Tag: building stuff

In the last post, I shared with you some of the thoughts I had about building binary challenges. This and the other recent posts grew from discussions with a friend in the UK, Bruce. Much of this sprung from a question about representing a spaceship crash-landing and how to best represent that. And that’s what I want to share this time, how I would create a crash-landing scene as the mechanical component of a scene.

Now, it is possible to do this as a binary challenge, as discussed in the last post. If this isn’t supposed to be a major scene, more like a speedbump or a reminder how dangerous the adventure is, it could be created like a binary challenge, a minion Narrative Character (NC) – hit the emergency gravity compensator and the ship will right itself.

If I wanted it to be a bigger scene, something that has impact on the characters and their narrative, I’d likely set up multiple NCs, one for each PC and probably create them all as regulars. So, for example, you might have the piloting challenge of keeping the ship on course, an engineering NC of the engines overheating, and a navigation challenge of finding a soft landing spot. Depending on the situation, maybe there are enemy fighters on the ship’s tail and another character is gunning for them (in this case, maybe three enemy fighters, an easy explanation for a Regular).

Let’s take piloting as an example. It might look like:

Keep Her On Course (good regular) TN 17
Concept: Rough re-entry +2
Phy +0, Cun -2, Cha +2

You’ll notice that Charisma is an option as a Trait to use against this NC. To be honest, the only way one could really use Charisma in such a way is if there is a crew one is commanding. If this were Star Trek, that would fit. The PC needn’t be the captain, it might be the helmsman working with other crewmates to get the ship levelled out and under control. If it were something like Serenity and the PC is Wash, it might look like:

Keep Her On Course (good regular) TN 17
Concept: Rough re-entry +2
Phy +2, Cun +0, Cha –
Note: Charisma cannot be used for this NC

So, why is Physique +2 and Cunning +0? Because in my mind, wrestling the ship’s control to keep her flying isn’t as good as the knowledge and alertness to choose the best options and methods to keep the ship on the course the navigator provides, when the navigator provides it.

This NC is a regular, so the PC needs three successes to overcome it and remove it from the scene. In creating it, I would imagine what each success might mean. I think for piloting, that’s pretty easy. First success gets the ship basically under control. She’s bucking and not flying straight, but the pilot is wrestling to get her on course rather than lacking any control at all. The second success has her pointed in the right direction, but she’s bucking and the controls are sluggish. The pilot feels like they could lose it at any moment. That third success is what finally bring the pilot relief. The ship is going where she should go, with some bumps and shimmy, but that’s normal for a rough re-entry. The pilot has done it!

Then I would do something similar for each other challenge, keeping all the PCs busy, because if it is one NC, they can work as a group to beat it, and unless it’s a great hero, they’ll likely do that without much effort. These NCs should be tailored to the PCs – these should provide spotlights for each PC and showcase how each has a role in the team and on the ship.

That’s how I would approach building a non-combat challenge that is supposed to be an important scene providing character’s spotlight and moving the story forward in an exciting fashion.

In case you were wondering, I would estimate that with four players (and therefore four PCs) this scene would likely last between ten and twenty minutes. Some groups are all business, working through the scene mechanically with some narrative but not a lot of extraneous discussions. Other groups like to discuss possible responses, what would look best, often bringing in character personality and backstory. But if you are running this at a convention, a scene like this would likely take about fifteen minutes.

In the last couple of posts, I’ve written about some of the perceptions and ideas that helped design Sword’s Edge, how I view failure and the purpose of Momentum. Let’s now look at an example of a binary challenge and how SE replicates it . . . or fails to do so.

By a binary challenge I mean something that is generally seen as a “do it or don’t.” The example I want to use is jumping over a chasm. In general, when viewing this, it looks binary – one gets over the chasm or one does not. How does a binary action work with Momentum and then Action.

To be honest, when I run a game, this isn’t something I would make a mechanical challenge. There would need to be something significant about it to justify making it a mechanical challenge – a Narrative Character (NC). Does a PC have fear of heights? Is there something about the challenge that touches on a PC’s pivots or other qualities? Generally, things like climbing trees (or buildings), jumping, or smashing through doors are part of a scene, but aren’t the heart of a scene (the goal or purpose of the scene), so I don’t really bother with them.

Let’s say we do. Let’s say there is a good reason to make this an NC, I would then ask myself: “Is this a prelude to something?” For example, to see the sniper before the sniper takes the shot or notice the warriors waiting in ambush. If it is, I would give the NCs a Quality (generally an Element) specific for Momentum that reflects this. The success or failure of Momentum then tells us if the PCs succeeded or failed.

