I'm writing up a superhero game called Capes. Its premise is "Power is fun, but do you deserve it?"

Two issues were highlighted by last nights playtest.

First issue: It is too easy for players to be blocked out of action, even unintentionally. If somebody rolls ten dice, and six of them are threes and fours (which I saw happen more than once) then everyone who has five or less successes is excluded from participating in the turn, no matter what else happens.

Proposed Rules Change: You no longer determine who has the right to declare Wonders by who has the most dice in their success pool, but by who has the most wonder dice (i.e. fives and sixes).

Do you think this will reduce the number of times that people are blocked out of the action unintentionally? Are there other effects that I'm not seeing?


Second issue: This is actually several issues that I feel I might address with a single fix:

• There is no mechanical encouragement to deliver stirring monologues and banter• There is no mechanical encouragement to chat about your history, your motivations and your plans for world conquest• There is a vague indication in the rules that "When you win a gamble for Debt, you should describe a new Fact about the world that supports your vision in that Drive", but it is wholly subjective and has no support in the rule mechanics

Proposed Rules Change: Each turn now opens with a formalized "Monologue Phase", during which the heroes and villains talk and posture. Several things that already happen would now occur in this phase:

• Attitudes activate• Powers activate• Debt is accrued to gain more dice• Debt is staked on Complications.• Complications that went the whole previous round in Resolution are now Resolved.

And some new things would also happen:

• Previously established Facts are referenced to... uh... give the person some sort of opportunity to do something in the mechanics... something more interesting than just getting a few more dice• For each complication that is resolved that has Stakes, the winner of the Complication can narrate a new Fact (or the opportunity can be deferred until the end of the scene).

In addition, the creation of Facts as part of the characters backstory would be part of the character creation process... so they start out with a stable of Facts that they have an incentive to reveal.

Do you think that this is the right direction for giving people a structure that encourages comic-book style monologues? How should Facts feed back into the game system?

EDIT: In general -- changes seem logical, especially a "Monologue Phase" and more formalized sequence of play.

TonyLB wrote: Previously established Facts are referenced to... uh... give the person some sort of opportunity to do something .... For each complication that is resolved that has Stakes, the winner of the Complication can narrate a new Fact (or the opportunity can be deferred until the end of the scene).

TonyLB wrote: ....Danny took an early, substantial, debt in Duty, and used the dice to achieve things that activated some of his many Tropes (thereby earning him yet more dice). He turned that into a cascade, one Trope feeding into the next from turn to turn, combined with effective play in his Attitudes. In a very short time he went from no dice at all to a huge pile. At the same time, his well-chosen Tropes forced him to narrate events in his characters own inimitable style.

Yeah! Making things happen so that they can make more things happen. I really like that.

I'm not sure that the hose of the feedback loop gets plugged in where you're recommending, though. I can see the argument for Facts enabling Attitudes and Tropes in some way. You could, for instance, let people reference a Fact in order to unBlock an Attitude or Trope (allowing it to be used again). But as I said, I'm not sure there isn't a better place to plug in the hose.

While I'm mulling that, I'll add two things: First is that the phrase "fighting for control" has all sorts of connotations. I'm pretty sure that we mean the same thing, but I'd prefer to say that players are striving for their chance to contribute. That reminds people that the Facts being made by their enemies are something that they (at least as players) should embrace as driving the story forward as well.

When the villains make "bad" things happen it's almost always an opportunity. Get imprisoned? You just got inside their secret lair. Find out an arch-villain is your father? You just gained a chance to save your father and undermine the opposition at the same time. I hope this doesn't just come across as pollyanna "lemons to lemonade" nonsense. I have seen this sort of embracing of adversity and change work for players time and time again.

Second, I'll point out a feature I like about tying the creation of Facts to only the resolution of Complications where Drives were Staked: Every Fact is morally freighted. A Fact doesn't happen because you struck a harder blow than the Undoctor... it happens because you struck your blow for Justice (or Truth, or whatever).

There's a subtle distinction there, and one that I have a hard time conveying in rules (so far). Let's take your example of "I state a few facts and now we're near a river".

That's perfect collaborative narration, reinforced by strategic priorities. Tying those together is a healthy synergy from the point of view of a game. But... you knew there had to be a "but", right?... it isn't really morally freighted.

Consider, by comparison: Hydrolad, Royal Guard of the Atlantean family and emmisary to the surface world, rescues Princess Nereid from the evil eco-Villain Blight. He'd staked Duty on this, so he gets to narrate a Fact about how the world supports his sense of Duty. He declares that the kidnapping of the Princess was just a distraction, and that Blights plan is to detonate a bomb underwater and drown New York in a tsunami. The villain is striking directly against Hydrolads most cherished Duty, to the ocean itself, and its peaceful relations with the surface dwellers.

