Hi there,

We finally tried this very much praised game. I held pretty high standards for it. Then during both reading and playing some pretty fundamental problems arose. (The same ones, I mean I have foreseen the holes in the procedure.)
In the session there were four of us. The GM and me had read the book before, he told us step-by-step what to do.
Actually we fantasized about the Master, made him kind of an architect (Brain, Teacher) who wants to make the perfect society. Living in an abandoned village he uses his Minions to bring more and more people from the nearby town (big village with a castle) to populate his village. He wants to show off to the landlord that his modern ideas are way better to live by. The 3 Minions became an intellectual authority one (a former teacher), a brute force one (an ugly-looking woodcutter) and a thievery type (a gypsy girl). They are atmospheric and that was (and is) enough for us. I think we followed the rules pretty closely and had a good time up to the point of starting the story, in the present of the game (not just inventing the history which is ok for this game to do by table agreement as I see it).
I practically spotted every fear of mine (based on one good reading of the book) arising while the group was fighting to make the scenes. We did make scenes, and some of them seemed ok, but I couldn't really get over the thought of 'This cannot be the game they talked about so lovingly.'
So how to frame / start / do a scene? How do we decide when to roll and if a More / Less than ... applies?
My best guess for a whole procedure: When the GM frames the scene (s)he has a goal in mind about what type of mechanic (s)he and the player will use (aka. what to roll). Then they fight a bit by fictional positioning and table agreement over if a Less than or a More than applies. When they are fine, they use the mechanic (rolling or not, dictated by the fiction made before). The GM narrates resolution based on the outcome of the mechanic (the points added and substracted). Too bad, if I am right, I don't see the 'When does a More / Less than ... apply?' question addressed.
So has this game a really full and clearly explained procedure? If yes, what's that?
Thank you for reading about my experience.

Hi Peter!

I am not sure I understood the problems you encountered, so maybe I am saying things that don't apply to your game. In this case simply let me know and I will correct my assumptions. My answer is based on some hypothesis on your game based on other actual play reports from other people, that maybe had similar problems.

The first thing I notice, is that the minion are "atmospheric"... but they don' do nothing... well...  EVIL!

Do they burn children's schools to scare the parents in moving to the new town? Do they kidnap people and then cut their ryes out and break their legs to avoid them getting out of the new town?

Why is the new town "better"? Do the Master take the children from the mothers to train them to be his "city militia"? Old people are killed to recycle them for spare organs or food? There are mandatory 16-hour/day work shift in the mines?

What did the Master force them to do in your game that made the PLAYERS really angry?

The game depends on the internal, HONEST, and VISCERAL loathing of the PLAYERS (not the characters) for the things that the Master force the Minions to do. If the players are enjoying the show, if they are playing some adolescent fantasy of a "children of the night"... they are playing the wrong game.

If you are playing the game well, during the game the players are hating YOU.  Maybe the minions don't, because they are convinced that the Master "really love them" or because they think they are monsters worse than him, but the players should jump from joy at the mere idea of getting to strangling you and feed you to the pigs.

I am using "you", not "the master", because you objective is to dissolve, during the game, the separation between the player's and the character's hate.  It's only at the end that you can join them in describing the atrocious end of the Master, "jumping ship" and joining them in the slaughter separating yourself from the Master.

Some techniques to getting these results are listed here: A Manifesto on Mastery: The Why and How of Making Minions Miserable

Then I see other problem:

in the present of the game (not just inventing the history which is ok for this game to do by table agreement as I see it).

My best guess for a whole procedure: When the GM frames the scene (s)he has a goal in mind about what type of mechanic (s)he and the player will use (aka. what to roll). Then they fight a bit by fictional positioning and table agreement over if a Less than or a More than applies. When they are fine, they use the mechanic (rolling or not, dictated by the fiction made before). The GM narrates resolution based on the outcome of the mechanic (the points added and substracted). Too bad, if I am right, I don't see the 'When does a More / Less than ... apply?' question addressed.