Hook Us Fast

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

So, I bring back a load of indie rpgs from a convention, and I'd like to try a bunch with my local gaming group. This often doesn't happen, and when it does, it often peters out sadly.

After some thought, I have concluded that it is not because my local gaming group is intrinsically flawed. The people I play with have, by and large, compatible styles, and want enough of the same things. The people I play with, by and large, as the same as the people I socialize with.

I have a pretty smart bunch of friends, and they also have a fairly high tolerance for crunch, rules hacking, rules reading, and generally paying attention to the rules of a game. So, I am reasonably convinced that, if my fellow players tell me en masse that a rule is vague and fuzzy, they are not being astoundingly clueless.

We do, however, have limited free time. We also want our games to be fun for us. These two factors mean we won't leap to try every new game. Still, there are enough games with a good enough rep that enough of us are willing, nay, eager, to give them a go. We've tried My Life With Master, Primetime Adventures, and Sorcerer, as well as a bit of noodling with Dogs in the Vineyard and Capes, and a session of the alpha release of With Great Power.

The results have been, at best, mixed. Now, sometimes, it's a matter of what we want vs what the game provides. Sometimes, in our not so humble opinion, a given game isn't as good as it's cracked up to be. But, sometimes, there's a game that I think could work if we put more time into trying it. Makes sense, right? You don't get good at something overnight, do you?

But, we don't want to. Under the best of circumstances, a game is likely to get one shot. If it doesn't work out, well, life's too short, and there are games that do work for us.

Oh, I still think Primetime Adventure has potential, and I do hope agrumer gets off his duff and runs a game of Dogs in the Vineyard. We may well play The Shab al-Hiri Roach. I've run multiple sessions of a Sorcerer game, and I do hope to run Polaris. But, in general, if it doesn't work well the first time, there's not going to be a second time. It's like a book where, if the author doesn't hook me from the get go, I want to go on to the next one.

I don't want to hear that I need a new bunch of players. I don't want to hear that I'm not hip enough to get it. If the author can't communicate clearly enough that we get it the first time, that is the author's problem.

Comments

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

Yes, Sorcerer was an early game, and Ron would have done it quite differently now. Nevertheless, that was what was said, and that was what Ron endorsed.

Interactions with the author are indeed another part of how a game resonates or doesn't with a group. Thus, some of what would still annoy us about the Sorcerer mechanics would likely annoy us less if some conversations on the Forge had gone differently. I consider this part of the Lumpley Principle.

But, even trying to factor that out, there's, for example, a mechanic in Sorcerer about rolling victories from one roll into another, and the question came up about how that worked if I'm trying to roll over my Cover: Swordswoman into my Stamina. Roll one vs the other? Roll against one die? The first is annoying and slows the game down to a crawl when it should be moving fast. The second seems more generous than the rest of the system feels.

Ron answered this one clearly, politely, and simply: He rolls against three dice. This was an example of a fine interaction with the author.

But. That simple rule of thumb is nowhere to be found in the core book or its supplements. This is a flaw in the game. It is a flaw in explaining the mechanics -- not in the author's unflagging support for the game, not in it not being the sort of game I want to play, not in it being an early Forge game, and thus not with the program. It is a flaw in communicating the mechanics that make the game playable.

As for PtA, I don't think the question of what we were going to play was a hugh problem for us. We knew we were going to do Keruton. I simply would not allow individual players to draw me into long discussions about it before all of us met together.

No, the problems we ran into were things like: How are Contacts used again? What was the actual rule about multi-stage combats? Understanding the mechanics of a short and simple game. Recall your comments on the writing. These were not motivated by the fact that we didn't decide in advance what kind of game we were playing.

[avram]

Oh, yeah. The actual writing about multi-stage combats implies the opposite of what Matt has said the actual rule is.

My point about Sorcerer is that, since it was an early Nar game, it's pretty stupid for people to claim that you have to Get Nar to understand it, since it would have been one of the vectors through which Nar was Gotten. In other words, Ron talks out of his ass again, but this time by proxy.

One thing I'm doing for Dogs, in anticipation of playing, is going through the discussions on the Lumpley Games Forge board and collecting Vincent's various rulings on thorny questions. (I'm compiling the Talmud!)

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

Yes, various Indie games have a Talmud. Actually, I presume this is true of non-Indie games, but I'm not usually as interested in them.

On the one hand, Indie game designers are very generous with their time, and generally extremely willing to answer questions. And, often, people compile, well, Talmuds. I see a few problems with this.

1. Acessibility. Can a gamer get to it? That is, does the Talmud for Game X exist? Is it online? How does a gamer learn about it? Currently, I can't access your Talmud, correct? You're still working on it. Is it something I can print out or put on a pda? Is it easy to use while playing the game?

2. Utility. This overlaps with #1 above. If I have to search the web for the one site or the one forum where my question is answered, then I'm going to have a hard time using the Talmud for Game X while playing it. Also, is the Talmud complete enough? Is it well organized? Doyle's got a good site for Sorcerer, but it doesn't usually have the information I'm actually looking for. Nev's constantly updating his Quick Reference, but there too, he doesn't tend to have the answer to the question that came up mid-session. Do I know where to look for my answer in the Talmud? This one overlaps with #1. There is a wealth of material in various Forge threads on Sorcerer, but finding the one thread one needs is a challenge, and, again, less likely to help during a session.

3. Effort. So, back to my original point. I'm playing this new game. I'm hitting problems comprehending the rules. Do I want to spend the effort hunting down the Talmud and finding the answers I need? How often do I need to use the Talmud?

4. Dang, it, the game should be complete. Despite my admiration for generous, patient authors trying to help people who play their games, despite my admiration for generous, patient gamers creating and releasing Talmuds (is that the correct plural form?), I don't like the pattern of sloppiness this can create -- and has created.

So, yes, I'm looking forward to the Talmud, and yes, I understand that no author can think of everything. And, yes, I want to play Dogs. But, I hope that the Talmud gets compiled into a new edition of the game.