I have been able to beseech and cajole 2 other folks into giving it a shot, Saturday the 8th at noon at a local gaming store!

Looking forward to it!

I assume it would be very uncool to shoot either of them a copy of the pdf as they have not paid.

I can teach them what they need to know, and I will email them links to the swf demo at the company website.

But I'm psyched!!

Actual Play!!

Woot!!!

Sindyr wrote:
I assume it would be very uncool to shoot either of them a copy of the pdf as they have not paid.

Cool...and good luck with that first game ;)

Now I just wish it wasn't a week and a half away - but I should just be happy its happening.  :)

Great! Some advice, based on reading lots of other people's Actual Play:

You're the guy who organized the game; you're the guy who's on fire with enthusiasm. You're not "the GM," because there isn't one, but you are the guy the others will look to -- so you need to lead by example.

What does that mean? My best sense is that it means

DO know the rules. (Try playing out a scene by yourself before you go to the game store, and use Tony's excellent flash tutorial on the website).

DO have a strong sense of the tone of the superhero story you want to play -- Batman animated series (dark and brooding) or Batman the 60s TV show (camp and silly), for example -- and get the other players to buy-in.

DO take the first turn and establish some strong, clear conflict people can react to -- at one quick-start game I played with Tony, he took the character of Magneto from X-Men, described the White House in smouldering ruins, and immediately placed out the goal, "kill the president on live TV." You can get subtle later. (Note that having a particular tone in mind really makes it easier to figure out what this BANG! starting conflict should be).

BUT DON'T spend more than five minutes creating characters.* Tell people the tone you're shooting for, give them the click-and-locks, and have them choose something quick from their gut-instinct of what appeals to them; then GO!

In short: If you try to play Capes with zero preparation time, you won't have as much fun as you should, because you'll flail around on those first turns -- but if you spend more than five minutes on preparation, you won't have as much fun as you should, either, because you'll have created stuff that gets in the way.

Note that you have already broken these rules by making up characters and posting them on this board. I would encourage you not to use those characters in the actual game: Use what you make up in that first five minutes poring over the click-and-locks with everybody else. This is not GURPS! This is not D20! This is a game where going with your gut instinct is a much, much more powerful tactic than sitting back and calculating: It rewards passion, intensity, and excitement.

More advice, if you want to hear it...

1.)  Get two items that are easily passed around but blatantly visible and different from each other to use as Page/Turn markers.  I use two different colored Koosh Balls.  The person who started the Page gets and keeps the Blue Koosh.  The Red Koosh gets passed to whoevers turn it is.  When the Red Koosh gets back to the Blue Koosh, the Page is over.  Do end of Page stuff.  Makes it easy to keep track.

2.)  Get a metric shit-ton of Debt/Story Token markers, different colored d6's, 3x5 cards and pencils.  It really makes things go easier.  I suggest using Poker chips for Debt and Story Tokens.

3.)  Play the guy that everyone loves to hate for the first scene and then absolutely play him to the hilt.  Pull no punches.  If the other players make hero types, play the nastiest, most ungodly awful villain you can dream up.  Make them hate him.  If one of the other players picks a villain character first, then play a really, really obnoxious hero that everyone reacts to in a negative way.  Tony's Major Victory character is someone like this.  If the other players look at you and say, "I really hate that guy." then you're a success.  They're invested in opposing him/her.

4.)  You've mentioned all sorts of house rules you're working on.  Those are cool and I'd love to see them.  Don't use them for this first game.  Play it as written.  You don't have any experience with the game yet.  Check it out and see how it actually works in practice.  It might even help you develop those house rules you were considering.

TonyLB wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
I assume it would be very uncool to shoot either of them a copy of the pdf as they have not paid.

These people are members of your playing group.  I insist you send them a copy of the PDF.  The copyright notice is explicitly written to give you that right.  Enjoy!

Sydney wrote:
Great! Some advice, based on reading lots of other people's Actual Play:

You're the guy who organized the game; you're the guy who's on fire with enthusiasm. You're not "the GM," because there isn't one, but you are the guy the others will look to -- so you need to lead by example.

What does that mean? My best sense is that it means

DO know the rules. (Try playing out a scene by yourself before you go to the game store, and use Tony's excellent flash tutorial on the website).

DO have a strong sense of the tone of the superhero story you want to play -- Batman animated series (dark and brooding) or Batman the 60s TV show (camp and silly), for example -- and get the other players to buy-in.

DO take the first turn and establish some strong, clear conflict people can react to -- at one quick-start game I played with Tony, he took the character of Magneto from X-Men, described the White House in smouldering ruins, and immediately placed out the goal, "kill the president on live TV." You can get subtle later. (Note that having a particular tone in mind really makes it easier to figure out what this BANG! starting conflict should be).

BUT DON'T spend more than five minutes creating characters.* Tell people the tone you're shooting for, give them the click-and-locks, and have them choose something quick from their gut-instinct of what appeals to them; then GO!

In short: If you try to play Capes with zero preparation time, you won't have as much fun as you should, because you'll flail around on those first turns -- but if you spend more than five minutes on preparation, you won't have as much fun as you should, either, because you'll have created stuff that gets in the way.

Note that you have already broken these rules by making up characters and posting them on this board. I would encourage you not to use those characters in the actual game: Use what you make up in that first five minutes poring over the click-and-locks with everybody else. This is not GURPS! This is not D20! This is a game where going with your gut instinct is a much, much more powerful tactic than sitting back and calculating: It rewards passion, intensity, and excitement.

I take your point - but I also can't not prethink things - it's my nature to plan and think ahead.  What I *will* do is not commit anything to paper for the hero I will play - already thinking of a music-based hero.

Gaerik wrote:
More advice, if you want to hear it...

1.)  Get two items that are easily passed around but blatantly visible and different from each other to use as Page/Turn markers.  I use two different colored Koosh Balls.  The person who started the Page gets and keeps the Blue Koosh.  The Red Koosh gets passed to whoevers turn it is.  When the Red Koosh gets back to the Blue Koosh, the Page is over.  Do end of Page stuff.  Makes it easy to keep track.

2.)  Get a metric shit-ton of Debt/Story Token markers, different colored d6's, 3x5 cards and pencils.  It really makes things go easier.  I suggest using Poker chips for Debt and Story Tokens.

