TRPG General Chat

Miniman

00:01

@nitsua60 Just in case you didn't get it already.

Surprisingly little overlap between you and I, actually.

nitsua60

@Miniman Yeah... actually turns out my casual impression was way off. KS and I have co-answered on 13 questions, as opposed to the 5 or 6 that you+he or you+I have co-answered.

trogdor

ah neat

nitsua60

@Miniman I think a number of times I've answered only to delete a minute later, when re-loading and seeing that you got an answer in 20 sec before me =)

Miniman

@nitsua60 I'm not at all surprised by the me + Korvin overlap - he tends more towards the "soft" questions which I try to steer clear of.

@nitsua60 You know you should just leave it up in that situation, right?

nitsua60

@Miniman Yeah, those things are traps, man =)

@Miniman Sometimes. Other times they're practically verbatim, so I've just delete and upvoted yours.

On really-simple rules questions often I don't see a need for two distinct three-sentence, one-cite answers =)

Miniman

00:07

@nitsua60 Maybe not need, but no reason multiple people shouldn't get rep from them :P

trogdor

lol

nitsua60

@Miniman Speaking of rep... it's a new UTC day. I think I've picked off #24....

trogdor

if they are literally just a minute or so apart I think most people will realize you both thought of the same thing

rather than thinking one of you copied the other

nitsua60

I just browsed through my 14 deleted answers; there are only four or five that might have been this sort of situation. I'm not too worried about the impact on site health =D

Rep-league, OTOH.... It's Korvin himself who's now in my sights!
(I wonder if I'll ever catch him, or if we'll both just end up at some equilibrium in the teens....)

Miniman

@nitsua60 How did you find your deleted answers?

nitsua60

00:11

user:me deleted:yes is:answer

trogdor

oh

nitsua60

though 'user:me' is likely redundant

trogdor

I was looking for the one answer I deleted at one point

Miniman

Huh, I had no idea you could search for deleted stuff. That's cool, thanks!

trogdor

XD

nitsua60

00:12

there's a notice saying searching on 'deleted:yes' will only return one's own content anyway.

Glad to help =)

trogdor

@Miniman same, at some point I figured it was just gone

nitsua60

@trogdor what was it about?

Nothing's ever gone, man. Time is a flat circle.

Jul 28 at 3:34, by nitsua60

@Miniman "@BESW turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legends fade to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the third age by some, an Age yet to come, an age long past, @trogdor rose. trogdor was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings or endings to BESW. But he was a beginning."

trogdor

@nitsua60 this was like,... 2 years ago probably

I don't even specifically remember what it was about anymore

nitsua60

I'm slowly going through some of my oldest posts, converting some where I used one-line bold paragraphs where it really should have been a ## header; interesting taking a trip down memory lane.

trogdor

@nitsua60 not sure what relevance this has to the specific conversation :P

nitsua60

00:15

@trogdor Nothing's ever gone, man. Time is a flat circle.

Jul 28 at 3:34, by nitsua60

@Miniman "@BESW turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legends fade to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the third age by some, an Age yet to come, an age long past, @trogdor rose. trogdor was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings or endings to BESW. But he was a beginning."

Miniman

I just found an answer that I have absolutely no idea why I deleted.

trogdor

@nitsua60 I do this in the chats I frequent, looking at stuff I said that got starred, stuff someone else said that I starred, and stuff I know I repeatedly say (like BURNINATE) XD

@nitsua60 now you are just self referencing,.. like really obviously :P

nitsua60

Hey, time's a flat circle, man.
[help me! I don't know how to escape! Flat spin!]

Miniman

@nitsua60 Help me work out why I deleted this.

BESW

@nitsua60 According to Narbonic, you have to get slapped by different women at the same relative time in each timestream you're unstuck in.

nitsua60

00:20

@BESW I feel like, in this case, I needed to end up obnoxiously pinging you enough times to get simul-slapped by all four of your components =)

@Miniman [reads]

BESW

Luckilly quoted pings don't re-ping.

trogdor

@nitsua60 you only pinged me though

nitsua60

[crap, then I'm never getting out of this!]

trogdor

besides, who ever said the BESW components where themselves in multiple timestreams,.. or that any of them were women? (if we are interpreting the cure very literally)

Miniman

@nitsua60 The only thing I can think of is that I decided it was wrong for some reason.

nitsua60

00:24

@Miniman Except it looks correct, and better-explained than many of the others...

(It's also kind of a crappily-posed Q, that I'm not entirely sure I'm getting all of.)

And the self-answer seems to be one of the poorest-explained ones =\

Miniman

Oh well, went ahead and undeleted.

nitsua60

@Miniman looking at the answers oldest->newest, perhaps you were writing yours when KMallory posted theirs and thought that one sufficed? It's also a pretty good one.

