Anamnesis: A Game of Fearful Recall

(an·am·ne·sis)
1. recollection.
2. a medical or psychiatric patient case history, particularly using the patient's recollections;
3. The transliteration of a Greek word for "remembering."  Whereas similar English words imply that the person or the deed commemorated is past and absent the word anamnesis suggests the exact opposite. It connotes an objective act, in and by which the person or event commemorated is actually made present and brought into the realm of the here and now.

GOAL:
The primary goal is to emulate situations where characters are struggling to recover lost memories (i.e. movies like "Dead Again" or less accurately, "Momento").  The twist is to use these characters to reproduce what I will call the "Survivor's Narrative."  It's a technique, common in horror and suspense genres, where the audience (reader/listener/watcher) is learning about an event that has already occurred.  Although some facts may be known of the final situation, we experience the tale as it unfolds from the chronological viewpoint of a participant.  Foreshadowing is frequent and information is revealed in only enough measure to built suspense, before the final stunning revelation (example include movies like "D.O.A" and "The Usual Suspects", or many of H.P. Lovecraft's stories).

As a result, the story that is constructed is told in such a way that we are both remembering something that has occurred, and creating / experiencing it anew for the first time.

CHARACTERS:
One player takes the role of the Examiner.  This is usually assumed to be a psychiatrist leading a form of group therapy.  However this is largely color.  The Examiner could be a priest hearing a confession (even with multiple players), an military or civilian investigator, or reporter writing a story, a close friend, etc.

The other players each take the role of an ordinary person who has experienced some undefined, terrible event that has caused them to lose their memory of the recent past; they still retain memory of their life at some point prior to the event.  Even if the character is unaware, all players acknowledge that these characters share something in common - a relationship to a person, object, place or an experience.  It is agreed that this shared thing is connected (or actually responsible for) what cause all their memory loss.  Note that this item does not have to be pre-defined, as long as players are willing to agree that it does exist and will be revealed by the story.

A player constructs a character on an index card -  A name, a job, some interests, some hobbies.  If the Examiner is not a psychiatrist, then players introduce themselves with the Examiner facilitating.  If the Examiner is a psychiatrist, he takes the cards and introduces each character to the "Group."

---Example Start---
[Examiner] 'Group, I want everyone to meet Cindy.'
[Rest of Group] (mumbling) 'Hello Cindy.'
[Examiner] 'Cindy, it says here that you're a bank account manager. Is that right?'
[Cindy] (in a small voice) 'Yes.'
[Examiner] 'Cindy says she likes running, and cooking. And she likes to read history books.'
---Example End---

SETTING:
In order to contrast the unknown horror of the players experiences, society at large is assumed to be founded on principals of empiricism.
In general, assume earth in a post WWI to present timeframe.  Could be set earlier in history or in a hard-scifi future with some modification.

CURRENT FORMULATION OF PLAY:
-Meant to be played in one evening (3- 4 hours of play) if possible, three evening at most.

-Statements made during the game are all made in retrospect or acknowledging the past nature of events.  Ritualized phrases (ala Polaris) may be used to keep the focus on this type of play.

-Narrative truth (which directly correlates to the clarity of the character's memory - so we might term this Recollected Truth) regarding what occurred is established by player statements during the game.  These can include character actions, winners of conflict resolution narrating results, or the Examiner helping "confused" characters agree on a compromised version of events to resolve notable inconsistencies.

---Example Start---
[Examiner] 'Okay Bob. You say that Cindy attacked you with a knife for no reason, and you were just defending yourself.  And Cindy we know you think Bob threatened you first. Can we all agree that you both were upset and share some responsibility for the fight in the kitchen?"
---Example End---

If the inconsistency is crucial, dice are rolled to resolve the conflict.  Differences in player statements are resolved by contests using conflict resolution, not task resolution.  Stealing from PrimeTime Adventures, even though characters can succeed, other players may win narration rights for a conflict.  The can include the Examiner in some cases.  In all cases, the Examiner is permitted to moderate excessive statements made by the narrator that are deemed unacceptable or problematic to creating a coherent story (remember the Examiner wants to piece together the series of events that lead to the memory loss, so he's trying for a consensus of truth).

---Example Start---
[Examiner] 'Bob, does that seem likely to you, that [x event] occurred?  Considering the shock you all had, we can respect you thinking that.  But isn't it possible what really happened was [y event] and for whatever reason, in your mind, it became something much worse?'
---Example End---

-Absolute truth regarding what occurred is established at the games' end by resolution rules (ala My Life with Master). This can involve rationalizing some nonsensical Narrative events (not this is not retconning so much as recognizing that all memory is a flawed version of what transpired).