Blight must now fight a battle on Hydrolad's preferred venue, both literally and metaphorically. The next scene will, indeed, be underwater where Hydrolad's aquatic powers are relevant. But the next scene will also be one where Hydrolad has tremendous reason to be sure of himself and of the rightness of his cause.


So I think I may be aiming at two feedback loops, one fast (Abilities to Wonders to more Abilities to more Wonders) and one slow (Facts to situations where the hero is morally invested, to Stakes, to more Facts).

(Basically a "me too" post).

TonyLB wrote: Yeah! Making things happen so that they can make more things happen.

TonyLB wrote: I think I may be aiming at two feedback loops, one fast (Abilities to Wonders to more Abilities to more Wonders) and one slow (Facts to situations where the hero is morally invested, to Stakes, to more Facts).

As a side-note, I'll mention that the question of Facts and how they impact Drives has made clear to me what the real danger of being heavily endebted in a Drive is.

Part of this system clearly has to be this: If you are Overdrawn in a Drive (i.e. have more Debt than your Drive value) then other players, the Editor included, are permitted to more substantially change the moral landscape in which the hero is operating.

If you're not overdrawn in Love, for instance, then the Editor can declare that your super-battle lasted so long that you missed your romantic dinner date. But if you're overdrawn then he can have your love interest start dating someone else.

EDIT: I meant that they're allowed to declare such Facts when... well... declaring Facts. The examples above assume that the hero has just lost some stakes in Love, and therefore the Editor is declaring Facts.

Sydney: Yeah, a table or something would be good. Anything that makes it clear how far you can narrate (the same way Wonder Levels and Complications do in the more immediate narration).

And... I've got no immediate ideas on how to do that.

Ok, a couple of things:

1. It would help me if you could itemize as many of the changes that you have made since since the beginning of the last thread when (as i see it) things really started to take off. If you can i would also love to see what changes you considered but rejected, and why you decided they were not appropriate.

2. I still maintain that until you at least outline non-combat play that a lot of the work we are doing here will be hampered. I would assume that there is a way other than Staking to get rid of debt tokens since, as i understand it, Debt is really an indicator of how much you doubt you are right in regards to a given drive.

3. I still lobby for more flexible Drives. I want to be able to create Batdude who has a powerful drive for Vengence and Justice but very little Compassion. It seems to me that by trying to make all possible meanings fit into 5 Drives we weaken the power of the Drive since it can become ambiguous in meaning.

4. Mechanics for changing Drives need to be worked out if we want to be able to show Heroes sliding into darkness or Villains being redeemed. This may not be a priority, but if it is we'll want to do something about it. Whatever we do needs to make this a difficult thing. Perhaps you have to distribut all Debt from a Drive into your other Drives if you change it to indicate a more general sense of doubt about your philosophy...

5. Facts really need to be fleshed out. What is the goal of Facts? To indicate changes to the World, to give a player influence over the direction of the Story, both? Here are some examples.

First, changing the World: Minute Man is defeated by the nefarious Nuclear Winter, the Editor is allowed to state a Fact for the Villain. "It's about 2 a.m. and Jimmy just got off work, he's walking to the bus stop when he hears a muffle scream from a nearby alleyway. 'None of my business, just keep walking,' he mutters under his breath."

As for influencing the Story, i would say that your Aqualad example is a great illustration of that.

To me it is changing the World that is truly interesting. It is a really cool indicator that there is life outside of your Hero, but that he can still effect that life. You may not find that as compelling as i do though...

6. See number 2. I am convinced that it would be a mistake to continue without fleshing this out. We do not necessarily need mechanics, but at least an outline of what it should look like and how much time should be devoted to it would be really good...

Thomas

User assumes all risk associated with following any of my advice.

Oh yeah, after reading the Actual Play post i am reminded that:

I do not believe we can get away with leaving Debt undefined much longer. We need to have a clear, consise defintion of what Debt represents if we want to make mechanics that fit.

Thomas

Thomas, thanks for weighing in.

I put up a new set of rules at the end of the previous thread. Many of the ideas from that thread have been incorporated in those rules somehow. The major change was that I went with the Complications-first system that I outlined in that thread.

If a change is not in the rules then I probably gave it a miss (with the exception of the open Facts question we're talking about right now).

Flexible drives are one of the things that I decided not to do.

