Spione

Last Saturday evening, five of the Nerdinburgh attendees played Spione. Gregor ran the game, and the players were Jenny, Joe Prince, Gordon and me.

JoeP and I picked out the protagonists, Issam (sp?) (who was in movies) and David (an entrepreneur). We picked our two missions. Both focused on the low key end of espionage - meetings, informants, dead drops. We got a 1950s setting. And Gregor explained the system in detail (there was lots of conversation before we got into play, but it was good).

Gregor opened with Issam's wife sitting opposite in an apartment, and a cold argument. Pornography flickered on a screen behind. As players, we thought the porn might be a misunderstood surveillance tape, or perhaps blackmail material. But the wife just wanted it out of the house. We had an immediate flashpoint - something was going to happen here.

Intertwined with this, we had David entering an airport with his beautiful Italian actress girlfriend. They have a brief argument when he's called away (some espionage business, I assumed). He raises his hand to slap her. A cop approaches. Flashpoint two!

Issam's flashpoint resolved to the wife vanishing. David's resolved to his girlfriend returning to the luggage hall and triggering a luggage bomb. She was killed. So, great start! Whatever you do, don't date a spy.

Over the next three hours, we played through their stories and reached a conclusion (if not a very satisfying one) for both. I had a hard time following JoeP's character's storyline, so I'm not even going to attempt to write it up. Any volunteers, Jenny/Joe/Gordon?

David had an assistant, Eric. Eric turned out to be a honeytrap, and had also slept with David's wife. We saw film of her+Eric in one of Issam's scenes (and that was the only crossover). Overall, David's operation was being rolled up. An informant realised he was due for the chop, and saw David as a bargaining piece. Eric turned out to be working for the Russians, and was sent in to wipe out David and the informant. Both die in a grubby apartment. We had an epilogue with Eric killed many years later (having been a successful spy for decades) killed by the same assassin who took out David and the informant.

There was a lot I liked in Spione, and a lot I found difficult to grasp, employ and play with. I'm very glad I tried it (along with Dirty Secrets a few weeks back). And Gregor did an excellent job running the game. Hands off when he needed to be, pacing when that was required, lots of system explanation.

• I thought flashpoints were a superb evolution of weaves and bobs in Sorcerer. They're a great, solid technique I want to use elsewhere - store up the conflicts and resolve them as one. Nifty.

• The flashpoint _mechanics_ felt hugely random. Juggling cards around took a long time, for no benefit I could see. My attention wandered while cards moved, stacked, moved again. The system was competitive, and I wasn't sure why it needed to be.

• The way the cards fell, I felt fairly powerless. There was nothing I could do, as a player, to nudge the results one way or the other or communicate my investment. In the final scene involving my protagonist, I had just one card.


• I scribbled notes of retcons, possible retcons and possible scenes, but didn't get to use many.  As David's story played out, I really wanted a scene where he confronted Eric (I was quite attached to the honeypot explanation for some of the events). I felt unsatisfied when we didn't get that.

• Following what had gone before, and which of it was fact and which supposition was difficult. We perhaps needed more bookkeeping. I know I swapped a couple of 'wtf?' looks with other players.

• In some games, I tend to instinctively scene frames, with no real sense of where they're going. The conflict then evolves as I play off someone and I can tweak the scene this way and that. In Spione, I had to pass on the responsibilty for evolution to the players around me. Maneuvers were short - just a few sentences. So scenes felt more like a game of exquisite corpse than I'd like. Though some of that was likely down to us being a new group.

• In order to incorporate material from the missions, and make sense of previous scenes, we retconned a lot of material - this was hard work. I enjoy retconning - it's very seat-of-the-pants exciting - but it's hard work. There were a few 'ah-ha!' moments I liked.

• In flashpoints, the protagonist-owners should play towards 'what their characters would want' and the other participants should play obstacles and difficulties. This was difficult, as I wanted to engage with the tragedy of a scene, but felt like I had to hand over that responsibilty to other players. In many games I enjoy, other players provide obstacles to what I want as a *player* - an unwanted happy ending, for example.


• We did have a lot of conversation about the game, and about scenes, and about flashpoints. I think one of the other players (Gordon?) felt we needed more. To really get the purpose of scenes out there, then make maneuvers. Instead, we made maneuvers and tried to build them into scenes.


• I didn't understand if I could reveal information (suggest connections and motivations) outside of flashpoints, and/or if flashpoints were a narrative rubber-stamp for suggestions.


• I found the briefing sheets difficult to assimilate. The details felt stifling rather than suggestive. As they're quite factual, rather than evocative, I found them difficult to use (compared to juicily suggestive Motifs in Covenant).


• We had very little dialogue. I didn't know how to get other players involved in scenes (compared to Contenders, say, where I can say 'Gregor, play my dying aunt'). So the power passed around the group, instead of across and among the group. I had less of a connection with the players opposite than the players beside me - which is damned interesting, actually.

I know a couple of the other players felt a bit unsatisfied, so hopefully they'll wade in soon. And I was really pleased when people talked about how unsatisfied they were in a clear, above-board conversation. That was superb.

Cheers,

Joe.

Hey, Joe.  Thanks for posting this up!  I have a couple of random comments that will hopefully be helpful.  As I've mentioned elsewhere, I consider myself to be something of a Spione partisan, so I'd like to help your next game be a better thing.

Hmm.  If I'm a Spione partisan, does that mean that Ron is my case officer?  Disturbing....

Anyways!  My random comments.

The first random comment has to do with a potential misconception about how player turns Spione (and, to a lesser degree, Dirty Secrets) function.  When it is your "turn", you have the final say.  It does not mean that you have the only say.  Everyone should be talking during everyone's turns, offering ideas and suggestions and whatnot.  Now, if you want to be sure that your idea gets incorporated into the fiction, then do wait for your turn to slip it in.  But you shouldn't feel like you need to be silent when it's not your turn.  I'll refer to this point later.

# The flashpoint _mechanics_ felt hugely random. Juggling cards around took a long time, for no benefit I could see. My attention wandered while cards moved, stacked, moved again. The system was competitive, and I wasn't sure why it needed to be.
# The way the cards fell, I felt fairly powerless. There was nothing I could do, as a player, to nudge the results one way or the other or communicate my investment. In the final scene involving my protagonist, I had just one card.

#In some games, I tend to instinctively scene frames, with no real sense of where they're going. The conflict then evolves as I play off someone and I can tweak the scene this way and that. In Spione, I had to pass on the responsibilty for evolution to the players around me. Maneuvers were short - just a few sentences. So scenes felt more like a game of exquisite corpse than I'd like. Though some of that was likely down to us being a new group.

#In flashpoints, the protagonist-owners should play towards 'what their characters would want' and the other participants should play obstacles and difficulties. This was difficult, as I wanted to engage with the tragedy of a scene, but felt like I had to hand over that responsibilty to other players. In many games I enjoy, other players provide obstacles to what I want as a *player* - an unwanted happy ending, for example.

#We did have a lot of conversation about the game, and about scenes, and about flashpoints. I think one of the other players (Gordon?) felt we needed more. To really get the purpose of scenes out there, then make maneuvers. Instead, we made maneuvers and tried to build them into scenes.

#I didn't understand if I could reveal information (suggest connections and motivations) outside of flashpoints, and/or if flashpoints were a narrative rubber-stamp for suggestions.