-Characters cannot die during the game.  Any character being seriously injured or losing control during a conflict "Blacks Out."  A "Black Out" is immediately followed by a scene where that character finds or is found by another character.  Additionally, the narrator of the conflict is required to describe how the character's personal situation, or the overall situation, is escalated or worsened by events that occur during the "Black Out."  This could include actions that character who lost control performed while "Blacked Out" (i.e. attacking someone or fleeing in terror).  Again the Examiner is called to moderate excessive statements.

-There is an end game (ala My Life With Master).  At the end of the game, unless the group has agrees otherwise, the resolution rules determine which character was the sole survivor.  All other characters are considered to have died / been lost / rendered catatonic during the event.  Their contributions to the narrative are rationalized as second-hand retelling (heresy) / recovered documents / ghosts / insanity (split-personality) /  sad figments of the survivors' imagination manifested in a distorted recall of events.\

-As the default assumption is that only one character survives, Players are encouraged to provide conflicts that drive other characters into desperate circumstances.  This can be through exterior forces (i.e. the source of the ominous event) or through having their own character act against the target character (which is dangerous because who knows who will win and who will "Black Out").  However the circumstances have to be approved by the group.  Other players can veto, raise the stakes, or make it more expensive for a situation to come to pass in order to force the circumstance to be "interesting."  Boring conflicts or results (i.e. "You're character feels suicidal and jumps off a cliff") as specifically forbidden unless approved by the player owning that character.

CURRENT MECHANICS UNDER CONSIDERATION:
-Through conflict, characters acquire points of "Insight" and "Desperation."  "Insight" is the means buy which a character bolsters their statements during conflicts and focus the narrative on an final explanation of what caused their memory loss.  "Desperation" is the fallout from conflicts that results in injury or severe emotional upset - characters can acquire "Desperation" whether of not they win a conflict.  When "Desperation" reaches a set threshold (or when grave physical injury results, which is frequently the same thing) the character "Blacks Out.

Both resources are acquired largely through conflicts.  "Insight" determines the cause of the memory loss and when the resolution end stage of the game is triggered.  "Desperation" determines who is the survivor when the game ends (specifically the character with the least).

-To help emphasize not only genre constraints but also to encourage players to buy into other players narrative, there is a mechanism called "Foreboding."  A player can make a statement about an element of the story that poses an unanswered question or draws attention to something unexplained.  He then can commit a limited amount of "Insight" to it.  At some later point another player may invoke that element and attempt to answer the question / explain the mystery.  At this point all players must decide if the answer is satisfying enough based on criteria - (a) Does it do a good job of explaining the presence of the "Foreboding" element; (b) Does it drive the story in an interesting direction; (c) Does it fit with the rest of the narrative.

If the answer is satisfying, the amount of "Insight" is doubled and the player who introduced the element decides how that insight is distributed between the two players.

If the answer is not satisfying, the player who introduced the element receives one "Insight" and the answer is recognized to be a possible Red Herring.  This means that a new answer can still be posed at some later point in the game by anyone except the player who introduced the "Foreboding" element (this includes players who introduced a Red Herring).

---Example Start---
[Cindy] 'I recall that when I met Dr. Havers, I couldn't help but wonder why he was limping.  But it didn't seem important at the time.'
<<Cindy invests 2 Insight into this to make it a statement of Foreboding>>

<<later Bob, having won narration rights while spying on Dr. Havers, decides to answer it>>

[Bob]'Through the keyhole I could see him take off his right shoe.  And when he threw it on the floor all this gummy padding fell out of it.  But the foot....the foot just looked wrong.  It was soft, and bendy, like..like there were no bones in it.  And then he rolled down his sock and I SAW IT!  BY GOD ALL HE HAD WERE THESE COILED THINGS!...It was like a bunch of worms or roots... But the worst part was how they were moving.  It was like they were stroking each other over and over again.  I couldn't watch any longer...I just ran, I guess.'

<<players agree this is a satisfying answer so Cindy gets 4 Insight points to split up.  She gives 3 to Bob, for his disgusting answer, and takes 1 herself.>>
---Example End---

PROBLEMS NEEDING TO BE SOLVED
1. How to avoid a wandering narrative that doesn't resolve to anything?  How to match need to invent story with a need to progress story?  The players are called not only the interact with the existing story elements, but create others from whole cloth.  And to have to try to have that created content align with other player contributions to lead to a satisfying answer.  "Foreboding" seems to provide part of the answer, by encouraging story to converge to include certain elements, but seems insufficient by itself.  The fact that the Examiner also acts as a de facto editor / approver of some player contributions also mitigates this to some extent.  But I don't want to recapitulate the "Impossible Thing Before Breakfast."  I want to avoid having the Examiner pre-create the situation and the answer and try to lead the players to discovering it.  But could the Examiner help focus the narrative energies by framing the story?  Maybe the Examiner could establish the general location and a set number of locals / sets for the story (possibly with player input)?