Non-combat play will be outlined at some point, but that point is not now. I agree that having non-combat would help in building Facts. Having Facts will also help in building non-combat. This is the order I'm choosing to tackle them.

The immediate goal of Facts is to address four areas where the system doesn't yet encourage behaviors I'd like to see:

• Monologues and banter• Revealing your history, motivations and plans for world conquest• Playing to and appreciating the "pathetic fallacy", as pointed out by Sydney in a previous thread• Progressively informing the past, present and future of the hero with their moral issues.

I do not believe we can get away with leaving Debt undefined much longer. We need to have a clear, consise defintion of what Debt represents if we want to make mechanics that fit.

I would say that all of the above questions are depnedent on what exactly you want to do with facts. If you take the Change the World stance, which i personally like, then reference and reward does not come into play.

I assume that you prefer Facts to be more focused on the immediate situation. In that case i do not really see a good way to correlate Debt type and magnitude with facts.

How Facts feed back into Monologue? I would be tempted to do this in a similar way to Tropes. Fact Level feeding back into your dice pool perhaps?

I think that at the moment there are only two major resources in play: Debt and Dice (there is a third if you count Facts). That means that either Dice or Debt should be the result of any "bonus". Since you are currently talking about Facts being generated through Debt invested Complications, Debt is out of the question so Dice is all that seems to be left.

Thomas

Okay, I have a thought for answering "What reward or opportunity should be given for a Fact reference?"

Referencing a Fact is required before you can either Stake debt on a complication or borrow dice on credit. Or, to be more accurate, these things are the outcome of narrating the reference of a Fact in the Monologue phase.

I was going to build an explicit system where people combine two facts in order to create a new fact with a higher value, but I think that behavior will emerge from the combination of what's listed above and the fact that Drives increase over the course of a game:

• Hero with Drive 1 uses his backstory Facts to make a bet of 1.• Resolving that bet gives him a 1 point Fact and also elevates his Drive to 2.• In order to bet 2 in something he will need either a 2-point Fact (which he may not have in backstory, given his low Drive) or two 1-point Facts• If he references two 1 point Facts in turn to show why a complication is important to him, and then wins that complication, I think that the resulting 2-point Fact will often be a natural outgrowth of the 1 point facts that went into it.

Do you think that will prove too much restriction on their ability to Stake? I certainly don't want to formalize "my guy" bunkering tactics: It would be silly to have a situation where (for instance) a player couldn't make their character care about rescuing innocents, because none of their backstory facts supported it.

But it would be nice if they were prompted to think of a reason for rescuing folks that's specific to their hero. Maybe they should be able to make up 1-point Facts at will?

It sounds interesting, but i am having trouble visualizing just what this would look like in play...

Do you have a clear idea regarding what you want Facts to do? I am getting the impression that you want to encourage players to develop their characters with them... Is there anything else you want to use Facts for?

Thomas

Sudden thought about Facts (heavily inspired by Universalis, which is after all the uber-game about Facts and Complications; and encouraged by Tony to braindump...):

Let's say, as folks have suggested, that 1 point of redeemed Debt in a drive gives you 1 point to state Facts relevant to your world-view in that drive. (Most obviously, these would be Facts supporting your worldview, but hey, you may want to challenge yourself: "I staked Justice and defeated Dr. Bad Guy -- my Fact is that he's just a pawn of a big conspiracy against justiceness!").

Let's stipulate further, for argument's sake, a rough sliding scale of Facts. Say, 1 Fact Point would a detail that may be tactically or thematically useful (adding a minor character, or a bit of geography, or some backstory, or a quirk to an established villain). Say, 10 Fact Points (to pull a number out of thin air) would establish a major setting element, like a globe-spanning conspiracy or an Evil Galactic Empire or "there's a Hellmouth under Sunnydale" -- the kind of thing that takes an entire series of comics or TV show seasons or movies to change. Maybe double the cost of a Fact if it is blatantly to the stating hero's advantage ("I'm Hydrolad -- this important fact takes place underwater, where only I can go!")

Now, allow Facts to be linked together. E.g. in the Hydrolad example above, someone has presumably stated at some point the following Facts:
(1) There exists Atlantis, an undersea city (as a setting element, this would be a significant Fact, worth 3-4 points in itself);
(2) Atlantis has a Royal Family (maybe 2 points, since these people have political power);
(3) Atlantis has a Royal Guard (maybe 2 points, since these people have military power).
(4) Hydrolad is an officer of the Guard (a 1-point detail, but allowing Hydrolad to link into the Guard).
(Conceivably all of these could be double cost if Hydrolad's player was the one who stated them, since they all set up potential advantages for him.)
You could even draw a relationship-map-like thing about how fact 4 (Hydrolad's guard position) depends on fact 3 (a royal guard to be part of) which depends on fact 2 (a royal family to guard) which depends on fact 1 (a city to have a royal family of).

