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Belle of the Ball live playtest at Pruvop, Thu. May 10, 6pm!


Head's up! I'm running a live playtest of Belle of the Ball with a brand new group of gamers at the Pruvop offices! Interested? I'll have several prototypes available for simultaneous groups if there's enough turnout. As always, you can find the most up-to-date info on Belle of the Ball here.

BELLE OF THE BALL PLAYTEST
Thursday, May 10
6pm • Each game lasts about 30-45min.
200 N. Mangum St.
Suite 201
Durham

You have to call to get into the building. If you're interested, email me at gobi81@gmail.com to get the secret digits!
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Sage Master

Ask Evil Hat Anything

If you’re a RPG.REDDIT fan, drop on by that site today and check out the Ask Me Anything thread for Evil Hat. Perhaps the burning question you somehow haven’t asked me here on this blog before has already been answered! Perhaps you can ask it there and get an answer!

http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/tctnj/we_are_evil_hat_productions_ask_us_anything_ama/

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Filed Under: Deadly Fredly, EHP Blogs Tagged With:

ICT: Distinction, Plot Points and Gear


Distinctions
Index Card Tactics made use of distinctions - 3 per characters. For the unfamiliar these are descriptors without die values.  Some of the ones we had in play included "Poor sense of direction" and "Very good at WANTING to be a knight".   Players may add a single distinction to a roll: if the player thinks the distinction will help, then it adds a d8 to the pool. If the player thinks it will get in the way, then he gets a plot point and adds a d4 to the pool.

Distinctions can also come up out of combat, though that's a little fast and loose. They're much more aspect-like in that context (albeit with no compel) and in practice a distinction can substitute for a die roll, for good or ill, when relevant.  Not for every die roll, but for that whole range of not-critical-but-seeing-how-things-unfold kind of die rolls.  For example, the characters might roll to try to find their way out of the forest or may opt to point out one character's terrible sense of direction. If so, that character gets a PP and the party gets lost.

Plot Points
The number of things plot points can be spent on is greatly limited by default in ICT. A plot point may be spent to:

  • Create an asset at d6. 2 PP makes it d8. 4 makes it d10 and 8 makes it d12.
  • Keep an extra die when tallying your result.  2 PP lets you keep 2 extra dice, 4 PP lets you keep 3, 8 PP lets you keep 4 and so on.

This may seem a bit limited at first glance, but there are two reasons for this.  First, it simplifies the default, which is important to a game like this.  Second, it frees up space to move a lot of these effects over to character classes to allow for more interesting mechanical differentiation.

Gear
Gear falls into 3 categories: weapons, armor and potions. There are a few other oddballs (like shields, which only matter to some classes), but those are the heart of it.

Every character has one weapon and one piece of armor, and over time, those can get replaced with better versions.  This is blatantly a video-game model, and I own that. If you want to expand it to allow more weapons, the model for that is relatively self explanatory.  If you do that, make weapon choice happen the same time a character picks his stat, and make him stick with it until his next action.

Weapons 
Weapons provide a bonus any time you act in combat.   Weapons have a category (for example, "Sword") which has some relevant interactions with classes in terms of what classes can use which weapons.  They also have a die value (starting at d6 usually) and often have some sort of distinguishing name (like "Knight's Sword").


As they adventure, they may find or buy more powerful weapons, which are represented in two ways. First, the base quality may improve.  The Training Sword d6 may get replaced with an Iron Sword d8, then Silver Sword d10 and finally Knight Sword d12.   This improvement is pretty straightforward - it makes the die pool bigger, and these are the big-deal upgrades.

Weapons may also have descriptors with a mechanical effect.  This is an intentionally wide scope, and while there will be some common ideas (like situational bonus dice) there is no concrete limit that things must adhere to.  

For Example:
Stone Sword d8
- On success, player may opt to inflict Petrified status in lieu of damage.

Fire Sword d6
- d10 vs ice creatures.

Jester's Sword d4
- On success, in addition to the outcome, roll d6

  1. Attacker Recovers d12
  2. inflict Sleep d12
  3. Inflict Stone d12
  4. Inflict Confused d12
  5. Inflict Toad d12
  6. Roll again, but swap attacker and target


Armor
Armor works basically the same way as weapons do, but the bonus is applied when you're defending in combat.  Like weapons, armor has different types, die values and descriptors.  The main difference is that while weapon F/X are about increasing damage or adding effects, armor bonuses are about reducing damage or mitigating effects.

Examples:
Robe of Shielding d6
- Effect: Shield d8 (Apply damage to shield before character)

Titan's Armor d8
- Double benefit of selecting Resolve.