#We had very little dialogue. I didn't know how to get other players involved in scenes (compared to Contenders, say, where I can say 'Gregor, play my dying aunt'). So the power passed around the group, instead of across and among the group. I had less of a connection with the players opposite than the players beside me - which is damned interesting, actually.

Just a little more on Maneuvers.

On anyway, Ron wrote this about Maneuvers:

Because during Maneuvers, [generating adversity is] *everybody's* job. Anyone at the table can reach over to that sheet, point to the brother, flip over the sheet, and point to some part of the Spy Side (say, the NATO part, and the tradecraft that says "bugs"), to generate a scene.

One person might say "your brother's lounging around your flat all day" and someone else picks it up with "and he finds one of your bugs," and still another person says, "he wants to be a spy too." This might all happen on the first person's turn, or be established through a series of turns, depending on how dialogue goes in that group.

Another, related feature is that since the Ace player begins, he or she *must* frame a scene for a spy he or she does not run. So that automatically creates an asymmetry during the first round ... the person running the spies do not, by default, necessarily get to frame their own scenes.

The group I played with in Berlin last November articulated this point so well, during play, that I transcribed the way they said it directly into the rules, and I think every time I try to say it, it's not as good. So see how I put it in the rules for the best way.

My point is that there's a *lot* less pressure regarding scene content than I think you're seeing or feeling. A lot less than Primetime Adventures or the Shab-al-Hiri Roach, for example. It's kind of the opposite, actually - the material for the scenes really is right there on the sheet, and the group/jigsaw rules for scene-creation during the Maneuvers lets you contribute as little or as much as you see fit, at the moment, without pressure to make it all climactic right that second.

The way the cards fell, I felt fairly powerless. There was nothing I could do, as a player, to nudge the results one way or the other or communicate my investment. In the final scene involving my protagonist, I had just one card.

Ralph, Seth,

Great stuff so far. I'm not going to dive into responses just yet. I'll be mulling a lot and I'd like to give the other guys a chance to come in with their thoughts.

Valamir wrote:
Once I made that connection...that the entirely arbitrary resolution system that I as a player have no ability to manipulate in a meaningful way...puts me as the player in essentially the exact same position as the Principle...I totally fell for it.

I'm workin' on a response! Joe, I really, really appreciate your patience.

The Forge seems to be rife with deep and powerful questions this past week, and I'm still hoofin' it to catch up.

Best, Ron

Hi!

I would like to second what Jesse said.  It's true that the character (the principal) is powerless over what will happen to him. No amount of skill, knowledge, no trait, no social or political power, nothing that he or she has can influence in any way the drawing of the cards. (During our first game, that I posted about in these three threads on the Spione forum, I saw the drawing of the cards at the start of flashpoints like a tarot reading. You are reading the future of the characters. "something bad will happen to you...", etc.). But the player has a lot of power and inflence over what will happen. In three different ways.

The first: It's the player who decide what really happen. The card can say "narrate something detrimental to your principal", but its up to you to decide what, how, when and to whom. At first, I didn't see how much liberty the player have over this because I was still thinking in terms of "conflict resolution", and if the flashpoint begin with someone shooting my principal, I though that I had to narrate how he got shot and "lose the conflicts". But this is not the case. in Spione you can really narrate what you want, under the initial constraint of rhe cards  (for example, in the last session, during a fast-paced chase in the Soviet Embassy with the principal held at gunpoint by a kgb agent, I used a couple of cards to narrate the death of a supporting cast character that was in another town)

The second: the choice of moving a card during the initial "accordion setup" is a meaningful one. Jesse already talked about some of these meanings, but there are others.  At the beginning, every card has the right to frame a scene. But you are under the obligation of making that scene advantageous to your principal (if you play one) or detrimental to one (if you don't), and you can't make facts "stick" in a permanent way wih only one card. During that phase, at the beginning, and every time someone move a card, you could have a choice about keeping it that way, of trading that scene with the power to help or hinder the narration of another player (or enforce one of yours). And this free you from the initial obligation to your principal, for that card. You can hose your principal, if you want. If you really don't like him and you don't want to "help him", you can move your card over the card of a non-principal player, wait for him to say something like "the car crashes, you are brought to the hospital with minor injuries", and add "they seemed minor at the beginning, but inside the ambulance I pass out and I die before reaching the emergency room" (this from an initial card arrangement that would have forced you to help your principal with your card!)
If you read my actual play thread, you will see that in the third session (when we really began to grok the game) we made a lot of choices like that. What I like, among other things, was the way it was always a very simple, but meaningful choice. Often, when a player is offered a wide choice with a lot of possibilities during a game, he/she freeze, paralized by uncertainty. Or he/she choose the first one he come up to avoid taking up too much time.  Here, the player during this phase has always only a few possible movements to choose from.  Often, only one.  And you can see it before it's your turn, When we began to understand better the game, the Flashpoints were really FAST, but all the movements really changed the "landscape of destiny" for the characters

So, fast, simple choices during the "mechanical" part of the flashpoint phase. And after that, you have put the limitations (that "foster creativity") in place to help you narrate what you want.

The third (and this is really big, and you have it only if you play a principal): by choosing to disclose, or not, you can decide if the supporting cast can be saved (at least, some of them), of it they all will end the story in prison, or dead.

Joe, when I did read the book, I thought that the game was really easy. A few pages, a few rules, no tables or things to memorize... and then when we tried to play it, at first we made mistakes almost on every single one of these few rules (even on the third session we still didn't use all the rules as written, and I did notice only reading the book again after that). I don't know if Spione would be hard to play at the beginning for someone who never roleplayed before, but sure at the beginning was hard for us. Because our habits got always on the way, and we played it like PTA or some other roleplaying game, not like was written. We had to learn to catch ourselves doing this, and only then we began to see how really was the game.  And after that, only playing it we began to notice the effect and the way these rules interacted (it was only the third time that I began to think about the endgame, and noticed how... political it was. "reveal your lie and deception, your secret shame, or your friends and family will be screwed". It was one of these "wow" moment that usually I get from reading fiction, not game instructons... but not many game istruction say "lies ruin people, only the truth can save them"* when you play them) [*sorry for the crass simplification, Ron, I know that the game is more nuanced that that]

Anyway, I don't think it's possible to "get" this game in only one session of play. Even with people less hard-wired on role-playing games. Much of what you can use the rules for is hidden, and you notice it only playing for more than one session (sometimes I think that Ron let his martial arts training spill too much in the way he write games. Or has seen too many times "Karate Kid I", and want to make us learn his game by passing a lot of time putting wax on, wax off...  I really LIKE game designers who hold my hand while I learn the rules, instead of saying "you have to earn it", you know?)

Hi Joe!

In my previous post I did forgot to adress something you said.This time I will use quoting to help me avoid this.

Joe wrote:
Last Saturday evening, five of the Nerdinburgh attendees played Spione. Gregor ran the game, and the players were Jenny, Joe Prince, Gordon and me.

JoeP and I picked out the protagonists, Issam (sp?) (who was in movies)

• The flashpoint _mechanics_ felt hugely random. Juggling cards around took a long time, for no benefit I could see. My attention wandered while cards moved, stacked, moved again. The system was competitive, and I wasn't sure why it needed to be.

• I scribbled notes of retcons, possible retcons and possible scenes, but didn't get to use many.  As David's story played out, I really wanted a scene where he confronted Eric (I was quite attached to the honeypot explanation for some of the events). I felt unsatisfied when we didn't get that.

• I found the briefing sheets difficult to assimilate. The details felt stifling rather than suggestive. As they're quite factual, rather than evocative, I found them difficult to use

Hello!