Miniman

@nitsua60 I upvoted it, so that might be it.

KorvinStarmast

@nitsua60 I love your show, and am glad you are being so helpful in so many ways. Right on! I have to go back to the grill since Momma is hungry!

nitsua60

@KorvinStarmast thanks for catching s/izard/arlock. Have a good evening, and gig 'em Aggies =)

afk awhile

trogdor

00:30

what was that sentence XD

@nitsua60 doesn't seem to work for finding my deleted answer

BESW

@trogdor Oh, like you've never needed help catching a s/izard/arlock. They're notoriously canny.

trogdor

@BESW those all sound like people I would hang out with, not try to catch

Shalvenay

03:22

hey there @JoelHarmon

Joel Harmon

hey @Shalvenay

how are you?

Shalvenay

@JoelHarmon doing OK here, as for you?

Joel Harmon

still very busy

not caught up from the weekend yet, actually :/

Shalvenay

@JoelHarmon when do you think you'll be caught up?

Joel Harmon

probably tomorrow

Shalvenay

03:26

@JoelHarmon alrighty then

Joel Harmon

no, I haven't forgotten that you've got an exercise you want to run through :)

SevenSidedDie

04:14

Our resident editing wonks might find the answers to this question interesting, especially the bit about style guides:

6

Q: What does `'s` mean in "What CPU's will it run on?"?

Does it indicate a possessive adjective or just a plural noun? If noun, why it is not CPUs (without apostrophe)?

(I did not know about the NYT style's use of apostrophe-s for initialisms that contain periods.)

DuckTapeAl

Hey, are there any Fate GMS on? I ran my third Fate session tonight, and I have some questions.

trogdor

I am technically one,.. I have not run many games though

@BESW is our main GM, and he has some Fate under his belt

he might not currently be here though

you can ask your questions though

or if you want you can wait to see a reply from him, your choice

BESW

I'm in consultation with a client, will be available later. Ask and if nobody's helped you when I'm free I'll chime in later.

@doppelgreener, @Magician, and others are equally qualified.

DuckTapeAl

My biggest problem has been with area attacks against mooks.

The third (and final) scene of the session was basically about the players setting an ambush for a group of mercenaries. Most of the mercs were nameless NPCs, and didn't have any kind of Notice or other don't-fall-into-an-ambush skill.

So the party ended up getting something like 6 free invokes across 3 different aspects as they built a perfect ambush, and I rolled super poorly in my opposition rolls.

So the fight starts, and the first 3 party members make some more advantages, and the fourth throws a fireball for +12 against a defense of -1, killing most of the mooks outright.

trogdor

04:30

are you asking how to not have that kind of thing happen or,....?

DuckTapeAl

Basically. Or, if I'm using some rule wrong, and if that kind of thing isn't supposed to happen anyway.

trogdor

@DuckTapeAl it's supposed to BE ABLE to happen

it probably shouldn't happen too often

mainly, you need to constrain your PC's time, on occasions when you don't want this to happen, or you could turn the tables on them after they set an ambush like this up by having a later scene where the person in charge of those mooks took the same amount of time preparing for a fight with the PC's (obviously you don't want to go too overboard with this and give them no chance of winning or getting away, but it shouldn't be a cakewalk either, it's a fine line to walk in situations like this)

you could also use compels to have a PC make a mistake any time it would make sense

that is a constant option, though one I understand it isn't easy to pull off for everyone

our group doesn't have as many compels happening as we would like, and we are all trying to increase the rate at which we all compel each other

DuckTapeAl

That's another thing that I'm having some trouble with. I don't really know how often I should be compelling people.

I'm currently getting about 2-3 compels per 3-hour session with an average group size of 4 players.

trogdor

@DuckTapeAl as often as you can manage it while not spending more time on one PC than another

@DuckTapeAl that isn't tooo bad

you might want to try to increase it to four, but this is coming from someone who personally can't manage more than 2 without losing focus on other things

XD

DuckTapeAl

:P

trogdor

04:38

so don't take it as any kind of admonishment XD

DuckTapeAl

I also find myself mostly compelling the same aspects, rather than compelling different ones each time.

