So, a few weeks ago, with much excitement on my part, we did a setup session for Ian Millington's Wraiths, which is a collaborative, GM-less roleplaying game in a modern military setting. The game divides the player group into an "insertion team" of covert troops and a "tactical team" that provides oversight and surveillance. Game events are intended to take place largely via roleplayed radio chatter, informed by mechanics regulating the creation and interpretation of adversity. Lacking its own native resolution mechanics, Ian suggests using FUDGE as the game's resolution system. We chose The Window.

The trick here seems to be picking a resolution system that doesn't conflict in a weird way with the Wraiths mechanics for interpreting and creating threats. The Pool, for instance, seems like an obvious bad choice, likely to produce boring gameplay situations where a player is both creating the details of a threat and describing the resolution of it. Seamus and I had some conversation about Wraiths on RPG.net in which he revealed his choice for a resolution system was Gregor Hutton's Elegant Role-playing, which seems like a good one as well.

I confess to thinking Ian's choice of the radio chatter micro-genre is pretty inspired. When other designers are wrestling in the same pit, following the tired recipe of fusing incongruities to bookstore genres, Ian busts out a micro-genre that everyone's familiar with, to create a game where there's no learning curve to hold back players from confident use of authorial and directorial power. There have to be dozens of these micro-genres out there waiting to be exploited by designers who manage to see above the pit. But it's so rare to see design uninformed by fannishness and lesser derivation that I'll admit to having been stunned.

Still, despite my best efforts, not everyone in the group thinks like I do. So I think Tom and I were the only ones really excited about Wraiths...that is...until we came up with a concept for the operation: the group would play IRS operatives on a mission to extract the 67 year old, tax-evading Elvis from his heavily fortified compound in Kalamazoo, MI.

The Wraiths game text is a bit conflicted regarding setup, implying strongly throughout that the game is wholly collaborative and GM-less, and yet suggesting that "all agents should receive a mission briefing, outline threat assessment and suitable maps or reconnaissance data." The game goes on to provide guidelines for collaborative creation of the outline threat assessment, but doesn't really speak to the issue of how to determine the general nature of the mission. So I brought a couple of maps to the setup session that were from old game supplements a friend had given me upon divorcing himself from the hobby. One was a hex map from some Judges Guild module that had unfamiliar continental coastlines and volcanoes marked on it. The other was a compound of a few buildings and connecting dirt roads from the James Bond 007 Goldfinger adventure module. We settled on that one, and the notion of the Elvis extraction followed from subsequent discussion.

We decided on an Executive Threat Assessment of 5 out of convenience. It allowed each player to contribute exactly one Threat during the Threat Assessment phase of setup. Per the rules, we went around the room, describing and marking threats onto the map:

1. Three or four surviving members of the Memphis Mafia, now heavily armed septuagenarians, patrolling the perimeter of the compound in a Range Rover.
2. An elaborate closed-circuit TV camera system.
3. Two Elvis impersonators in main residence.
4. Motion sensors hooked to whips of monomolecular wire concealed in sprinkler heads.
5. Trip wires rigged to explosives in the north cluster of trees.

And it seemed to me at that point that the rules ought to clarify exactly what constitutes a threat. Is a closed-circuit TV system with no specified hostile powers a threat? Should this be Threat and Obstacle Assessment? Everything worked out fine in play, but a little clarification would be nice. The way it worked in our game, Threat Assessment was effectively just a way of imposing complexity on the Mission Strategy portion of setup. This is what we got for Mission Strategy:

1. Bypass closed-circuit TV system at console in blue building.
2. Program escape path into motion sensors at console in blue building.
3. Plant explosives in garage to destroy off-road vehicles, circumventing pursuit during escape.
4. Make way into main building.
5. Prepare horses for escape (saddle them, etc.).
6. Get King's ledger book from safe.
7. Identify correct King w/ voice analysis.
8. Neutralize bodyguards.
9. Clear escape tunnel.
10. Remove/extract King via horseback.

So it was in the Mission Strategy stage that we saw most of the potentially active threats appearing: bodyguards, potential adversaries in the escape tunnel, possible pursuit by off-road vehicles during escape, etc. This actually created a bit of uncertainty for us during play when it came to rolling for the reality behind assessed threats. Should the insertion agent roll for the reality behind the escape tunnel objective? What about for saddling up the horses? We'd ended up with a mixture of tangible threats and complications during both Threat Assessment and Mission Strategy, that left us with a bit of uncertainty and doubt about them during play. Again, we ended up having a hell of a lot of fun, but we were trying to play as faithful to the rules as we could, and just found ourselves uncertain how we'd mucked these two stages up. It had felt very natural to create obstacles without specified hostile powers during Threat Assessment.