The main thing is to say "thanks" for playing the game. As Gregor might have mentioned, it's more of a book about something which then includes a game as a smaller piece, rather than a setting for the primary product of a game, so I hope you or others are interested enough to check it out. Ideally, the game is to be played by people who were turned on by the book, in whole or in part, rather than channelled as a game in isolation from one person to others.

Regarding the handouts, I had to make a pretty strong choice early on, about the primary audience. I eventually decided that it would be spy fiction fans, rather than the gaming community, and therefore those handouts are tuned more to the pre-existing vocabulary of that group. For anyone else, yeah, there's going to be a little learning curve, although I think I cover most of it (except for "wires" which I forgot) in the book. I'm glad you found a plus in the effort. It's kind of funny, after being exposed to this stuff for a while through proximity, my wife has picked up a lot. To the extent that, when we watched the first season of 24 a while ago, she snarled "What sort of a counter-intel officer are you?! Need to Know!" at one of the characters.

All the other folks who've jumped in have made excellent points, and covered most of the ground that I might have. And probably better, as each of them sort of fought through some of the pre-conceptions and arrived, as it were, whereas I had deliberately stripped off as much as I could from my own habits before I began. Here's the one thing that hasn't been discussed yet: your key use of the term "protagonist" to describe the principal you played.

And in that little thing, lies all the difference. Because the principals are not protagonists; or better, they have as much chance to become protagonists during play as any other character, Supporting Cast or not. The principals aren't even player-characters. In many ways, the principal players are more like GMs than like players, because those two spies are pivot points for the operations they're involved in as well as for the people they are close to. Also, "players" in the traditional sense of term do not exist in Spione except as (and if) any characters become protagonized through the group dynamics of play. If it's a principal, then that person becomes a "player," and if it's not, then anyone can become a "player" simply by choosing to act with that character, or making suggestions about him or her. Such a character may become a multiply co-owned protagonist. It's even quite possible for no character at all to become a protagonist, and indeed, there are spy novels like that. Admittedly, rather cold and bitter ones, but they do exist.

I realize how weird this is, and perhaps doubly so for people who have enjoyed PTA, Polaris, Burning Empires, My Life with Master, and many others, like you and I have. Most of those games were written from an experience of having been de-protagonized through habits and systems of play in the past, so insta-protagonist game design has been a logical step over the past seven or eight years, among us. I played a very big part in that subcultural shift, actually, and so did Paul Czege, 1999-2002. With Spione, I'm doing something different - I'm aware that people are able to protagonize characters, so I set up the components that are necessary for it (basically, pregnant "situation") and said, when and if it happens during play, you're 100% free to do it ... and then I let go of any other structure for determining who and how.

I mean, let's say one is interested in playing Narrativist / Story Now. It's very nearly a given: you have to have at least one protagonist. I asked myself, why lock it down before the rest of the process as to who it is, though, and who gets to play him or her? That's an assumption of role-playing history. It works. But that doesn't mean it's the only way to go, and quite arguably, it's inconsistent with the grim and gut-exposing genre I'm working with, which is neither quite fiction nor non-fiction, and in which the author, frankly, is often conflicted about the rightness of disclosing things and/or having things work out a particular way. So I opened it up for Spione, knowing that people can protagonize characters, and saying, that's part of the process of play when and if you want it to be, not something you nail down right before play, which is - actually - not necessarily justified, creatively speaking.

I saw exactly what you're talking about, or what's implied by your description, during playtesting - people with role-playing backgrounds had to get over their notion that this character we made up before play is automatically going to be the protagonist of the story. The good news is that, like so many other assumptions we've exploded here at the Forge, it seems insurmountable until you do it, and then you say, "Huh! Why was I so stuck on that?" afterwards.

I'd like to clarify something about all these assumptions I'm talking about. They are functional and powerful things, in currently-existing games. I wouldn't want to play PTA unless I knew every player-character was regarded as a protagonist from the outset. I'm not talking about what Chris Chinn, Matt Wilson, and I call "gamer baggage." Nor I am referencing the evil-awful Brain Damage concept that I talked about two years ago. When I talk about assumptions and habits, in this case, I'm talking about good things which happen not to be suitable assumptions and habits for Spione, and that's all.

A few other little fiddly points ...

1. Ralph's point is very strong, especially in combination with Jesse's point, but the little bit I'll modify is this: the phrase "you are," in reference to a character. Welllll ... not only. Anyone, whether they play a principal or not, also has player-type (or GM-type, whichever) authority over other characters on his or her turn, in a way which resembles Universalis. You can even direct the actions of a principal you don't play on your turn, subject to veto, which I have noticed typically is not exercised. So I'm not disagreeing with Ralph or Jesse at all, but calling attention to a feature of the game which assigns responsibility for a principal's actions to the person who owns him or her, but doesn't restrict that person's actions to that principal, nor proscribes others' contributions to the principal's actions.

2. Scene creation and development follows the same logic as the protagonist idea. It's pretty much the exact opposite of Trollbabe or PTA - instead of saying, "This is a scene, with such-and-such a purpose," we instead have various components of location, persons, dialogue, actions, and color sort of adding up, and either we find ourselves in a capital-S scene, or we have a nice bit of relaxed characterization or imagery. I've noticed that new groups, especially with PTA-experienced folks, tend to drive toward conflicts and Flashpoints with an almost frantic reaction ... it makes perfect sense that they want to Bang things, but it's kind of funny that the primary criticism Matt received with PTA was "Gah! What about 'just playing' and letting the scenes develop into important or not important on their own?" So that's what Spione does, and now it's the opposite criticism, "Gah! How do we know whether the scene's important or what it's about?" That contrast leads me to think that both criticisms are about expectations, not about the intrinsic quality or function of what the game offers.

3. A bit of advice: it's perfectly OK for someone to say, "Hey everyone, I got it! I know exactly what [a character] will do," or something equally blurted-out and based on something specific the person wants in the story. If so, then it's perfectly OK for each person with a turn still remaining prior to this person to use the Color option, if they are all actually interested in responding to the stated desire. And if one person along the way has something of his or her own, and if that doesn't fly for the person who spoke, well, Flashpoints are there for that purpose too, because nothing said during Maneuvers has to be true. Flashpoints therefore can be either more like bidding in Universalis, or more like conflict resolution in (say) Dogs, or any combination of the two.

So, there are some of my thoughts on your post and experience. I really want to say, this isn't about "you are gamerz and did it wrongg!!" What I'm saying is that it really is something ... new ... and as such, yes, there's going to be a bit of a learning curve, predicated on play rather than explanations. (Moreno, there really isn't any other way. The Spione rules text is full of hand-holding. It is just something so "off" that doing it is required.) Even for people who've mastered the learning curve for many existing games that were developed at the Forge or inspired or affected by it, because the design is going someplace else. I can only hope that the material is interesting enough to prompt some willingness to try it, and so in the case of your group, I am really, really happy that was the case.

Best, Ron

P.S. Ah, Issam. Poor bastard!

edited to fix grammar

So I'm not disagreeing with Ralph or Jesse at all, but calling attention to a feature of the game which assigns responsibility for a principal's actions to the person who owns him or her, but doesn't restrict that person's actions to that principal, nor proscribes others' contributions to the principal's actions.

Hi Seth,

During Flashpoints, yes. During Maneuvers, no one is necessarily doing any such thing. I figure you knew that, but also thought it'd be good to get it textually explicit here.