I find it kind of hard to keep 25 aspects in mind in play.

trogdor

you could keep a list of all characters and their aspects

on flash cards maybe if that helps

DuckTapeAl

*5 players in the game, with 1 usually gone in any particular session.

trogdor

@DuckTapeAl we have technically a couple more people than that, and also a little more fluidity in how many people show up

I am the only person, other than BESW, who as I said GM's and who's house happens to be the place we meet at, who shows up every time

in your example, I see a particular thing that could happen

if those mooks are commanded by someone with a certain degree of competence, this ambush could lead that person to decide to target them personally in some way

like orchestrating a counter ambush that the PC's might have a chance to learn in some way came from being spied on after their resounding sucess

DuckTapeAl

Mhmm.

trogdor

04:46

basically, you have several tools at your disposal that you may or may not have thought of

if your PC's make a habit of taking too much time to set up a success, you could put a literal/narrative timer on them

the classic example is a bomb they have to diffuse that is literally counting down

obviously you don't want to use that exact thing all the time, but setting up scenarios where they only have a certain amount of narrative time to work with could help.

doppelgreener

i agree with trogdor

DuckTapeAl

I sort of did that this time. I asked them what they were going to do to set up their ambush, and limited them to only three 'actions' before the enemies showed up.

trogdor

@DuckTapeAl cool, that is good

DuckTapeAl

I think the biggest problem was that all of the players had at least +1 in the skills they were rolling, and none of the mooks had relevant defenses, so they ended up getting success with style each time.

doppelgreener

there was a session we were planning an ambush. the ambush was to happen the next session. that session, we showed up, and so did our enemy... to bring our attention to a hostage situation he'd set up, and to offer peaceful parlay.

trogdor

04:50

@DuckTapeAl you can always tailor the encounter to the PC's

DuckTapeAl

So it was a ~+6 on the players, against a +0 on the mooks.

trogdor

mooks, in Fate, are technically designed to be walked through

doppelgreener

your players might have an ambush organised, which would tend to go just like, say, the ambush with Patience in Firefly.

trogdor

if you want a fight involving mooks to have real punch, have them stall for a more competent ally, or have hostages, or be guarding a bomb

DuckTapeAl

Well, it was mooks with a supporting character leader, but he didn't have much in the way of Notice either.

doppelgreener

04:51

you might want to hand it to the players. but, their opposition might also subvert the ambush.

DuckTapeAl

I'm also having a lot of trouble judging difficulty. The first combat was 4 enemies with +4 fight and a 2-box stress track, and it ended up being a huge slog.

So I tried to make this one a little easier, with a bit more going the player's way, and it ended up being trivial.

trogdor

@DuckTapeAl unfortunately, a lot of combat in Fate just tends to take a long time, unless it was too hard or too easy

DuckTapeAl

I'm so used to playing D&D, where I wouldn't have to prepare at all to run a combat that was fun. This is very different.

doppelgreener

the difficulty in judging appropriate difficulty numbers is probably the biggest weakness in fate

(really? i'm used to having to prepare a lot)

DuckTapeAl

Yeah. Most of my encounter-building in 3.5 involved picking something more or less random from the correct CR out of a monster manual and reflavouring it to look right.

I'd try and grab an actually-relevant monster if one existed, but it usually just ended up being whatever was the right-ish CR.

I would rarely spend more than an hour a week on session prep for 3.5.

It was more like a half hour for my D20 Modern X-Com game, and "while we ordered food before the game" for my Harry Potter Savage Worlds game.

And I feel like, with Fate, I need to spend a couple hours preparing and thinking about how the players could respond to things if I want a session where the players feel challenged and engaged without steamrolling something, or getting steamrolled.

doppelgreener

04:59

i do that.

but i also use fate because i'm interested in stories where the primary problem-solving method and primary source of challenge does not involve people dying.

i've used other systems specifically for the kinds of stories they help me tell, and i use fate for the kinds of stories fate helps me tell.

trogdor

I have typically spent very little time actually prepping a session, but a lot of time thinking about what I want to do in one

that being said, that has not yielded the best sessions all the time

not that I have run it that many times

doppelgreener

i spend a while thinking about what kind of challenges i want to present the players with, and what i want the main NPCs to be like, and what i want their surroundings to be like. (but i have fun doing that.) then i spend maybe an hour whipping up stats for whatever primary NPCs I have that need their own stats, and for the classes of mooks I expect I might draw upon.

trogdor

@doppelgreener that is actually more or less how it ends up working for me too

with maybe less than an hour spent on the stats

partly because I feel like, if I spend too much time deliberating on what the ratings of the stats will be, they will just keep changing

DuckTapeAl

@doppelgreener That's basically what I did this week, but I feel like I wasn't able to predict my players well enough with that level of preparation to actually give them the level of challenge I was aiming for.

trogdor

yeah

that is my main problem

I would love to be able to predict what the PC's were going to do (though that would take out a lot of the fun of GMing and being surprised by them of course)

DuckTapeAl

05:19

Well, I've got to get to bed. It's 1AM where I am. Thanks for the help!

doppelgreener

goodnight!

trogdor

good night

doppelgreener

05:35

@Ben Sounds like the experiment failed in this scenario.

or succeeded in producing a result, at least

Adeptus

@doppelgreener sounds similar to how I've played a Kender (but with minimal annoyance to other players) - every now and then I'd ask the DM, "has anything fallen into my pockets?"