Let's call such a bunch of linked facts a "Tangle." (Because in the genres we're imitating, they are tangled, darn it). Now, here's the fun part: Whenever you establish a new Fact, you can link it to an existing Tangle, right? So if you have 1 point, you can either establish a piddly free-standing fact -- or, for the same price, you can establish a little wrinkle that brings in an entire existing tangle.

E.g. at some point in Tony's Hydrolad example, somebody (maybe the Editor, maybe the player who did that session's Big Page One) established, "the bad guy has a hostage" -- just a generic situation at this point. But then somebody spent a Fact point or two to establish "the hostage is Princess Nereid of Atlantis!" -- just a low-level detail, maybe 1 point, but it links into the Atlantis Tangle, above, which means everything about Atlantis is now potentially in play, for free.

This should be a big, big incentive to use facts to state big Tangles of backstory, since with one new Fact you can now bring in a whole bunch of pre-established Facts to help you.

But wait, there's more! As a game develops, it'll develop multiple Tangles. State one Fact, and you can link two previously separate Tangles into one big one.

E.g. Luke Skywalker (a hero character) is
(1) a farmboy from a desert planet
(2) who lives with his aunt and uncle and never knew his parents.
A barebones Tangle of backstory, just two low-level facts; kinda dull. Meanwhile, however, the Editor and players have established collectively some big-ass Facts:
(1) There is an Evil Galactic Empire oppressing everyone (10 points, baby -- it'll take three movies to get rid of these guys)
(2) Darth Vader -- "that cool villain in the black mask who attacked Princess Leia's ship in the Big Page One, remember?" -- is a top agent of the Empire. (Just a 1 point detail if we've already established Vader exists).
(3) There's a Galactic Rebellion striving to restore the Old Republic (4 points, maybe?)
(4) The Republic used to be protected by these cool mystical knights called Jedi, but they're all dead. (1 point detail; no biggie).
Now the guy playing Ben Kenobi, eager to get Luke's player in the game, establishes two more little 1-point detail Facts:
(1) Luke, your father was a Jedi...
(2) ....and he was murdered by Darth Vader
Suddenly Luke's 2-point background Tangle links into the whole Galactic Civil War Tangle, all 16+ points of it.
A few sessions later, of course, the Editor is a real bastard and spends 1 Fact to alter an existing Fact about just who Luke's father was....

The key to this concept is that it costs a lot of Fact Points to establish something complex and world-shaking -- but it costs almost nothing to establish a new relationship among existing Facts. Hence players are encouraged to spend their Facts on links and relationships, which are what drives story.

Very interesting. I really like the idea, but i would also advise caution since this has the potential to overwhelm the rest of the game (which is already so cool).

That said, i like a lot of the basic ideas put forward about Facts. Sounds like playtesting time!

Thomas

Well, I tried writing up an example of Facts in action. What it mainly did is confirm my suspicion that I haven't figured out exactly how I want them to work yet.

There are two ways that Facts can build on each other: There's causal relationship:

• Spiderman gets cut in combat + Osborne sees that Peter is cut = Osborne learns Spiderman's secret identity• Osborne learns Spidermans identity + Osborne learns that Peter Parker loves Mary Jane = Mary Jane is a target• Mary Jane is a target + Mary Jane confesses her love = Peter pretends not to love her

...and then there is moral/thematic building

• Peter ignores his uncles advice + Peter lets a criminal go = Uncle Ben is killed by that criminal• Spiderman fights crime because Uncle Ben was killed + Osborne makes an appeal to Peter as a father figure = Peter decides his identity, and whose influence is important in hs life

I am not seeing, at the moment, how to support both progressions. I hoped that it would emerge from the notions I'd already thrown on the table, but when I worked through an actual example I had to consciously aim, rather than just let myself be guided by the system.

EDIT: The "progressions" discussion above was meant to be in response to Sydney's idea of Tangles and interconnection... which I like, but which strikes me as also vulnerable to the issue of the multiple ways that things can be connected. I was just too tired to write it clearly. Still am.

Hmm, I guess I'm missing the overall goal of Facts here. In the original post it seemed like they were mostly to add color as the result of victories, but now they seem to have morphed into something where it's necessary to codify every event in the character's life or else they can't interact with the system. This strikes me as kind of lame and tending to tedious bookkeeping on the character sheet. Even if you want the requirement that the hero has to have a personal stake whenever they stake something, it seems like you can just say "the player has to justify it with something from the character's history."