Best, Ron

Well, it's been a while since I've played, so I'm glad that you pointed it out.

Ron,

I don't know if this is comment on personal growth as a "game" reader or your personal growth as an author but for what it's worth, I wanted to say that I got all of everything you said above from Spione's text alone.  I consider Spione to be a very a scary thing because it has rules and structure but no....something...limits isn't quite the right word.  The way I keep saying it to people is that has absolutely no "social safety nets."

Principles may or may not be protagonists.  Flashpoints may or may not resolve conflicts.  Disclosure may or may not happen.  It's like looking at something that's moving real fast.  You can tell it has shape and mass but that's about it.

Jesse

jburneko wrote:

Valamir wrote:
Once I made that connection...that the entirely arbitrary resolution system that I as a player have no ability to manipulate in a meaningful way...puts me as the player in essentially the exact same position as the Principle...I totally fell for it.

Ralph, I think you might be overstating a bit.  To be fair what I'm about to say is from reading only and not play experience but it seems to me that "meaningful" is the wrong word.  You CAN manipulate the system in a meaningful way, what you can't do is manipulate the system in a favorable way.

The way is see it, if you're the Principle your ideal situation would be to have a double stacked card at the far right end of the run because then you could narrate yourself out of whatever jam all the previous negative narrations at narrated you into -- TA DA!  However, there is no way to willfully move your own cards to the right.  So you're left with a choice -- leave your cards where they are and hope that everyone else moves their cards to the left of yours OR move your cards to the left in the hopes of protecting whatever you can with an early narration before the hammer falls.

Jesse

Hi Ron,

It's even quite possible for no character at all to become a protagonist, and indeed, there are spy novels like that. Admittedly, rather cold and bitter ones, but they do exist.
*snip*
I saw exactly what you're talking about, or what's implied by your description, during playtesting - people with role-playing backgrounds had to get over their notion that this character we made up before play is automatically going to be the protagonist of the story. The good news is that, like so many other assumptions we've exploded here at the Forge, it seems insurmountable until you do it, and then you say, "Huh! Why was I so stuck on that?" afterwards.

Hi, Callan!

I would have liked to use an example taken from spy fiction, but as I said I was never a fan of the genre (but I must say that reading Spione has got me interested. I really didn't know that there was spy fiction like that). So I will use as an example the movie "The Village"

(I hope you had seen it, because I will spoiler a major turning point)

At the beginning, we see the story from the point of view of someone. We assume he is the protagonist, the "hero" of the story. Then, in the middle of the movie, he is wounded, and will die unless someone will get some antibiotics for him. Then we "discover" that the real "hero" is his blind girlfriend, that will face the (literally) unseen dangers of the woods to save him.

You could do a shift like this easily in Spione. You simply narrate what happen. But it would be impossible in PTA or any other game with a initial declaration of "these are the protagonists". And the example is not some obscure artistic movie seen only in festival, but is a movie made for the "common audience", to make money. It's a movie made for the enjoyment of the public, Why should not be able to enjoy this as players?

Other examples: Psycho, or any of the TV series where a supporting cast member overshadow one of the initial protagonist becaise is more like by the audience.

For a literary example you don't need to search for some experimental unknown book: what about the Lord of The Rings? Sam begin as a protagonist?

Hi Ralph!

Valamir wrote:
Let's say its the climactic scene of the whole sordid tale.  This is the scene which decides who lives, who dies, whether the principle's family gets out alive, all of it.  My card is the King.

Here's the deal...no Kings.  What's my ability as the player to impact this flashpoint?...pretty much nothing.

Hi Moreno,

Those are good examples, but they contain a protagonist at some point. I'm refering to not having a protagonist at all as a valid option in play. For example, the first 'Prince of nothing' novel is one of the books I refer to that has no protagonist for an extended time - it appears at the start to, but then you find he's psychotic, then you find he's not even that, he's actually automaton like (and it never really examines the source of his orders). However, awhile in it brings in another character (Akkaman) and I loved him - I've often thought he carried me through that first book. Incidentally he was a spy character - a mage of one of the tyranical mage schools who was sent out to gather information - the character always doubted his actions (which had led to deaths of loved ones) and was scared by nightmares of a past apocalypse every night as part of the schools methods. Not to mention the whore he dearly loved and who dearly loved him, but he always left behind. Ouch, she was a good character too. Great three books, read them all in the end, and the automatons role is pivotal to it all - but if I'd had to deal with just him, I'd have thrown the book away. The automaton was vital to the story, but I needed more than that.

The other book that had no protagonist (and alot of violence) - lets say I got half way, checked the end, saw it was just more like that, and tore the book in half. That's the only book I've ever destroyed. I just felt cheated that I'd gone through all the nastyness he'd described and all it was going to be was more nastyness.

Callan,

I am posting to tell you to stop.

In playing Spione, protagonizing a character (any character) is a constant option. There is literally no way to be stuck in a game with no protagonists unless every person at the table wants to be.

What I'm seeing you say is, "I hate stories with no protagonists! Hate'em!"

If this isn't being presented as a criticism of the game, then there's no point for it to be stated in this thread. OK. You hate them, which is on its own of no interest to anyone but you.

If it is being presented as a criticism of the game, then you are speaking of a game you (a) haven't read or played and (b), as I have emphasized and now repeated, does not require this element which you hate.

I am risking accusations of using moderator power to shut up criticism of my work, but I hope it is clear to thinking people that what you're writing is not criticism. It is a distracting display of opinions which only seem relevant and which are already co-opting the attention of others from their current, already subtle and difficult dialogue. "No protagonist" pushed some button of yours, and I don't see any reason for us to have to be there while you react.

Best, Ron

I'm so not happy with that post.

Callan, let me re-try it as the game designer participating in the thread, only.

Can you clarify what you'd like to know or want to say about the game (as described here), for me?

Best, Ron

Hey Moreno, I'm not really interested in the precision of my abstract example.

My point was, and remains simply this: 

As a player you have absolutely no means to tactically influence how much of an impact you will or won't have during the flashpoint...over whatever issue is involved.  You as a player are powerless to affect that.  The random draw of cards determines that.

I was then drawing the parallel to how this feeling of powerlessness is exactly parallel to the feeling of powerlessness felt by a principle who's out in the Cold...and saying that's a good thing, and players should embrace that feeling to bring themselves closer to the themes of the game.

That's all.

Valamir wrote:
My point was, and remains simply this: 

As a player you have absolutely no means to tactically influence how much of an impact you will or won't have during the flashpoint...over whatever issue is involved.  You as a player are powerless to affect that.  The random draw of cards determines that.

Where can I find more information on this game? It sounds like a really good source of material, inspiration, or just a good play in general (provided the mentioned problems get resolved...or turn out to not be problems.)

Ralph,

I just wanted to poke my head in here and acknowledge that I see where you're coming from.  Yes, I think we're coming at the same thing from two different angles.  I'm just very picky about the use of the word "meaningful."  Yes, I have no power to control the random draw of cards.  I might get four cards, I might get no cards and there's no spend a point to draw another card or anything like that.

But once the cards hit the table, I, as a creative participant in the game have meaningful choices to make.  Even if I have no cards the No Shot rules give me a meaningful choice to make.

That said though, yes, I see how the core mechanic puts the player in the same desperate situation as the Principle.  This to me is one of the ways the game's Premise is encoded in the mechanics.  And again all this is said having only read it.  Maybe there's even MORE of sense of desperation and powerlessness when you're actually in that spot than I'm anticipating.