Ben

05:53

@doppelgreener eh?

Miniman

> as an experiment I decided to use a character quirk to make it a bit more interesting

Ben

Oh. Right. Gotcha

eimyr

08:34

What happens if you bounty a question that gets closed/put on hold before the bounty expires?

BESW

08:53

You work to get it re-opened.

doppelgreener

Bountied questions cannot be closed actually.

Mods can close it by refunding the bounty first.

eimyr

oh

BESW

[ticks "learn something" off daily list]

doppelgreener

I found this out once by trying to VTC a question with a bounty on it. Told me I couldn't.

Miniman

That seems open to abuse, actually.

doppelgreener

09:00

This is probably a solid feature because someone might step in and go "no, actually, this question's awesome! c'mon give it answers!" and put their points on the line to rescue it. Naturally if you do it enough to prevent proper moderation taking place, people might start getting annoyed at you, including the mods. 8)

And I've had flags go through more or less requesting the bounty get refunded and the question closed because the question sucks even if there's a bounty on it.

(But in those cases the question very clearly sucked.)

Miniman

Ah, I totally forgot the thing that makes abusing this impossible: There's a two-day waiting period before you can bounty a new question.

doppelgreener

oh, yeah.

BESW

It's caveats all the way down!

doppelgreener

lots of time to close bad questions.

@BESW Except when...

I will BRB then I have some thoughts to dump on a game design topic.

Shaamaan

09:14

Hello.

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the "Devourers in the mist" pregenerated campaign for Trail of Cthulhu. I'm looking to start one tomorrow with a relatively small group of people (3 players + DM) and was wondering if there are any possible pitfalls I should look for.

BESW

09:30

@Shaamaan [wave] Sorry, I've only read Trail and am gearing up to start my first GUMSHOE-based game (Bubblegumshoe).

Anaphory

@BESW Oh, I thought you had played a bit of Trail!

Shaamaan

As did I! Cheat, cheat! :P

BESW

Nope, haven't played Call either.

I did recently see a blog about the "problem" with most GUMSHOE games... [tries to dig it up]

> While each ability has points tied to it, giving us our resource source, those points don’t feel particularly pregnant with meaning on a story level. Abilities end up having three states: abundant, scarce, and depleted, and while you can ascribe some meaning to those states, it’s only with a few particular abilities (like Health) where they really seem to have some narrative punch. I’m not sure what it means, exactly, to have run out of points in my Stealth or Driving ability, other than that I’m gonna be more at the mercy of fate.

> - "Evil Hat and Gumshoe," Fred Hicks 2011

It's really interesting to read Bubblegumshoe with that five-year-old blog post in mind.

BESW

09:50

Burning steel wool dropped in liquid oxygen. Really quite beautiful.

Anaphory

@BESW Does it change those things? Also, how much force do you anticipate you have to put in your suspension of disbelief for investigative vs. action skills?

BESW

@Anaphory It definitely... plays with them. The General Abilities don't have any story weight behind point spends, but are presented more as "points = times you can Do A Cool Thing." Relationships and Cool, though, are aggressively re-positioning the resource mechanic into a strong narrative-driving position.

I'm not sure what you mean about suspension of disbelief with investigative vs action abilities.

Shaamaan

Actually, since we're talking about the system, I'm wondering about investigative abilities. The rulebook specifies that if a player has a specific investigative ability, then they automatically succeed at doing that particular task. Awesome, we're no longer at the fate of random die throws. But when we're talking about finding clues for a mystery (Trail of Cthulhu and the likes), then it feels this ends up with the DM just automatically telling what a player finds / sees...

...with no involvement needed from that player.

(I should write "might feel like" - I haven't actually played the system yet...)

I'm guessing the idea then is to find out what the players DO with the clues / solutions provided going forward?

eimyr

Hello

Shaamaan

@eimyr Hello

BESW

10:02

@Shaamaan I'll be back in a little bit.

Shaamaan

@BESW Sure. :)

eimyr

I haven't read Trail or the specific adventure.

Nice to see another Pole around here though.

Shaamaan

<waves>

Anaphory

@BESW IIRC, when we played Esoterrorists, we found it quite jarring at times that an investigation ability was depleted while a very similar action ability still had points (or the other way round).

BESW

So, one thing about Bubblegumshoe: they've drastically stripped down the ability lists.

It's limited to common capabilities that teenagers who are also Sleuths would have access to. Additional "adult" or specialist capabilities are accessed through Relationships (your mom's a cop? spend a point to get access to Cop Talk) or through a very costly way to get a specialist ability for yourself.

Now, clues: There are several different kind of clues. The kind you get automagically for free is only the bare minimum needed to keep the mystery going.

