[Domus] -- refining the overwrought beast

[Darcy Burgess]

I've been doing some rework on my submission for Andy K's Mini Chef contest that he ran about a month ago, and I'm ready to open it up to others.

Domus should be an intense, tense, spiritual game -- set in a Roman-esque world.  The Brothers Grimm do Gladiator.  Loaded with Prophecy and all sorts of good overacting.  Throw in some worldbuilding, a dash of interplayer competition, heat and serve.

My intention is to publish this as a free PDF during its alpha (playtest) stages, and once I'm happy with it, to move to PDF for cash.

The document in its current form can be dl'd - here -.  It's seen a little tweaking since it was originally submitted to the contest, but not so you'd notice on a quick once-over.

The To Do list that I just have to do (stuff I'm firm on):

• a "monster manual" section, as part of the setting.  Some typical adversaries and creatures, with their associated Beliefs and Symbols.  The challenge here will be infusing Patria with colour without treading on individual groups' ownership of the setting.
• amend the mechanics chapter to reflect the fact that NPCs will have access to Cranks via Beliefs and Symbols, as well as Tenets.
• more examples of play throughout the text

The To Do list that I need help with:

• Defining the mechanical nature of Spiking, Growing and Dominance.  Prophecies are the "victory condition" of the game.  I've got to work that in too.
• Pulling Prophecies into the conflict resolution mechanic as a modifier, but without making them "another Belief".

Thanks

[talysman]

I take it that a Spike is an attack on someone else's Prophecy, while Grow is an attempt to improve your own Prophecy? does this mean the Prophecy words will have ratings, unlik Beliefs/Symbols, or will a successful Spike cross off a word from your Prophecy? (in which case, getting epic" is the same as Growing Prophecy.) I think the easiest way to effect a Spike in the mechanics would be to treat the Child of Destiny and the Child's Prophecy as two opponents; an attacker can split Effect to apply against both.

I'm a little confused by the "damage/healing" mechanic in the game. "damage" is a Crank Deficit. my first question is: does this mean you can't contribute color to a complication, or does it mean that you have to contribute more color than your current deficit to earn that extra die? second question: it looks like Children of Destiny "heal" their Crank Deficits by not contributing color to earn Cranks and not taking risks in a Complication. I think this is going to cause a problem.

since it's also a little confusing how a Child of Destiny would use (nonmagical) healing to help either another CoD or an injured NPC, I might suggest the following: healing and recovery is a conflict (Complication) against the wound (Crank Deficit). treat the wound as an NPC and apply Effect against it.

the game certainly has a lot of promise! I'll be interested to see how it develops.

[Darcy Burgess]

You've nailed the concept behind Spiking and Growing right on the head.  And I think you've done me a great service by suggesting using the Prophecy as an entity unto itself.  The idea of involving the Prophecy as an individual agent capable of engaging in resolution opens up a lot of great avenues.

Regarding the damage/healing mechanic, the idea is closer to your second interpretation -- you have to contribute more to a given complication to earn your Cranks.  Where you're off the mark (and I'm suspicious that this is just terminology flying around) is that it's not just more colour -- it's more of whatever you use to earn those Cranks (incorporating Beliefs/Symbols/Tenets, proposing Complications, etc.)

It's interesting that you raise the issue of "to heal, you get less involved".  I've had the same concern myself.  I'd like to put this out there for debate, but I'm simultaneously suspicious that the real answers will only be discovered via actual play.

Here are the two ways I see this playing out:

Option 1 -- Pessimistic/Realistic view

• Child takes some damage
• Next conflict out, Player decides to try keep his head down to heal
• This runs the risk of removing the player from communal creativity and putting him/her in a strictly reactive role
• This is countered by the fact that not working to get those cranks makes you a natural target for more beats (you're easier to take).

Option 2 -- Rose-coloured Glasses view

• Child takes some damage
• Next time out, Player decides to suck it up and take the damage as a personal challenge to get into the game even more.
• Goto step 2

I see Option 1 as the tactical choice, and Option 2 as the (god, this is a loaded term) "creative" choice.  I'm not applying a value judgement here -- some players will prefer one or the other, and will (hopefully) chose different ones at different times.  I'm assuming that from your statement, you believe that only the worst parts of Option 1 will crop up in play?

Regarding healing as an "activity", I had never envisioned it as an option -- your wounds are your own to carry and deal with.  Now, I don't have any objection to complications involving healing an NPC, so I'll definitely have to consider the implications of this and make it explicit in the text.

[Shreyas Sampat]

I wonder why the tactically sound choice is not also the choice that creates the behavior you most prefer?