Jesse

Reithan wrote:
Where can I find more information on this game? It sounds like a really good source of material, inspiration, or just a good play in general (provided the mentioned problems get resolved...or turn out to not be problems.)

Admitting the possible danger of bias, my perception is that none of the people posting in the thread are arguing with one another or dealing with any problems of understanding the rules. The thing is, there's little shared language to talk about the rules, and the simple system has enough emergent facets to lead to many "ifs" when trying to describe something, especially in the abstract. What's being worked out here, and unfortunately, possibly to the detriment of public curiosity about the game, is how people are most satisfied with talking about it.

Based on discussions at the Spione site, as well as in person with Ralph and others, I'm confident that the rules text itself yields no problems of procedure - what it says, you do, and there isn't anything you do that is left out. Um, that's probably getting into self-promotion, so I'll stop.

Best, Ron

Hi Folks,

I was one of the other Spion players at Nerdinburgh (the "Gordon" mentioned). I dropped in just after the initial actual play post was made and I haven't had a chance to get back to the post until now. Hopefully, this will allow us to get this thread back on the track of our actual play experience.

I'll start off with my imediate reaction to the game after we finished playing, then expand from there.

I must admit. I didn't enjoy the session of Spione. I came away from the game feeling that we had spent several hours creating a pair of stories that were not memorable, collaborative or interesting. I felt that I had very little actual input into the stories, and what input I had was often changed or twisted in a direction I did not want it to go.

I'm not a spy fiction affictionado, hell I don't even like james bond. I've watched a fair bit of 24, but mostly because my wife is a big fan. So when the principle sheets organisation sheets came out they were all a bit on the overwhelming side. The sheets got passed around the table for everyone to have a quick look and then we got going.

I honestly can't remember any of my narration during the manuvours. Although I do remember us jumping to flashback for a large part of Issams narration and me spending several manouvers trying to narrate in what I felt was a better ending for his wife.

I also struggled to find a protagonist that I could invest in. The first one I tried was Issams wife, but she was written out at the first flashpoint. So I tried to keep her as a protagonist when we went to flashback (not very satisfying because no-one else was interested). The next was Eric, but by this point we were running short of interesting characters, so lots of people latched on to him.

In the first flashpoint I had no cards, in the second, one card and on the last two flashpoints I had two cards, but I was only able to double on one of them. My double was used to add in the fact that eric was being taken away by his russian handlers. Mostly because I was so bored with the existing story I thought I'd try and tell my own one off to the side. Unfortunately, everyone thought this was a great aspect for the story and jumped all over it, eventually resulting in Eric setting up David so he could insert himself into the KGB and act as a double agent. 

I raised the question several times as to whether we should go to flashpoint yet. But this was more so that I could get a feel of where the flashpoints were meant to go from the groups perspective than actually

After the session there were two main things that I sugested would have improved play.

I thought the group was too large to handle the round the table narration style of the manouvers well. We had 5 people playing, and the stories changed a lot between each of your manouvers, so it was very hard to keep things on track with your own priorities. I think a slightly smaller group might have made things a bit less random as far as the stories trying to pull in multiple directions.

We also didn't do much back and forth or discussion about what was happening in each manouver. The players rarely discussed what ideas were cool or what they were working towards with each manouver. Normally they just narrated thier little piece and moved on. I think this may have been an important thing we missed out on with a group of this size. 

Since the game I've had a couple of other thoughts I'd like to share.

The whole idea of the non-principle players working to move the principles further into the "cold" was not really discussed at any great length. I think if that had been stressed a bit more, it might have helped us all keep pulling the sories in the same direction.

I had a real problem working out who the cast of each of the stories was. If we had had copies of the principle sheets and the opperation details of our own to refer to as well as the communal copies in the middle. I think I would have been able to use the information to springboard my ideas a lot more easily.

The flashpoint mechanic is an interesting one, but one that I didn't feel was that intrinsicly tied to the setting. I was interested to learn that it was a mechanic that Ron had used before elsewhere and then incorporated into Spione. I really like the idea of it and the way that it functions during the flashpoint.

I get the feeling that the real system for the game is based on a currency of ideas about interesting things we could do with the story. The flashpoints and manouvers system set those ideas in stone, but like it was stated, you can't do that on your own. But, unless there is that back and forth of selling ideas to the other players and incorporating thier ideas you run the risk of ending up with the jumbled mess we did.

We only had one person at the table who had read the book. So I think a lot of Ron's careful hand holding didn't get passed on to the players. Is there a cheat sheet or a play style brief for this game to get players into thinking the way you want to play, Ron?

Hi Gordon,

I appreciate your post and think feedback of this kind is wonderful as a designer - it's a door to understanding the game, a sharing of a willingness to try my game, an even more important willingness to say "can our minds meet" about it. At the individual level, you and me, it's what I want.

However, at a promotional and website level, I'm battling a sickness of the heart in trying to reply. It'd be different if this were at the actual-play forum at the Spione site, which isn't an RPG-culture bulletin board. Here, however, I see fans of the game arguing with one another over phrasing (theirs, not the rules), which gives the message that the game is confusing and creates contention. I see the basic statement that it was No Fun, which is all anyone needs to say, "Oh," and be done with it forever. I see evidence of a play session that however well-intentioned, did not begin with a combination of ideas or intentions to play that matched the game's content. The thread has become my worst nightmare: the precise points where Spione departs from role-playing culture becoming its description among the culture. Through no one's fault, really. The hell of it is that not one person posting to this thread has done anything wrong or said anything that wouldn't be a source of fun discussion at the home site.

I see no way out at that level. I fear the damage is done and that Spione is now a target for detractors and a write-off for anyone who'd be interested. I also fear forlornly saying to less and less people over time, "But some people really liked it when they played too ..." Does it matter that successful and provocative actual play is described at other sites? I don't know.

So my attention has to stay focused on talking with you, the person, which carries none of that malaise. I wish I could help more, though. It's hard to do anything other than pointing to the book. Moreno, I think you did it an injustice. It really does say what to do. It cannot say what a given group will do with it or what the experience will be like, because the starting point of the reader cannot be controlled, nor would I want it to be.

What that means is, I'm struggling with how to illustrate here what the book says that clearly did not get communicated for this particular group. It's frustrating to imagine responses that say, "Oh, well, see, Ron doesn't explain things in his books and has to talk about them on-line," which is a standard riff, when all I'm going to do here is repeat stuff that's in there. So Gordon, please let me know whether any of the following makes any sense.

1. There is no purpose whatever to the Maneuvers phase except to put the two principal characters into the Cold. Playing Spione without this being explicit is like playing poker and forgetting to mention to the group that you will be betting with real money.

2. The game is intended to be relevant at a personal/political level, which is hard to explain since it's not about being preachy (the default hearing of the word "political" today). It's a matter of bringing in elements with resonance, or also of finding something at least interesting or revelatory in the background information. Moreno, you have an intense personal history regarding fascism, the CIA, and Italian politics. Did you share that with the group? Did any such issues arise in the story? If not, then I'm not sure what to say or do.

