Silent Sound: A Game of Guilt and Judgement

[jburneko]

Hello Everyone,

I don't really fancy myself much of a game designer so I almost never post in this forum.  I'm not posting much these days in general because life has gotten busy busy busy.  However, I was struck by a rare spark of inspiration and I'm looking for feedback.

I have always been facinated by the video game series Silent Hill.  I particularly like the second one as it presents Silent Hill as a place of judgement.  People with guilty consciences are lured there and the setting warps in twisted judgement of their past.  I also love the constant shifting between the "normal" setting and the nightmare version of the same setting.

For a LONG while I've wanted to combine these elements into an RPG.  Over the last couple of days I've put this together which owes a lot of thanks to various other games like SOAP, Sorcerer, a little bit of Trollbabe, and My Life With Master.  I've thinly disguised the inspiration for the game by titling it:

Silent Sound

Character Creation

Numerically, characters consist of three stats: Physical, Social and Guilt.  Player's devide 7 points between Physical and Social.  Guilt is set to the higher of the two values.

Next, players create a Secret for their character.  This should be some questionable action your character has taken in the past and would rather forget about.  Only the player and the GM should know about the Secret.  In Silent Hill James's Secret is that he euthenized his terminally ill wife.

Finally, players create a Lure for their characters.  Something has brought the character to Silent Sound.  In Silent Hill James's Lure is the letter he recieves from his dead wife claiming that she is waiting for him in the town.  This is made public to the other players.

Conflict Resolution

Conflict Resolution is as per Sorcerer.  Opposed die rolls comparing the number of dice in Pool A that out rank the highest die in Pool B.  Tied dice cancel each other out.  The number of "victories" will not be as significant in Silent Sound as they are in Sorcerer.

The Two Worlds

The player's characters will move between two worlds.  The first world I will simply call Silent Sound.  The second world I will call Shadow Silent Sound.  

In Silent Sound nothing overtly supernatural will ever happen.  Things may be disquieting, out of place, or threatening but everything that happens in Silent Sound will prove to be normal human conflict in the end.  Silent Sound should feel as though Horror is either looming or has just left.

(Note: Here is one of the many places where I break with the video game inspiration.  I imagine the town to be sparcely but definitely populated.  I imagine sequences in Silent Sound to play out like little vingettes or perhaps incomplete episodes of the twilight zone broken up by trips into Shadow Silent Sound).

Shadow Silent Sound on the other hand is a nightmare version of Silent Sound.  The walls bleed, doors move, monsters attack from the shadows and friends reveal themselves to be the boogyman.

PCs may only ever meet in Silent Sound.  Shadow Silent Sound is always faced by a single PC alone.

The resolution mechanic changes slightly depending on whether a conflict is taking place in Silent Sound or Shadow Silent Sound.

In Silent Sound conflicts are resolved by rolling the appropriate attribute (Physical or Social) vs the target's appropriate attribute (usually an NPC's or another PC's Physical or Social).  Success means the conflict swings in the PCs favor and a point is moved from the PC's Guilt to the attribute used in the conflict.  If the PC fails then the conflict fails and the PC has the option of either moving a point from the attribute to Guilt or narating how the failure moves the PC into Shadow Silent Sound.

In Shadow Silent Sound all conflicts are resolved by rolling the appropriate attribute (Physical or Social) vs the PC's own Guilt.  Failure results in the gain of a Guilt point (but no attribute loss) and the PC remains in Shadow Silent Sound.  Success means the player may either remove a point of guilt (but no attribute gain) and remain in Shadow Silent Sound or return to Silent Sound.

The Role of Secrets

From the GM's perspective The Secrets are the meat of the Setting and Situation.  Silent Sound should be a hodge-podge mix-and-match set of references to the PCs secrets.  Each player should be wondering what everything in their immediate situation has to do with either their own or another PCs Secret.

Shadow Silent Sound on the other hand should be focused on the current PC's secret who is visiting.  Every conflict in Shadow Silent Sound should be a hint about that specific PC's secret.

From the player's perspective Secrets are the metagame currency.  After a PC has returned from a trip to Shadow Silent Sound the other players may attempt to guess that PC's secret.  These guesses are written down privately and handed to the PC in question.  That player then confirms which players, if any, got it right but does not reveal the secret.  Thus it is possible for Player A to know Player B's Secret but Player B not know Player A's secret.  The idea is that players discover each other player's secret individually.