I think the only time in the Fact-stating example where Facts are used in an interesting way is when Jack says "ok, they go back to a thought-to-be abandoned I-4 base with me following them secretly". That's the sort of narrative control I can see possibly requiring someone to pay for. The rest of the stuff seems like the sort of basic storytelling twists I'd put in as a GM anyway (this assumes, admittedly, that you're not using a more Universalis-esque model where everyone, including the GM, has to pay for what they introduce into the scene -- but none of the examples seem to go with that, so).

Inky, you're right. This is wandering away from what I was originally talking about. I didn't give a clear direction, and so people have given me lots of suggestions that would work in some system. Now I need to apply some critical judgment and figure out what needs to happen in this particular system.

The result of winning Stakes was meant to be that the world was proven to be a little more the way the hero thinks it should be. The Facts should be pieces of Evidence that either support or undermine the heroes trust in their principles (whatever those principles are).

A lot of important stuff can be done using a Fact structure to tell the external story. But the more I think about it, the less that fits this particular game. Instead, the Fact structure should help to tell the internal story, the moral evolutions that accompany and inform the external actions.

Hrm... maybe the "strength" of the Fact isn't in how much impact it has on the world, but in how clear and unambiguous it is as evidence for belief? So a world-spanning conspiracy of criminals who have corrupted some public officials, but not all, would be a fairly low-level Fact, because it doesn't unambiguously disprove Justice. But when a speedster gets a heart-transplant across country in time to save a cute little girl who draws him a picture in crayon out of gratitude, that's a high level Hope Fact.

I've rewritten the Example of Facts in Play to reflect this. I'm happier with it now, though I still felt that I was having to deliberately seek the sort of play I wanted, rather than that I was guided to it by the system.

TonyLB wrote: I've rewritten the Example of Facts in Play ... I'm happier with it now, though I still felt that I was having to deliberately seek the sort of play I wanted, rather than that I was guided to it by the system.

As I think about what Facts should actually be (and thank you Thomas for continuing to ask me this until I was forced to admit that I had no idea), I keep thinking of Eisenstein's theory of Montage in film-making. To simplify way too much: Eisenstein ran an experiment. He made a film that started with a woman looking out a window, expressionless. He followed that with different scenes. Group A saw children playing and laughing outside. Group B saw a desolate autumn scene with leaves falling. When asked "What is the woman feeling?" Group A said she was happy and contented, while Group B said she was sad and forlorn. If shots are made appropriately short, he argues, the emotional content is conveyed to the audience by the way the pieces are assembled.

One of the things I did as I reworked the Example of Play was to replace general Facts that told something unequivocally with specific Facts that could be viewed as evidence, but which required interpretation and context.

So not "Protects the innocent", but "Disobeyed an order that would endanger a crowd". Is this about Hope, or Justice, or Duty? You can't tell until you see how the hero puts it in context in his life. It's the expressionless woman looking out a window. People will create the content of the Fact as they decide to refer to it at a particular moment. Which means that the same Fact can be under different Drives for different people. You could, in fact, share them around the same way Exemplars are shared, and with much the same effect of linking characters together.

But having different people view the same Fact differently could actually be much more intriguing than that: Because they can disagree violently about what it means. Jack Chance can say that his disobedience was a sign of his concern for the common man. Director X can say that the disobedience was just a sign that he's a prima donna whose selfish attitude led to the Bureau's discovery.

So, here's the question: Should players contest the meaning of the Facts at all? And if they do, is it done by the addition of further Facts that put Jack's disobedience in context? Or do they actually contest for points in the Fact, in the same way that Complications are contested now? Or something entirely different?

I think that i am still confused about what you want Facts to do...

What do you want to use the mechanics of having Facts in the game for? Giving players a way/reason to fill in character backgrounds? Giving players a signifigant way to control the plot (director stance)?

I apologize if all the questions get annoying, but i am really excited by the game and had a lot of fun playing so i really want to see it work out...

Thomas

No need to apologize! I just thanked you (last post) for your questions! They're very helpful.

Plus, I think I actually know the answer to this one now.

Comic books tell two stories that share many of the same events. Distinguishing what events are part of which story is not a precise science: All the most important events contribute to both stories, but in different ways.

There is the Adventure, which is a reasonably logical sequence of events following the rules of cause and effect. The stakes of the Adventure are external.

And there is the Moral, which is a thematic sequence of events following the rules of symbolism and emotional significance. The stakes of the Moral are internal.

