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Dark Side Aspects & Fate Points

I love the Dark Side in games, but usually games don’t handle that well. The rules make it too rigid and predictable. (Since Mythender is built around a giant Dark Side mechanic of its own, this is something that’s been on my mind for years.) I’ve played in Fate games where I’ve messed around with it — usually as a convention game where a long arc of someone falling to the Dark Side wouldn’t really be played out, so it played more like Dresden’s sponsor debt (which isn’t a bad model to start). But for a longer-term Fate game, I always felt like I’d need more.

Then Josh Roby showed me I was wrong. He wrote up a thing for the Smallville RPG called Jediville, where the one Jedi Padawan and the one rogue Force adept have a Distinction:

The Force (Heritage Distinction)
d4 — Add a d6 to the Trouble pool and Earn a plot point when you call on the Dark Side, rolling your own Angry or Afraid.

And that’s it for the mechanic. There’s no checking to see if the character falls further into the Dark Side. It’s just a freebie…that screws over the group in general. And the implications of that are what will drive a “falling into Dark Side” arc, not a score-keeping mechanic.

I found that to be damned delicious. The idea that the group could just play out the fall at their own pace is pretty awesome! Now, it’s not for every game — sometimes you want to feel the pressure that it could happen (like I do in Mythender), but for other games this is gold. And that’s what I want to see in the Star Wars-inspired Fate games I run. With that, here’s…

Dark Side Aspects & Fate Points

Dark Side aspects is an aspect type (see my Typed Aspects post).[1] This aspect type can be applied to any aspect — character aspects, location aspects, world aspects, etc.  These are not invoked or compelled normally. Instead:

Invoking Dark Side Aspects

You invoke Dark Side aspects for free — that is, you don’t pay a Fate point to get the +2, reroll, or whatever other benefit an aspect might provide (such as skill substitution). This is not the same as a free tag, though. When you get the bonus, the GM gets a Dark Side Fate point specifically for your character. At a later point, he’ll use that Dark Side Fate point (see below) to compel you with that or another Dark Side aspect.

When you do, you need to incorporate into the narrative how the Dark Side changes what you do. Sometimes that’ll be obvious (like, say, with Force Lightning), and some won’t be. As with all other invocations, you and your group will find the right narrative spot.

Compelling Dark Side Aspects

The GM can only compel a Dark Side aspect if he has a Dark Side Fate point waiting in the wings for your character. Valid compels include corrupting something you’re trying to do or pushing you to act on your emotions. You know, getting your Dark Side on. Take the compel, and you get that Dark Side point for your character.

(Note: If you’re making a distinction between internal vs world compels, these compels are of the supernatural variety.)

Alternatively, some location or world Dark Side aspects make sense as something you could compel normally. “Sinister Caves of Dagobah” is something that could possibly cause mayhem to anyone. In those cases, it’s whatever you’d consider a normal compel, with the normal Fate point deal.

Buying off: Yes, you can buy off these compels, but it’s harder to resist the Dark Side when you’ve let it in. For every Dark Side point being pushed forward, you need to buy it off with two normal Fate points. Naturally, the GM can escalate, provided you have enough Dark Side points queued for him to. If you do buy them off, all the points go away; you’ve successfully resisted the Dark Side, so those points are discarded.

Creating Dark Side Aspects

Your build will determine this. The GM can declare some location or campaign aspects as Dark Side type. And Jedi-type characters may be required to take a Dark Side aspect. Maybe there’s just a campaign aspect called The Dark Side (and maybe further Dark Side aspects on a character). But that’s all build-specific.

Side note: there may be some fruit in looking at the Lawbreaker stunts from Dresden Files RPG for this. But that’s a further topic, I think.

Using Dark Side Fate Points

Dark Side points should look different from other Fate points. They are counted separately, and should just be more menacing in general.

These special Fate points may be spent on any aspect, as per normal Fate points. You get a +3 bonus instead of the +2. As with invoking a Dark Side aspect, you need to incorporate how the Dark Side affects the action you’re doing.

Unlike with regular Fate points, you can spend them on Dark Side aspects. For those, you get a +5 bonus instead (or a reroll & +3 — treat it as invoking the aspect once for free and once with the point). You’ll give your Dark Side point back to the GM, who’ll keep it in the wings to compel you again (you’ve spent one point, and one point gets put in for the free invoke).

Dark Side points want to be used! After every milestone (assume a Dresden-style progression), you lose one Dark Side point you’re holding. If you have none, the GM loses one that’s waiting in the wings for you. You can out-wait the Dark Side with utter inaction, if you so choose. (Why you would, I don’t know, but it feels fitting with Jedi going on years-long retreats.)