The one issue with using The Window as the resolution system is that it reserves unto the GM the power to set the target number for a roll. We determined during setup that we'd use a fixed target number of 6, and that a member of the Tactical Team providing guidance to a member of the Insertion Team would have the option of adjusting the target number upwards or downwards for the Insertion Team member by making a pre-roll against one of his own skills. Picture the following exchange:

"No time for that Wiseman, which wire? Over"
(Rolls Demolitions skill against target number of 6. Fails.) "Wiseman to Bebop, cut the red wire. Over" (Informs Bebop's player the target number is 4)
(Rolls Knowledge against target number 4. Success.) "Negative Wiseman, cutting the black wire. Over"

It worked real good in play. You should have seen the Tactical Team struggle to come up with increasingly creative ways for me to rouse the 550 lb Elvis from his narcotics-induced slumber as I failed each of three successive rolls:

"Affirmative, use the bedpan. Over"

Anyway, we chose a one hour time limit for the mission, and used the stopwatch mode on Tom's G-Shock wristwatch to keep time. The Window works pretty fast, so we didn't hardly stop it when we consulted the resolution system. And that's in keeping with the rules. We did though, as implied by the target number rule modification described above, have out-of-character exchanges. The Wraiths rules insist that "the game takes place in absolute real time, all conversation in the group is in character." But we couldn't imagine how that could possibly work, so we didn't have a problem ditching it. What if we'd chosen Hero or d20 Modern for the resolution system? I can't imagine that you wouldn't stop the watch.

I was quite surprised by the play-through. It was chaotic like you can't believe. Play provokes a very different adrenaline reaction than I've experienced with any other game. I can't even really describe it. No initiative and no taking turns. Just five people trying to imitate radio chatter. It didn't feel like any game I've ever played. But truly, we had a blast. When Scott, acting as a Tactical Director, introduced a threat that sealed Matt's agent in the escape tunnel, Matt, recollecting the mandate in the rules that if a team member is wounded "they should take steps to remove themselves from the mission," had his character radio, "Tell my wife I love her." When I radioed about discovering the grossly overweight, unconscious King, I got to say, "I can't believe he let himself go like this."

And, yeah, I realize the Insertion Team created complications independent of the game mechanics that way. It frustrates me.

Ultimately, I think the game should have its own resolution system, not unlike what our group devised, or alternately, should provide links to suggested resolution systems with notes on how to handle mechanics that those systems might reserve to the GM, and on which ones realistically support absolute realtime. I think it should give up on the mandate of no out-of-character conversation. And I think some guidelines and examples of Threat Assessment, Mission Strategy, and subsequent reassessment of threats and obstacles would be a good idea. Why should I feel like I'm breaking the rules when I narrate without regard for game mechanics that I can't wake the King because he's doped up on Vicodin? The game mechanics need to be there for me.

Paul

Hi Paul,

Sorry for not getting back to this sooner. I've been interested in hearing about this game since your group first started discussing it.

Here are my questions ...

1) Did the "radio chatter" mode of play allow for screen time for everyone as desired, or did anyone get bumped out or interrupted (beyond an enjoyable level)?

2) Is there any potential for a protracted climax that could become boring? By which I mean, say just about everything's happened that could happen, the screwups as well as the triumphs, and it's time to finish up - but the dice or whatever keep making people contribute, long past the point where it's fun. I'm beginning to become quite a fan of "endgame" mechanics, and I wonder if Wraiths would benefit from such a thing.

Best,
Ron

Hey Ron,

1) Did the "radio chatter" mode of play allow for screen time for everyone as desired, or did anyone get bumped out or interrupted (beyond an enjoyable level)?

I sit here slack-jawed, vowing never again to characterize your reputation for omniscience as undeserved. Your perception that I harbored a strong opinion about this very matter is nothing short of the most impressive mysticism.

One thing I have noticed over the course of my life is that left to their own devices, women naturally create a very different conversational dynamic than men do. Growing up in a neighborhood with other boys, a young man learns to compete conversationally for influence in the group. Among the eight on the playground, one boy says, "Let's trade baseball cards." Another says, "No, let's play bike tag." Men grow up like that, jockeying for position, for influence, and fighting to be heard. Childhood for girls is different than that, and conversation among women is characterized by a greater degree of attending to each other, listening, and taking turns being heard.

And so competing to influence game events through imitation of chaotic radio chatter can feel frustrating to a woman, rude, and maybe not much fun. On this basis, I submit that Wraiths is a rather bad choice for introducing a girlfriend to roleplaying, and beyond that, I expect, is a game that many women aren't going to like very much at all.

Now, it's possible our group's failure to adhere consistently to the stage whispering requirement exacerbated the discomfiting roughshod frenzy of effort to influence game events, and that sticking carefully to that requirement would have produced a different play dynamic. But I tend to doubt it. Though I'd love to hear a contradictory playtest report.

2) Is there any potential for a protracted climax that could become boring? By which I mean, say just about everything's happened that could happen, the screwups as well as the triumphs, and it's time to finish up - but the dice or whatever keep making people contribute, long past the point where it's fun. I'm beginning to become quite a fan of "endgame" mechanics, and I wonder if Wraiths would benefit from such a thing.

No. I can't conceive of how that might happen. The game is built to end. Either the time runs out, and the mission is a failure, or every member of the Insertion Team is dead or neutralized by game events and the mission is a failure, or the Insertion Team completes every one of the items on the Mission Strategy and the mission is a success. Every complication that gets introduced to the game during play happens within the hard limit of a set timeframe. And every item on the Mission Strategy was put there consciously, and out of interest, by a player.

Paul

Hi Paul,

Oh, very funny, Mr. Slackjaw. Folks, Paul is tweaking me 'cause he had already told me via off-Forge conversation that not everyone liked the "radio chatter" thing equally. So I asked my question in full knowledge that he had observations and ideas about it ready to go. Pitch a guy a softball and he line-drives it straight at you ...

Anyway, the "endgame" elements of the play design make this game interesting to me, as well as the social dynamics of getting "stuff" into play.

Best,
Ron