3.)  Play the guy that everyone loves to hate for the first scene and then absolutely play him to the hilt.  Pull no punches.  If the other players make hero types, play the nastiest, most ungodly awful villain you can dream up.  Make them hate him.  If one of the other players picks a villain character first, then play a really, really obnoxious hero that everyone reacts to in a negative way.  Tony's Major Victory character is someone like this.  If the other players look at you and say, "I really hate that guy." then you're a success.  They're invested in opposing him/her.

4.)  You've mentioned all sorts of house rules you're working on.  Those are cool and I'd love to see them.  Don't use them for this first game.  Play it as written.  You don't have any experience with the game yet.  Check it out and see how it actually works in practice.  It might even help you develop those house rules you were considering.

Adam wrote:

I take your point - but I also can't not prethink things - it's my nature to plan and think ahead.  What I *will* do is not commit anything to paper for the hero I will play - already thinking of a music-based hero.

Plan as much as you want, in all the detail you can think of. Get your music-based hero down in all the detail you care to record, and when you get to the session, put it aside and think of a new hero.

Sindyr wrote: How does one "give them the click and locks" at a table with no internet if one does not have the vinyl thingies that Tony sells? 

One piece of advice... don't use scissors.  Exacto knives are the way to go, far more control if you want the click and locks to ... click and lock. 

Sydney wrote:
(Just cut 'em out as rectangles; don't worry about making the little projecting bits under "Styles" able to interlock -- you'll go crazy, and people will get the idea without your doing that).

Gaerik wrote:
3.)  Play the guy that everyone loves to hate for the first scene and then absolutely play him to the hilt.  Pull no punches.  If the other players make hero types, play the nastiest, most ungodly awful villain you can dream up.  Make them hate him.  If one of the other players picks a villain character first, then play a really, really obnoxious hero that everyone reacts to in a negative way.  Tony's Major Victory character is someone like this.  If the other players look at you and say, "I really hate that guy." then you're a success.  They're invested in opposing him/her.

Sindyr wrote:
I should have *something* prepared to jump start the process...

Gaerik wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
I should have *something* prepared to jump start the process...

Why?  I'm not saying you can't but it isn't necessary either.  In fact, until you see what kinds of characters the other players make, it'll be hard to plan anything to jumpstart the process.  This isn't Champions or Mutants and Masterminds, where you create a situation or plot and then try to hook the characters into it.  If you plan to let the other players make characters there, then just wait and see what they make and then make something guaranteed to really make them say, "That guy really sucks.  Let's pummel him."

Three days and counting - and I've got my Koosh balls. ;)

Now to cut out all those paper click and locks...

So Sindyr, how did it go?

OK, (Deep breath...)

While not bad per se, it seemed unsatisfying to all of us 5 players.  We all had fun, but each person seemed to feel something was lacking...

I have been trying to put my finger on it (which is why I haven't posted) and have not yet really been able to do that, so I will post instead some of my vague impressions, scattershot, and hope a complete picture emerges.

First, the good: there were moments of crazy fun.  One guy played a homeless guy named Mitch the Twitch, and we had a lot of fun with him.

We ran two scenes.  The first started in an (mostly) abandoned warehouse with humming equipment doing something.  I threw down an Event of "The machines overload and explode"

The characters were:
Mitch the Twitch (Homeless mortal)
Mr Jones (a spook mortal)
Mr. Machismo (a super villain)
Marduk (another villain)
CyberJohnny (a superhero)

This was one long ass scene as we tried out the game for the first time.  The scene took around 2.5 hours.  Many people threw down goals, like Mitch escapes!, Mitch find a place to stay, Marduk gets the mind control device, CyberJohnny gets and destroys the Mind Control Device, etc.

As we ran through this scene, different questions and actions brought up different rules: alliance, claims, debt, story tokens.

The 2 villains found that staking and splitting debt seemed to be not as useful.  We tried that, but had a couple of unlucky rolls - which leads me to my first comment.

Unlucky rolls seem to have far too significant effect.

If both villains try to roll up a dice and suck out, and the other side has already been claimed, then that's it, baby.
Perhaps a house rule that no conflict can be claimed for its first two pages.

Even worse are when someone rolls a six - and certain people were having some luck there. It got frustrating.

We villains staked a lot of debt on one particular conflict and were defeated, getting back double our debt and becoming WAY overdrawn.

However at the end of the scene we had the basics of capes mostly down.

One thing everyone complained of right away is with people dropping conflicts every so often, the scene went on and on and on, with no end in sight.  Everyone agreed that a rule saying that on page four not only Events could be vetoed but also Goals.  This way, if people did not want the scene to drag on, they could just veto all additional conflicts.

The second scene was in an alleyway.  Everyone changed characters.  This time the major players were:
Lucky Charm - a super hero
An Evil space supervillain trying to destroy city hall
another gadget hero played by a different guy who spent a story token to also bring in his mortal sidekick
a catwoman like mimic supervillain
another mimic supervillain

This scene progressed more quickly, about an hour, during which city hall got destroyed (but everyone evacuated in time, no loss of life) and the spaceship was prevented from beaming up the Malignite Ore under the City Hall.

During this scene, I wrote up a goal: Lucky Charm saves "Catwoman-mimic" from embarrassing herself - thinking that this would involve the player of that character.  I rolled a few times, and got me a six on my side of the conflict.  Then I waited, planning to let her have the victory without a fight once she staked and split.  But she never did, although others were doing that with other goals on the table.  So I shrugged, claimed my side, and walked away with a decent inspiration - but my winning this goal seemed to upset the player, despite my initial hands off period.

We also had an issue that within the scene there seemed to be 2 disparate scenes going on - one in the initial alleyway, and one over and near city hall.  Perhaps when the player put out the goal "So-and-so destroys City Hall" I should have told him that City Hall was not the scene.  What wound up happening is that people got more and more creative and the logic got more and more tenuous how their characters abilities could be used on goals on the table that weren't really physically close to them.

Also, it was noted that everyone was using the thinnest of excuses in finding ways to use the abilities we had left - trying to find some way to apply "surveillance" for example to escape a headlock.  Several times people played the ability and had to be prodded into adding any narration at all.

Likewise some players narrated stuff, but did not take any actions on their turn, such as writing conflicts or using abilities - but this made sense as several of them did not have any abilities left, especially in the first scene.