The mechanics of Dice Pools and Wonders help players work together to create the Adventure. The mechanics of Facts and Debt should help players work together to create the Moral. Mechanically the Editor should have GM-level control over the Adventure, but Heroes should have GM-level control over their personal Moral.

Exempli Gratia

• Hyperman defeats the scouts of an alien invasion force bent on destroying life on earth (Adventure)• Hyperman needs to get into space in order to face the mothership... it will take the combined efforts of the worlds mistrustful countries. Hyperman makes a speech at the UN which convinces people to look beyond their differences to their common humanity (Moral)• While the joint human space-ship effort proceeds, Hyperman talks with Granthor, captured leader of the scout forces (Moral)• As the space-ship approaches readiness, Granthor escapes custody and reclaims his own ship, damaging the human vessel as he flees to his mothership (Adventure)• Facing a tight deadline of orbital bombardment, the scientists who have learned to look past their political differences work together to miraculously fix the human space-ship (Moral)• Hyperman blasts off into space and tries to fight the mothership, but is overcome and captured (Adventure)• Granthor, swayed by the virtue shown by Earth to doubt his races superiority, betrays them and frees Hyperman (Moral)• With renewed determination, Hyperman manages to disable the mothership at the last possible instant (ADVENTURE/MORAL)• The mothership flees, vowing to return in time. The people of earth celebrate both their escape from doom and the fledgling understanding that made it possible (Moral)

The Wonders/Adventure vs. Facts/Moral distinction is an interesting one, especially when you rack Facts under specific Drives (as opposed to the rather endlessly amorphous idea I proposed a while back). It works very well with the idea that the same fact can be perceived by different characters as a different Fact (e.g. in the example, did disobeying an order in order to protect innocents count as undermining Duty or supporting Hope? Jack Chance and Director X disagree intensely).

Mechanically the Editor should have GM-level control over the Adventure, but Heroes should have GM-level control over their personal Moral.

I'm not sure how useful this post will be for you, Tony, but I figure I might as well toss it out as food for thought. This isn't meant to be a critique of your current system idea (I quite like it) but more of a first-blush response.

Let's take your current example of Hyperman and the aliens. The events in your example are very cool and add up to a nice story. However, each step along the way hinges on the outcome of the Fortune mechanic. What if things turn out differently? Are the following outcomes acceptable for Capes, or not?



• Hyperman fails to defeat the scouts of an alien invasion force. They destroy Times Square and set up a command post in the Empire State Building.
• Hyperman tries to convince the UN to work together to build a spaceship, but it doesn't work. The UN decides to negotiate a surrender instead.
• Hyperman tries to take on the alien base singlehandedly, and is badly injured.
• With no other course, the UN surrender is negotiated and the Earth falls into alien hands.



In other words, is failure (especially catastrophic failure) an option, or do the heroes always manage to make things right in the end?

John Harper wrote: .... is failure (especially catastrophic failure) an option, or do the heroes always manage to make things right in the end?

Sydney: I sort of figured that the question of Soviet (back in the day) and American scientists working together and bumping up against each others preconceptions would be the B-story in the Hyperman example. That's probably worth making clear (maybe by giving Hyperman a secret identity as a rocket scientist) if I decide to include that particular example in the main text.

The discussions between Hyperman and Granthor also struck me as B-plot ("C-plot"?) I'm not sure how easy it is, in practice, to separate the plots though, as you rightly mentioned. And who "controls" which plot must be arbitrated through the system... so happily the players should never have to say to themself "Hey, are we telling the A-story or the B-story here?" (although the system can (and will!) be designed to give players more authority/control in Moral and the Editor more authority/control in Adventure).


John: Personally, "Earth Conquered!" sounds like a terrific comic book story to me. I think catastrophic failure (and, indeed, losing the Victory Point race for an entire session or several sessions in a row) makes for terrific stories. I think (in the original example) that Granthor escaping and Hyperman being captured would both have been battles that the heroes lost... but they're fun in the story.

The key element (IMHO) to making this work for Capes is making it very clear that heroes can use Facts created by villains, and vice versa. Once they're made they're just Facts, and they become open to interpretation.

So Evil Hive Queen Vexis feels that planting the Cluster flag on the Empire State Building is a great proof of her Power. And that makes her more morally certain. Hyperman, on the other hand, can look at the same Fact and use it to reference Duty ("Aliens taking over earth! Not on MY WATCH little missy!"), or something else entirely. And that may well make him more morally certain. Heroes are funny that way.