[talysman]

I see Option 1 as the tactical choice, and Option 2 as the (god, this is a loaded term) "creative" choice.  I'm not applying a value judgement here -- some players will prefer one or the other, and will (hopefully) chose different ones at different times.  I'm assuming that from your statement, you believe that only the worst parts of Option 1 will crop up in play?

as it stands now, yes. from the looks of it, you have two creative goals with respect to conflicts:

• encourage players to contribute creatively,
• include an element of danger for physical conflict.

... but the way damage and healing works now, damage not only reduces your effectiveness in conflicts, but you have to be less creative to stand  chance of healing the damage. the negative impact of damage also discourages players from risking physical conflict, since it reduces their effectiveness. what I would do is encourage creativity instead: heal one level of damage with two Cranks. so, when a Child of Destiny is wounded, the player is going to add twice as many creative elements to the next complication and may even take the initiative to introduce complications; they may even ask other players to make complications for their Child to give them a chance to pile on the color and heal their damage. that's a win-win situation, especially since it simplifies your game; you will only need one healing rule.

[talysman]

oh, forgot to add: as it stands now, temporary wounds cause you to lose your next Crank. this is mechanically identical to saying "heal temporary wounds by spending one Crank". so, using my proposal means a permanent wound is just twice as bad as a temporary wound, but otherwise heals the same way.

[Darcy Burgess]

Persuant to John's suggestions re: nature of Prophecies, they aren't going to be "just words", but they're also going to have a numerical rating.  All characters' Prophecies will start at the same rating (# TBA), and can be messed with in the following fashions:

Grow

• add a term, OR
• add to its rating

Spike

• add a term, OR
• subtract from its rating

In both cases, the mods to the rating will be by the same amount (likely a constant to keep things simpler), and the instigator (spiker or grower) gets to choose what is done, and (if applicable) what term is added.  This implies that the List can be seeded with "negative" terms.

I've had another thought that is still simmering -- it's not fully formed by any means, but I think it may be a good way to address the whole issue of the damage feedback loop.

• Damage is now a resource -- it's something you want.  Each wound will behave in a similar fashion to a Belief, and be useful to the character
• The descriptive portion of a wound should relate to how it was caused -- such as a description of the physical wound ("deep seeping gash") or its effect on the Child ("hard time dealing with women")
• There will be some sort of threshold of Wounds that you don't want to cross -- being taken out of the story would ensue
• If you invoke a Wound in a Complication, the outcome of that complication matters even more:


• if you Win, you get to Grow your Prophecy
• if you Lose, you increase the severity of that Wound.  This affects two things: its Crank power (eg: a severity 2 wound cranks twice for one activation), and it also counts towards the wound threshold at its new severity (eg: the same severity 2 wound counts as if it were 2 "normal" wounds)
• Just as with Beliefs, Symbols and Tenets, using a Wound to crank a Back Up has to pass the "sniff test".

As an upshot of this new Idea, I'm considering removing Growing as an effect of "getting Epic", and opening G.E up to all CoD in a given Complication.

Something that isn't explicit in the text as written is that all effect that's removed as an effect of G.E gets added to the GM's Effect total for the purposes of "going too far".

As a sidebar, I'm considering expanding the damage rules to incorporate all Complications, not just combat.  That was (to a certain degree) an artificial limitation to meet the criteria of the contest (focus on Combat).

These changes open up a couple more questions (which are more or less rhetorical, but if anyone has any brilliant ideas, I'm listening. >grin< )

• how do you die/get permanently taken out?
• is there any negative effect of wounds other than eventually crossing the "threshold"?
• how do you heal -- or CAN you?
• how do you make a given Complication an opportunity to Spike another player's prophecy?
• is there any way other than using a wound in Complications to grow your own Prophecy

This is really exciting -- it's good to see this thing progressing (rapidly!), and I'm finding the feedback really helpful.

[Darcy Burgess]

quick update:

first revision is 90% done, and I think I've managed to incorporate all of the feedback received thus far (both public and private).  I'm planning on posting the revised sections as soon as they're complete.  Big changes in Prophecies (as in, it exists as a section...), as well as some changes in general conflict resolution (including me finally accepting that personal differences aside, Conflict is the generally accepted term, so let's not play at wordsmithing).  I haven't yet written the revised damage rules, but they're also on the stack.

Once that's done, I'm looking at getting enough world material to put it up for playtest, so I'm obviously going to start looking for willing souls...(hint, hint).

I also have another thread going on over in publishing, which may be of some interest.