Players may only meet in Silent Sound if one player knows one of the other Player's secrets.  This need only be one-way knowledge.  A can be in B's scene if A know's B's secret but B doesn't know A's secret.  If C knows only A's secret then C can only be in B's scene if A is present as well.

Players in the same scene in Silent Sound may add a single bonus die to another player's conflict roll if they narrate an addition to the scene that hints at their own Secret.  Player A can earn a bonus die for Player B if Player A adds something that hints at A's secret.

In Shadow Silent Sound things get more interesting.  A player may earn a bonus die for himself if he adds something to the scene that hints at his own Secret.  Each player who knows the current Player's secret may also add an element to the scene that hints at that player's Secret.  The die earned from this addtion is added EITHER to the player's attribute roll OR the opposing guilt roll.  The player who added the detail decides.  Player A is facing a Physical Conflict in Shadow Silent Sound.  Player A adds a detail that hints at his Secret and gains a bonus die for his Physical roll.  Player B knows Player A's secret and chooses to add a detail that also hints at Player A's secret.  Player B may now choose to add a die to either Player A's physical roll or the opposing Guilt roll.

End Game

Once every player has discovered every other player's Secret play continues until the moment when each player has been once again thrown into Shadow Silent Sound and each player faces their final conflict which should be some extreme nightmarish representation of the character's Secret.  In this final conflict each player MUST (it's optional in the other cases) add a detail pertaining to the current character's secret and decide whether to add a die in the player's favor or the Guilt roll's favor.  Also, this is the one and only time the GM weighs in as well.  Each player then gets to narrate their final fate based on the success or failure of this final conflict.

(Note: I really like the Epilogue conditions in My Life With Master and I feel like this game needs something similar.  However, I really don't see much beyond the dichotemy of either the town consumes you or you escape which can read like a win/loss condition and lead to a gamist interpretation of the rules.  I'm not sure if that even really bothers me but my intent was to have a game that focused on players passing judgement over each other's characters with the GM driving the Setting's "Hanging Judge" attitude).

More Baroque Options: (The above is the base concept.  Below are other options I've considered which may just over complicate the game.  So any thoughts on these would be greatly appreciated).

Using a version of "roll over" victories instead of single bonus dice.  

In Silent Sound Player A would make the same conflict roll that B is making.  For each victory A would like to give to B as bonus die Player A must add a detail to the scene that hints at his own secret.

In Shadow Silent Sound each player who knows about the current Player's secret rolls his own Guilt vs the current Player's Guilt.  For each victory the player wishes to assign the player adds a detail hinting at the current player's secret.  These dice may be added individually to either the player's attribute roll or the final guilt roll.

Guilt Capping

Guilt can never be more than 2 times the player's highest attribute.  If Guilt would ever rise above this value then the player instead narrates a detail hinting at his secret into another player's scene.  That player then gains the guilt point instead.  This can cause a richochette if that point would take the player's guilt score over the limit.  No player may assign the guilt point to player who has already been in the guilt chain.  If every player overflows then the guilt point eventually winds up in the hands of the GM who may spend it on a single die roll.

Guilt and Attributes never drop below one.   (Note: I feel like some kind of counter reaction to happen to the one described above in these conditions but I'm not sure what.

Again, any and all feedback is welcome.

Jesse

[Jasper]

Hi Jesse,

Really cool idea!  I've never played Silent Hill, but it seems like an interesting concept you've got here.  I have a bunch of smaller comments before some general questions.

"Silent Hill" and "Shadow Silent Sound" are wordy (especially with the assonance).  Maybe just go with "Sound" or something and "Shadow" for brevity.

Even though you have a cap on Guilt, it seems like characters can easily enter into a spiral, becoming more and more trapped in the shadow world.  Are there any specific steps a player can take to make escape easier?  In Sorcerer for instance, you can narrate a lot of cool stuff and get bonuses.  Were you thinking of porting that over too, or is it always just a straight up roll?

Is going to Shadow Silent Sound just a "punishment" for losing a regular conflict? Can people go there if they feel like it?

I'd like to see Lures get some more mechanical bite, since I like the idea a lot.