Dark Side Stunts

Oh, here’s a thought. Everyone with a valid character concept (you know, Force user) as a free stunt:

Force Lightning

Pay a Dark Side Fate point. For the rest of the scene, you may use your Mysteries skill (assuming a Spirit of the Century skill build — replace as necessary) in lieu of Guns (or similar skill). Treat as Weapon: 3.

If you invoke a Dark Side aspect for this roll, add +3 to your roll instead of +2.

It’s also possible that this entire post is its own free stunt for valid character types, rather than something the entire party can use. If you, you know, want to make the game feel more like other Star Wars games that deprioritize non-Force characters.[2]

What Using the Dark Side Means

Ideally, as you use the Dark Side you’ll end up doing actions that support different Aspect changes (though enforcing that with a rule is beyond the scope of this post). You’ll also have an impact on the relationships around your character, both PCs & NPCs. The world changes for the Dark Side users. Now, you can treat this humanistically, in that it’s how you’re treated that changes you — just like how gunfighters are treated in Western fiction, compared to other people. Or you can treat it cosmically, where the Dark Side makes people around you act different to drive you further in. From the point of the story, it matters less why and more what happens because of it.

And it leaves characters free to truly explore the power & consequences of that grey area between pure Light and pure Dark. I find that a more enriching option for Star Wars play than just feeling you’re Light until the one day all your “I have a good soul” hit-points are gone, flipping the switch that makes your character an evil NPC.

(There’s also a question of whether the Dark Side additional bonuses apply to fully-Dark characters. If Lord Vader’s statement of “If only you knew the power of the Dark Side” is an absolute truth, then yes. On the other hand, if it’s the comment of someone who has once experienced the rush of Dark Side power before it ebbed, much like a cocaine or heroin fiend feels over time, then no. Either way, there’s something interesting to say about the setting there.)

Where One Might Use This

Check out Brennan Taylor‘s upcoming Fate game, Bulldogs! It’s sort of a cross between non-Force Star Wars & Firefly. So, hey, add some Force right in. :)

(I’ve been alluding on Twitter to a Bulldogs! setting hack in my head mixing this idea with Dragon Age’s Circle Mages & Templars.)

- Ryan

[1] Another way to look at it is that it’s a meta-type, as it can be applied to aspects of any type…depending on your build.

[2] Incidentally, Jediville above doesn’t. So, it’s not an either-or, even if my snark suggests so.

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Invoking Aspects for Skill Substitution

I can’t remember how long ago or the context where this came up[1], but there’s a neat Fate trick I stumbled upon a bit ago. If you’re a Fate junkie, I recommend you first take a look at Lenny’s post on the Fate RPG site about trappings & how they relate to skills and stunts.

With me? Good. So, mix the following together: stunts that allow for trappings to attach to another skill (a.k.a. skill substitution) & the idea of invocation for effect (where you use an aspect & fate point to justify something about the world or current situation). You get…

Invoke for Temporary Skill Substitution

If you want to substitute using one skill for a given trapping of another, and can justify how one of your aspects allows you to pull off that substitution, you may pay a fate point to substitute that skill for the rest of the scene.

Example: Sally Slick’s fighting Doctor Methuselah’s Steel Vanguard — automations larger than a man, able to withstand gunfire and are damned cunning…as though a human mind were housed inside those metal monstrosities! She has the aspect “Monkeywrench,” so she justifies that her Engineering skill should allow for the “I can attack you” trapping. She pays a fate point, and for the rest of the fight, her wrench is a weapon those chrome fiends will come to rue![2]

Interesting-to-me aside: the combat functions in Fate are implicit trappings, in that some skills have the privilege to cause stress and the effects that causing stress has.

The potential for abuse?

I’m not sure if this has any more potential for abuse than the +2/reroll that regular invocations have. The thing about the Fate point economy is that you have a built-in mitigation for abuse. You want people to spend Fate points. That creates the desire for compels, the engine that makes a Fate game work. But I could be wrong there. More play would show the answer.

Of course, if someone keeps doing the same substitution over and over, they might just want to take that as a stunt and save themselves from needing a Fate point.

- Ryan

[1] $20 says it was a conversation with Lenny Balsera. We have a habit of brainstorming a lot about Fate over cocktails.

[2] Of course, in pulp I allow anything to be a combat skill, so with respect to my games (and the Spirit of the Century games GMed by others that I’ve played) this is a moot example. Still, I wanted to dust off the iconic Spirit characters. It was either that or bring in Dick Awesome. :)

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[Fate] More Compels in a Nutshell

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Following up from my previous post. Go read that and this comment first: http://lcdarkwood.livejournal.com/3824.html?thread=15600#t15600 - I'm doing my reply as a new post because it got long, and because I think it'll be helpful to further discussion.