So in a sense, Facts don't slant the playing field mechanically... as higher-value Facts are added they raise the stakes, giving everyone the ability to sling more Debt around.

They do slant the playing field tactically, because in order to reference villainous Facts, the heroes may need to do something tactically unsound, like a full frontal assault on the heavily defended Empire-State HQ with nothing more than a rag-tag band of humans who escaped from slavery in the alien diamond mines. But that's sounds, to me, like a good thing for the system. It creates precisely the kind of heart-over-head victories that make the genre so wonderful and so easily mocked.

TonyLB wrote: Sydney: I sort of figured that the question of Soviet (back in the day) and American scientists working together and bumping up against each others preconceptions would be the B-story in the Hyperman example. That's probably worth making clear (maybe by giving Hyperman a secret identity as a rocket scientist) if I decide to include that particular example in the main text.

TonyLB wrote: So in a sense, Facts don't slant the playing field mechanically... as higher-value Facts are added they raise the stakes, giving everyone the ability to sling more Debt around.

TonyLB wrote: They do slant the playing field tactically, because in order to reference villainous Facts, the heroes may need to do something tactically unsound, like a full frontal assault on the heavily defended Empire-State HQ with nothing more than a rag-tag band of humans who escaped from slavery in the alien diamond mines. But that's sounds, to me, like a good thing for the system. It creates precisely the kind of heart-over-head victories that make the genre so wonderful and so easily mocked.

Sydney Freedberg wrote: By the way, is everyone getting what I mean by "A Plot" and "B Plot"?

Tony,

I am not entirely sure what you are thining of doing mechanically, but it sounds to me like there are too many limits on Debt. You already have a limit based on you Drives, and it seems as if you are adding more and more limits/ and options. This results in a dilution of focus. I really think that the Debt system focuses well on the idea of deserving power. As you add more mechanics you change the focus. If you want to change focus then go for it, but i am sort of afraid that the game will lose something...

Of course it is entirely possible (probable, even) that i am simply not seeing this the way that you envision it, which could very easily render my commentary silly and irrelevant...

EDIT: Quadruple crosspost... that is a first for me...

Thomas

Okay, so, it is possible for the Hero to fail again and again and spiral into tragedy. There is no built-in mechanical system to give the Hero a chance to save the day at the last second or anything like that. That's what I figured, but I wanted to confirm it.

Since a lot of your examples touch on Spiderman or other comic-bookiness (that all end happily, eventually), I wanted to pipe up and say "but the Fortune system can result in the good guys losing again and again with no ultimate victory and no happy ending." If that's a type of play you want to support (and I think it's a good thing) then the current system is on the right track.

In Capes, sometimes Mary Jane dies. Or leaves Peter for good. And sometimes Green Goblin wins and murders a lot of people. No safety net. No "script immunity." No cavalry waiting off-stage.

John Harper wrote: Okay, so, it is possible for the Hero to fail again and again and spiral into tragedy. .... In Capes, sometimes Mary Jane dies.

There are, indeed, plenty of stories in comics that are spirals into tragedy. Chris Claremonts X-Men, for instance... nasty, nasty stories of characters pushed to (and beyond) the brink of human endurance. But it would be a grave concern to me if such stories were ever forced upon the players.

I think that the players should have vast power (within the framework of the actual resolution of the conflicts, as determined by the Adventure rules) to define the Moral outcome of the story, and whether or not it is toward cheerfulness and unity or misery and sacrifice. People can (and, I imagine, will) choose the type of stories that appeal to them.

What I'm aiming for is a system where the moral story emerges from the adventure, but is not limited to the same outcome. A story where every battle is lost (decisively) can still carry a message of hope. A story where the heroes win at every turn can end up making them question everything about themselves.

Mechanically, there is some support for this already, but I'd like to add more.

Already, the Stakes on a Complication are not related to the number of Victory Points being dumped into it. An event can be tactically minor in the scheme of the alien invasion of earth, but still carry massive weight in the hearts and memories of earth's defenders (because it had high Stakes but low Victory Points). So heroes can achieve small, even uncontested, victories in the midst of larger defeat, and still come out ahead in terms of how many (and how powerful) Facts they get to define.

This could be made into a stronger phenomenon if villains could be required to match Stakes with the heroes in some situations. That would allow the heroes to both establish more Facts and to undermine the certainty of the villains (by dumping Debt Tokens onto them). This would get to the emotional inflexibility of many villains (the obsessions, the megalomania, all that).