3. The "Spy vs. Guy" genre is almost totally alien to gaming culture, although not necessarily to individuals within it. The very word "spies," in the context of RPGs to date, means action, skill, coolness, training, disguise, and ultimately, unthinking patriotism. It can be campy and rapid-fire, like Bond, or all grim and moody, like 24 - they are the same, i.e., they are Thrillers. Spy vs. Guy is not Thriller. None of what "spies" means in Thrillers applies at all. It may interest people to know that Richard Helms, arguably the most politically significant CIA chief in history because he was subtle, despised The Spy Who Came in from the Cold with every fiber of his being. He rightly diagnosed it as a threat to the secret culture of intelligence and to the U.S. version of the Cold War itself, which he considered holy. To turn it around to my way of thinking, as I consider Helms to have been basically a reptile in human form, the Thriller borders on literary evil. I don't ultimately despise every example of it, and can find many of them fun, but as a whole the genre is pure propaganda in the negative sense, with concrete and terrible effects in reality, as manifested again and again, e.g. From Russia With Love (John F. Kennedy's favorite book) and most recently 24 (each season of which is eagerly perused by guards and interrogators in Guantánamo for ideas).

Unless the group is at least interested in the Spy vs. Guy concept, which goes well beyond the notion of "a guy in trouble! can he trust his masters?" into the realm of nearly-surreal political horror, then again, I guess I don't know what to say. Points #1-3 are so tightly intertwined that they are really a single concept.

4. The piecemeal, small-unit, unpredictable construction of scenes, actions, and conflicts is not a new way to do things, but a formalized version of what really happens without being acknowledged in many groups. All I can do is to ask you to accept, provisionally, that it can work, and to considering shifting to expectations of play that differ from "where this scene is going" and "what I want to see happen." I tried to articulate that a little bit in my earlier post, on the first page, using PTA as the explicit contrast, so I'm interested in your responses to that. I'd like to hold off on discussions of group size and other procedural features until we talk about it.

Thanks again for posting, and again, for playing.

Best, Ron

P.S. Oh yeah! There is a diagram of play available on the site, using little pictures and circles and arrows. I don't know whether you used it, nor do I think it's a perfect blueprint for play that will perfectly educate anyone about everything. So check it out and see what you think.

Ron wrote:
Hi Gordon,

I appreciate your post and think feedback of this kind is wonderful as a designer - it's a door to understanding the game, a sharing of a willingness to try my game, an even more important willingness to say "can our minds meet" about it. At the individual level, you and me, it's what I want.

Ron wrote:
I see no way out at that level. I fear the damage is done and that Spione is now a target for detractors and a write-off for anyone who'd be interested. I also fear forlornly saying to less and less people over time, "But some people really liked it when they played too ..." Does it matter that successful and provocative actual play is described at other sites? I don't know.

Ron wrote:
What that means is, I'm struggling with how to illustrate here what the book says that clearly did not get communicated for this particular group. It's frustrating to imagine responses that say, "Oh, well, see, Ron doesn't explain things in his books and has to talk about them on-line," which is a standard riff, when all I'm going to do here is repeat stuff that's in there. So Gordon, please let me know whether any of the following makes any sense.

1. There is no purpose whatever to the Maneuvers phase except to put the two principal characters into the Cold. Playing Spione without this being explicit is like playing poker and forgetting to mention to the group that you will be betting with real money.
[/Quote]

Then this is one of the main places I went wrong. I'm not sure if this was explained before the start of the session or not or if it just slipped past me and I never noticed it. Certainly Gregor (the one person who had read the book) seemed to be puruing that within the manouvers. But I really don't think the rest of the players were.

Ron wrote:
2. The game is intended to be relevant at a personal/political level, which is hard to explain since it's not about being preachy (the default hearing of the word "political" today). It's a matter of bringing in elements with resonance, or also of finding something at least interesting or revelatory in the background information. Moreno, you have an intense personal history regarding fascism, the CIA, and Italian politics. Did you share that with the group? Did any such issues arise in the story? If not, then I'm not sure what to say or do.
[/Quote]

This wasn't something we managed to achieve. I can see where this comes from with the dirty secret and the disclosure. But I'm not sure where else this was meant to come from in play. Is this meant to be something the players are bringing to the table or is it meant to come from the setup or rules in some way? 

Ron wrote:
3. The "Spy vs. Guy" genre is almost totally alien to gaming culture, although not necessarily to individuals within it. The very word "spies," in the context of RPGs to date, means action, skill, coolness, training, disguise, and ultimately, unthinking patriotism. It can be campy and rapid-fire, like Bond, or all grim and moody, like 24 - they are the same, i.e., they are Thrillers. Spy vs. Guy is not Thriller. None of what "spies" means in Thrillers applies at all. It may interest people to know that Richard Helms, arguably the most politically significant CIA chief in history because he was subtle, despised The Spy Who Came in from the Cold with every fiber of his being. He rightly diagnosed it as a threat to the secret culture of intelligence and to the U.S. version of the Cold War itself, which he considered holy. To turn it around to my way of thinking, as I consider Helms to have been basically a reptile in human form, the Thriller borders on literary evil. I don't ultimately despise every example of it, and can find many of them fun, but as a whole the genre is pure propaganda in the negative sense, with concrete and terrible effects in reality, as manifested again and again, e.g. From Russia With Love (John F. Kennedy's favorite book) and most recently 24 (each season of which is eagerly perused by guards and interrogators in Guantánamo for ideas).

Unless the group is at least interested in the Spy vs. Guy concept, which goes well beyond the notion of "a guy in trouble! can he trust his masters?" into the realm of nearly-surreal political horror, then again, I guess I don't know what to say. Points #1-3 are so tightly intertwined that they are really a single concept.
[/Quote]

Can you give me some examples of the sort of influences that would be more appropriate?

It looks like I'm struggling with a frame of reference for the game. If any of the other players at the table are reading this, is this something that strikes more of a cord with you as far as being interested in the concept? Was this maybe a major feature holding us back?

Ron wrote:
4. The piecemeal, small-unit, unpredictable construction of scenes, actions, and conflicts is not a new way to do things, but a formalized version of what really happens without being acknowledged in many groups. All I can do is to ask you to accept, provisionally, that it can work, and to considering shifting to expectations of play that differ from "where this scene is going" and "what I want to see happen." I tried to articulate that a little bit in my earlier post, on the first page, using PTA as the explicit contrast, so I'm interested in your responses to that. I'd like to hold off on discussions of group size and other procedural features until we talk about it.

Thanks again for posting, and again, for playing.

Best, Ron

P.S. Oh yeah! There is a diagram of play available on the site, using little pictures and circles and arrows. I don't know whether you used it, nor do I think it's a perfect blueprint for play that will perfectly educate anyone about everything. So check it out and see what you think.

I need to run just now. I'll go back and read your previous post and diagram give my thoughts on this tomorrow.

Hi,

The Spione Wiki is designed to provide a cornucopia of references - it's a bit overwhelming, maybe, but the Spy vs. Guy section ought to give a good start, as well as the subcategory of that name in the Film section. The first chapter of the book describes the literature and includes a profile section on the work of John le Carré. There's also an older thread at the Spione forum which is about one's "top five" for recommending to people.

My favorites aren't necessarily the most famous titles, but the most famous ones are damned good, that's for sure. Let's see ... so I guess it's most useful to provide an informal, as of this moment list for each.

