Unamed Game: Looking for a little advice

[Keith Senkowski]

Hi,

I have been working on an RPG for the past couple of years and have recently come to a point where I think I may need to scrap my setting and try something else.  I am begining to wonder if there is a need for another "fantasy" RPG.  I should also point out that I have written and layed out the document and have been working on the art and working with my editor.  My questions are should I consider trying a different genre?  Have I gone too far to make a change?

The Setting: I guess the best description for it is that it is a kind of fantasy horror.  There are only different ethnicities of humans, no elves, dwarves, and such.  The two monothesitic religions have indoctrinated the people into believeing that there is no "evil" and that all is a part of "god's" plan.  The players play characters that have learned that that isn't true and that the evil in the world has a different source.

I do have to say that I am very comfortable with the mechanics of the game and that I designed them to be able to be moved from genre to genre.  

Keith

[matthijs]

Keith,

it's very hard to say whether you should change genre. Every time it seems that fantasy has been all used up, a new game comes along and becomes a major seller. Ars Magica, Earthdawn, and D&D3 are all examples - they all surprised the hell out of me when they survived more than a year, and they're all fantasy RPG's.

Perhaps you could say a bit more about your game? Specifically, in what ways is it different from other games on the market? What do you believe will be its major selling point(s)?

- Matthijs

[Keith Senkowski]

I guess that is part of my problem.  I am having trouble distinguishing what sets the game apart.  I may be a bit too close to it to look at it and say "X" is the best part about it and that is what will sell it.

The setting is heavily influenced by medieval slavic and mongolian culture and myths.  It is heavily detailed covering topics like the ethnicities, language, social classes, family life, urban and rural life, the calendar, religions, holidays, general beliefs and superstitions, important organizations, as well as the requisite country information (covering geography, the people, politics, history, and forbidden lore).  The religions are modeled on real life relgion, not the typical fantasy hodge-podge of mythology, as are the organizations that have grown out of them.  Equipment is detailed with it's social importance rather than simple "this is a long sword and it does X damage".

The fantasy part I guess comes from the magic/superstition part.  I like to think of it as a sort of medieval/fantasy X-Files without the government agencies, but plenty of evil conspiracy.

As you can see there is a lot going on, but I'm not sure if any of it makes the game stand out at all.

The mechanics are pretty simple.  Point based character creation.  Attribute scale of 1-6.  Resolution of actions follows the same formula throughout (Stat X + Stat Y + 1D6 = Total which must be equal to or higher than Difficulty).

[Mike Holmes]

A maxim that I believe in is that any game concept can be made to work if you have a good enough system making it happen. This assumes that you've got enough talent to make the setting portions of the game attractive in the first place (which we have to assume if you feel that you can make a game in the first place). So, assuming that you can make a suitable setting then there's no reason that another fantasy game isn't a viable choice.

Add to which, it seems that your setting has some unique things about it. I think you should definitely push ahead with it.

What's the status of the game? How close is it to publishable? What plans to you have for it?

Mike

[Keith Senkowski]

Like I said, I'm not too sure that anything is really all that unique about it.  There are tons of games out there.

The games status is that it is nearly ready for our final edit.  I still have to rewrite/tweek the introduction and add the index.  I have finished most of the interior art and I am negotiating with an artist for the cover.  All that being said I am hopping to have it all wrapped up in a nice package by the end of January or early February.  Completing my copy for the editor before the holidays is kind of bad timing on my part.

I am not sure on which direction I am going to take with publishing.  I have been reading the posts in the forum and the articles on the site as well as investigating elsewhere.

Keith

[Mike Holmes]

Have you gotten feedback from any independent playtesting? I think that it's too close to the wedding for you to be objective at this point.

Mike

[greyorm]

Equipment is detailed with it's social importance rather than simple "this is a long sword and it does X damage".

Interesting. I must ask: how do you make this work mechanically? That is, what's to stop any given player from ignoring the social/cultural importance and just picking from the list according to "whatever does the best damage."

Note: I do not consider "well, the GM can..." or "the GM should do this to the player if they do..." to be responses to this specific question. While those are solutions, I'm interested in the actual non-GM-intervention-required mechanics that would back the idea up.