I should add that all but one were experienced GMs in their own right.

A few of them found the Capes rules cumbersome and overly complex - I did not have that issue.  We all agreed however that the whole affair, the storyline that emerged in both scenes seemed wild, unpredictable, and chaotic.  Also, the two scenes did not seem to have anything in common - like two completely separate comic books.

Oh, we did decide to employ inspiration combining under the rule that 2 insps combine into 1 insps 1 higher than the highest Insp used - max of level 5.  A lot of people had level 1 Insps and they seemed useless.  In any case, this house rule did not seem to cause any problems.

I think (in addition, or perhaps, complementary, to the above) there was also a problem about trying to find one's purpose.  Capes is not about playing a character, and everyone got that.  But several people approached Capes from a GMing point of view, and found that the unstoppable chaos destroyed that idea - I could see in their eyes the thought that if this was a traditional rpg that the GM, as the sole ultimate power, could just wade in and make things right.

So that was that.  One player had a bad time and she probably won't play again, one player said he absolutely would (and so would I) and the other two seemed up for it but with some hesitancy in their voice.

Having played a game of this I think I have internalized 80% of the rules at this point, and hopefully the next session would go better, but it would be hard to say.  I think I am up for trying it again, if I can get another session planned and people committed.

But I have to say that my first exposure of the actual play left me somewhat disappointed.

Now before everyone jumps on me and says I did it wrong, let me say:

Maybe I did it wrong.  Maybe this was the "burn in" and things will get better.

But I do want to raise another possibility.  Maybe Capes is NOT an rpg per se.  Maybe its really a strategic competitive resource game (fighting for control of Conflicts and/or amassing story tokens) with a dressing or veneer of rpg flavor.  Maybe you can't have a combination competitive strategy game and rpg without the former overwhelming the latter.

I want to experience another Capes game or two before deciding if the above is true or false, but its a thought.

So that was my first Capes experience.

Out of interest, who brought Passion to the table, and what was it about?

You talk about a lot of other stuff, but I can't twig out the answer to that question from your post.

But I have to say that my first exposure of the actual play left me somewhat disappointed.

Now before everyone jumps on me and says I did it wrong, let me say:

Maybe I did it wrong.  Maybe this was the "burn in" and things will get better.

But I do want to raise another possibility.  Maybe Capes is NOT an rpg per se.  Maybe its really a strategic competitive resource game (fighting for control of Conflicts and/or amassing story tokens) with a dressing or veneer of rpg flavor.  Maybe you can't have a combination competitive strategy game and rpg without the former overwhelming the latter.

I want to experience another Capes game or two before deciding if the above is true or false, but its a thought.

So that was my first Capes experience.

Also, the two scenes did not seem to have anything in common - like two completely separate comic books.

During this scene, I wrote up a goal: Lucky Charm saves "Catwoman-mimic" from embarrassing herself - thinking that this would involve the player of that character.  I rolled a few times, and got me a six on my side of the conflict.  Then I waited, planning to let her have the victory without a fight once she staked and split.  But she never did, although others were doing that with other goals on the table.  So I shrugged, claimed my side, and walked away with a decent inspiration - but my winning this goal seemed to upset the player, despite my initial hands off period.

Out of interest, who brought Passion to the table, and what was it about?

I'm not trying to say "you did it wrong," exactly.  More like, I see some problems in the way your group approached the game.  Problems that understandably arose from an unfamiliarity with the techniques required to get really satisfying play from Capes.  Here's what I see:

You emphasized to your players that Capes isn't about playing a character.  I think this may have been a mistake.  It's kinda true, but also kinda misleading.  One facet of Capes is all about being invested in a character's story.  You have to really care about what happens in order have the drive to stake everything to get what you want.

You also emphasized that each person is more like a GM.  This is also quite true, but to a player whose primary experience is with traditional games this may be a harmful idea.  If you go into a Capes game expecting to have the sort of control that a GM has, you're going to be savagely disabused of that notion pretty quickly.  I think that it may be painful to have to try to figure out exactly what your role is while you play, especially if you came into the game with preconceptions or confusion about your role.

In my experience, I don't discuss this sort of stuff with people before I play with them.  I just show them the game like any other rpg and then encourage them to expand on their narration.  There's typically a little bit of "I can do that?" but it's always been positive.

Stuff that contributed to your broken story experience:  The things I noted above probably didn't help, but I think the thing with nobody playing a character for more than one scene was a big factor.  You said that the two scenes didn't have anything in common.  If even one or two of you had played characters from the first scene, you would have instantly had a thread of a storyline without any particular effort.  If you don't have reoccurring characters, then somebody has to do some work to tie the scenes together in some other fashion. 

An idea somebody suggested that I liked very much was to start out by having everybody make up Spotlight characters.  Even if you're not using the Spotlight house rule, make up the guys that the comic is going to be about.  Make up your X-Men or your Avengers or JLA or your Batman/Robin/Joker/Catwoman.  Whatever.  There's something to be said for just jumping in with both feet and seeing where you go, but much of the time, you go nowhere.  If you have some main characters at the beginning, you'll be more likely to get a story you like.

You mentioned that the storylines within scenes played out wildly and chaotically.  This is part of the burning-in period that you mentioned.  People get weirded out by having a lot of freedom to go in whatever direction they want.  They go all over the place just because they can.  After a while, they realize that going in every which way isn't really very fun, isn't really very satisfying, and isn't at all a good way to earn Story Tokens.  They settle down and work together to roleplay a story.

You indicated that it didn't feel like a roleplaying game, more like a "strategic competitive resource game" with a rpg dressing, etc.  Again, I'd say that this is because people weren't investing in their characters or in the story.  This is a feedback loop.  I think this is probably why people weren't bothering to narrate their ability use well (or at all), and using abilities in ways that were narratively  obnoxious.  Nobody was putting any work into creating a cohesive storyline, so nobody felt any impetus to maintain the cohesiveness by adding positively to the story.

Some particular bits that I want to address specifically:

Sindyr wrote:
The 2 villains found that staking and splitting debt seemed to be not as useful.  We tried that, but had a couple of unlucky rolls - which leads me to my first comment.

Unlucky rolls seem to have far too significant effect.