I don't think there's functionally that much difference between what SotC says and what I'm saying. Let's break it down by passage, and I'll show you where the letters fall:

"If a character is given a situation (X) where he would normally have a number of choices (Y), and limiting those choices to act in accordance with his aspect is going to make more trouble for the character (Z)..."

"If everything would be going along normally (X and Y), and the aspect makes things more difficult or introduces an unexpected twist (Z), that’s also grounds for a compel."

The only thing I'm adding is clarity, mainly for the purpose of providing a rubric for judgment, for those folks who still wonder if their compels are doing what they actually should. Because, look, you have to evaluate a game mechanic by asking yourself what it actually does to play, what its purpose is.

So, let's look at a bad example:

***

You're Dane Black, private eye. You have the aspect, "Damsels in Distress Do It To Me Every Time". I narrate that a beautiful dame comes into your office, distressed, and flops into the chair at the desk and says, "Mr. Black, you have to help me, I have no one else to turn to!"

You decide to take her case. The GM hands you a fate point.

***

What actually happened there? What did giving you a fate point do for the story we're making, what did it show me about your character, what drama did it create? Absolutely nothing, and absolutely none. I basically just gave you a bennie for playing your character, something you should be doing by default, or else you have bigger problems than figuring out this game.

So, let's go again, and this time add the all-important Z (apologies for potential lack of class here):

***

You're Dane Black, private eye. You have the aspect, "Damsels in Distress Do It To Me Every Time". I narrate that a beautiful dame comes into your office, distressed, and flops into the chair at the desk and says, "Mr. Black, you have to help me, I have no one else to turn to!"

You decide to take her case. I go "Hm," and decide a compel might be fun here.

So I narrate that you're heading out the office with her when your phone rings. You say you ask her to hold on a second and answer it. I say it's your girlfriend, and she's, oh my god, stranded on the freeway with smoke coming out of the engine and needs your help right now!

You try and reason with the dame, and she tells you that she came to you instead of going to the cops ('cause she thinks they're dirty), so it looks really bad for her right now. She needs you to get there and investigate the scene before the cops do, otherwise, she's (gasp!) a suspect.

You say, "Don't worry, babe, we'll have plenty of time." I hold up a fate point and say, "No. No, you won't."

So now we have all three elements - a situation that is complicated by an aspect, a potential choice that needs to be made, and a good idea of what consequences could result from doing so. If I want to be explicit, I might say, "Look, it's either one or the other. If you go to your girlfriend, there are probably going to be cops all over the scene, mucking with evidence and whatnot, and then the dame will be a suspect. If you go with her, your girlfriend is going to be upset, to say the least... and you will feel the fury of a woman scorned later."

You think about it and say, "Man. I guess the job comes first." I give you a fate point and smile the smile of the wicked, and we roleplay the rest of the scene.

***

Now: what did *that* exchange do for the story? A whole ton. First of all, it told us something more about the situation at hand, which maybe sets me up for a new scene. Second of all, it told us something essential about your character *beyond* just the aspect on the sheet - your decisions do that more than any selection of pithy phrases can. And notice, I didn't tell you what to do or what not to do at any point; control of your character remained wholly yours.

Next, it ramped up the drama a bit - now we have a tension of both time and relationship in play, which we can mess with to good effect later. Paying off that kind of buildup will give the session more emotional resonance and punch.

Lots of bang for buck there. Imagine if you had one of those every scene.

***

Final note: So, you may be looking at this and saying, "Well, what if I refuse the compel?" Hey, fine by me - but what are you really saying "no" to? Are you really rejecting your aspect? No, because it's clear that whatever decision you make, it's relevant to your usual pattern of falling for damsels in distress. (Even if you say no to taking the case, because you're having a strong-willed moment.) Are you saying no to one particular choice or another? Not really, or not anymore so than you would in normal play.

So there's only one thing left to reject, really, which is the potential for complication. The Z.

So, there it is. If you do compels in your group, and you don't say a lot of this stuff explicitly, but you still have fun and dynamic results, I'm willing to bet that all of X, Y, and Z are happening in some fashion. If you're having issues, going back to this rubric and evaluating what you do by it will, I hope, help you out a bit.
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[Fate] Compels in a Nutshell…

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Hack Type: Advice
System: Spirit of the Century, The Dresden Files RPG, any Fate v3 variant

Just because it came to my mind and I wanted to archive it somewhere, this is as simple as the definition can get:

1. Something relevant to aspect X happens.
2. The player chooses to respond with Y.
3. Z happens as a result.*

* = Z is something complicated and/or horrible, and is not bound by the application of other game rules (like skill rolls, etc.)