Secrets.  Secrets rock.  Especially the ability to gian bonuses by revealing them. They're a little like the Mysteries I have in Trials of the Grail, though with some crucial differences (Mysteries aren't pre-defined but instead answered by the players during play using narrations; it's also everyone's shared goal to uncover them).   Some ideas about them:

Maybe you could explicitly break each secret down into multiple parts, so there's a quantifiable way to say "Okay, Jim knows about half of my secret, while Carol knows only a fifth of it" and tie that in to the giving of bonuses in the shadow world.  The different parts could frame the secret and then detail it, with the last one being a real douzy. E.G.

1. "I took a flight to the Andes one year to go mountaneering."
2. My wife was on the plane with me.
3. The plain crashed.
4. My wife used to cheat on me.
5. I ate her."[/list:u]

I think this would help with the hinting as well.  It's kind of hard, I'd imagine, to guage exactly what qualifies as a good solid hint; it might be useful to some people, and not others, depending on how they think, and so on.  Does the GM decide what's significant and what's not?  Can he demand a better hint?  

I'd also suggest allowing a bonus of more than one when giving a secret, based on how good the narration of it was, and how big of a hint.

How were you envisioning people inserting hints about their secrets in general? It seems especially hard in scenes that your characters isn't actually in.



Okay, general question: what's the goal of play, for the players?  They're supposed to reveal others' secrets -- specifically to judge them?  Or specifically to do something at Silent Sound, and judgment just comes along with that?  Are the characters supposed to be working together -- in which case in seems that putting your secret-based bonus towards harming someone's guilt roll would make things pretty awkward.  How do you see character dynamics working?

[jburneko]

Hello Jasper,

Thanks for the feed back.

I agree with you about the wordiness but unfortunately I haven't really thought of anything better.  If I write this up in a more user friendly manner I will probably come up with some kind of abreviation or new terms for the two realities.

The more I think about it the more I do like the Guilt Cap idea.  As for thrashing in the shadow world I'm not sure if that's a problem.  Imagine this extreme case:

Physical: 1
Social: 6
Guilt: 12

First of all, conflicts in the normal world are opposed rolls against PC and NPC stats.  So Guilt doesn't factor into success or failure at all.  Even in Physical Conflicts 1 die on 3 or 4 from an NPC isn't that bad.  But Okay, let's say you fail a Physical Conflict.  In this case I'd say it causes both a guilt bounce and an automatic trip to the shadow world.

Now you're in the shadow world.  You're pretty screwed if you have to deal with Physical Conflict here.  1 die vs 12.  Though it's not impossible for you to roll an 8 or 9 or 10 and have the twelve dice come up 6 or 7 across the board.  But the 6 on 12 isn't bad.  So look for ways to start a Social conflict in the Shadow World.  All that's really going to happen is that you're going to stay here for a while.

Note to Self: If I do keep the Guilt bounce rules how do they work in the shadow world?  Maybe Guilt bounce goes directly to the GM here.  Maybe with the additional note that the die can't be used against this player.

As for porting over the roleplaying bonuses from Sorcerer.  No, I'm deliberately not porting those.  Here's why:  First, those bonuses are my least favorite thing about Sorcerer.  The reason being, that I've never liked GM arbitrated bonuses and rewards because my standards are unreasonably high.  What impresses and excites my fellow players I usually consider "acceptable."  

But more importatly I wanted the metagame rewards to be entirely wrapped up in the Secrets.  Players should want to get their secrets out there.  First of all, hinting at their own Secrets nets them a bonus die in the shadow world.  Secondly, the more players who know their Secrets the more potential help they can get from their fellow players although at the risk of the players deciding to weigh in on the side of Guilt.

The idea is that the Shadow World is more metagamey and more player centric in terms of what is actually happening in the game world. The Normal World is more GM centric and less metagamey.  In the Normal World the only way to get a bonus die is to first have another player in the same scene with you and have that player choose to add something to scene that hints at their secret.  Again another reason for players to know your secret or for you to know theirs.  It's the only way to get them in the same scene with you.

But I agree with you that the bonus dice seem limited.  If there are only three players that's only three potential bonus dice in the Shadow world and 4 on 12 in the above example seems too harsh.  Thus my idea of adapting the roll over victory rules as well.  Which creates an interesting side effect.  The more Guilt you have compared to another player's Guilt the more judgemental influence you have over that character in the shadow world.  I still feel that it's missing something but perhaps a playtest will prove me wrong.  It does, however, provide a reason why a player might deliberately try to fail conflicts.