Potions
Potions are basically canned effect dice that spare you the trouble of rolling.  Right now there are only 2 kinds, healing and Remedy. They have a die value (usually d6 or d8) and they're applied as recovery against damage and conditions respectively.

More specialized potions exist that get a +2 step effect, but only work against specific conditions.  So a d6 remedy potion operates at d6, but a d6 Soft potion works at d10 vs. Petrification.  To simulate the "always works" element, I may demand that any specialized potion be built on a base of d8 (effectively d12) but I might also like the idea of cheapo potions that kind of work.

Ok, that's a lot. Probably enough for today. Classes are probably next.
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Some Space to Think Tagged With:

Century Club Logo Pins and Dice Bags!

Spirit of the Century Dice Bag from Dragon Chow Dice Bags
Spirit of the Century Dice Bag from Dragon Chow Dice Bags
Wow, check out the promotional items Evil Hat has coming up soon. These two beauties bear the Century Club logo from not so long ago! Follow Fred for new info.
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Sage Master Tagged With: ,

Bullshit Your Way Through a First Draft

After talking about second drafts last week, let’s dive into first drafts! We all know the whole deal about how first drafts will always be shitty[1], right? That’s writer 101. If you don’t believe that, then I don’t know what to tell you. Don’t get into writing. :)

But that doesn’t stop us from questioning what we’re writing. Sometimes when we allow ourselves to “write shitty,” we’re focused on being okay if a sentence sucks or is unclear and we move on, knowing that either it’ll get fixed or cut in revision. But when it comes to ideas that take a lot of words — 500, 1000, 2500, whatever — there’s a sense of commitment that we believe we’re creating in putting that work in.

And then we start questioning that commitment. “What if this idea sucks?”

In this first draft I’m working on, I had that thought a few times. “What if presenting the setting as vignettes totally missing the shit out of this?” “What if these rules totally suck?” “What if…” all over the place.

Part of the HK-TK experiment was to make myself write in spite of that feeling. The game, as I assumed and found out in the first playtest, is broken as fuck (which I still need to blog about). But if that stops the writing process, then writing would never get done. I wouldn’t have found out what does work, why some things don’t, and build off of that.

Which is why I’m writing this. You need to bullshit your way through that first draft. You need to accept that some of the ideas that you feel like you’re committing to will be wrong, but you need to write it because you won’t know which will be wrong, and you won’t know why some things work and some things won’t. Be bold; press on and be willing to bullshit.

Because that’s what every writer does. It just doesn’t look like total bullshit because of revision, peer review, beta readers, editing, all that work. But I assure you, a first draft is born of bullshit.

How do you bullshit? When you come to a point in your writing where you need to make a decision, just make one. Then write on from there, until you need to make another decision, and just make that one as well. Keep going. Don’t pause to muse on one and turn it into a catalyst of procrastination. To quote the brilliant Kit La Touche: “The beautiful thing about making decisions is that, once you’ve made them, you can evaluate them, and change them if need be. if you never make them, then you can’t do that.”

- Ryan

Oh, and if you want to know more about the bullshit process that is writing (and I say that with love, else I would not keep doing this), you should devout the shit out of Chuck Wendig’s blog & books on writing. But I’m going to assume you’re doing that already. :)

[1] One of my favorite bits about this comes from Anne Lamont’s Bird by Bird, her chapter on Shitty First Drafts. My magazine writing teacher years ago had us read this, which caused me to get the book.

Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Man of Misadventure Tagged With: ,

Index Card Situation

This is not technically part of Index Card Tactics, though it's related, in that another part of ICT is that it uses situation generators like Two Guys With Swords. This is another such tool (and don't worry, I'll be getting onto classes and equipment and so on).

This trick works best for a group of 4 or 5 who either have some sense of their character or who are willing to make things up enthusiastically.


  1. Hand each player an index card. Have them write the name of one NPC who is very important to their character, with perhaps a single sentence description of who they are and why they matter. Broad strokes.  
  2. Pass the card to the player on your left (not the GM).
  3. On the card they have received, the player now writes down something bad that might happen to the person named. This should not have a lot of details outside of the character, so "Stripped of their title"  is good but "Stripped of their title by the Cardinal" is not.
  4. Pass the card to the player on your left (not the GM).
  5. On the card received, the player now writes down a good outcome, flavored by the bad one.  It should not merely be "The bad thing doesn't happen" but rather an outcome that might be hoped for over and above mere nullification. To continue the example of stripped of title, "Be honored by the king" would work well.
  6. Pass the card to the player on your left (not the GM).
  7. On the card received, the player now writes down who wants the bad outcome to happen.
  8. Pass cards back to the first player.
  9. Player looks at the situation as presented and - privately - writes their rating on the card, representing their interest in seeing this in play. Ratings are from 0 (I actively hate this, and never want it to see the light of day) to 5 (This is AWESOME, I totally want this) .
  10. Cards are handed over to the GM.
  11. GM looks through the cards and, based on interest level, puts them in motion.