Accepting or rejecting the compel is almost always (and by this, I mean if it's not, reexamine the compel) about accepting or rejecting Z, not X or Y. 

When in doubt, applying this as a litmus test is a pretty good way to go, I think.

EDIT: I've been asked to provide examples. Didn't any of you folks ever take algebra? :)

Aspect is Greedy.

1.) A crime boss offers you money to sell out your friends. 
2.) You sell out your friends for the money.
3.) As a result of this, your home base gets destroyed. (And probably, your friends are pissed at you, but they're PCs too, so that's for them to decide.)

or

1.) A crime boss offers you money to sell out your friends.
2.) You want the money, so you give him false information.
3.) As a result of this, he discovers the deception and puts a price on your head so large every bounty hunter within 1,000 miles wants to kill you.

New example. Aspect is Senior Assassin for the Black Mambo Society

1.) The Society asks you to do a job of questionable ethical value.
2.) You refuse.
3.) They kill your grandma.

or

1.) The Society asks you to do a job of questionable ethical value.
2.) You agree.
3.) Your grandma finds out and disowns you.

***

Why does it not become a compel until the third part? Two reasons.

The first is, because this could always happen instead:

1.) Crime boss offers you money to sell out your friends.
2.) You lie to get the cash.
3.) I ask you to roll Deceit against the crime boss' Empathy, to see if you successfully get the cash or not, and you invoke your Greedy aspect to help you on the roll.

See the difference? With a compel, you *automatically* decide the outcome is going to be dramatically or "plot" complicated, as opposed to using any other means of resolution. With compels, plot happens because of who you are and what you choose.

The second reason is, you cannot ever, ever, EVER take away a player's choice regarding his character's actions. Period. Even when we didn't know how to articulate these things as precisely as we do now, we knew enough to tell you on SotC page 44 that you can limit the available range of choices but not dictate precise actions. Aspects are not, and never should be used as, a railroading tool.

I'll be the first to admit the text in SotC could have been clearer on this point. It's clearer in Dresden.
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[Do] Further thoughts on FATE hacking and Doctor Who

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Fred Hicks linked to this review of the new Doctor Who RPG. Specifically calling out the initiative system.

One thing that I had to make especial mention of is the phasing system in rounds of conflict (not necessarily combat.) The bias of the game against violent conflict resolution strongly shows here. Basically, what you are going to do that round determines what order you go in. The order is basically: Talkers, Movers, Doers, and Fighters. As examples: If you're going to talk your way out of a situation, you go first. If you're going to run for cover, you go second. If you're going to use a skill of some sort, or try to do some sort of 'timey-wimey' thing, you go third. If you're going to shoot up the place, you go fourth. This is a very different way of handling conflict rounds than most RPGs do, and it has its appeal. It very closely reflects the mood of the series (even Daleks appear to pause for one of the Doctor's soliloquies) and it is a different take on 'who goes first' in a conflict round.

This, combined with the thoughts from the previous post make me think of the real power of that FATE/Do system.

When you go first, you get first dibs on drawing from the bag, which gives you control of the fate of who ever goes after you. That means if Talkers go first, they get a LOT of influence over the probability.

Let's say you're playing a big diplomat, kind of like the Doctor, but you frequently come up against fighty types, again like the Doctor. A Talker like the Doctor may face some troubles from these fighters, but he is always able to win the day (even if at some cost.) What REALLY gives a Talker problems is another Talker, thus the Doctor's more persistent intellectual rivals like the Master. But let's get back to the mechanics.

Even if you had a poor draw, say øø--, you can still put those -s and øs back into the bag to make sure the fighters don't catch any break. Ah, but if you have a good draw, say ++-ø, you can keep some of those successes to make it that much more likely the fighters will draw poorly.

This becomes even more powerful if you allow draws of one-to-four stones. Let's say we used an utterly simplified version of FATE's skill pyramid. There are four skills: Talking, Moving, Doing and Fighting. You must prioritize these skills for your character so they are ranked 1, 2, 3, or 4.

When you draw to perform either of these actions, you may draw that many stones from the bag. So if you're Talking is 3, you may draw three stones.

The turn order remains as noted above, Talking, Moving, Doing, Fighting act in that order. What's different is how ties are resolved. The player who has the higher skill may go first, which gives her the advantage by letting her draw more AND draw sooner than her opponents. This gives her a step up when the Doctor faces an opponent who is normally a fighter, but tries to talk.

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[Do] FATE Hack

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Hey, still writing the big transcript-format examples of play, but I just wanted to toss a quick idea out there for FATE folk. I can't shake the feeling I wrote about this before, years ago, but now I've got a concrete procedure in Do to compare and contrast to FATE.