Among my favorites

The Looking-Glass War by John le Carré
River of Darkness by James Grady
the Kyril trilogy by John Trenhaile
Funeral in Berlin by Len Deighton
The Sandbaggers (BBC TV series)
The Sisters by Robert Littell
The Intercom Conspiracy by Eric Ambler
The Lives of Others (German film)

Most famous

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Smiley's People by John le Carré
The Six Days of the Condor by James Grady (film version: Three Days of the Condor)
The Falcon and the Snowman by Robert Lindsey (also, film version)
Berlin trilogy and later books by Len Deighton (not related to the title in the above list)
The Company; The Defection of A.J. DeWinter by Robert Littell
The Miernik Dossier by Charles McCarry
The Mask of Dimitrios by Eric Ambler
The Heart of the Matter; The Quiet American by Graham Greene (the recent film version of the latter is a knockout; put it up in my fave list)
Spooks (called “MI-5” in the U.S.) (BBC TV series)

Titles that emphatically do not belong in the genre include the Blackford Oakes novels by William F. Buckley Jr., the Jack Ryan series by Tom Clancy, the James Bond series by Ian Fleming and others (although the literary Bond is a fascinating animal, not at all the same as either the film character or the popular icon), and any other novels by Charles McCarry.

Best, Ron

P.S. I confused myself at one point in an earlier post; I somehow got it into my head that Moreno had organized this game session in Italy, which of course makes no sense because he already did that a while ago. So my question to him makes no sense either.

Hi Joe,

Beyond protagonism, literature has other techniques for making a case about something - like a narrator (a voice who isn't even in a character in the story world), or even description, like the badguys always wear black, or the onset of winter comes just as someone dies. Or even as subtle as the title of a chapter. Talk amongst players is much like a narrators voice (here it's the groups voices discussing). They're all a means to an end of making a case. Did the game seem to accomidate some method like those? I've read a sample of the book part of spione and that certainly promotes discussion, I'd imagine the rules promote some methods of getting into some meaty subject. What was there?

Ron wrote:
I'm so not happy with that post.

Callan, let me re-try it as the game designer participating in the thread, only.

Can you clarify what you'd like to know or want to say about the game (as described here), for me?

Best, Ron

Hi Callan,

I am not really interested in trying to dissect previous posts and who-meant-what. I'm trying to move forward.

If you are saying that a story needs some substantial and consequential piece of the material, "compelling" probably being my best choice of words, then we agree fully. Spione is amply stocked with such things.

1. The primary mechanical one, which is far more important to the outcomes of play than the principals, is embodied in the characters called Supporting Cast. It is entirely accurate to say that a game of Spione is ultimately about them and what happens to them.

2. Another one, which I think is also quite important, is the unavoidable relevance of the spy "community" (Spider's Web) in Berlin during these decades to anyone alive in the world today. That is usually manifested as reactions and associations, especially when a few details are made known via discussion. Exactly which details, and what those reactions and associations will be, depends on the group.

Protagonizing characters fits very well into the "story material matrix" or "tissue" or whatever you want to call it, which is present due to these two elements. Using your analogy, these two things are the hovering mechanisms of the  hovercraft, which can also be fitted with wheels, or better, shall we say "afterburners," enhancing the airborne-motion function.

Best, Ron

Ah, a focus on supporting cast and their outcomes - that's an interesting difference. Perhaps not relevant, but sometimes in a film I think how supporting cast are kind of just used to show off someone elses life (yes, some sort of protagonist/hero/dude), but I think that doesn't quite work if the lives of supporting cast are treated as unimportant. Ah great, looks like I'm thinking it's all to support some hero dude. But really if all supporting cast lives get roughly as much focus as some hero dude, then you could decide someone else is actually the hero dude of the story. Might be what your getting at, but in my own words. And would the focus on supporting cast tie into the spy vs guy genre, in that it's alot about guys/normal people/supporting cast?

With #2, it is no doubt close to the bone. No wererats to grant some distance from the situation, ala 'it was a mutual decision'? ;) But wouldn't it be less about protagonising stuff and more about our own personal positions in relation to these events? I know it could sorta cross polinate to the supporting cast (ie, players start put them in that same position) and make them more relevant to us, but it'd be doing so by adding whatever diamacles swords are hanging over us in real life (hope that's not too dramatic a description). That's stark stuff. At those points in play, doesn't the whole protag stuff get left behind for awhile, while people think of their own position?

Also, rocket hovercraft - yay!

Hi Callan,

Actually, my point #1 refers to Supporting Cast insofar as they are present and affected by the story, but not protagonized in any full/complete way. To do so is perfectly viable but also would be kicking in the afterburner, not using the hover-widgets. I am claiming that attention to the Supporting Cast (which is to say, following the rules for Maneuvers) without necessarily protagonizing any of them is a strong hovercraft.

Regarding point #2, I am referring to a far more visceral, unconsidered experience with using the material than any sort of spoken or acknowledged activity. It may help to consider this point: that if you ask people about their politics or their relationship to historical events, you will typically get platitudes or vague denials; if they help to create a story which offers those issues as material, and if the story-creation process is Narrativist, then (a) you will discover more honest expressions of their reactions and associations, as well as (b) prompt reflection upon the issues afterwards.

Best, Ron

Ron wrote:
2. Scene creation and development follows the same logic as the protagonist idea. It's pretty much the exact opposite of Trollbabe or PTA - instead of saying, "This is a scene, with such-and-such a purpose," we instead have various components of location, persons, dialogue, actions, and color sort of adding up, and either we find ourselves in a capital-S scene, or we have a nice bit of relaxed characterization or imagery. I've noticed that new groups, especially with PTA-experienced folks, tend to drive toward conflicts and Flashpoints with an almost frantic reaction ... it makes perfect sense that they want to Bang things, but it's kind of funny that the primary criticism Matt received with PTA was "Gah! What about 'just playing' and letting the scenes develop into important or not important on their own?" So that's what Spione does, and now it's the opposite criticism, "Gah! How do we know whether the scene's important or what it's about?" That contrast leads me to think that both criticisms are about expectations, not about the intrinsic quality or function of what the game offers.

3. A bit of advice: it's perfectly OK for someone to say, "Hey everyone, I got it! I know exactly what [a character] will do," or something equally blurted-out and based on something specific the person wants in the story. If so, then it's perfectly OK for each person with a turn still remaining prior to this person to use the Color option, if they are all actually interested in responding to the stated desire. And if one person along the way has something of his or her own, and if that doesn't fly for the person who spoke, well, Flashpoints are there for that purpose too, because nothing said during Maneuvers has to be true. Flashpoints therefore can be either more like bidding in Universalis, or more like conflict resolution in (say) Dogs, or any combination of the two.

Hi Gordon,

You wrote,

We did do quite a lot of hurtling towards the Bangs at breakneck speed. Although I think it's interesting that all the players pushed the story towards flashpoint at quite different rates. Knowing what I know now, I spent a lot of time just adding colour and letting other push the story. Oddly, I think I would have enjoyed it more if we were all willing to sit back a little more and let the story move forward a little more sedately.

Actually that all seems to make a lot of sense.

Now all I need to do is find a group for another session and see if I can get it to work at the table :-)

Hi Ron,

From what I understand now - were the flashpoints in the AP happening a little fast? Or atleast faster than what might be the assumed average for the game? From what I've read here I'm getting the feeling there may be more of a slow boil - err, how to describe...like ingrediants are added one at a time to the soup, in a way that somehow suits the last ingrediant, but not toward a particular recipe. Not a bunch of ingrediants at once?

Just a quick post to say that I'm now back from being in Ireland and I'll have a post to make later. A few points just to clarify.

(i) I played as a player, so there weren't any non-particpating people at the table.
(ii) We got through 3 Flashpoints in play, so I don't think we were going straight to flashpoints at all.
(iii) The two characters chosen both had short Supporting Cast lists, so we did actually complete the game in the 3 hours or so. Most cast went out through double cards though Joe Prince revealed a trespass and wrote one out using a Fate.