If both villains try to roll up a dice and suck out, and the other side has already been claimed, then that's it, baby.
Perhaps a house rule that no conflict can be claimed for its first two pages.

Even worse are when someone rolls a six - and certain people were having some luck there. It got frustrating.

We villains staked a lot of debt on one particular conflict and were defeated, getting back double our debt and becoming WAY overdrawn.

During this scene, I wrote up a goal: Lucky Charm saves "Catwoman-mimic" from embarrassing herself - thinking that this would involve the player of that character.  I rolled a few times, and got me a six on my side of the conflict.  Then I waited, planning to let her have the victory without a fight once she staked and split.  But she never did, although others were doing that with other goals on the table.  So I shrugged, claimed my side, and walked away with a decent inspiration - but my winning this goal seemed to upset the player, despite my initial hands off period.

Perhaps when the player put out the goal "So-and-so destroys City Hall" I should have told him that City Hall was not the scene.  What wound up happening is that people got more and more creative and the logic got more and more tenuous how their characters abilities could be used on goals on the table that weren't really physically close to them.

Also, it was noted that everyone was using the thinnest of excuses in finding ways to use the abilities we had left - trying to find some way to apply "surveillance" for example to escape a headlock.  Several times people played the ability and had to be prodded into adding any narration at all.

Likewise some players narrated stuff, but did not take any actions on their turn, such as writing conflicts or using abilities - but this made sense as several of them did not have any abilities left, especially in the first scene.

A few of them found the Capes rules cumbersome and overly complex

Oh, we did decide to employ inspiration combining under the rule that 2 insps combine into 1 insps 1 higher than the highest Insp used - max of level 5.  A lot of people had level 1 Insps and they seemed useless.  In any case, this house rule did not seem to cause any problems.

Matthew wrote:
One thing I rabidly want to avoid is somebody playing and hating Capes.  In my D&D-centric environment, one person spreading bad vibes could completely kill my chances of spreading indie games.

Tuxboy wrote:

Also, the two scenes did not seem to have anything in common - like two completely separate comic books.

Did anyone, in particular the person that narrated the beginning of the second scene, try and make a connection between the two scenes or was the whole thing left up in the air?

The fact that none of the characters from the first scene appear in the second would also increase that feeling of a disconnect.

Nope - the person who narrated the 2nd scene did not try to make a connection.  And since none of the characters were the same, that didn't help.

During this scene, I wrote up a goal: Lucky Charm saves "Catwoman-mimic" from embarrassing herself - thinking that this would involve the player of that character.  I rolled a few times, and got me a six on my side of the conflict.  Then I waited, planning to let her have the victory without a fight once she staked and split.  But she never did, although others were doing that with other goals on the table.  So I shrugged, claimed my side, and walked away with a decent inspiration - but my winning this goal seemed to upset the player, despite my initial hands off period.

Did the player articulate why they were upset? Was it the loss of the conflict or what was narrated that caused the reaction? Did they not understand that this could be claimed? If it bothered them that much why didn't they roll against it?

They were not being communicative - they were putting a good face on it and trying to be a good sport, but obviously unhappy.  So I can't answer some of those questions.

TonyLB wrote:
Out of interest, who brought Passion to the table, and what was it about?

You talk about a lot of other stuff, but I can't twig out the answer to that question from your post.

Tuxboy wrote:

Out of interest, who brought Passion to the table, and what was it about?

Very good point...

Did you try and drive a plot along and involve the others? Or did everyone just wait for someone else to make the first move?

Matthew wrote:
Some particular bits that I want to address specifically:

Sindyr wrote:
The 2 villains found that staking and splitting debt seemed to be not as useful.  We tried that, but had a couple of unlucky rolls - which leads me to my first comment.

Unlucky rolls seem to have far too significant effect.

If both villains try to roll up a dice and suck out, and the other side has already been claimed, then that's it, baby.
Perhaps a house rule that no conflict can be claimed for its first two pages.

If you'd all had more Story Tokens to spend on extra actions, do you think this would have been less of a problem?

Even worse are when someone rolls a six - and certain people were having some luck there. It got frustrating.

We villains staked a lot of debt on one particular conflict and were defeated, getting back double our debt and becoming WAY overdrawn.

Did you get many Story Tokens for it?

During this scene, I wrote up a goal: Lucky Charm saves "Catwoman-mimic" from embarrassing herself - thinking that this would involve the player of that character.  I rolled a few times, and got me a six on my side of the conflict.  Then I waited, planning to let her have the victory without a fight once she staked and split.  But she never did, although others were doing that with other goals on the table.  So I shrugged, claimed my side, and walked away with a decent inspiration - but my winning this goal seemed to upset the player, despite my initial hands off period.

This sounds really weird.  You drop this conflict, spend several actions to roll up to a six, she doesn't touch the opposing side, then gets upset when it resolves in your favor?  Did she have the debt and Story Tokens necessary to roll up her side higher than your six?  Was she intimidated because in Scene 1 she saw villains staking and splitting and still losing?  Also, is this the person that had a bad experience and will not play again?  I'd really like to see that split off into another thread and addressed in detail.  One thing I rabidly want to avoid is somebody playing and hating Capes.  In my D&D-centric environment, one person spreading bad vibes could completely kill my chances of spreading indie games.

Perhaps when the player put out the goal "So-and-so destroys City Hall" I should have told him that City Hall was not the scene.  What wound up happening is that people got more and more creative and the logic got more and more tenuous how their characters abilities could be used on goals on the table that weren't really physically close to them.

Also, it was noted that everyone was using the thinnest of excuses in finding ways to use the abilities we had left - trying to find some way to apply "surveillance" for example to escape a headlock.  Several times people played the ability and had to be prodded into adding any narration at all.

Were people having fun with this?  In my experience, sometimes players will do something that actually decreases their enjoyment of the game just because the rules allow them to do it.  Was there any inquiry as to why someone was putting down a conflict that didn't seem germane to the scene?  Or why someone was reluctant to narrate the use of their ability?

Likewise some players narrated stuff, but did not take any actions on their turn, such as writing conflicts or using abilities - but this made sense as several of them did not have any abilities left, especially in the first scene.

I think this may actually be against the rules.  I don't think you get to narrate unless you use an ability or create a conflict.

