The Forge Archives

I have a system mechanic/paradigm I'd like to hit yall with:

Beans


Every character has a pool of Beans- these can be anything from a number written on a napkin to a pile of actual honest to god frijoles (I prefer the candy kind).

Beans act like drama points (spend em to take naritive control), experience points (spend em to get better), and hit points (you loose em when you get F'd up... and generaly when beaten in any kind of contest...

Beans are bet during a conflict.  

Basicly, Beans represent the strength of a character's presence in a story.  Characters flush with Beans can get into more trouble, make a bigger impact, and shape the narative... Bean poor characters suffer a lack of screen-time.

Run out of beans, and you're out of the game, unless another player is willing to float you a loan.  This will cost you 1.5 times the initial loan to repay, and must be returned ASAP from any ingame scores.


I've been playing with normal cards and poker-inspired betting rules.

At the start of the conflict, the agressive party sets the Buy In by throwing some of his beans into the pot.  To enter the conflict, all parties must match this buy in.  If someone doesn't want to buy in, then they can sacrifice some beans to bail (I figure 1 bean for every 3 of the aney or some such).

Everyone then gets some cards (as determined below), aranges them, makes bluff-faces, and then plays them out in some way.


This is how I figure:

Everyone plays 1 card from their hand, face down.

Anyone who wants to can Raise- adding more beans to the pot.  

When there are no more raises, someone Calls.

Everyone flips cards, and the person with the best play wins, noting the victory.

Play continues like this for three rounds, with the chance for raises at each step.  

If a player chooses to bail, he looses everything he has already bet, but doesn't risk anything else.

At the end of three full turns, the pot goes to the player with the most victories.  If the GM wins, he may eat the beans in front of the players and laugh laugh laugh.




Characters are described like this (keeping in mind, that this thing is about 45 minutes old):

APSECTS
Body (clubs): physcial stuff
Mind (diamonds): mental stuff
Aura (hearts): social stuff
Spirit (spades): mystical stuff

Affinities
Stuff you are good at or learned how to do.  


All aspects start at 5.  This is how many cards you are delt for a conflict of that type.  Typicaly, a GM will give you a certain number of Adds to increase this (noted like +1 or +3) indicating you get extra cards for that kind of thing.  I played with +5 total.  Drop one by up to -2 for extra adds... but a sorry ass disadvantage.

Affinities let you discard a certain number of cards before play begins in a round.  From one to three cards can be ditched and redrawn.  I used 10 levels for my one hand of playtest.
Card Play

Each Aspect has an associated suit.  Cards of the right suit beat any other card, regardless of face value.  A 2 of clubs beats a kind of diamonds in a fist fight.  

If no cards have trump, next is Face value.  Higher face value wins.

Jokers are wild.

Ties are disguarded; no win.  Two joker tie.

Allies can Gang Up, using the better of their played cards against a single foe, but they must split the pot if they win.



Loosing all your beans means something different depending on the Aspect you lost them through.

Body -death or unconsciousness
Mind- confucion and shock
Aura- destroyed confidence, iniability to look anyone in the eye
Spirit- jibbering insanity.

Regardless, you're out if you can't afford to play.  

Kindly GM's (called Dealers from now on) might give you a Stake at the sart of the session... just don't piss it up the wall, or you have to leave the table.

Against totaly inferioir oponents (those with less than 1/10 you beans), you can only play for Chuckles.  You Bet Beans, but he bets Chuckles.  If you win, you get all the Chuckles... but your oponent still looses his Beans to the GM.  If you get beat... tough, your oponent just hit the big time.  Don't think you can go around sharping the little guys and earn some Beans at it.

This is why Dragons are so lazy... there just ain'y any percentage in slaughtering most people.  Dragons will have HUGE pools of beans... they'll be able to flat out-bid just about any comer.




If you're read this far, big thanks.


And


What do you think?

Oh Yeah,

Each play of card is narrated; players state intention when they throw the card out there, then the Dealer rules on how it actulay goes when the winner(s) are determined.  Players can try and be clever, bluffing the Dealer with grandiose descriptions hoping he will bail... but the house rarely gets bluffed.

The Dealer can throw cards from a big shoe (lots of decks), each player can get his own deck (my prefered method), or you can write a really cool Card Shuffling Program (or just use PC Solitare, you lazy bum).


Characters who run out of beans can be subject to all sorts of hummiliation- made to fetch drinks for everyone, to complement the Dealer on his haircut, or simply to sit in the corner.  Every such hurtful task he is made to endure earns him a few Beans from the Dealer's Stash.  These don't have to be repaid, but you know the looser will just piss them away again.