You get those "core" clues if you're in the right place using the right skill, without a roll or a spend.

You can spend or roll to get more clues which aren't absolutely necessary but help give important context or speed things up (like hints at WHY the culprit did the thing).

Generally, you have to narrate your Sleuth looking for clues in order to trigger the GM telling you what you found.

And yes, the focus is on what you DO with the clues, in the context of the dramatic and complex social landscape of a teenager.

Shaamaan

10:23

@BESW Yeah, there are spends. But that's still pretty much automatic. I.e. "Do you want to use Forensics, or make a 1-point Forensics spend?", "I do the spend", "OK, you see..."

It seems (correct me if I'm wrong) that the use of investigative abilities is predetermined by the GM, and the players cannot actively use them for the actual clues. Of course they CAN be used outside of clues ("Can I use biology to determine where's the best place to hit this wild animal to cause it to flee?") when they are cleverly used, but for the actual mystery it doesn't seem to be the case.

BESW

There's also other kinds of clues; core clues are the kind described above, but there's pipe clues (which the GM lays into the session without calling attention to), extra clues (non-essential clues you spend to get), and leveraged clues (which you acquire by using an existing clue as pressure while using Social Abilities to get more information).

And there's an overarching theme of the system which I think addresses your underlying concern:

The rules are more like guidelines, really. They're very loosey-goosey and the text regularly reminds the GM to embrace players' theories, integrate players' ideas, and generally massage the rules whenever they'd get in the way of fun.

It's a weird system for me that way: LOTS of numbers, but exactly what the numbers are isn't so important as the impact they have on the drama.

Shaamaan

Yeah, well, of course. ;)

Ok, so just to make sure I've got this right. A PC walks into some area containing a clue requiring a spend. They do have the ability, and could make the spend. Should the GM actually proclaim outright "John, you feel there's something wrong here. Would you like to use a 1-point spend of XYZ to get to the bottom of it?" or do they keep quiet and wait for the player to use XYZ themselves?

BESW

Keep in mind, please, I haven't done a single session of this game yet, or any GUMSHOE system.

Shaamaan

I know... But I'd still value your input on this.

In other words - neither have I! :P

BESW

@Shaamaan Either way works, depending on the nature of the clue and the pacing of the game at that moment.

Anaphory

10:31

@Shaamaan I think that's the disconnect I mean. (It's been 8 months since I tried it.) That's where an investigative ability becomes an action ability, and that may lead to odd stuff.

@BESW And between them, there's the “John, you feel there's something wrong with the [XYZ-related] here.”

i.e. hinting that there's more to be found, but letting the player roleplay the looking for it.

BESW

Aye.

And spends can also be used for a player to take narrative control.

[rummages in book]

> Certain clues allow you to gain special benefits by spending 1 or 2 points from the relevant ability pool. During your first few scenarios, your GM will offer you the opportunity to spend additional points as you uncover these clues. After that, it’s up to you to ask if there’s anything to be gained by spending extra time or effort on a given clue. You can even propose specific ways to improve your already good result; if your suggestion is persuasive or entertaining, the GM may award you a special benefit not mentioned in her scenario notes.

> Extra info
An advantage later
A favorable impact
A time savings
A solution to the immediate problem
A moment of personal spotlight

> Or other benefits that you or the GM come up with. Benefits make the story richer, more complete, and more fun. Offering a spend is the GM’s way to say, “There’s more neat stuff in this story.” Asking to spend is the player’s way to say, “I’d like to do something neat with this.” Both GM and player should be eager to add neat stuff to the game.

I think of Bubblegumshoe points as pools of fate points attached to specific abilities.

But... yes, Investigative, General, and Interpersonal abilities are pretty much what they say on the tin.

It's gonna be rare (but not impossible) to leverage an Investigative ability in a throwdown.

I'm having a hard time seeing a big overlap between any two particular skills, though.

That feels like it was a symptom of an over-detailed skill list.

And where there is potential overlap, that's intentional because it gives wiggle room for spotlight management.

Heck, three of my players have put points into Town Lore with specific notes to the KIND of Town Lore their Sleuth specialises in (early history, NDN relations, and natural features; economics, tourism, and high society; crime and social issues).

Anaphory

10:52

@BESW Sounds like it. In particular for computer skills, there was a bit of it in Esoterrorists.

BESW

There are 30 abilities in Bubblegumshoe, spread across Investigative, Interpersonal, and General.

The fewer Sleuths in your game, the more points you get to make sure you have the Investigative and Interpersonal skills reasonably covered on your team.

Anaphory

Yep, we discussed how to do that for varying numbers of players before.

BESW

If there's any ability you want that isn't on the list, you can have a Relationship with someone who gives you access to that ability, or you can spend an additional 4 points to have access to it yourself without the drama of a Relationship in the way.

