jokers anyway to tell them apart, so why not?

The only reason I can think to use a chart to compare results is that you can always write up another chart when the topics get old. I'd like to think that the topics are vague enough that they can be re-used quite a bit, but at some point someone may get tired of using food as a metaphor. No problem, just start using a new chart... or cross out the offending topic and write in a new one.

_________________
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[ This Message was edited by: Cameron on 2001-10-16 14:36 ]

[Mike Holmes]

I see what you guys are saying, and the answer is because of the extra set up time creating the cards. If this were to be published, sure, of course. But as an indie mechanic, well, most people can come up with a deck as a randomizer and can just refer to the chart. Is it really that much more time in play? OTOH, this is from a guy that likes Rolemaster. :smile:

An interesting idea would be to create the cards at the beginning of each session. Each player gets a few three by five cards or something and lists a couple of surface and substantial topics each. Then these are drawn randomly during play. Might draw the topics closer to the game itself. Or maybe the players just add the substantial topics, and get the surface topics from the original chart. Anyhow, just an idea.

Mike

[Jack Spencer Jr]

On 2001-10-16 10:24, Ron Edwards wrote:
Hey,

I agree with Laurel that the card mechanic is too layered. The key points are (1) draw and (2) neat topic. Why insert step (1.5) with the cards, when the only effect is to slow things down by forcing a translation to step (2)?

Best,
Ron

Slows things down, but no more than if you rolled dice and then consulted a chart.

I can see the appeal of using playing card rather than a bunch of scap paper pieces in a hat.  It's a professional looking deck of cards w/o having to shell out for such at a printer.

That said, it may not be a good reason to use playing cards, but it doesn't slow things down as much as the metagame mechanics I'm woring on using the I Ching.

[Laurel]

Maybe 3x5 cards cut in half?  The problem with bigger cards is that they take up more space, make shuffling a nightmare, and are more prone to rips and accidents.  Normal playing cards are a great size to use and would be spiffy except that the lamination makes it really hard to write something that won't smear, fade, or just look ugly (speaking from personal experience here *g*).  Of course, unlaminated cards suffer a lot more wear.

If you went for tarot cards, or even one of those dime-store books on how to do fortune-telling with regular cards, finding topics might be easier.  You just pick a topic that relates to one of the meanings for the specific card.  Whatever you do, I think having the quote or idea on the card itself is really important.  

[Cameron]

As I said before, the reason the topics are linked to playing cards is because the actual game system uses a poker deck exclusively. Having slips of paper in a hat seems fine, but the I don't see consulting a matrix as slowing down the game at all since this would probably be done before the game starts (like how catch phrases are distributed before a game of Dying Earth). Using a tarot deck is silly since every game using this system will have a perfectly good poker deck lying around.

Of course, you will note that I haven't yet been able to come up with a full 54 superficial topics or 54 real topics. I was hoping to get some suggestions, but the discussion so far has revolved around whether the mechanic works or how to make it run smoother.

Oh, here's a few more.
Red Joker: Draw 2 and switch the superficial topic with the real topic (i.e. you are talking about the death of innocence, but you are using it as a metaphor to talk about cartoons)
Black Joker: Pick your own topic

_________________
-Cameron
genexcuse@yahoo.com
http://www.geocities.com/genexcuse
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http://www.generationexcuse.com

[ This Message was edited by: Cameron on 2001-10-16 16:40 ]