Notes and Variations
  • Step one assumes a friendly NPC.  It's possible to allow it to be a hated NPC, in which case that should be noted on the card, and the logic of step 7 inverts to "Who wants the good outcome for this character?"
  • It is possible for Step 1 to be something other than a character, such as a town or organization.  For certain games (conspiracy oriented one, frex) that might be apt, but go easy on it.
  • Step 7 is fre-form as presented, but if you're using a game with an existing cast of characters "in play" (like a Dresden Files City, a tech Noir playset, or even something like Apocalypse World's fronts) then the character selected should be drawn from that list, or tied to that element.
  • In step 11, Player rating is important to determining plot relevance but it's also a useful yardstick for difficulty. That is, a low-interest situation should also be one that is reasonably easy to resolve. 
  • In step 11, one challenge to the GM is how to tie things together when player interest is high.  This is, to my mind, one of the fun things about bing a GM.
  • In Step 11, If interest is across the board low, then that may be a reason to check your table.  Is it that your players have radically different tastes and they're spilling on each other? Are they looking for more of a monster smash this evening? Do the NPCs really not grab them?  Only you can really know your table, but take it as a cue to think about it. 
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Some Space to Think Tagged With: ,

Variable Data in Card Game Design

Belle of the Ball - Cards Spreadsheet


I've certainly had an educational weekend. Right now I'm laying out three card games: Zeppelin Armada, Velociraptor! Cannibalism!, and Belle of the Ball. I'm kind of using Belle as a training ground to become a more efficient card game layout-er, 'cause damn that's actually a really a fun job.

What wasn't so fun was manually inserting every digit and icon directly into the layout. It was prone to typos, misalignments and subtle printing inconsistencies. I knew the big guys at WotC couldn't be setting up their Magic cards this way. Perhaps there's a way to automate this process?

I have some experience working with print houses who do what they call "variable data." It goes by several names, kind of like the Devil. Indeed, the central feature of variable data turns out to be spreadsheets. Not quite Lucifer, but close.

I followed Adobe's datamerge tutorial. I managed to figure it out thanks to several video tutorials that you can see at the top of this post. Each tutorial lacks in some areas, but others compensate. When you've watched them all, you get a real sense of how this can be used in card games.

For an example, check out this spreadsheet for Belle of the Ball. Some of the columns list plain text, others list .eps images that I call where necessary. These images are card icons generally, though the "PORTRAIT" column is where I'll call the portrait art. Now, I can set up one card template and be sure that all the icons, text, and art are in exactly the same positions.

Very powerful kung fu here, folks. Imagine you're making a card game like Magic: The Gathering. Your suits will have different backgrounds, each card has unique art, several cards have recurring icons in different amounts, and all have varying blocks of text. Using layers in InDesign, you can set aside spaces for all these elements without fear of them overlapping each other in unpredictable ways.

Set your background image block in a BACKGROUND layer in InDesign. Do the same for ART, ICONS, and TEXT in ascending order. Then you lay out your image and text frames as per the tutorials above. There you go, no fuss card game layout.

P.S. If you are making a game like Magic, and you'd rather show quantities as a row of individual icons instead of a single digit (like mana cost), there are two things you might do:

One, you can set aside several columns representing each potential space for mana cost icon. Then, insert the appropriate .eps as necessary. This may be tedious, but it's relatively straightforward.

Two, you can create a special font for ALL your game icons. Then, you don't have to call any special .eps files at all. You can just insert normal text into your spreadsheet, set the InDesign text styles to your special font, then voila! You have yourself a card game.
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Sage Master Tagged With: ,

Catan City / Settlement Token Necklaces

Megan continues making awesome meeple board game jewelry but now she's expanded to other board game tokens, too. Love Catan? Like, really really love Catan? This necklace is 16.25" long, sterling silver plated with a lobster claw style clasp. Available in red, white, blue and yellow.
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Sage Master

Index Card Tactics


I was talking about this with Ryan Macklin last night and I had a moment of "huh, I should write this down" so here it is.

At Pax East, I ran a game of what can probably best be described as tabletop Final Fantasy Tactics.  Early in the con I had run a game of Cortex+ D&D that had gone well, but I'd been struck by a desire to hack it further, and the end result is something that you can still see the Cortex+ roots in, but is kind of its own beast.

One of the essential rules of this design was that everything could be done on index cards (or post-its), and the character "sheet" ended up being a set of cards, one for stats, one (eventually 2) for class, one for distinctions and one for equipment.