Each of your Relationships also has a point value attached to it, which you can spend on rolls or to get your Relationship to be especially useful (like letting you into a place you'd normally not be able to go, or would have to spend Cool to enter).

The people who Like or Love you serve mechanically as very flexible tools for helping and supporting you, including unlocking the ability to spend Cool in throwdowns and that kind of thing. You can even siphon Cool damage off onto them! But the more you spend your Relationship points, the more strained the Relationship becomes and you have to spend time strengthening the Relationship in order to refresh your points.

Shaamaan

(Sorry for the late response)
@Anaphory I like the "You feel there's something wrong with the [XYZ] here". Sounds like a plan. That said, the players need to know about spends - given this will be out first time playing Trail, it... may... not be the best idea. But I still like it! :D

BESW

BGS has the GM prompt for spends the first session or two.

Anaphory

11:06

Yes, do keep pointing out spends regularly until players ask for then on their own, and if you can, make the first spends they ask for out of their own volition be very neat to reward that behaviour!

BESW

I expect my players to use spends similar to Fate's declarations.

A kind of mechanised "yes, and" improv.

Anaphory

Ah, I may have been confusing Trail of Cthulhu with Cthulhu Dark, which is a game @BESW have played before, isn't it?

BESW

Oh, yes.

Cthulhu Dark is pretty awesome.

...it is also a game where failure is not an option.

Anaphory

I should complete this by saying that I have not run Esoterrorists, I have only played it and advised some newbee-GMs how to run it for the game I didn't play in.

(It was a workshop on RPGs, and as part of it, we two leaders had every participant run a session of Esoterrorists, in two groups, with us prep-advising the GMs in the group we didn't play in and providing debriefing for the GMs we played with.)

BESW

Interesting. What prompted that structure?

Anaphory

11:15

Unfortunately, the documentation of the workshop did not work out as well as expected, otherwise I'd dig into that now to find own-experience advice for running Gumshoe for the first time.

BESW

Heheh.

Anaphory

I go to these things regularly to run or take part in courses/workshops on a variety of topics, and because it's quite a geeky participant-base, a friend and I decided to give a course on RPGs.

Given our pre-disposition to theory, and the way the event is split in two equal parts around new year's eve, we decided that the first half would be about breadth and the second about depth.

In the first half, we discussed history, social contract, theory, System Does Matter etc., and played some RPG poems, Fiasco, Torchbearer and Sagas of the Icelanders/Apocalypse World.

In the second half, we wanted to do some GMing theory, and because Horror/Investigation is in general a hard and very specific thing to run, we decided that that would be what we would have everyone GM.

BESW

Nice.

Got any resources you'd recommend for a GM going into investigative gaming?

Like, for horror I'd recommend Nightmares of Mine to anyone.

Anaphory

Not as such from the top of my head – it was also quite a challenge for myself to get that going, because it's not my core play style either. Might ask my co-leader about it, because he does play more like that, but that will take some time and requires me to remember it when I see him online.

BESW

If you do, I'd appreciate it.

What I know about mystery structure in literature doesn't translate easily.

Anaphory

11:38

I have sent him an email directly, maybe I'll get an interesting answer.

Shaamaan

If there's a resource for investigative gaming, I'd be interested too.

Anaphory

It's a shame that this is on the shopping-question side of the gray area of mainsite questions.

@BESW I think it could skim on the other side of that zone if you phrase it as asking for advice on how to realise those pieces of structure (not too many, and listed with examples) in-game. But that's still either too broad or essentially putting the information in that you do want to get out.

Nox

Hello people.

Anaphory

Eyup!

BESW

What's new?

@Anaphory Thanks! I can't think how to make it a good mainsite question either...

Nox

11:48

Still toying with an idea of a GM-less games.

What's up with Hillfolk/DramaSystem.

BESW

There are a number of 'em.

Hillfolk isn't one I'm particularly familiar with.

Nox

Looks like it was popular/offered a lot in shopping questions when they were allowid on this stack

Anaphory

Dunno, read it, tried to grok it, didn't get it.

Focus is on inter-player drama, the way it does this is by very specific beats and scene framing, otherwise quite freeform.

Nox

Yeah. So looks like it was praised as an idea, but never actually tried by most.

BESW

I'm really looking forward to trying Lovecraftesque some time, but I'm not sure it's technically GMless.

More like GMful.

Anaphory

11:51

GMless and GMful are difficult to distinguish!

Nox

So 'everybody' is a GM?

As opposed to 'nobody'?

BESW

Not that either!

Nox

No idea than what you mean.

eimyr

Thing is, GMlessness is only appropriate where a concept of GMing is defined and applicable.

