Shit! Fucking Firefox! Fuck! Fuck! I had a whole fucking page of post that FF just fucking nuked. I hate it. This crappy board system, too, that doesn't save a draft of what the fuck I'm typing. FUCK!

Oh, well... in brief, if Fate works out (after point capture) thus:

Nestor (6pts) > Jason [GM] (5pts) > Philoctetes (no points) > Sarpedon (no points)

Is it kosher for the GM to use Jason's points 'against' Nestor? I interpreted that as fine: it represents a potentially Pyrrhic phase victory for Nestor, who still has the opportunity to use his points to 'heal' himself. Thor disagreed - he felt that it would have negated his victory. Which of us is 'right'? (In AP, I kept the points for new muses for Jason - it kept the game running, and will help Jason in the long run.)

Cheers,
Alexander

P.S. We're having fun! Here's (some of) the story so far in the Cælestial Compass.

There is no limitation to how one spends Points, regardless of victories. You were correct; there is nothing stopping Jason from, say, using Chaos to diminish Nestor's scores.

However, I'm confused. How did Jason have any points that Nestor didn't capture? Were the two not opponents? Or, did Jason capture points from Sarpedon and/or Philoctetes? Both of those are feasible explanations.

If Jason his Nestor's opponent, then Nestor has the option to take any or all of Jason's points from his hand.

That said, Nestor can't capture points that Jason captured from Nestor's allies (i.e. non-opponents).

Matt wrote: However, I'm confused. How did Jason have any points that Nestor didn't capture? Were the two not opponents? Or, did Jason capture points from Sarpedon and/or Philoctetes? Both of those are feasible explanations.

Ok, cool. He's good to go then, and, yes, he can sucker punch Nestor good!

But, as you learned, putting Points in Muses is Almost Always Better.

Thanks for the clarification (and sorry for the outburst this morning!)

So really, it's in my interest, mechanically, to ask other players not to participate in my conflicts?

Unless they're sufficiently invested (with Muses) to give them reasonable odds of victory. There's no reason for them not to be present in the scene, but a weak presence in the conflict could cause you harm. Same with Talismans... a feeble talisman is going to be more of a liability than a boon.

OTOH, more participants = more points, and points mean prizes! er... more points available to the me, as GM, gives me more incentive to develop NPCs according to the rules, giving them appropriate Muses as they come up in play, not behind the scenes.

Thor, there is another slightly more disturbing option. Don't ask them to duck out; declare them as opponents (you'll have to get creative as to why your goals are opposed, e.g. capture all the glory or something).

Like Thor, I'm troubled by the implication of the rules. There were a couple of instances last session where Thor, because of his Muses, outclassed us other players. The opposition was generally scaled to give him a challenge. To Thor, our participation was counterproductive, because it gave his opponent Points. To us, there was no incentive to participate, because we could win no Points. I dealt with it by splitting off to place my character in conflict with an opponent who was more my scale. It seems the mechanics fragment the group, which isn't really what I'm looking for.

I need more information. Does Thor's character have MORE total Muse points than everyone else? Or, are they comparable.

If you all have basically comparable Muse points, what the hell are you fussing about? Get into situations where your Muses rock as much as Thors! Concede. Get out. Do whatever. That strikes me as a bunch of player choices, not a system flaw.

If Thor does indeed have lots more Muse points total, what's up? How did he get so many more? Was it luck?

And, finally, if the game master is throwing things at Thor to match his numbers a bit better, one alternative is to separate out some scenes / conflicts for you. Easier said than done, I realize, but it could be an issue of GM management.

Matt wrote: If Thor does indeed have lots more Muse points total, what's up? How did he get so many more? Was it luck?

boredoom wrote:
It seems the mechanics fragment the group, which isn't really what I'm looking for.

I agree that the rules are more set up for individual or adversarial action among the players, rather than team play. The problem with adversarial play is that I don't want my character to engage Thor's over anything that matters to him, because then he'll bring his Muses into play, and I'll lose. We each have an incentive to frame scenes that matter to us, but not to anyone else.

I was attracted to 9W in part because Muses can resolve no matter if you win or lose. But I'm finding that you really have to win the contests that lead up to resolution of the Muse, or you won't have enough points invested in the Muse to give a nice payoff.

In other words, with regard to my character's status as a liability, it isn't luck: the approach I took towards creating a character - have a bunch of different Muses that were not connected to each other or only loosely connected to each other in order to "see where they would take me" - was not as effective as having a group of Muses that were designed to work in concert with each other.  (Which is completely obvious to me in retrospect and may even be part of the advice given in the book).  Although, in my defense, during the first session of the game I had really lousy cards, so the difference between my character and Thor's, while slight at first, grew pretty quickly as he started consistently earning points

Matt wrote: I recommend that you let the game play out a bit longer. I have observed players take these two alternate paths you describe. The more focused player burns brightly ... until his story arc resolves. And, then he's left pretty open and relatively "weak" as he basically starts from scratch. Meanwhile, the player with a varied character is a slow-burn, and builds up a considerable amount of effectiveness and versatility over several sessions -- at least 4-5 sessions.

Thor, that's true. But, it's also true of the widely varied player. Obviously, the difference is that the focused player tends to acquire more points and, hence, more Muses.

However, one issue may be that the less-focused player needs to work with the group to frame more varied scenes. Another trend I've noticed is that the GM really jumps after the focused player because it's easier, focused, and more exciting. It's a trick to remember to keep things shaken up and let other players do their thing as well.

One simple way is round-the-table turns at scene framing, so that each player gets his preferred chance to shine. I suspect, however, that you guys are already a step ahead of me on that technique or similar ones.

I don't want to muddy the waters here, but I have to ask:

If Jason was not Nestor's opponent in the conflict, how can Jason inflict harm on Nestor with the points? Can't you only hurt characters that you have declared as opponents?

And if he was Nestor's opponent, then Nestor would have captures his points.

Or am I missing something?

John wrote:
I don't want to muddy the waters here, but I have to ask:

If Jason was not Nestor's opponent in the conflict, how can Jason inflict harm on Nestor with the points? Can't you only hurt characters that you have declared as opponents?

And if he was Nestor's opponent, then Nestor would have captures his points.

Or am I missing something?

Ah ha! I see. Nevermind then. :)