By the way, the analogy of the roll over in the Normal World would be that the player would have to actually join the conflict in some assisting way.  Note: This means that one PC could actually work AGAINST another PC in the Normal World as well.  So we would do attribute vs. attribute on that roll first.  Each victory the player wanted to apply to the main conflict would have to be accompanied by a hint about their secret.

The more I write about it the more I like the idea.

I think it's interesting that you bring up voluntarily going to the Shadow World.  The stumbling block I had on this game idea for a long time was the need for the Shadow World to be very player centric and that coming and going should revolve around player choice.  I was thinking about entering the Shadow World being a "get out of conflict free" card.  That is, a player can choose to simply abort a conflict unresolved by volunteering to go the Shadow World.

I'm glad you like the idea of Lures.  Lures are basically weak kickers more akin to the "reason why my character is on the island" from Over The Edge.  I'm not sure if they need anything more.  They're supposed to be a guide for the GM in what kind of set pieces and situations he can start the player off in.

I am, however, thinking about adding a couple of more details to character creation.  First, I'm thinking of adding descriptors to the two traits like Sorcerer.  However, I'm thinking they'd really just be flavor than have any mechanical benefit (similar to the descriptor choices in Trollbabe).  Also, I'm thinking of having each player describe some previous relationship to the town they have had in the past.  Another thing I like from the video game series Silent Hill is that the town is a little bit like Shell Beach from Dark City.  All the characters remember going there in the past but everything here and now is strange and unfamiliar like they've never really been there before.

The idea is that Secrets, Lures and the Town Connection all combine to create raw material for the GM's prep work.

I'm glad you like Secrets.  Too bad I can't take credit for them.  They're used here almost exactly like they're used in Zero To The Bone which in turn borrowed them from SOAP.  I don't think breaking them down into components is such a good idea since it would be fairly easy for a player to guess a component along another version of subdivision and thus be "wrong" when they weren't really wrong.  As for guessing the complete Secret the player who owns the Secret is the judge of who is right and wrong.  If a player is really close I imagine it would be alright for the player to say, "Be more specific" or some such and then wait for another round of guessing.

As for the inclusion of hints I don't really see the GM having much say over what is a good or poor hint as long as it's an honest effort.  If it in anyway relates to the player's Secret then it counts.  Weak hints just lead to a longer more subtle game.

The insertion of hints is entirely a metagame affair and can be anything from environmental color to directly altering the situation.  It's not necessarily and in most cases won't be anything a player's character DOES but rather a Setting or Situation metahpore that alludes to the Secret.

Let's say my secret is that I am an "Angel of Death" Nurse and that I used to poison some of my patients.  Now I'm in the Shadow World and the GM says that I'm in a grave yard when suddenly zombies start clawing their way out of the ground.  Then another player who knows my secret wants to weigh in.  So he says, "And all the zombies are dressed like nurses" and then annouces if the die is going for or against my roll.

I'm glad that you ask about the purpose of play because I think a lot of games lack a clear an acurate description of what everyone is supposed to do.  I'm going to try and make a big distinction here between Players, Characters and the GM because they have very distinct roles.

The Characters all have a questionable past.  Silent Sound is a place of judgement that puts out a supernatural call to these Characters in the form of Lures.  It is unfair to call Silent Sound a place of Evil, it isn't, it is a place of unforgiving judgement.  It's the GM's job to "play the setting."  Everything in the setting from the wallpaper to the NPCs and their interactions is there to punish the Characters for their Secrets.  It is the Player's job to answer the question: Do these Characters deserve it?

Notice that even in Shadow Silent Sound there is very little metagame control a Player has over the success/failure of his own Character.  That Character is at the mercy of the Players who know his Secret.  It's litterally a trial by jury.

One thing to keep in mind is that Normal Silent Sound is not neccessarily always tailored to the acting Character's Secret.  So that Character may be interacting with situations that resemble and deal with another Character's Secret.  For example, consider the game with the "Angel of Death" nurse.  Another Character entirely may encounter, say, a mother with a termanelly ill child.  That Character's Player is already going to be facing and making choices about life, death and illness through their Character's actions.  So what happens when that Player learns about the other Player's "Angel of Death" Secret?  How does the trial of their own Character affect their judgement of another Character?

Characters may or may not help each other.  Players may or may not aid or hinder each other.  These are independent variables.  Two Characters can be the best of friends while the Players are busy heaping on the Guilt.  Characters may not even ever meet.  There's a lot of room here, I think, for complexity.

Thanks again for the feed back.

Jesse