BESW

One person is a Narrator (introduces the scene, makes sure the scene's requirement are met, describes the location and the NPCs, adjudicates conflicts, decides when the scene is over).

eimyr

11:53

In Lovecraftesque the concept is not realised by any persona, but you also can't say it's completely absent.

BESW

One person is the Witness (speaks for and narrates the main character, makes choices for him, focuses on his fears and reveals his past).

And everyone else is a Watcher (enhances the themes and atmosphere elaborating on details provided by the Narrator, plays NPCs if the Narrator asks).

Each scene, the roles are shifted one space along the table.

So everyone takes multiple turns in each role over the course of the session.

Anaphory

With the Watchers, that's definitely GMfuller than other GMful GMless games, where only the Narrator-equivalent takes turns.

BESW

Then there's games like Do: Pilgrims of the Flying Temple, where you get to narrate your pilgrim's actions whenever she is helping people--and the entire rest of the table collaborates to narrate her actions whenever she gets into trouble.

...or Dog Eat Dog, which is kinda hard to describe.

There's no GM, but a lot of the GM's traditional privileges are given to one player.

Not because there's a sense one player needs to have those privileges for an RPG to work, but because the RPG is about the imbalance of power.

Anaphory

Pirateas (?) has a narrator, another player who contradicts the narration, and a third one to adjudicate.

Nox

I recall reading about the game like that once on story-games.com, where one of the players was some kind of a rebel against the status quo and another should have been it's embodiment, with others serving as extras / voting on what is best : to remain in the current state or go through the painful revolution.

eimyr

12:06

Great Ork Gods has a GM who does not adjudicate difficulty of actions.

Nox

All these seem to have one thing in common: they are there to tell one specific kind of stories and are ill suited for, for example, telling two stories with the same characters.

Anaphory

I think we mostly list the exceptions here.

BESW

And then there's Nomic.

Anaphory

A core model is that you have a narrator, doing many of the things a traditional GM does, and a mechanism according to which those narration rights change hands.

(By topic, by time, by scene/turn, by spending a resource, ..., or any combination thereof)

In Universalis, you have narration rights over the things you control, you buy control by an OOC resource which you gain by putting your things in conflict with other players' things, and disputes are resolved by negotiation, escalating to bidding that resource.

BESW

There's also a whole category of games which don't really give any indication about whether they expect a GM or not, and don't give mechanics or advice on the subject.

They leave narrative control entirely as an exercise for the group.

Anaphory

12:13

Got an example for that?

BESW

Roll For Shoes, of course.

All Outta Bubblegum.

Danger Patrol: Pocket Edition.

Surgadores, by design.

Wibbs

Is closing a question because of tone/rant a thing?

BESW

Link?

Wibbs

-3

Q: So Hard For My Wizard to Use a Sword?

So, what's the big problem here? D&D 5e seems to be much better than 4e, much simpler than 3(.X)e, and a very nice, flexible system, on the whole, if a bit simple, and toned down, in some spots. I'm looking at the wizard, my favored class of all time, in D&D, and I can say I like most of what I s...

dnd-5e weapons wizard

It is ranty, but there is a clear question there

BESW

Related. Is your question "How can I do this?" or "Why can't I do this?" — BESW 28 secs ago

Wibbs

12:24

I get that, but that is clearly not the reason a number of those close votes were cast

BESW

Oh, absolutely.

But... yanno, sometimes the community just says "Hey, clean this up."

Wibbs

and policing on tone is a dangerous slope to start down

BESW

It might not technically be a close reason, but I'm wary of slippery slope arguments and I'm okay with asking someone to cut the fat out of their post.

And no, I don't think it's clear.

Wibbs

meh, fair enough

BESW

It's clear there's a question, but because of the rant style the exact nature of the question is unclear.

Look at that answer: it's technically an accurate response to the question despite just being pure speculation about how game mechanics map to real-world concepts.

@Wibbs One of the cool things about the Stack is that precedent is not given undue weight. "But we did it that way before!" often elicits the response "Hmm. Probably wouldn't do it that way now though."

Nox

12:39

And sometimes "Let's go to this one that was before and fix it as well"

BESW

That general attitude of "Let's try things and learn from our mistakes!" is one of the qualities I value in the Stack.

eimyr

@Wibbs I previously posted some rant questions and the were accepted. Here ranting seems to obfuscate the problem instead of highlighting it.

If someone writes "X happened and X is stupid and why X at all, X is so stupid, wat do when X is stupid?" it's different from "X is stupid in A, B, C, D way. Wat do?"

nitsua60

13:38

@BESW I have a deep and abiding love for nomic.

Nox

0

Q: How do I create a Difficulty Class formula for a battle system that lacks one?