Oh, we did decide to employ inspiration combining under the rule that 2 insps combine into 1 insps 1 higher than the highest Insp used - max of level 5.  A lot of people had level 1 Insps and they seemed useless.  In any case, this house rule did not seem to cause any problems.

I figured that it would work okay, but I'm curious about how you handled the narrative aspects of this?  Did you drop the lower Insp and just bump the higher one?

Sindyr wrote:
I got like one I think - but got 4-6 debt - but that conflict was one one which we oversplit as a test - but even so we had two villains trying hard to keep a goal from happening, they got lucky and got a six, we split our dice but neither of us had story tokens so each of us tried to roll up our side on the action on our turn, but I rolled a one and so did he, so thats that.

Sindyr wrote:
We brought to the table a desire to play a superhero rpg and the capes rules, open minds, and enthusiasm to find a new way to do it.

Is more than that required?

TonyLB wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
I got like one I think - but got 4-6 debt - but that conflict was one one which we oversplit as a test - but even so we had two villains trying hard to keep a goal from happening, they got lucky and got a six, we split our dice but neither of us had story tokens so each of us tried to roll up our side on the action on our turn, but I rolled a one and so did he, so thats that.

Six times?

Your action, your reaction, his reaction ... then his action, his reaction, your reaction.  Six rolls available, if you wanted them.

You got ones on all of those?  Shit man, that is bad luck.  Still and all, sometimes the dice just tell you it's your day to get kicked to the curb.

TonyLB wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
We brought to the table a desire to play a superhero rpg and the capes rules, open minds, and enthusiasm to find a new way to do it.

Is more than that required?

'course.  We've been telling you that for weeks now.  I've lost count of the number of people who have told you that the game runs on the willingness of players to passionately invest in it.

So who got excited about a goal?  Who got personally, visibly, passionately invested in making it go their way?  Who brought the passion?

Anybody?  Anybody?  Bueller?

Sindyr wrote:
How do you make the other players do that?

Or maybe what you are saying is I should tell the other players that if they didn't have fun, the game author says it is their fault for not being passionate enough.

Sindyr wrote:
How do you make the other players do that?

Matthew wrote:
The flipside is that they have to start out caring about their characters at least a little bit.  If they aren't engaged, they can just ignore any conflict you drop, and then nobody has fun. 

drnuncheon wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
How do you make the other players do that?

You can't force it...but you can encourage it.

Lead by example.  Get excited yourself.  If you're running the demo, play the villain.  Be melodramatic and nasty.  Make people want to stop you.

Sindyr wrote:
Does anyone have any answer to my question about can you react to your own die roll on your own action?  This is pretty important to know if it is the case.

Also, does anyone have any opinion on how game breaking it is to simplify Insps by allowing their use to be independent of what situation cretaed them?

Sindyr wrote:
Does anyone have any answer to my question about can you react to your own die roll on your own action?  This is pretty important to know if it is the case.

Also, does anyone have any opinion on how game breaking it is to simplify Insps by allowing their use to be independent of what situation cretaed them?

Also, I dropped a Goal: Lucky Charm looks amazing saving the day.  I don't recall if anyone stepped up to make getting that goal a challenge - and I was willing and ready to hand out some story tokens on that one.

Sindyr wrote:
On the other hand, I don't play a villain really well - my hearts not in it - that was probably a mistake I made, but I probably had to make given it was the kick off game.

Sindyr wrote:
Also, does anyone have any opinion on how game breaking it is to simplify Insps by allowing their use to be independent of what situation cretaed them?

drnuncheon wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
Does anyone have any answer to my question about can you react to your own die roll on your own action?  This is pretty important to know if it is the case.

You absolutely can - check out the demo and the examples of play.  You always get the option to react to your rolls first.

Matthew wrote:
When you drop a goal that is important to you, but not to anybody else, go ahead and stake some debt on it.  Say "Nobody's going to oppose me on that?  Wow, I guess I'll win some free Inspirations, get rid of some of my Debt, and all the Story Tokens will just go away.  I can't believe that none of you guys want those Story Tokens."  Also go ahead and comment on the stuff that they're laying down.  If they drop a conflict involving your character that you're just not interested in, say "I dunno, that's really not grabbing me.  You want to change that to 'Goal: Lucky Charm gets the girl'?  I would totally stake debt on that."

Eric wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
On the other hand, I don't play a villain really well - my hearts not in it - that was probably a mistake I made, but I probably had to make given it was the kick off game.

The energy of the game comes from opposition.  I actually find villains easier to narrate because in the comics, the villains tend to get all the cool lines anyway.

You have to want things in Capes.  You have to want things enough to fight for them and other people have to be willing to threaten those things and make you earn them.  That dynamic is what makes the game work.

Sindyr wrote:
Also, does anyone have any opinion on how game breaking it is to simplify Insps by allowing their use to be independent of what situation cretaed them?

Handwaving the inspiration connection is a lost opportunity for narrative flavor.  If you have an inspiration "Captain Invincible bravely fought the lizard-men" and you want to succeed at "Lava Boy has a nice time on his date with Betsy" is just plonking down the inspiration as fun as narrating, "'My God,' Lava Boy thinks to himself.  'The team faces all kinds of super-powered threats without flinching every day, and here I am scared to death to be around a pretty girl.'  He swallows the lump in his throat and puts his arm around Betsy's shoulders.  She smiles back at him."?  I know which one I like better.

Narration isn't always easy.  I know I can draw a blank.  But I choose to see that as a challenge rather than a burden.  Some of the hardest narrations produce some of the best story elements.

Sindyr wrote:

Question:  Can I pass my React to let other react before me, and React after them?

Glendower wrote:

Sindyr wrote:

Question:  Can I pass my React to let other react before me, and React after them?

Yes.  Once you say pass, you can react to a die roll afterwards.  It then proceeds in order around the table, with people choosing to react or not react.

On page 40:
"The acting player has first chance at a Reaction, and then the opportunity passes around the table clockwise, as many times
as needed. If a player foregoes their right to React at first they may still React later, after other players. But once they React
they cannot React again. "

Sindyr wrote:
If so, if you *can* pass your reaction and simply take it later after everyone else, what's to prevent people wanting to react but not wanting to react first?  Whats to prevent the reaction phase from becoming crawn out as people try to out-wait each other in order to the last person to roll the die?