The stats were really the core of this, and they worked out very well, both accidentally and intentionally, and they were the result of trying to add in a few more mechanical and tactical hooks. I went with 4 stats and chose my preferred four that describe _how_ you do something rather than what you do. For the unfamiliar, they are Force (Strength, directness), Grace (Speed & dexterity), Wits (Thoughtfulness and intellect) and Resolve (Willpower and endurance).  In a narrative sense, you choose the stat that matches how you're acting, so an attack might be forceful (Hammer the guy), Graceful (Dodge around), Witty (Study the opponent, then strike) or Resolute (Wait for an opening). It's a nice, colorful set, but I wanted to jazz them up a little, which produced this:



The actual dice values are, I hope, fairly self explanatory.  When taking forceful action, this guy rolls a d6. Pretty simple.

Now, before I get into the details of this, let me provide a little data on how play worked for context.  Initiative was based on the Marvel model that Fred came up with, and on your go, you took an action and chose which stat you would use as part of the roll.   Once that happened, that was the mode you operated in until your next action, which was relevant for defense rolls, and which had tactical implications that I'll explain in a minute.  The important thing is that you got locked into that mode.

Now, the other details: The black arrows represented advantage, so Force had an advantage over Grace, which had an advantage over Resolve and so on.  The mechanical upshot of this was simple - in a conflict, the stat with the advantage would step up one[1].  Thus, if this guy used Force against someone else using Grace, his D6 would be bumped up to a d8. This is not a huge bonus, but it offers an additional incentive to stat choice beyond "The best one".

The other bit is that each stat has a specific mechanical effect, taken down in shorthand on the sheet, and they break down as follows:

Force: Any stress (damage) you inflict is stepped up by one
Wits: Any conditions (non-damage) you create are stepped up by one
Resolve: Step down a stress or condition die on you.
Grace: You may interrupt initiative to take action or refuse to accept to take your turn (unless the other part is also using grace and has a bigger die).[2]


So, that makes the choices pretty straightforward. But what about the GM? You definitely don't want to keep track of all that. And so you don't - these are PC rules. For enemies, life's much simpler.

Since this was Final Fantasy Tactics inspired, most of the opposition was in the form of monsters, which were statted up pretty simply, like:



Just a few notes for a die pool, a special attack (If he used the earthshaker dice, he didn't do damage, but imposed the wobbly condition) and a note that he was a force creature, which suggested what he was strong or weak against.[3] Simpler monsters didn't have a stat at all, and boss monsters might have two that they can switch between.  Easy on the GM, but creates a broader landscape of choices (especially when there's a range of enemy stats - do you want to use wits on the ogre knowing that there's a RESOLVE Troll on the board?).

Anyway, there was more stuff with classes and gear, but I figured I'd start with the basics.


1 - "Step up" is shorthand for "Increase die size by one" so stepping up a d6 turns it into a d8. "Step down" is just the reverse


2 - This worked startlingly well.


3 - In the future I might consider making this hidden information for the video-gamey reason of offering an avenue (SCAN) to finding this out. But that might also be too much work.  
Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Some Space to Think Tagged With: ,

A Simple Revision Trick

(I’m sure I’ve shared this trick in the past, as I do often with people, but here it goes again.) Say you need to revise a piece you’ve recently written. Best thing to do is shelve it for awhile, until the text isn’t fresh in your mind. But you don’t always have time for that. Such is freelancer life.

What I do in those situations is twist the layout in Word. Let’s start with the first page of a draft, my story from Don’t Read This Book. Here’s how I start, with the defaults in Word for Mac 2011:

Then I do four things:

  • I change the layout from portrait to landscape.
  • I switch to two-column layout.
  • I change the font family. If I’m using a serif font, I’ll go sans-serif or monospace. Vice versa. Sometimes I also change the font size.
  • I use line-and-a-half spacing. This is partly a holdover from back when I printed material to revise or edit.

With that done, a really neat thing happens: the line breaks shift. See, we’ll often get hung up on text as it is on the page, not just the words as they are. So by changing that, making the lines look different and the font making the letter shapes slightly different, it shifts from pure visual memory into a fresher space.

See, when we’re reading the familiar, we fill things in our minds — not just textually familiar but visually so. This is to short-circuit that.

See for yourself. Grab the PDF with both versions as two separate pages.

Granted, what I’m showing you is the final version that you’ll see in Don’t Read This Book. I’m a bit too embarrassed by the first draft to share that one. :) Anyway, I hope this trick helps you out.

This idea has inspired Rob Donoghue to try something similar — use one writing tool for initial writing, and another one with a different layout for revision. I look forward to hearing about his results.

- Ryan

Filed Under: EHP Blogs, Man of Misadventure Tagged With: ,
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