See, the good people at Evil Hat Productions are producing Do, but their house system is the popular FUDGE-adaptation FATE. Being a FUDGE-based system, FATE uses special dice that have two symbols. Two sides are +, two other sides are -, and the remaining two sides are blank. Four of these dice are rolled, the +s added, the -s subtracted, and then compared to this chart. In general, more +s mean you do better. And when you toss in the Aspects and so on, it's a very different system from Do's.

In Do, you use black and white stones in a bag instead of dice. Each turn, three stones are drawn and you choose whether to keep the black or white, then return the unchosen stones back into the bag. Keeping more stones generally means you do better in the short term, but the colors of stones you keep and the color of stones in the bag have long-term effects in the story.

The cool thing about the stones-in-a-bag system is that each player's action feeds into the probability... the fate, if you will... of each subsequent player's turn. It would be interesting if you could bring that aesthetic into a game system actually called FATE, y'know? So here's a first thought.

BASICS

Instead of dice, the group has a bag with stones that come in three colors. Each color effectively takes the place of the plus +, minus -, and blank ø. The colors should be of equal number, so a typical game might have 15 stones of each color in the bag.

Instead of rolling four dice when you want to perform a daring deed, you pull four stones.

Those four stones are added up just like a roll of the dice in traditional FUDGE, and compared to the chart.

After that resolution is complete, you may keep some of these stones, but with a few restrictions as noted below.

KEEPING STONES

You may keep a +, but only if you are also keeping an equal or greater number of øs from that same draw. You may keep a ø, but only if you are also keeping an equal or greater number of -s from that same draw.

For example, if you rolled + ø ø -, you could keep one - and one ø. You couldn't keep more than the single ø because there are not enough -s to allow you to do so.

If your draw is missing one of those symbols, then prerequisites noted above are a little different.

If your draw has only ø and -: You may keep a ø, but only if you are also keeping an equal or greater number of -s from that same draw. You cannot keep any +s, obviously, because there are none in that draw.

If your draw has only + and ø: You may keep a +, but only if you are also keeping an equal or greater number of øs from that same draw. You can ignore the prerequisite -s.

If your draw has only + and -: You may not keep any +s, but you may keep as many -s as you like.

FATE

Once you've chosen which stones to keep, put them in a cup, where they won't get mixed up with anyone else's supply of stones.

The remaining stones go back into the bag.

Early on, you're drawing a fairly balanced set of stones. But, by choosing to keep the -s, you make it more likely that future players (including yourself) will draw ø or +. In time, by keeping more øs, you will make +s more likely, too.

Over the long term, the stones you keep may reflect a plot arc or a character's growth, depending on your particular story.

PACING

The biggest pacing difference between Do and FATE is the frequency of fortune coming into play.

In Do, one bag lasts the whole session. The procedure of play is very, very structured. More like a board game than what you might expect from an RPG. Each player literally takes turns and on her turn, she makes one draw from the bag. It's easy to figure out the pacing of the story based on this rigorous structure of play. We can set guidelines for how many stones should be in the bag, offer suggestions for lengthening or shortening a session, and even predict how many turns are in the average game session.

Contrast this with FUDGE, where a dice roll would come as frequently as players and GMs deem necessary, often not following any particular turn order (unless initiative rules are invoked). A player could make three rolls in a row, then the player next to her could make one roll, then the first player could make two more, then a third player could jump in suddenly with a string of rolls of his own.

If Do followed FATE's the free-wheeling roll-when-you-want-to attitude, the bag would b e emptied in minutes. Ah, but that is assuming this FATE hack keeps the one-bag-per-story assumption in Do. Perhaps another aesthetic is called for.

Perhaps there are, in fact, three bags per session, following a three-act story structure. That may literally be three separate bags, each with equal sets of stones.

The easier solution is to simply refill the bag once it has fewer than four stones in it. As you feel the bag getting lighter and lighter, the GM and players can build towards a climax.

Each act might follow different prerequisite rules, too, so the first act might encourage you to keep blanks, the second act encourages pluses, etc. Perhaps your game has some flavor that would encourage one or the other, I dunno.

---

Okay, those are my thoughts for now. I leave this to FATE fans to tweak and hack at your leisure.

How do Fate Points work in this system?
Where do Aspects come in?
How about skill checks and experience points?