And as Mike said -- given the amount of work you've put into this, it's a little too close to the wedding to be objective about it now. To expand the analogy, you might even consider your nervous second-guessing yourself to be akin to "wedding day jitters."

[Keith Senkowski]

Yeah, my editor told me that "You weren't this nervous for your wedding".  That may be a part of it, but I think that fearing to release a product into a market already saturated with product is valid.

Unfortunately, the playtesters that I had were not very good at, well giving me feedback.  I'm debating on finding another group of playtesters.  I realize outside help is always good (case in point my post here), but my experience has kinda soured me to it.

I didn't come up with a mechanic to force players to adhere to the social/cultural importance of the weapons.  I just try to stress the cultural/social importance in the setting throughout the book.  For long time I debated on rules to force players to adhere to the social/cultural aspects of the setting and decided against it.  What would the merit be?

[Harlequin]

Rather than force people, a good mechanic will usually do one of two things if you're using it to promote a theme - like cultural appropriateness in this instance.  It will reward behaviour it likes, or it will entirely eliminate the option of counterbehaviour.  IME "dissuading" or punishing is not only unfriendly but unuseful when it comes to such mechanics.

So if you want, for example, to promote the cultural appropriateness of the right weapon, you could use one of the two approaches above, or both.

Rewarding the behaviour is best accomplished by making it the most statistically sensible thing to do.  This can be as simple as this statement:  "A Mongol warrior receives a +1 to hit with the horsebow or the (mongol sword?).  He also receives a +1 to [armour class, to-be-hit difficulty, whatever] when fighting on horseback."  Or it can be intricate: "Each successful raid which brings back greater plunder than the last is marked by a Mongol warrior with a lashing on his queue.  When using a horsebow or (what would you call that?), he may add the number of lashings on his queue to his combat total."

Forbidding counterbehaviour sounds ominous, but it's actually quite subtle and effective.  Sorcerer itself uses this trick - the Descriptors listed are there to support certain themes, and you do not get to just make up your own, so you, too, will support these elements of play.  "Drug Addict" may be on there, but "Game Designer" is not.  For your game, again a simple example: "Mongols may become proficient with the horsebow, spear, (did they use swords anyway?), or hunting eagle."  You can compromise slightly, adding perhaps "All other weapons are covered by the Foreign Weapons skill, which is purchased at 5x usual cost."  But be careful; it's often more effective to not even include this option.  The key is to pretend that the "bad" options just don't exist and that nobody would ever want to choose them anyway.  

A more complex example of forbidding could be:  "Weapon skills above 2 are purchased with skill points normally.  The first two levels, however, can only be acquired in the culturally appropriate manner; very few cultures actually use formal weapons training of any kind.  See the culture pages for details; for example, a Breton gains lvl 1 proficiency in a weapon only by being given it by his father or elder brother, and lvl 2 by using it to defend Brittany from outsiders.  A Mongol gains lvl 1 in a weapon by crafting it himself or taking it from a vanquished enemy, and lvl 2 by carrying it on a raid and bringing back plunder."

Does that help clarify some of the methods of using the mechanics to reinforce even subtle things like cultural significance?

Oh, and, get good playtesters - blind test if at all possible.  Package up a copy of the game and give it to someone for free, on the condition that they log their sessions and send them to you.  It can be hard to find reliable help, but having them test the product as written without knowing you at all is a biggie.

- Eric

[Loki]

Like I said, I'm not too sure that anything is really all that unique about it. There are tons of games out there.

If you feel that way, your instinct is probably right. However, that doesn't mean that there isn't something here that wouldn't interest people--after all, it interested you enough to work on it for years.

From your description, I'd say that this game is probably filling a role that you personally don't feel is being filled by the games that are out there (or that you've had experience with).

My suggestion to you is this: if what you've got is a very compelling setting, publish that. You might choose to publish it so it's compatible with some popular systems, or just the system that you feel it fits with the best.