Sindyr wrote:
Point taken - the downside comes from when the complexity becomes a burden and time gets lost either trying to come up with narrations or bookkeeping the Insps.

Perhaps as the basic Capes mechanics become second nature, we shall bring back in the narrative aspects of Insps.

Sindyr wrote:
If so, if you *can* pass your reaction and simply take it later after everyone else, what's to prevent people wanting to react but not wanting to react first?  Whats to prevent the reaction phase from becoming drawn out as people try to out-wait each other in order to the last person to roll the die?

drnuncheon wrote:
I'd say if you go full circle without a reaction, it's time to move on.  For courtesy, I'd do it something like this:

Alex: OK, I rolled a 3...I'm not going to react. Betty?
Betty: Pass.
Carl: Not yet.
Dave: Pass.
Emily: Nope.
Alex: So nobody wants to react?  Last chance...OK, it stays at a 3.  Betty, its your turn.

J

We do it the same way that Hans does.  We do spending Story Tokens for extra actions the same way.  On your turn you can pass, but if everybody passes, you lose your chance.

Matthew wrote:
We do it the same way that Hans does.  We do spending Story Tokens for extra actions the same way.  On your turn you can pass, but if everybody passes, you lose your chance.

Sindyr wrote:
How do you make the other players do that?

Several players brought enthusiasm to the table, and lots of it.  That should suffice.

Well then why are you balking at answering this question?  Sounds like you should have plenty of examples of players who got passionate about goals, and invested in fighting off all opposition.  Tell us about them!

"passionate" is a superlative word and I do not employ it often.  Using it is like leaving oneself a loophole, a way to say "yeah, but since you had problems, you must not have been (supebolded) *passionate*, you know, not really" - in other words, self-serving circular logic of proving oneself right by jiggering the semantics and definitions.

What I can tell you is that:
1) I was invested in winning the Lucky Charm is Awesome conflict.
2) I tried to dangle the Lucky Charm Saves Catwoman-mimic from embarrassing herself to get that player to invest.
3) There was a The Mind Control Device gets destroyed that at least 3 of us were fighting over.
4) There was a City Hall gets Destroyed that at least 3 of us were fighting over.

Mind you, we were under the impression that we could not react during our own action - it changes things a lot if you can.

There were also other goals that were of medium interest such as Mitch the Twitch finds a place to stay.

Does this answer your question?

No, but it lets me ask more specific questions.  I'm not asking you to defend your experience, I just want you to tell the story, for Pete's sake.

So let's start with item #1:  You were really invested in the Lucky Charm is Awesome conflict.  Cool!  What did you say?  What did you do?  How did you shove Lucky Charm's potential awesomeness right out there in the other people's faces and make sure they got a good whiff?

Sindyr wrote:
What I can tell you is that:
1) I was invested in winning the Lucky Charm is Awesome conflict.

2) I tried to dangle the Lucky Charm Saves Catwoman-mimic from embarrassing herself to get that player to invest.

drnuncheon wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
What I can tell you is that:
1) I was invested in winning the Lucky Charm is Awesome conflict.

That's good.  But the best goals are obviously the ones where you and someone else are both invested - on opposite sides.  I don't particularly have any reason to oppose you on that goal.  Now if you slap down "Lucky Charm shows up Dr. N and gets all the credit"...well now.

2) I tried to dangle the Lucky Charm Saves Catwoman-mimic from embarrassing herself to get that player to invest.

Hmm.  This might be a player thing.  An inexperienced player might think "Gee, if I win, and he wants Lucky to save my character, and I'm opposing him, that must mean my character embarasses herself.  I don't want that to happen."  Like I suggested in a previous post, I'd go for the clear-cut goals and only slowly introduce them to the idea that you're actually fighting over narrative control.

(When you think about it, you could actually have something where a player is fighting to have their character fail, and someone else is fighting to narrate them succeeding - even though in the game-world their characters are doing the exact opposite!)
J

Now that I look at it again, I think I might understand why your player didn't jump on "Lucky Charm Saves Catwoman-mimic from embarrassing herself".  I'm going to be jumping to some conclusions here, but I think they're on target.  If I were playing Catwoman, I think that goal would probably piss me off too.  The way its phrased is like "Catwoman is going to embarass herself!  Luckily, Lucky Charm is here to save her from her own stupidness!"

If you're not accustomed to exactly how much freedom you get in narrating resolution, it could look like there were only two options:  You win and you narrate Lucky Charm saving stupid Catwoman from embarassing herself.
She wins, and has to narrate Lucky Charm failing and has to narrate embarassing herself.

If that was her interpretation, and I'm starting to think that it must have been, I see why she clammed up and wouldn't touch that goal.  By dropping that goal, you establish that Catwoman is some bumbling dork who's going to make a fool of herself if big strong Lucky Charm doesn't step in and saaaaaave her.

Just to be sure, I ran this scenario past my wife.  "You're playing a character named this, he's playing character named that.  He drops this conflict. What would you do?" I asked.

Gouge his eyes out with a spoon, pretend conflict was never dropped.

Not only do I find it condescending, he's introducing a goal where whether I win or lose, I look like an idiot.

Either I lose the conflict, and I fuck up, letting him play gallant... or if I win, I get to fuck up spectacularly, anyhow.

Either way, the eventuality is already set. I am a fucking idiot.

Bah, cross-posted with above.  My point still stands, though.  I expect that at least part of why your player wants to never play Capes again is because you dropped that conflict.

Makes sense - she didn't realize that there was a third conflict - narrate in such a way that there is no embrassment to save her from.

Let's take this back a step.

I am sitting at the table, trying to figure out a way to motivate the player to get involved.  I think about dropping the goal "Catwoman-mimic embarrasses herself" but I realize that I can't, because the player of that character can veto the goal, right?

So I think how can I reword that so that it is not vetoable, but threatens the same result.

And that is how I came up with "Lucky Charm saves Catwoman-mimic from embarassing herself."

So the problem here is that the player didn't know (and neither apparently does your wife) that the winner of the conflict is only bound to narrate the success or failure of the goal.  She is not restricted in anyway from narrating why Lucky charm failed at the goal - and one valid reason to narrate is because Catwoman-mimic did nothing to embarass herself, therefor there was nothing for LC to save her from.