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2009 Ennies Nominations

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So, the 2009 Ennie Award Nominations are out this morning:

http://www.ennie-awards.com/nominations/nominees.asp

As someone on Twitter said, my fingerprints are all over 'em. This is good, because I like the Ennies, and it's really great when the Ennies like me back. I'm already a proud papa lately, but this magnifies the feeling, and for my other 'babies' to boot. :)

Evil Hat's Nominations

  • Best Writing - Don't Lose Your Mind
  • Best Setting - Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies
  • Product of the Year - Don't Lose Your Mind
  • Product of the Year - Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies

One Bad Egg's Nominations

  • Best Electronic Book - The Death Mother
  • Best Electronic Book - Hard Boiled Armies


I declare TRIUMPH with [info]chadu at this point, since we went back and forth on the presentation of the Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies' setting so much, and lo and behold a BEST SETTING nomination. Yes, I'm jazzed as all hell for having two entries on Product of the Year (out of 10), but the setting nod is the real marker there as ultimate validation of the goal we had in producing S7S.

And Ben Baugh getting BEST WRITING for his work on Don't Lose Your Mind? Well, yeah. He did such wonderful things with language and vignettes and all that in DLYM, I would have been sorely disappointed if that hadn't gotten a specific nod, too.

The One Bad Egg stuff is a happy thing, finally, as that's the place where I actually wrote some stuff this year instead of doing higher-level production and layout stuff. I'm a little startled that Armies and Mother beat out Cultures (Cultures has been a consistent strong seller) for nomination, but they're both results from me working at the top of my game at OBE, so I'm pretty tickled.

It doesn't stop there, though, as I look towards the question of "What non-Fred IPR-carried products got the nod?"

IPR Nominations

  • Best Cover Art - 3:16 (BoxNinja)
  • Best Interior Art - HELLAS (Khepera)
  • Best Interior Art - Mouse Guard (Archaia)
  • Best Writing - Hot War (Contested Ground)
  • Best Production Values - Mouse Guard (Archaia)
  • Best Production Values - HELLAS (Khepera)
  • Best Rules - Starblazer Adventures (Cubicle 7)
  • Best Setting - Dreadful Secrets of Candlewick Manor (Arc Dream)
  • Best Setting - Hot War (Contested Ground)
  • Best Podcast - Voice of the Revolution (IPR!)
  • Best Game - Starblazer Adventures (Cubicle 7)
  • Product of the Year - Mouse Guard (Archaia)
  • Product of the Year - Starblazer Adventures (Cubicle 7)


I'm mixed, of course, in my feelings about Mouse Guard. Mouse Guard is a fine work, worth the nods it has gotten (and more that it curiously didn't). But Luke and I are on the outs (something I don't really want to talk about, but also don't want to pretend isn't true) after he decided that it was more important to spit in my face than accept an apology for a big goof-up I made earlier this year. As such, I am doubtful that I'll be continuing The Summer Revolution past this year, and am on the fence as to whether I'll use that promotional site this year at all, since it was based on a partnership with Luke, and Luke's temper makes him a poor partner for me. I might be giving Mouse Guard some vote love, but that love's all for Archaia at this point.

Anyway, enough of that drama.

Overall, that's a pretty good spread. It's a great spread from the Evil Hat perspective, too, given that Starblazer Adventures is based on the Spirit of the Century SRD, but I'm also intrigued that IPR's catalog includes three of the five Best Setting nods, given that I think there's a sort of general perception out there that "indie means setting light". I'm sad that Master Plan isn't on the Podcast list, but Ryan's influence is still strongly felt, as he's been doing the audio production on Voice of the Revolution, which has improved the show's quality in all sorts of subtle-but-palpable ways. Don't Lose Your Mind author Ben Baugh is getting some love for Candlewick, too, which is good & just; he's probably one of my top five setting authors these days anyway, and it's *hard* to get me to love setting writing.

In the end sum, it's important to realize that in one very big way, the Ennies are already done for us (speaking in the smaller EHP/OBE sense, and in the larger IPR sense). Nominations are hard-won and carefully considered by the judges each year, but the voting is in the hands of the general public. It's particularly hard getting actual wins from that everyone-in-the-world vote; our catalogs do their best work not in quantity, but in quality, so to some extent creating the product familiarity necessary to garner a vote is the biggest obstacle of all.

So when you hear folks on the above list say things like, "It's an honor just to be nominated" -- and it is! -- listen a little closer. That nomination they're talking about is a win all by itself.

Edit: Chad's post: http://chadu.livejournal.com/743514.html

Second Edit: Somehow I failed to mention I did the layout on Starblazer Adventures, so I have an actually-palpable connection to that product beyond contributing to the SRD on which it's based.
Filed Under: EHP Business, ENnies, fate, s7s, spirit of the century Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

The GSL Isn’t Worth Worrying About

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My initial impression after reading a bit of the GSL hullaballoo is that it's nothing really worrying about...

... so long as you're willing to walk away from it. Yeah, it represents a sticky legal bog into which many a game company could walk and few could come out. Yes, it's a disappointment for many folks who thought they could make some more money like before by creating products supporting the biggest dog on the block.