2. Do characters need additional motivation beyond "Find out what happened"?  Will additional motivations cloud the narrative, leading to too many blind ends and not enough focus on "Find out what happened"?

Any ideas, suggestions, reactions, or other comments are welcome.  I feel I have an interesting concept here that's bolstered by a few decent ideas.  What I need is some feedback on how to cut what appears to be a Gordian Knot of directionless narrative.

Sounds neat, Adam!

There's one thing that occured to me that might also address your coherent-story goal.

Instead of the non-examiner players all deciding what one thing they all have in common, have each player pick up three index cards and, in secret, write the same thing on each one -- "Fire at the Park Hotel" or "Man with a Limp" or "The Sewers Under Manhattan".  Then shuffle all the cards and deal three to everybody.  Then reward the players for introducing that element into their own narration during play (maybe they get Insight tokens).  Because there are three copies of each, when the second player introduces an element, it forms a connection with the first player who played that element.  In this way, players will, in-game, reveal their connections, and there will be some element of suspense as events unfold (and you look forward to your three cards showing up).  You could even tie the endgame into the last card being played, though this may be awkward.

(There is a slight chance that someone might be dealt three of the same element, but this is unlikely even with two players and gets increasingly unlikely the greater the number of players.)

Joshua,

I been considering the use of cards with locations, but I really like your idea of card with events & persons as well.  But again it would be possible that the proposed ideas, as a group, would be too divergent to bring the game to a solution in a short period of time (this is not expected to be a long term game).  I think we can re-use the role of the Examiner as editor of truth here to take the player input and then try to "stack the deck" toward a coherent story.  How about this:

1) After creating a character, each player takes 9 index cards and writes down:
-3 different persons that they are interested in encountering during the game
-3 different events that they are interested in occurring during the game
-3 different locations that they are interested in visiting during the game
(note that "they" refers to the player, and not the character)

2) These cards are passed to the Examiner.  From each players stack of 9 cards the Examiner choose 3 cards; they could all be one type (i.e.person), or of any combination of types (i.e. 2 locations, and an event).

3) The Examiner writes additional cards, in a number equal to the number of other players, containing either a person, location, or event.  These contributions are either used to "spice the pot" as it were or to set up likely connections between player contributions.  The cards the Examiner wrote, and the cards he selected from each player, are shuffled and then dealt at random back to the players.

4) Players receive two additional Insight when the cards are brought into play as part of their narration.  Cards can be used as the basis of a statement of "Foreboding" or as answers to statements of "Foreboding" as normal.

5) The game can end before all cards are played.

I think I may have to adjust the number of cards players receive (don't want to give players fewer than 2 or more than 5 I think).  And I like your idea of multiples of the same cards in play, but I'd prefer not to have more than 2 of the same, rather than 3 of the same.  What do you think of this change?  Does it push the game too much in the direction of a card or board game, rather than a roleplaying game?

I don't think you need the Examiner to handle the cards.  That's Game Master controls the story stuff, which is not necessary in your game (as I read it).  If the unfolding story is as much a surprise to the Examiner as the other players, then the Examiner has a participatory role in the game, rather than a management role in the game.  I can easily envision an Examiner desperately trying to figure out how to "make sense" out of the stuff coming out of the players' mouths -- and having a lot of fun doing it.  I think that'd be a lot more entertaining than trying to corral the players into some vague sense of where the story is "supposed" to go as determined by the cards the Examiner chose to circulate among the players.  It's the difference between a continual surprise and a continual frustration, to my mind.

Hell, the Examiner could write cards that get dealt out to the players, and could hold cards, himself.

The reason that I proposed multiples of the cards is to create connections between players.  I play "Riot in Times Square", then you play "Riot in Times Sqaure", that allows us to have our individual characters meet and interact.  If you escalate the reward for playing a card's duplicates -- or even better, reward the prior players of the card as well (first player of card gets an insight when they play it; when a second player plays the card, they get two insight and the first player gets one insight; third player plays the card, they get three and the others get one each) -- then you've got another suspense mechanic that both encourages players to get the cards out there soon as well as encouraging them to build on others' contributions.  It should also encourage a more coherent narrative (I pimp myself: Conquer the Horizon also rewards players for reintegration; it works).

Tangentially, I'm kind of sketchy on why only one player survives, and the others don't; it kind of confuses the post-action group therapy theme.  Perhaps include it as an option, rather than the only way it really works?

Joshua,

I'm really enjoying your take on this.  I'll have to check out Conquer the Horizon.  In the meantime, can you clarify whether you see the cards as being:
a) Primarily the means of introducing new content to the story
b) Primarily the means of encouraging players to have characters interact
c) Primarily the means of encouraging players to "buy-in to" or incorporate other players' content in their narration.