The text is very clear on how to set-up and play the game, how to move cards in Flashpoint and what they allow you to do. The book was passed around to help people decide what they wanted to do on their turn in flashpoint and it wasn't always a "crude" or "flashy" event that was generated.

[In fact, Joe Murphy seemed bored by me going through the sequence of ordering the cards very deliberately, since I guess we all "got" how you could move them and what their positioning and strength meant.]

A tripping point was that no one had seen the book beforehand since the con was put together at very short notice. We also were very unfamiliar with each other as a group -- I think if we played together again we would have a much better feel for each other.

We did have some discussion of when to go to flashpoint, over and under-shooting but I got the feeling that we didn't act as a group on what we discussed. But more on that later.

Hi everyone,

Callan: yes, that's right. That's a good analogy. The interesting thing, too, is that when the water boils, not everything will necessarily be resolved or known, but some will, and there's no way to tell what will or what won't until you're in the middle of it. Once that particular process (Flashpoint) is over, the group returns to Maneuvers.

Gregor: I was waiting for you to encounter this thread, because you were the point man and my primary thing to say is, "Thank you," for bringing out the game to everyone there. Please don't get the wrong idea from the thread so far. It's not an easy experience for some of them, and I've had to address points of confusion or dissatisfaction as they've come, from that person's point of view. That does not mean I think you fell down on the job, misrepresented the game, or did anything poorly.

The fact is, you can say X and Y and Z about Spione until you're blue in the face, and people will only hear what they can process at that moment, for whatever reason. I went through this a thousand times with Sorcerer, which is only a half-step (albeit a signficant one) away from "normal" role-playing. With Spione, the difference is indescribably vast. It's like asking people to jump off a cliff with you.

Regarding introducing Spione to strong role-players, is, "I've been there." Even if people have a fun time, they still itch and fuss and find things to be weird about. I really don't know whether it will ever work as a convention or demo game. It lacks a comfortable structure like the ones found in Contenders or Perfect. Its genre features are not quite "genre," as you know, and they deliberately kick the more familiar Thriller genre features in the balls. The only thing to do is to trust the slow boil, and for the ingredients to be added to be things that are genuinely interesting. It also requires prompting genuine interest in the history, or elements found in history. For instance,

Did you know that the communist spymaster for East Germany totally dominated the intelligence "war" for twenty-five years? Without him, the KGB would have been a mere shadow of itself, in terms of spying on the west. He made the CIA and everyone else look like idiots, over and over, and the more we find out, the worse it gets. His name was Markus Wolf. And get this: he was a liberal, intellectual, Jewish German. When he retired in the 1980s, he became a glasnost activist.

If you're talking to an American or a Brit, and if the person is really listening and using any part of his or her brain, that little speech is pretty much guaranteed to elicit a reaction like, "What? He was what? How ... no, wait a minute. What?" (Yes, everyone who's into this stuff, I know that Wolf's character remains a matter of some controversy. I'm presenting a superficial view which is, nonetheless, at least accurate if not nuanced.) The point is that the person is jarred a bit. That's not the KGB. That's not the communists. That's not the Germans, for Pete's sake. Then they might be curious. Who was this guy, and what were his spies like? Once someone shows some curiosity, then things can move. It's the equivalent of being turned out by a genre character-concept, but not the same.

I really don't know how that can be made to happen in a con environment when everyone's just pulled up a chair and is expecting some comfortable variant of Dogs, Polaris, or My Life with Master. In my expected model for play of the game, it shouldn't be "made" to happen anyway, it's just a matter of finding out who's interested in that way and pulling them together eventually. If neither anchor is present (shared interest in the topic, or shared social familiarity as a group), then I dunno.

So, again, thanks. I'm interested to know what the game was like for you, and any suggestions you might have for dealing with the game in this context.

Best, Ron

Isn't that being a bit dramatic to say it's potentially impossible to present? I know it covers a vast amount of ground, so it seems unbefitting to describe it in some reduced way. But people are (and should be) trying to find out whats fun about a game, in order to play for that very quality and then they actively pursue it. Too much trust factor, as you'd know, and their just following your footsteps. I know you want them to find whats important about the various world events, but surely that can come with repeat play. Surely a more basic pitch can initiate things? I thought of one to get at the core idea of guys - I mean, yeah, world events are important but at the base your game is about guys, so it's not missplaced to set a basic pitch revolving just on that. Anyway, here's a pitch I had fun making up, taking into account what I know of the game:

What does an animal do when it's cornered?
What does a man feel, when every step he takes slowly backs him into that corner?
This is the life of a spy. This is Spione.

Hi Callan,

Depends on whom you're talking to. In this thread, and in reference to Gregor's experience, I'm talking about dedicated role-players in a strong gaming-community context, like a convention or at a website like this one. Presenting Spione in that situation is like selling air to fish. That's not a slam on that culture, but it is a fact; I've had it demonstrated to me extremely clearly on multiple occasions. For instance, I introduced the book and the activity to a roomful of folks using a personal pitch almost exactly as you describe. Y

Gregor, in hopes of making better tactics for the future, I'll be interested in anything you suggest. I also hope I'm doing a better job of promotion in this thread than I've managed in the past, as I've been ripping my brain apart with every post to try to apply what I've learned from those past experiences, and to be as absolutely honest with the readers as I can conceive.

Outside of that context, the book is a remarkably easy sell. I've passed out cards on request to people standing in line at the butcher shop, sitting next to me in an airplane, and chatting on the basis of having kids in strollers in the same location. None of these were intentional targets for sales at the outset, either - more like, "Oh man! I have to have this book. Do you have a card?"

If you check out the website, you'll find the back of the book in there somewhere, and I think I did a pretty decent/dramatic job of describing the Cold as a juicy thing. But again, it's not targeted toward role-players, and the notion of being and feeling like a spy, as a goal or purpose of the activity, is not mentioned or present in any way. It's not at all about "you have a spy guy! you say what he does!" (I know that deviates a bit from what Ralph posted, but I think his point was far more focused on a particular stage of play rather than toward the purpose of the activity as a whole.)

Best, Ron

Hi Ron

Yeah, I agree and I don't know how to best tell people to have an open mind and don't try to be over-clever. I find the book really helpful to me to read out loud when playing, next time I should get someone else to read it out actually that would be a great way of spreading the knowledge about the table. I really think the handing the book around thing helps a lot, it passed around a lot for flashpoints but it should have circulated more.

The phrase that strikes me at the start of play is "Principles are spies -- not spymasters, not politicians, not special ops commandos". But the thing is, we all nod and go "yeah, yeah, I get it, no James Bond, ordinary people, lying and spying" but in play we still default to more "gamer" stuff. Y'know, the big, flashy stuff, the kills, the bombs, disappearances, etc.

I think we had problems with holding ideas lightly and just playing the game, it's like we have to unlearn some of the "indie game" and "general gamer" expectations we have. I mean, we got to the first Flashpoint and I think one of the players asked if we should set the stakes.

Maybe it's like the playing music analogy. We all came along with our own strong riff, or style we are going to play, and just played that riff irrespective of the beat, scale or contributions of everyone else and the theme of play. But I think the only way you get better is to talk about it, and we did (and are), and we pick up the instruments again.

I think Spione has a really stripped-back and elegant way of generating fiction, and the answer I see (for me, anyway) is to leave other games and their expectations at the door and just follow the advice in the book. It really is low prep rules-wise as long as I bring my own opinions and observations about people and life to the table.