But for Evil Hat Productions (and hopefully, for many others), it's a big So What. Sure, maybe EHP could someday put out a 4E supporting product (I certainly think I have a setting concept that could go interesting places, and Rob's been talking about a modular add-on concept that could fit to nearly any campaign world), but it's not essential that we do -- and it never really was. The 3E OGL days gave us a lot of opportunity to get us some strongly developed second and third tiers. Plenty of companies and one-guy shops made their bones in that environment; they've got a name and a brand from that time. If they play their cards right and leverage that brand well, they don't need 4E to continue growing their fan-base. It'd just be nice. Phil Reed has plenty of folks standing shoulder to shoulder willing to follow Ronin Arts wherever he takes it. Green Ronin's supporters are legion. And so on.

If anything, the GSL tells us that we can probably comfortably give 4E a year to see where it goes, to see how it settles out from its awkward early stages. But more than anything, at least from where I stand, the 4E GSL is -- for my money -- a move by WOTC to support diversity in the RPG market (however unintentional that move may be). Fewer companies will be producing 4E stuff. Some will because some are willing even in the face of some pretty nasty legal terms -- every swamp-bog has its explorers, however few -- but many won't. But those many won't be standing still.

And as a few folks have pointed out, there are plenty of options for the second and third tier to get some all-star team-up action going on. True20 and Pathfinder provide successful, proven branches of the d20 oeuvre for folks interested in staying "close to home". If WEG ever gets off its ass, there's talk of making d6 an open license. Savage Worlds now has a free license (once you're approved) and a second license that provides solid support of fan-sites doing whatever they want, legally. And, yeah, Evil Hat's Fate system (and the open content of Spirit of the Century) remains free for use via the OGL (plus, we're happy to negotiate reasonable brand license terms for SOTC and DRYH if someone becomes interested -- as we already have).

So I'm not worried. I'm excited.

Maybe you can be, too.
Filed Under: EHP Business, fate, ogl, spirit of the century Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

The Whiff Factor: GUMSHOE Edition

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As a part of getting my head wrapped around the upcoming GUMSHOE game Mutant City Blues game from Pelgrane (think the Powers comic book as an RPG), I decided to sit down with The Esoterrorists and give it a read. I'd heard some mixed reviews (1, 2) about this game both online and off, and wanted to see what was up with it.

I actually enjoyed the read quite a bit. Yes, the system's pretty simple -- honestly, I'd have loved a bell curve in the die-rolling part -- but I do like the idea of bringing the idea of the character sheet as a resource management problem together with the investigative horror genre.

I haven't yet gotten a chance to read through my copy of Trail of Cthulhu, nor have I reread the advance text I have of Mutant City Blues, so I'm not sure if later versions based on the core GUMSHOE system from Esoterrorists make any substantial changes to how the system functions. That's next.

At any rate, ultimately the GUMSHOE system looks to be something that takes a specific stance on the "whiff factor" in RPGs. Most of you know what the whiff factor is: a whiff is what happens when you roll the dice, putting all kinds of focus and effort into it even, and you just flat out miss, your joy dies, and someone else gets their turn. It can really stink, and a lot of more recent designs are a response to the existence of the risk of the whiff. Fate's definitely included in this, with the invoking part of aspects intended as a mitigation of the whiff.

GUMSHOE is particularly concerned with the whiff factor when it comes to investigative, fact-finding challenges in games. Its answer is simply to eliminate them: if a clue is there to be found, it is found by those with an appropriate investigative ability (though not really in any sort of railroading way -- the idea is that you might get your clues, but the interpretation is still left up to the players). Dice don't come into play with investigative abilities 99% of the time, but you can still spend some points out of your various investigation abilities' pools in order to get some bonus extras. Sure, you might know right away that this guy's lying to you about the gun because you have an nonzero rating in your Bullshit Detector skill (you gotta love a game that has Bullshit Detector as a skill), but you might be able to spend a point or two from your BSD ability pool to notice that he's positioned himself so that you don't notice that box on the desk behind him -- containing the gun! Again, my Fate brain kicks in a little here and says, "hey, that's a lot like extra shifts on a skill roll", and there's definitely some resemblence, minus the rolling of dice.

This approach with investigative abilities is ultimately a pretty good thing for the game, I think, and it's dirt simple to house-rule in a little story-gaming sensibilities here if you want them -- let the players spend a point to assert the existence of a clue, much like a successful declaration roll works in Fate. I can definitely see using the SOTC brain to say -- in essence -- okay, the automatic clues from having an ability are essentially assessments and the point spends from those pools are declarations and calling it a day, there. Instant hippy GUMSHOE action!