For instance: Perhaps if the heroes have been listening when the villain referenced their own Facts ("I have defeated the champions of nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety nine worlds!"), and can therefore reference those Facts themself ("I challenge you, at this particularly inconvenient juncture! Will you decline the chance to defeat your ten thousandth world?") then both the hero and the villain Stake Debt off of the same Fact, and the villain is not permitted to decline.

Yes. Gwen Stacy. That story-arc is amazing. One of the best in comics, I think.

I guess my point was just that people have certain expectations when they think "comic book super heroes" and it usually means "good triumphs over evil." I think it's worth mentioning in the text that Capes doesn't necessarily conform to that expectation.

EDIT: Cross-posted with Tony.

TonyLB wrote: What I'm aiming for is a system where the moral story emerges from the adventure, but is not limited to the same outcome. A story where every battle is lost (decisively) can still carry a message of hope. A story where the heroes win at every turn can end up making them question everything about themselves.

TonyLB wrote: The net outcome of that is that a villain can only force a hero into Stakes by using a Fact whose clarity is less than or equal to his current Debt (i.e. a debt he could pay the Stake on).

I was reading over the rules again (i am going to try to get a group together tonight to play...) when i ran into the most recent Stakes stuff:

If your enemies resolve the Complication then you have to take back your own tokens and an equal amount of the enemies tokens (if they bey them on that Complication).

First off: Yes, you're right about what happens when you lose a Stake only you bet on. But as you've just pointed out, the villains have an incentive to Stake on it when they control it, prior to resolving it.

Heh... on some levels, staking on a Conflict you're clearly about to win is just "gloating". That's good villainous material there. I agree that I don't want the system to so heavily encourage gloating that the heroes are compelled to engage in it (the way Champions heroes are compelled, under the undrifted rules, to deliver finishing blows to drive unconscious villains beyond quick recovery).

I've been trying to figure out a good way to limit Stakes to "non-sure bets". But there are so many ways that a bet can be sure that I'm having a bit of trouble codifying it. People can have an advantage because of points in the Complication, or because of the tactical situation, or because they just plain have a bigger dice pool than their opposition.

That's complicated: possibly more complicated than I'm capable of addressing. So I've been exploring some other options. I think that one way to encourage people to Stake on complications that are going to be contested for a while is to give unresolved Stakes a benefit in the dice-pool side of the rules.

In the ongoing revision (which will see light of day when the rules are coherent and complete again) I've revised the Level 5 "Inspiration" Wonder to read like this:

Level 5: Inspiration. This Wonder may only be played on a Complication you do not (before playing the Wonder) control. Everyone on your side (e.g. the Heroic side) receives two dice into their dice pool for each point of Debt they personally have at Stake on the Complication.

TonyLB wrote: I've been trying to figure out a good way to limit Stakes to "non-sure bets". But there are so many ways that a bet can be sure that I'm having a bit of trouble codifying it. People can have an advantage because of points in the Complication, or because of the tactical situation, or because they just plain have a bigger dice pool than their opposition.

TonyLB wrote: That's complicated: possibly more complicated than I'm capable of addressing. So I've been exploring some other options. I think that one way to encourage people to Stake on complications that are going to be contested for a while is to give unresolved Stakes a benefit in the dice-pool side of the rules.

TonyLB wrote: ... In the ongoing revision (which will see light of day when the rules are coherent and complete again)....

"Do something" about them is a bit vague.

If I set the text to go across the entire screen, my experience is that it's even harder to read.

It's very possible that what I need to do is to add more white space in the form of more pictures and little sidebars, so that the arrangement of the text is more vertical (with only one or two columns of narrative on each horizontal level). Was this what you meant, or did you have something else in mind?

Multiple text columns on a web page are not very common (as opposed to print). They can also be tough to read if a column is taller than your display -- you have to scroll down and then back up to pick up the rest of a line. I recommend a single narrow column of text (around 600px, say).

Or let the text flow from one edge of the browser to the other and let the user decide how wide they want the text to be. That's probably a more web-friendly method.

I'm certainly making an effort to make it all more readable.

That having been said, I personally like the columns.

I agree that making it single-column, across the entirety of the screen, would be more web-friendly. But at the moment I spend a lot more time looking at the rules than anyone else does, so I'm going to lean toward my comfort. When things are finalized I'll reformat it to the most popular layout I can find.

Wow. An entire flurry of posts occasioned by my witless comment. I feel strangely powerful, kind of like the guy who put his beer can down on the "LAUNCH" button...

TonyLB wrote: "...It's very possible that what I need to do is to add more white space in the form of more pictures and little sidebars, so that the arrangement of the text is more vertical (with only one or two columns of narrative on each horizontal level). Was this what you meant, or did you have something else in mind?