In the case of jumping the chasm, is it to get into a fight? To rescue an individual? Is it in pursuit of a villain? In some of these cases, I would build it into the NC as above. In the case of pursuit, I would represent it as an Element for special use – something like “Using ground for advantage (Physical) +4.” This provides a mechanical replication of the chasm to be jumped over which remains binary for that round, but then does not follow through to the next – the PC either overcomes it or is delayed by it.

What if there is a good reason to create this NC all on its own. It doesn’t matter then reason, but let’s say there is a good story or character reason to create a binary challenge – a do it or not kind of challenge.

In this case, I would definitely make it a minion – one success is all that is needed. I would make sure its rank represented the difficulty of accomplishing the task, and give it a fitting Concept. Still, looking at something like jumping over a chasm and considering how I have described Momentum, one might wonder how it fits together. What happens when the PC has Momentum but fails in the Action Test? What happens when the PC fails Momentum? What happens if the PC fails both Momentum and Action?

Okay, in general I allow the players to narrate the results of their Test. Leading up to the Test, I ask, what they are trying to do, and when we have a result I ask what happened. Sometimes, the player asks for input, so this would be my input.

What happens when the PC has Momentum but fails in the Action Test? The PC makes it across but doesn’t land well on the other side. They barely made it and are hanging over the edge. Think of Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark, at the beginning when Alfred Molina leaves the whip on the other side of the chasm. Indy jumps, doesn’t quite make it and is hanging there. Another failure? Starts losing handholds. Another failure? Falls for a bit but catches a root or outstretched rock. Etc.

What happens if the player fails Momentum but succeeds in Action? The PC thought they were ready to make the jump but realizes, as they reach the edge, that they aren’t going to make and skid to a halt before going over. Catching their breath, the PC can try again – they can try to Seize Momentum – or maybe they realize there’s no way they can simply leap over this chasm, and they stop to consider alternatives.

Failing Momentum and the Test? I would use a narrative similar to the one above about landing badly and scrambling for handholds, but in this case, the bad landing knocks the wind out of them – or worse. Since this would likely be Physical Stress and therefore Penalty Ranks to Physical, I would continue to represent failures as things that would hurt, like a the slipping down the side and grabbing something wrenches out the character’s arm, and then fall they lose their grip and fall, only to land hard on an outcropping of rock or protruding root.

To be honest, SE doesn’t work great for binary challenges. It’s not really designed for that. As with any generic system, it has its weaknesses, and this is one of them. SE was designed to run the kind of games I like to run, and in those kinds of games, most binary challenges are part of a greater action scene and so rarely stand alone as an NC.

In my last post, I tried to illustrate some of the thinking regarding success and failure in Sword’s Edge, and specifically with Momentum. This time, I want to talk about how one can represent that in the narrative.

To reiterate, Momentum is about who controls the conflict – who is in the driver’s seat. The winner of the Momentum Test is considered “active” and the loser “passive,” but this is only because the terms “attacker” and “defender” have the context of combat whereas Tests in Sword’s Edge can be about anything. In this article, let’s agree that the active character is attempting to change the status quo in a manner that benefits them and the passive character is attempting to stop that change. Both might be active, but only one is acting on the status quo – the passive character is instead acting on the active character.

How does this relate to the narrative of the game? What does this look like? Consider a fight scene in a movie: while the protagonist might generally be shown succeeding – especially when facing mooks – there is often a point at which there is some kind of setback (especially in a Jackie Chan movie!). The character is momentarily thwarted, but this generally leads to a new and different attempt that succeeds in some way. The character in this case did not lose Momentum – they really still controlled the fight – but they did not succeed in that particular action.

Now, this is different from the big fight scenes when the protagonist is fighting a boss or mini-boss, as this is much more like a fight against a regular or hero – a success doesn’t result in an outright win, merely progression towards a win. Sometimes, in such a scene, you can actually see where the opponent Seizes the Momentum. This usually leads to another moment where the protagonist steals it back, but there is often a moment when the tables turn on the protagonist until they can reassert control of the fight.

But what about other situations in which the visual of controlling a situation is not so obvious. Let’s take the example of a starship crash-landing on an alien planet. In such a situation, what does failing to control the situation look like? To me, that would be the PC unable to concentrate, unable to focus, forgetting the processes or lacking a real solution to the problem. Failing Momentum means that the situation is out of the PC’s control. She’s flailing about, maybe doing something, but not doing anything right.