This is probably an important point for Capes players to learn - the ONLY constriction on what a player may narrate after winning a goal conflict is that it must address either the success or failure of the subject character act achieving that goal.  How it plays out is entirely in the narrators hands.

Right?

Sindyr wrote:
I thought that even if I put out my own goal that I am obviously interested in winning, over players should be drawn to that like moths to a flame knowing the story tokens they can get?  In other words, they don't have to care whether or not Lucky Charm looks awesome, they just need to realize that *I* do, and that they can profit from that.

I assume that all goals "X does Y (to Z)" can be resolved by the successful conflict winner in having X succeed at doing Y, having X fail at doing Y because X fails, or having X fail at doing Y because Y is not possible.

Sindyr wrote: "Catwoman-mimic embarrasses herself" but I realize that I can't, because the player of that character can veto the goal, right?

So I think how can I reword that so that it is not vetoable, but threatens the same result.

And that is how I came up with "Lucky Charm saves Catwoman-mimic from embarassing herself."

This is probably an important point for Capes players to learn - the ONLY constriction on what a player may narrate after winning a goal conflict is that it must address either the success or failure of the subject character act achieving that goal.  How it plays out is entirely in the narrators hands.

Right?

Sindyr wrote:
This is probably an important point for Capes players to learn - the ONLY constriction on what a player may narrate after winning a goal conflict is that it must address either the success or failure of the subject character act achieving that goal.  How it plays out is entirely in the narrators hands.

Right?

I am sitting at the table, trying to figure out a way to motivate the player to get involved.  I think about dropping the goal "Catwoman-mimic embarrasses herself" but I realize that I can't, because the player of that character can veto the goal, right?

Goal: Catwoman-mimic proves she's cooler than everyone else

Or

Event: Someone is proven to be cooler than everyone else

This way you get both the carrot ("look what I get if I win!") and the stick ("look what they might do to me if they win"), as opposed to simply beating them over the head with the stick ("Goal: Don't be embarassed" or "Event: Someone is embarassed").

drnuncheon wrote:
I wonder what her reaction (and Mrs. Glover's reaction) would be to "Lucky Charms embarasses Catwoman"?  She can't veto it, so you're clear there.  But it's clearly drawing a line in the sand: I am on this side and I am going to embarass you - unless you do something about it.  Instant conflict.

That's way less condescending, and while it would get the same sort of reaction from MY catgirl (ie, I'll make life HELL for you from here on out, no matter how good or innocuous your intentions in the future), that wouldn't make me scratch the PLAYER'S eyes out.

It's the ridiculous implication and condescending nature of a lot of male gamers that piss off women who would probably truly enjoy games.

And when even your conflicts and plot devices insinuate that the chick's going to fuck up and be incompetent, you have serious reasons why most women roll their eyes at gamer dudes.

drnuncheon wrote:

Sindyr wrote:
I thought that even if I put out my own goal that I am obviously interested in winning, over players should be drawn to that like moths to a flame knowing the story tokens they can get?  In other words, they don't have to care whether or not Lucky Charm looks awesome, they just need to realize that *I* do, and that they can profit from that.

True enough - in the absence of other goals.  But you have to remember that your goal is competing with the other goals out there for the attention (and resources) of the other players.  Every time my turn comes up, I have to decide:  am I going to spend my actions on stopping Lucky from looking good? Am I going to spend it on trying to win "City Hall gets destroyed"?  Or am I going to throw down a goal of my own?

Matthew wrote:
She says:

That's way less condescending, and while it would get the same sort of reaction from MY catgirl (ie, I'll make life HELL for you from here on out, no matter how good or innocuous your intentions in the future), that wouldn't make me scratch the PLAYER'S eyes out.

drnuncheon wrote:
I wonder what her reaction (and Mrs. Glover's reaction) would be to "Lucky Charms embarasses Catwoman"?  She can't veto it, so you're clear there.  But it's clearly drawing a line in the sand: I am on this side and I am going to embarass you - unless you do something about it.  Instant conflict.

Matthew wrote:
It's the ridiculous implication and condescending nature of a lot of male gamers that piss off women who would probably truly enjoy games.

Sindyr wrote:
Let this be a lesson to me and everyone else - before trying to motivate someone with a hindering or negative goal, try enticing them with an enabling or positive one.

I am sitting at the table, trying to figure out a way to motivate the player to get involved.  I think about dropping the goal "Catwoman-mimic embarrasses herself" but I realize that I can't, because the player of that character can veto the goal, right?

So I think how can I reword that so that it is not vetoable, but threatens the same result.

And that is how I came up with "Lucky Charm saves Catwoman-mimic from embarassing herself."

Tuxboy wrote:

I am sitting at the table, trying to figure out a way to motivate the player to get involved.  I think about dropping the goal "Catwoman-mimic embarrasses herself" but I realize that I can't, because the player of that character can veto the goal, right?

So I think how can I reword that so that it is not vetoable, but threatens the same result.

And that is how I came up with "Lucky Charm saves Catwoman-mimic from embarassing herself."

Just out of interest did you ever consider "Goal: Catwoman-mimic  saves Lucky Charm from embarrassing himself."?

Now there is a conflict that everyone could invest in, especially if Lucky Charm was being played as an insufferable egomaniac...I think everyone would want to narrate that one...I know I would (starts counting the debt) ;)

Sindyr wrote:
No I didn't - that would have conflicted with my story goals (vis-a-vis LC looking AWESOME)...  now if someone *else* put that goal down *I* would have jumped all over it.

1) I already had the Goal down "Lucky Charm looks AWESOME" - it would be unwise for we to create a second goal I needed to be invested in while that one was in play - for goals I care about winning, the fewer I need to fight for in any one turn, the better I can get them won.
2) My goal (small g) as a player was to play a conflict that I would want to let the other player win.  One that makes my character look bad does not qualify.
3) I personally get more invested when I am I fighting for a positive as opposed to fighting against a positive.  So while I would get deeply invested in winning "LC looks AWESOME" I may well ignore the goal "LC looks like a TOOL" as well as tune out any narration of its eventual resolution, and instead play as if that goal and its resolution had never occurred.

I can use selective blindness and selective amnesia when I must - a quite useful tool in this game I would imagine.

