Trickster Takeaways

[Raemon]

First iteration of Trickster Day was too silly. Second one wasn't really silly enough, and didn't have enough opportunity for trickery. The ideal version of it probably has some significant changes but I'm not sure if it's ultimately worth it to revamp.

One major issue is that people are basically seated and immobile, which makes it hard to distract, trick, or steal.

One thing I *think* I noticed - people spent more time staring at their phones (where the ritual book was), then I remembered people staring at the printed-out-ritual-book we used at Rationalist Seder. (It may be that phones have stronger associated behavior patterns than booklets). If the ritual remains in a booklet form, I'd like to try actually printing out the booklet next time.

Some relatively low effort changes one could make:

1) During the "share the first lie you told", "communicate a truth using Allegory" and similar parts, have everyone stand up and split into two groups, moving around a bit. (This'd increase opportunity to distract/trick/steal things)

2) Individual M&Ms felt a little too small to really care about, and it might work better to use something large that comes out in smaller quantities (and less apt to melt and get sticky - maybe something like a Hershey's kiss sized-thing?)

(That said, we DID get people accidentally eating M&Ms and skittles at the same time and going WTF!!??? which was delightful (to people other than them, anyway))

3) It might be better to have the roles be non-secret (so people can reinforce each other's role instead of forgetting it) and having it more clearly defined. (The Devil's role probably shifts to being 'incite others to trickery', rather than remaining hidden)

Some higher effort changes could include:

1) Building improv into the experience more (tell a story, each person acting out the role of their character?)

2) Figure out a way for it to involve more standing up and moving around, throughout the whole evening

3) Having people bring their own trickster stories rather than reading them from a book

4) Have some kind of iterated game of trickery and/or trust. Two major options I see:

 - "cooperation games", i.e. things like "everyone can put some candy into a central pot, and then the pot is doubled and split evenly"

 - "iterated hidden role games" (i.e. One Night Ultimate Werewolf, or Coup, which I played recently and can be done in 5 minutes and felt very much in the spirit of the night). This may be easier and more fun than the ongoing "who is the Devil?" game. Ideally, maybe create a new game which more explicitly ties in with the evening and is a more polished "game" than the sort-of-but-not-quite-games we did.

Trickster Mythos

In general, people did not seem to get much directly out of the Trickster stories, which might suggest that it doesn't matter which stories you use (and should optimize more for enjoyment than any kind of poignancy). 

Alternately, one might optimize for having the night generally be fun, and people coming away having a good time without noticing anything poignant happening, BUT if they do it multiple years you have a chance to actually have some of the connections and themes.

I haven't yet decided whether I'm sticking with this as a project (I still think it has potential but am not sure it's worth the effort to realize the potential). I do think it was a good learning experience though.