OK, I’m tired, so this is going to be a short one. I GMed a one-shot of MLWM for three other players this afternoon, before going on to play DRYH with two of them. We’d played story-games together before, but I’m the only one who’d played MLWM before (or read the rules).

First thing I want to touch on is that we played MY LIFE WITH THE TOUR DE FRANCE!!! I mean, holy shit… Two years ago, I wouldn’t have dreamed of playing something so far removed from the traditional tropes of RPGs.

The setting choice came out of nowhere (well, not really out of nowhere, but that’s how it felt), after I’d explained the rules, and we’d been tossing around ideas of witches in the middle-ages and whatnot for ten minutes or so. Everyone rolled with it, and we had a blast. MLWM’s rules worked just fine with a modern, realistic setting. I really enjoyed the absence of fantasy elements.

Next, starting values. I used 3 Fear, 3 Reason, 1 Love for each Connection (so 2 Love in total), and no Innocents. We didn’t quite squeeze the whole game into the 6 hours we had, so I had to cheat a bit to have the End-game happen. I think I should have used 2 Fear, like the other game I played in. I also didn’t actually kill any Connections, even if I came close. Had I killed them, we definitely wouldn’t have had enough time.

The Master was a team doctor, set on proving her medical superiority. The Minions were:
- Paolo Caligari, the team star rider, addicted to the stuff the Master provides.
- Wouter Vogel, the team manager, blackmailed by the Master.
- Frank Clavier, the sports journalist and ex-rider, in love with the Master.

This brings me to something I think should really be stressed when playing MLWM: it’s very very important to spell out why each Minion fears and obeys the Master.

Two minor rules problems also came up.
1/ I know that the Minion’s More Than Human doesn’t save the player from having to make a roll in the process of obeying a Command the Minion didn’t resist. But sometimes, coming up with a reason to roll is hard.
2/ When a Minion commits villainy, there seems to be no mechanical difference between a tie and a failure. We decided to have the Minion try again differently, in case of a tie.
Anyone have advice for these issues?

Another issue one player had was that interactions between Minions, if they’re conflicts of some type, tend to delay the end-game. This seems like a shame, since inter-Minion conflict is so cool. Any ideas?

Last question: has anyone played MLWM GM-less? Does it lead to conflicts of interest? If so, can they be resolved with using an antagonist-system comparable to that of Polaris? And does it lead to a less consistent Master persona?

Thanks for any input!

Hey JC,

JC wrote: 1/ I know that the Minion’s More Than Human doesn’t save the player from having to make a roll in the process of obeying a Command the Minion didn’t resist. But sometimes, coming up with a reason to roll is hard.

JC wrote: 2/ When a Minion commits villainy, there seems to be no mechanical difference between a tie and a failure. We decided to have the Minion try again differently, in case of a tie.

JC wrote: Another issue one player had was that interactions between Minions, if they’re conflicts of some type, tend to delay the end-game. This seems like a shame, since inter-Minion conflict is so cool. Any ideas?

JC wrote: Last question: has anyone played MLWM GM-less? Does it lead to conflicts of interest? If so, can they be resolved with using an antagonist-system comparable to that of Polaris? And does it lead to a less consistent Master persona?

thank you for the answers ;)

Tour de France. Heh, I certainly wouldn't think of such application :)

Don't think that Commands and player scene requests are what determines which dice rolls happen. The narrative determines what dice rolls need to happen. If a loyal sheepdog defends a Connection, then that's a Violence roll for the minion.