As our previous Sorcerer game had ended and we were still waiting for Universalis to arrive, my regular gaming group decided to try a game of Great Ork Gods to fill the gap. We certainly had a lot of fun, although there were some confusions and things that didn't quite work out. I'll get to them later, first I will tell a bit about our session.

There were four people, Eva, Annette and me being players, Michiel being the GameMaster. We played a scenario that differed from the one in the rules mostly cosmetically. Our boss, the troll, wanted us to disrupt a wedding held in the small village below, as he himself wanted to marry the bride. Our goals were: keep the bride and the priest alive and the church intact (2 Oog for everyone); but each of them is worth 1 Oog if killed/destroyed. Killing the bridegroom, the smith or the wizard (the latter two being the village's primary defense) also yielded 1 Oog each.

The very first action of Eva's very first orc was to floor mine and Annette's by throwing a goblin before our feet, so she could be the first in the village and get the most Oog. Of course, my orc Bjorg God-slayer did not take this kindly, and shot his rival in the back. That Which Guards the Gate was unmerciful, and the first ork had died barely five minutes into the game.

O well, it would too much time to recount everything, but some highlights:
* My ork sneaks past the villagers (who are staring wide-eyed at Eva's ork awkwardly and unintentionally riding an enraged bull into town) into the church - and stands eye in eye with the assembled congregation. "Uh... This goblin wanted to kill the bride! I'll kill him for you." The goblin's little neck snaps, and Bjorg God-slayer takes a seat among the other wedding guests with the townspeople being somewhat unsure what to make of this.
* Eva's ork is hungry, takes a crying little girl and puts a stick through her. The crying stops abruptly, her body goign all limp. Looking up, she sees a horde of townspeople coming towards her carrying pitchforks and scythes. Pointing at the little girl, the ork says: "Stay away, or I'll kill her!"
* Another of Eva's orks is being charged by the blachsmith wielding a very big hammer. She takes a goblin, holds it between the smith and herself, and annouces that now the smith won't be able to see her and she's going to sneak up on him.
* Annette's ork runs into the church, carrying a huge four meter long, very heavy wooden beam. The priest, the bridegroom and the sorcerer are all running around with murderous intent, so the ork takes a good sprint and throws the beam towards the... bride, who is crushed under its weight.
* The heroic Bjorg God-slayer, after killing the sorcerer (partly by biting his manhood off), the priest and the bridegroom and setting the church on fire as an added bonus, attempts to escape from the collapsing place of worship - and fails the very last roll of the evening, dying at the top of his Oogness. Alas!
All of this was great fun and we really liked this game - but let's go on to a more critical analysis.


1. We were pretty confused at first about the distribution of narrative power. Who gets to narrate, the player or the GM? (I don't believe the game text specifies.) We first allowed the players to narrate, but this reduced the GM's role to something very boring; so instead we decided that the GM narrated. This did not work all that well, because it limited the player's ability to come up with brilliantly funny events. Perhaps next time we'll let the GM narrate failures, the players successes. How do other groups handle this?
2. No Oog was given foor cool actions. I blame this partly on the previous point, since when the GM does most of the narrating, chances are smaller that players will come up with something really funny. More importantly, we should have talked it through a bit beforehand - if we do that next time, it'll probably go better.
3. We were a bit confused about the availability of goblins. At first we played in such a way that you could always use random goblins, not just your followers, if you needed - say - a shield. But this made goblins too abundant, and almost no action was done without one. So we decreed that only followers could be used, but this made goblins a bit too rare. (Especially because there wasn't a lot of Oog to go round, see point 2.) Anyone has good guidelines for this?
4. I had a lot of luck during the game's initial stages, ending up with an orc with very good scores (even though I took an insulting name) including a '2' for That Which Guards the Gate, and with three gods among whom Slashings and Slaying and That Which Guards the Gate, This had the effect that the survival chances of my ork were much, much higher than that of the other orks. My ork only died at the very end of the game, whereas Annette had two orks being killed before the end and Eva lost no less than 5(!) ugly green creatures. This imbalance is not terribly important in a game such as Great Ork Gods, but I do think some frustrations arose because of it. Dying in amusing ways is fun, but it gets stale after the third ork if you never achieve anything. I recommend some change in the rules that ensures that one player doesn't have gods which are obviously better. One solution we may try next time (but see below) is simply to pass all gods to the left after an ork has died. I don't see any problems with this, and it effectively removes any imbalances.
5. I noticed that we didn't really like that 1d6 extra hate when you choose an insulting name. The die came up '1' several times, and people begged the GM to roll again - when you call your character "Bjorg God-slayer" you want some serious hate! :) Maybe 'add 1d4 +2' hate or something would work better.