If there's something else that you're trying to acheive, some focus of game play that is a departure from the usual fantasy "gather up the party and let's go fight" then figure out what that is and build it into your game. My example would be Call of Cthulhu (which I realize isn't a very popular game on these boards). It's a pretty standard horror investigation game with a compelling setting, but what really sets it apart is the Sanity mechanic. That mechanic really changes the tone of the game, and is what I find most enjoyable about it.

Perhaps there's something like this about your world... it's a standard fantasy game with a compelling setting... but it has some mechanic that is very different than what's out there, a mechanic that encourages a type of play that you enjoy. An example of just this sort of thing is probably The Riddle of Steel, which for me is a pretty nice setting, a somewhat standard fantasy game, but with the addition of these Spiritual Attributes which utterly change the focus of the game away from dnd style treasure/xp gathering.

[contracycle]

Hey I'd say this sounds sufficiently different from most FRPG's to qualify as pretty innovative.  No stock races, a primary conflict rather than just a space to loot n pillage, what at least aspires to be a coherent and seldom explored setting.  Unless the mechanisms were offensive to my eyes, I'd probably investigate if I found it on a shelf.

[Lxndr]

Which leads me to ask the question:

you designed the mechanics to be portable from genre to genre, more or less.  What about them makes them a better suit for your game than another genre-portable system?  What is unique about the system in terms of how it influences, reinforces, or otherwise supports the setting?

[Keith Senkowski]

Does that help clarify some of the methods of using the mechanics to reinforce even subtle things like cultural significance?

It does.  It also gave me an idea.  Thank you.

Perhaps there's something like this about your world... it's a standard fantasy game with a compelling setting... but it has some mechanic that is very different than what's out there, a mechanic that encourages a type of play that you enjoy.

Innovative is the key right.  I don't think that there is anything that is particularly earth shattering.  I do think that there are a lot of little mechanics that when brought together as a whole make a small innovation.

No stock races, a primary conflict rather than just a space to loot n pillage, what at least aspires to be a coherent and seldom explored setting.

One of the two primary reasons I started on this obsession was a disatisfaction with the lack of focus in many of the traditional fantasy games out there and my desire as a polack from Chicago to seem some slavic influence in RPGs.  I also desired to create a setting that has the sense of being real, but at teh same time has fantastic elements that are a bit easier to swalllow.  I always thought for fantasy to work there has to be very little fantasy and a lot of reality.  You have no idea how sick of anglo-irish settings I am (but don't tell my irish wife).

What about them makes them a better suit for your game than another genre-portable system?  What is unique about the system in terms of how it influences, reinforces, or otherwise supports the setting?

The easy answer would be that the system of my invention better suits my system because I wrote/created it, but that would be a cop out.  At its core they system doesn't directly support the setting, which is what makes it usable for other settings.  It is the add on mechanics that support the system and setting, particularly the fantastic aspects (magic system, cultural options, corruption mechanic, goon mechanic, etc).  These mechanics are what really tie the system to the setting.

[contracycle]

One of the two primary reasons I started on this obsession was a disatisfaction with the lack of focus in many of the traditional fantasy games out there and my desire as a polack from Chicago to seem some slavic influence in RPGs.

Preach on, brother.  Good influences would be:
Peter Morwood: 'Prince Ivan'
CJ Cherryh: 'Rusalka', 'Chernevog' and 'Yvgenie'

... if you have not read these already.

[Kirk Mitchell]

Hi,

I must say, I most certainly find your concept intruguing. I don't think that your basic formula is directly tied to the setting, and that you could easily change the setting, however, I would not. I would like to hear more about the background of your setting, and more of your mechanics (specifically, how they would tie in to the setting).

My question would be: what has made you want to change the setting? Something must have come up. Maybe an idea that you liked better (happens to me all the time), but changing for this reason, especially when you have invested so much time and effort, generally gets you nowhere. Did you discover a problem with the setting? Is it simply because of the huge amounts of fantasy RPGs out there? If so, I think that if you have something in your setting that is innovative, or gives a new twist (no matter how small) to gameplay or ideas, I say that the industry needs it. Games have become instant classics because of some new little twist.

Anyways, give the waters a good stir to stop them from getting stagnant, and see what comes up.

Sermon over, and hope it helped,
Kirk