On the one hand I like the suggestion that players are rewarded in increasing amounts for tying into the same content, since it's a big encouragement.  But I worry that because later contributors are more highly rewarded, players will "hold out" as it were - try to wait until someone else plays a card (and gets a low reward) so that they can play the same card and get a better reward.  Probably only playtesting will reveal if this is a serious concern.

Also, too much reward for using cards focuses play on the cards themselves.  I especially don't want to limit play to what's dictated in the cards.  I want players focusing on the story first, and the cards second (if at all).  Anything other than that is the cart before the horse, and play could become little more than the card game "Once Upon a Time".  I want to keep in the forefront of my mind that at this stage, cards are just one possible solution I'm considering to solve this problem.

In regards to the Examiner taking on the role of a GM - yes and no.  The Examiner is helping orchestrate the creative contributions of the players.  The Examiner, by choosing the cards, isn't limiting player options - he's focusing them.  He doesn't decide what the significance of the people, places, or events in the cards - the players do.  And even though he chooses to eliminate some of the intial suggestions of the players, nothing prevents a player from later re-introducing that content in narration. 

Humans are pretty good at seeing patterns.  Somewhat like reading a tarot card, I imagine the Examiner considering subjectively whether certain player contributions "feel" like they will fit together in an interesting way.  He then adds his own twist to this pattern.  This perceived pattern then is distorted again, since the cards are randomly returned to the players.  These players have only an incomplete idea of what all the cards are and as yet no firm idea of what they will come to represent in the story.  So each player, when formulating a pre-interpretation of the story's content, is basing it on incomplete information.  This I hope will lead to so interestingly warped tales that still will manage to hang together pretty well (i.e. not be a wandering, stream-of-consciousness type story).

And finally it's important to realize that players are not beholden to the cards at all.  It's just a sort of fallback means (a) getting inspiration if the player is unsure of what to narrate next, and (b) hinting to the group what another player might think would be cool.  I like the fact that the cards form part of the reward mechanic, but I think it's crucial not to have the overpower rewards for non-card based input.

What's you're feeling about this?  Am I missing your point?  Am I successfully aiming at my goal or am I inadvertently undercutting / drifting away from my intial statements of what the game is about?

Oh, and the whole group therapy is kind of a dodge.

I think I wasn't honest enough with myself when stating what I want the game to be about.  Although I see it having applicability toward other genres, the strongest enactment of the game in my mind is a short Cthulhu-like horror tale.

Part of the horror of the game would be the knowledge that one of the characters is actually only semi-sane.  The group therapy, the other players, even the Examiner, are just part of this character's hallucination.  They represent the survivor's damaged mind struggling to piece together what happened to them.

Part of the energy that drives play would be for the players to struggle to BE the survivor.  "Turtling" behavior, as can happen in normal Cthulhu games, isn't a path to success since "Insight" comes largely from conflicts.  And high "Insight", along with a low "Desperation", is the means of determining who is the sole survivor.

I hope that help explains it.  It may be that I either need to strengthen my focus on that type of play (and not try to cover the whole suspense drama) or alter the end game to be more accommodating to multiple survivors.

Myrmidon wrote: a) Primarily the means of introducing new content to the story
b) Primarily the means of encouraging players to have characters interact
c) Primarily the means of encouraging players to "buy-in to" or incorporate other players' content in their narration.

Myrmidon wrote: On the one hand I like the suggestion that players are rewarded in increasing amounts for tying into the same content, since it's a big encouragement.  But I worry that because later contributors are more highly rewarded, players will "hold out" as it were - try to wait until someone else plays a card (and gets a low reward) so that they can play the same card and get a better reward.  Probably only playtesting will reveal if this is a serious concern.

Myrmidon wrote: Also, too much reward for using cards focuses play on the cards themselves. ...  it's important to realize that players are not beholden to the cards at all.  It's just a sort of fallback means (a) getting inspiration if the player is unsure of what to narrate next, and (b) hinting to the group what another player might think would be cool.  I like the fact that the cards form part of the reward mechanic, but I think it's crucial not to have the overpower rewards for non-card based input.

Myrmidon wrote: The Examiner is helping orchestrate the creative contributions of the players.  The Examiner, by choosing the cards, isn't limiting player options - he's focusing them.

Myrmidon wrote: Part of the horror of the game would be the knowledge that one of the characters is actually only semi-sane. The group therapy, the other players, even the Examiner, are just part of this character's hallucination. They represent the survivor's damaged mind struggling to piece together what happened to them.  Part of the energy that drives play would be for the players to struggle to BE the survivor.