We are certainly going to play this game again, and we (mostly Michiel actually) have thought up the following interesting variant that we'll probably try out:
* Play starts as normal, except that the Gods are randomly distributed. Everyone (including the GM) gets 2 starting spite. (The GM cannot use spite - see below, and you'll understand.)
* The GM describes the scenario including the Oog that can be gained. At this point, everyone knows all there is to know about the scenario.
* Whenever an ork dies, that ork's player immediately becomes the GameMaster. The previous GameMaster enters play with a new ork. All gods are passed to the left. (Skipping the new GM.)

This variant appeals to us because it allows everyone to play a stupid ork (which is even more fun than GMing). And really, it's not like the GM needs to have something prepared or anything. Thoughts about this?

Hi Victor,

Glad you had fun, and it's more than a tad pleasing to see folks in foreign climbs playing my game.

In answer to your points:

1. The intention is that the GM narrates everything; and that's the way I run it. Quite a few other folks, however, have gone with some level of player narration and had great success with it - so it appears either can work.

2. GM Fiat Oog is quite important to the game, I feel. Had I been GMing your game I would probably have awarded a point of Oog for each of the events you listed above. I generally give Oog for things that make everyone laugh or things that just strike me as startling inventive.

3. Only follower Goblins can be used in actions. In fact, I'm tending towards only follower Goblins being used for anything. Following on from Ron's suggestion I also "refresh" everyone's Goblins at suitable moments during the game; which, combined with the extra Oog from GM Fiat should keep the Goblins available enough.

4. In the last game I ran I decided to drop the God distribution system outlined in the playtest rules, and go back to the system I originally used. The players pick in order, then in reverse order until all the God's are assigned. I also gave a point of Spite to the player with only one God.

As to the unfairness factor, yes, it does come into play - but in my experience players with the luck end up get stamped into the dirt by a big influx of Spite from the other players.

This variant appeals to us because it allows everyone to play a stupid ork (which is even more fun than GMing). And really, it's not like the GM needs to have something prepared or anything. Thoughts about this?

Hello,

Here are some handy threads about playing the game:

[Great Ork Gods] Nothing but mayhem
[Great Ork Gods] The fruit of woe
[Great Ork Gods] Gunch! Squish! Arrgh!
[Great Ork Gods] Eating people

I think some of your questions get pretty well covered in them.

About narration, well, it's true that the GM narrates outcomes, but look at how much group work is necessarily going on.

1. Player states intention, which in practice usually includes a great deal of Director Stance - "There's a pitchfork leaning against the wall, right? Of course there is! I take it and ..."

2. Other player who owns the relevant God states a difficulty, perhaps embellishing, perhaps not.

3. Huge flurry of Spite and Goblins begins, with the latter especially entailing narrations on the part of the player. (At this point the GM is usually helpless with laughter and not narrating anything.)

4. Roll! GM narrates outcome, but in practice, I've discovered that it can become a group narration with everyone shouting out details, merely with the buck stopping with the GM.

So I think you'll get a lot out of using the principle that "narration" does very well when it's really "everyone may contribute, but one person rubber-stamps."

Best,
Ron