But GUMSHOE segregates its investigative abilities from what it calls "general abilities". General abilities are the ones where the dice (okay -- die, since it's basically 1d6 plus however much you're willing to spend from the relevant ability) come into play, introducing risk and the possibility of failure. Moreover, to underscore the horror element (and, I suppose, avoid the real possibility of gaming the very simple dicing system a bit too much), in Esoterrorists at least there's an explicit recommendation that the GM not disclose the target numbers to the players before they roll. That's a risk heightener, to be sure, but it also does something that I wouldn't have expected out of GUMSHOE: it embraces and maybe even desires the Whiff Factor in general abilities. General abilities are there to give you something to spend to increase your chance to succeed, yes, but their existence and resolution method also suggests they are there to give you opportunities to fail.

Problem is -- from my perspective at least -- that there's nothing to be gained from the failure and complications that arise from it. And that's a place where players can get really perturbed, especially if you were sitting on the target number and not letting them know what it was.

Chad Underkoffler's PDQ system (among others) takes on this sort of thing by giving a reward back to the player when failure occurs: some sort of experience point benefit has been seen, as well as other temporary benefits (analagous to getting a fate point when you fail a roll -- Fate doesn't do that, but we figure the compel mechanic stimulates the Fate point economy just fine without it).

I think something along those lines could do a lot to improve the perturbing situation described here, in GUMSHOE; just let players get back one point in any one of their pools (or just in the one that is being used on the roll) whenever they fail a roll. Now, you have folks willing to spend a point on nearly every general ability test: they get a +1 to their roll, increasing the feeling that their general ability rating is palpable and relevant, and that either boosts them to their success, or is a break even if they fail. It's a tiny change, and it does mean that characters might end up feeling more heroic or resilient than they normally would, but I think it's a change that could seriously improve the perception of how the system works in play. (I talked this over with Rob, who's been a bit lukewarm on the game, and confirmed that this is a change that would address a solid chunk of his lukewarm-ity.)

So, yeah. I suppose it's all proof that I'm still heavily inclined to look right away for what house rules when I encounter a new game. So how about you? Do you have any house rules you'd be inclined to apply to GUMSHOE?
Filed Under: fate, pdq, spirit of the century Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Faith, Faces, & Fingerprints: The Questions and New Names

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Answered Questions from Last Time
  • What has become of the Face?
  • Who abducted him?
  • Will Brynna, Anders, and Thea be able to find him? (Will they even try?)


New Questions
  • Will Anders be able to impersonate the Face successfully?
  • Will there be another attempt on the Face's life?
  • Will the Face recover from his injuries?
  • How will the Council's vote on prayer taxation resolve?
  • What documents was the Glacindoan Ambassador burning in the fireplace when Anders last visited the Embassy?
  • Were Thea and Brynna recognized by the Serpent Ring?


New Names
  • The Serpent Ring (the most dangerous thugs from the Pit hired to kidnap the Face during the vote)
  • Breck (the Serpent newbie who Thea "converted" with her faith)
  • Raff Schneider (Office admid for the building where the Council of 7 meets. Raff tends to hear more than he "should".)
  • The Millers' Daughter (Recently widowed, Raff's age, she had a recital at which she was introduced to Raff thanks to Anders' maneuvering; they hit it off and may be something of an item now)
  • Mekhee Fillip (Graffito artist; friend of the group, he helped arrange for a distraction when they needed it)
  • The Order of Gannet (Thea's monastic order -- and Patriarch Wendell's, too)
  • Doctor Horatio Alban (The Face's physician, he has finally been brought back together with the Face, who is recovering from major head trauma. Dr. Alban is the one to put Anders on his mission.)
  • The Council of 7: In addition to The Face, we now have The Crown and The Blood; The Chalice and The Coin; The Left Hand and The Right.


Old Questions, Still Lingering

  • Will Brynna & co be able to pull off their caper to subvert the publication of new, anti-Brynna guidelines for graduation at the Black College?
    • The plan seems to involve replacing one of the plates in the printing... How will they pull that off?
  • Why have couriers been disappearing?
  • Why was Patriarch Wendell (seemingly) taking a bribe from the Glacindo delegation?
  • What was the purpose of the gunpowder smuggling operation out of the back of the Glacindoan Embassy?
    • What transpired in the harbor to cause that explosion?
    • Who came out on top—the smugglers or the Gondoliers?
    • Who gained access to the Gondolier watch tables and shared them with the smugglers?
    • What did the head smuggler mean when asking what he should do about "the others", during Anders’ ruse?
  • Who had the Face kidnapped?
    • Why was he abducted?
    • Who wrote to the Face to warn him of an attempt on his life?
Filed Under: actual play, fate Tagged With: , , , , ,
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