I'm working with an existing battle system, and I'm trying to devise a formula that gives me a 'difficulty class' ranking, similar to DC in D&D. Ideally, it would give me an intuitive ranking on a scale like 1-10 or 1-100 that allows me to quickly evaluate how good a match two opponents would be;...

difficulty-class

Looks like a question for Game Development SE

But is actually too 'broad' ?

nitsua60

@Wibbs in that instance I read and re-read a few times and still am not clear on whether the question is "why doesn't training cover weapon proficiencies like it does tool proficiencies," "how can I put a sword in the hand of my wizard," "am I wrong in thinking that multiclassing one level is really expensive?" Buried in there, I think, is the question about how training is structured, which sounds maybe like it's the core of the question? But I really can't tell, so I find it unclear.

Anaphory

13:53

@nitsua60 I have a theoretical love for nomic, but practically never managed to enjoy a full game of it.

nitsua60

@Anaphory How would one know if the game had ended? In my experience they just... die. (Or, rather, the group sort of dies around the game!)

Anaphory

Yep.

eimyr

I've never played Nomic.

Is there a link I should see?

Anaphory

Actually, it may be that our Mornington Crescent Nomic did come to something of a conclusion…

Nomics are games in which the rules state is part of the game state, Wikipedia is as good as any link.

eimyr

So it doesn't actually need any initial ruleset, eh?

nitsua60

14:06

@eimyr Rather, it needs a minimal starting ruleset to function as a 'seed.'

eimyr

Hm.

Perhaps this ruleset should be random.

Anaphory

What that ruleset looks like depends on how you want to play.

nitsua60

yes, I've seen a few variant starting sets, each intended to nudge the eventual mid-game into one "flavor" or another.

I've only ever played "classic."

Anaphory

Our Mornington Crescent Nomic was, in essence, starting as (a) a players turn consists of moving a pawn one station along one line by one station on a London Underground map, anouncing where they move it to and then proposing a rules change which is voted on; (b) turns pass clockwise around the table; (c) the first player to anounce Mornington Crescent wins; (d) No player may move the pawn to Mornington Crescent.

@nitsua60 Also on whether you want the start of the game be about frantically fixing loopholes, long implications discussions, etc. and what you want to happen when rules are obviously in conflict.

nitsua60

14:32

Would this be an okay comment to leave on the wizard+sword question?

>It seems you've read the "training" section and realize that there's no mention of weapon proficiencies. So your lead-in question is trivially answered: "no," with a single-page reference to the section you already mention. But given the amount you've written it seems you've actually got other things on your mind, which is what makes this all seem so unclear to me.

Miniman

Sounds pretty good to me.

eimyr

15:07

@Ash heyooo

Anaphory

16:43

Is it time to learn a new programming language?

nitsua60

19:23

VtC primarily opinion-based ^^

=D

trogdor

20:40

lol

Anaphory

:D

Anaphory

21:15

What's a good, gender-agnostic, proverb-like phrase to say that “The components of the raw results one researcher might consider ‘noise’ are often valuable as ‘data’ to some other researcher”?

nitsua60

@Anaphory I.e. you'd like to avoid the "man" in "One man's trash is another man's treasure"?

Anaphory

Yes! And I wasn't aware that phrase actually exists, so thank you!

nitsua60

Would "one's trash is another's treasure" suffice, or is inherently too-referential of the "man"-based version?

Anaphory

I don't have any problem with the obvious derivation, but to me an unqualified “one's” has too much a “everyone's” connotation, so I think “one person's trash is another's treasure” might be what I am looking for.

trogdor

21:59

so basically just replace "man" with "person", fair enough XD

I guess that saying is strictly an American thing or something

I had thought it was a very well known saying

Anaphory

I don't know, I'm not an English native speaker.

I may just have never encountered it while in the UK.

trogdor

yeah, I figure now, it's probably something people in like, America, Canada, Australia, and Britain might know

might even be that one or two of those places actually also has not heard it though XD

I have heard it several times, but at the same time, it might not be too widely used anymore, or it might not be a thing in the UK

it isn't a huge deal, I am just surprised someone hasn't heard it before,... but after having had any thought on the subject it makes perfect sense

Anaphory

Even if we had just coined it here it would still be precisely the phrase I was looking for!

Short, to the point, alliteration, and expressing what I was looking for.

trogdor

@Anaphory it's always cool to find that exact phrase that sums up what you want XD

BESW

23:42

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Miniman

@BESW Damn, that's getting long.

BESW

"Getting" long? I've been shaving off one or two a day and have only added one or two a week for the last... three weeks?

Miniman

@BESW Well, maybe I haven't expanded it in a while.

BESW

About once a month I go mine Kickstarter for new links.

trogdor

it is pretty long

but I think that is just the residue

I definitely seem to recall a time it was longer

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