And then a failure when the PC is the passive party – on the defensive – means that the PC has done exactly the wrong thing due to this lack of confidence or confusion. I’d likely narrate this as the PC having a crisis of confidence, questioning her ability and knowledge (a Penalty Rank to Cunning).

I think we can all think of examples in our own lives in which we did not have control of a situation. We were faced with a problem and lacked a way forward. We did not have Momentum. But then we took a chance, took a stab at a solution – uncertain if it would work but unwilling to allow the situation to persist or even degrade. That was us Seizing Momentum. Get it right, you have control of the situation and can now influence the status quo in your favour. Get it wrong? Yeah, really bad things can happen.

So that’s how I think about representing Momentum and failure in the game. It can be more clear when one is representing combat, but the same dynamics carry over into all resolutions.

I’ve been bugging a couple of other designers about their games, one because he asked me to and one because I’m helping with playtesting. I really like both of these games and I think I see ways they can be improved. As with any critique, it’s up to them to decide if there is value in my comments, and value is what is forefront of my mind right now.

Games have values hard-baked into them. Whether intentional or not, a game has activities it values and others it does not. Just because an activity is necessary for a game to function does not necessarily mean the game values that activity. All my games include rolling dice as a randomizer, but the games do not value this. I can confidently say/write that because none of my games reward dice-rolling. They reward the results of dice-rolling, but that could be the result of any randomizer, and I have chosen dice because they are the randomizer I understand the best.

Right there I revealed what I’ve been thinking about: rewards as signifiers of value. A game will reward what it values. The main mechanical reward in Dungeons & Dragons is experience points. There are other rewards which have a mechanical function – they effect the “behind the scenes” system that gives structure to the narrative/story – but they also exist within the story. Experience points – at least as I understand them – are wholly mechanical. PCs gain experience points from defeating enemies. In 5e, one can provide story rewards or rewards for noncombat challenges, but these are optional. The system rewards defeating monsters, so the game obviously values defeating monsters. You can do a lot of things with the D&D system, but if you are running it “rules as written,” your PCs will be fighting and defeating monsters and other opponents because that is what the game values and what it rewards.

If there is a reward in the game, it is because that is an activity in which the game wants you to engage. However, when designing a game, I think it is easy to disassociate rewards from values. Sometimes, we design at an instinctual level and only later review and consider what we have created. Rewards are a part of design, and the giving of rewards is not bad, but it does make the activity one is rewarding a required part of the game. Sure, one does not need to engage in that activity – no one is coming to your house to force you to defeat monsters – but the character will actually be penalized for not doing so. The character will not be rewarded while other characters undertaking the activity will be.

In my experience, when designing a game, it’s super important to ask yourself does the activity I am rewarding have value? Do I feel it is valuable? If it is not and does not, why am I rewarding it? So in Sword’s Edge, there are two activities which the players control that provide rewards – hitting Pivots and having a character act in a way that might seem sub-optimal, but that fits in the genre being replicated. Like D&D, there are other optional ways, but these two are “rules as written” (basically, Luck exists to reward players as a way of reinforcing activities at the table to which the GM or group has assigned value).

Why do Pivots have value? Pivots are the signposts that tell everyone about the character’s goals, quirks, and style. They are also signposts to help GMs design adventures. By hitting those, the player is reinforcing the character as expressed by that player. This in turn means that if the player wants to change her vision of the character, there is incentive to change the Pivots which then assists the GM in fashioning adventures that will speak to the player and character. There are two levels of reinforcement, but the mechanical one is likely the one that will motivate as the other – the enjoyment of the game – might not be significantly impacted.

Why does following genre conventions have value? Following conventions has value as it helps to support an atmosphere and approach which the group has agreed it wants to foster. There’s no problem playing a Stormtrooper in a Star Wars campaign, but remember that the characters in Star Wars are basically good. They can be anti-heroes, but they fight the good fight, so that Stormtrooper needs to abandon the Empire/First Order and help the Resistance. The player still gets to play the character desired while being rewarded for sticking to the genre on which the group has agreed. This balances the desires of the player and the group.

So when designing a game, consider what your game rewards. That signifies value. Did you intend your game to value that activity? Is it in keeping with the concept or stated aims of the game? Rewards are good. Values are good. Consistency is better because it generally delivers a better play experience, closer to the stated aim of the system.

At least that’s what I think.