Nevertheless, there are plenty of ways to motivate me to give you story tokens - you just have to care what conflicts I want to be involved in - which is pretty much the key to Capes, isn't it?  Discovering what kinds of conflicts each player is motivated to try to win?

"against a positive" should read "against a negative"

1) I already had the Goal down "Lucky Charm looks AWESOME" - it would be unwise for we to create a second goal I needed to be invested in while that one was in play - for goals I care about winning, the fewer I need to fight for in any one turn, the better I can get them won.

... or "Lucky Charm is so AWESOME that everyone (even you!) agrees that he's the best super-hero ever."

Nevertheless, there are plenty of ways to motivate me to give you story tokens - you just have to care what conflicts I want to be involved in - which is pretty much the key to Capes, isn't it?  Discovering what kinds of conflicts each player is motivated to try to win?

... or "Lucky Charm is so AWESOME that everyone (even you!) agrees that he's the best super-hero ever."

As I understand it, people create goals for one of three reasons:
1) to win - in order to get Insps, clear debt, and narratively resolve something in the story
2) to lose - in order to get story tokens
3) to prevent something from occuring for a while, regardless of whether you win or lose (preventative goals).

When I created the goal "Lucky Charm looks awesome", my motivation was neither #2 nor #3. 

Given that one creates a goal for reason #1, it behooves one to not have other players drawn into it - in fact, it may be wise strategy to instead create a goal for them to be drawn into so that they don't interfere with one unilaterally resolving the goal you really want to win.

Long story short, as far as I can see, if one can arrange, manipulate, or otherwise get people to not engage in the goals you want to win, you will have a much better chance at winning them, and achieving the outcome that was the reason you wanted to win it in the first place.

Is this obvious, or is there a strategic reason why I would want to have players drawn into a goal that I want to win?

Is this obvious, or is there a strategic reason why I would want to have players drawn into a goal that I want to win?

Tuxboy wrote:

Nevertheless, there are plenty of ways to motivate me to give you story tokens - you just have to care what conflicts I want to be involved in - which is pretty much the key to Capes, isn't it?  Discovering what kinds of conflicts each player is motivated to try to win?

But in this case you were essentially "demo"ing the game to people, and under those circumstances it might have been better to subsume your "wants/needs" and try to generate the same degree of enthusiasm in the other players that you have expressed in your previous postings. It is one of the reasons that the "demo"er is best off taking the part of the villain initially, as this encourages the others to enter clear-cut conflicts against them.

In games with an experienced group your point is definately valid, but in a group that is as yet unconvinced by the game then there is a risk that overplaying our own "wants/needs" will conflict with the "wants/needs" of the other players and could drive them away as it seems it did with the the player of Catwoman-mimic.

3) I personally get more invested when I am I fighting for a positive as opposed to fighting against a positive.  So while I would get deeply invested in winning "LC looks AWESOME" I may well ignore the goal "LC looks like a TOOL" as well as tune out any narration of its eventual resolution, and instead play as if that goal and its resolution had never occurred.

I can use selective blindness and selective amnesia when I must - a quite useful tool in this game I would imagine.

Nevertheless, there are plenty of ways to motivate me to give you story tokens - you just have to care what conflicts I want to be involved in - which is pretty much the key to Capes, isn't it?  Discovering what kinds of conflicts each player is motivated to try to win?

Tuxboy wrote:

Is this obvious, or is there a strategic reason why I would want to have players drawn into a goal that I want to win?

Seems reasonable, but my point is that you were trying to encourage people to come back and play Capes again, therefore, maybe, winning wasn't of paramount importance in this case.

Sindyr wrote:
Is this obvious, or is there a strategic reason why I would want to have players drawn into a goal that I want to win?

TonyLB wrote:
So what's the benefit of pursuing only one possible goal to the exclusion of all others when you can pursue everything at once?

Sindyr wrote:
Trying to win it plays differently from trying to lose it.

Assuming that its a non gloatable conflict, then I disagree that accidental victories are good.

You want to make them stake as many tokens as you can - you want them to win, but you also want to maximize the tokens you get when you win.

Giving them back double their debt is not helpful to you.  I have found it extremely easy to generate debt any time I want - so it's not like they need help their.  And you run the real risk that you will cause them to stop playing that character because of how overloaded it is with debt.

So you can make the most of it, but anytime you *win* a conflict that your really wanted story tokens out of, and whose narrative resolution is not all that important to you, then I think we really must admit that that is a failure.

Giving them back double their debt is not helpful to you.  I have found it extremely easy to generate debt any time I want - so it's not like they need help their.  And you run the real risk that you will cause them to stop playing that character because of how overloaded it is with debt.

So you can make the most of it, but anytime you *win* a conflict that your really wanted story tokens out of, and whose narrative resolution is not all that important to you, then I think we really must admit that that is a failure.

Matthew wrote:

Giving them back double their debt is not helpful to you.  I have found it extremely easy to generate debt any time I want - so it's not like they need help their.  And you run the real risk that you will cause them to stop playing that character because of how overloaded it is with debt.

Nah, I disagree.  Look:  There are two conflicts on the table.  You don't really care about either of them.  Steve cares about them both deeply.  Steve has four debt staked on one of them, and the other is tied.  You spend a Story Token for an extra turn and stake some of your Debt and you roll up and control the goal so you get to resolve it.  You narrate it painfully, making Steve really regret losing it.  He gets back eight Debt, and a few Story Tokens. 

Top of the next page, Steve is badly overdrawn on Debt so he has to roll down his highest die on the remaining goal that he really cares about.  Now he's desperate to get rid of all that Debt and after that horrible loss he's even more desperate to win the goal that's left.  He dumps all the Debt just to get it off his guy and spend his Story Tokens rolling up his dice to make damn sure he wins this one.  Even if you wanted to win this goal, you'll have a tough time because of all the resources he has now, so you don't fight too hard.  When the page resolves, you've gotten rid of your Debt, you've raked in twice as many Story Tokens as you would have, and Steve spent the Tokens you gave him.  AND Steve was dealt a resounding blow, yet managed to overcome it and finish with a triumphant victory, so he's happy about what you did.

So you can make the most of it, but anytime you *win* a conflict that your really wanted story tokens out of, and whose narrative resolution is not all that important to you, then I think we really must admit that that is a failure.

No way.  If you win it, it's a tool that you use in order to farm more Story Tokens later.