Fast'n'Loose minis gaming is like this...
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Robert
Oct 30, 2008, 1:28:47 PM10/30/08
to troupe berkeley
Hi all:
I put up the other thread about getting folks together for some
fast'n'loose minis gaming, and have gotten some good responses, but I
wanted to clarify abit about what this kind of gaming is like. Elliot
and I threw together a two-session game like this, and he has the
notes, so I hope he'll put up an AP report or jump into this thread
and give some examples of what I'm talking about.
First off, this kind of game is really neither fish ( competitive
skirmish wargame) nor foul ( Players + GM style traditional rpg), but
it is fun.
Here's what I mean:
1) We use miniatures. And, we use the miniatures to generate ideas for
what characters are like, and the kind of events that seem like they
just _should_ occur.
Example: The game was a Lost World kind of set up with dinos.
Unsurprisingly, dino-action stuff got put into play: There was a
stampede of herbivores and an attack by a T-Rex. Later, the setting
itself lead us to include a flock of pteradactyls tearing apart the
gas-bag of the down zeppelin to use as nesting material.
Example: One of the miniatures looked a bit like Teddy Roosevelt, so
we made him... Teddy Roosevelt. There was a striking resemblance in
another miniaature, a funny little fellow with thick glasses and a
butterfly net. We declared this one to be Maynard Roosevelt, Teddy's
unknown "distracted" naturalist, older brother.
Likewise, we try to limit stuff to what we can represent with
miniatures ( although there were exceptions!). For example, in the
first session, the nearness of the German colony on Venus was
mentioned, but no German figures were available, so we skipped that
idea ( they showed up for the second session, however, and became
pretty important). In session two, a random generator suggested an
idea for help coming in on the German side of things. Elliot was up
for including some sort of steam vehicle. a great idea, and certainly
in-genre, but agai, no figure!!
Instead, a female big-game hunter type figure appeared and was written
in as the German patrol leader's super competent adventuress ex-gal
pal, and made an important last minute entry into events.
2) But it's more like playing with GI Joe and pals, than a tactical
wargame!
I mean that in the best possible way, too.
Think back to when you were a kid and did something like that. Now,
skip goofy childhood arguments, and substitute in adults capable of
respecting a die-throw result to determine how events go when people
have different ideas. Tactical considerations are by now means thrown
out, they're just left at the level of agreement or die-throw! How far
does a mini move? As far as makes sense in context. How far does a gun
fire? As far as makes sense. Is there some cover to sneak behind?
Again, what makes sense in context, modified by consensus, and a
simple die throw when there are differing ideas about which should
occur. Interruptions of events are pretty much handled the same way.
More in a minute.
I put up the other thread about getting folks together for some
fast'n'loose minis gaming, and have gotten some good responses, but I
wanted to clarify abit about what this kind of gaming is like. Elliot
and I threw together a two-session game like this, and he has the
notes, so I hope he'll put up an AP report or jump into this thread
and give some examples of what I'm talking about.
First off, this kind of game is really neither fish ( competitive
skirmish wargame) nor foul ( Players + GM style traditional rpg), but
it is fun.
Here's what I mean:
1) We use miniatures. And, we use the miniatures to generate ideas for
what characters are like, and the kind of events that seem like they
just _should_ occur.
Example: The game was a Lost World kind of set up with dinos.
Unsurprisingly, dino-action stuff got put into play: There was a
stampede of herbivores and an attack by a T-Rex. Later, the setting
itself lead us to include a flock of pteradactyls tearing apart the
gas-bag of the down zeppelin to use as nesting material.
Example: One of the miniatures looked a bit like Teddy Roosevelt, so
we made him... Teddy Roosevelt. There was a striking resemblance in
another miniaature, a funny little fellow with thick glasses and a
butterfly net. We declared this one to be Maynard Roosevelt, Teddy's
unknown "distracted" naturalist, older brother.
Likewise, we try to limit stuff to what we can represent with
miniatures ( although there were exceptions!). For example, in the
first session, the nearness of the German colony on Venus was
mentioned, but no German figures were available, so we skipped that
idea ( they showed up for the second session, however, and became
pretty important). In session two, a random generator suggested an
idea for help coming in on the German side of things. Elliot was up
for including some sort of steam vehicle. a great idea, and certainly
in-genre, but agai, no figure!!
Instead, a female big-game hunter type figure appeared and was written
in as the German patrol leader's super competent adventuress ex-gal
pal, and made an important last minute entry into events.
2) But it's more like playing with GI Joe and pals, than a tactical
wargame!
I mean that in the best possible way, too.
Think back to when you were a kid and did something like that. Now,
skip goofy childhood arguments, and substitute in adults capable of
respecting a die-throw result to determine how events go when people
have different ideas. Tactical considerations are by now means thrown
out, they're just left at the level of agreement or die-throw! How far
does a mini move? As far as makes sense in context. How far does a gun
fire? As far as makes sense. Is there some cover to sneak behind?
Again, what makes sense in context, modified by consensus, and a
simple die throw when there are differing ideas about which should
occur. Interruptions of events are pretty much handled the same way.
More in a minute.
Robert
Oct 30, 2008, 3:07:35 PM10/30/08
to troupe berkeley
So, that pretty much covers the way the minis play differs a bit from
a minis wargame. The onlyother differentiation I'd make is that Elliot
and i weren't playing particularly competitively. rather we'd bounce
ideas back and forth, and use the Mythic GM emulator to spark ideas
when we were stumped. Characters were still in danger, but not in the
same way that it would be with something like a Games Workshop game.
Okay, so how is it different from an RPG.
1) Back to minis. As I mentioned, we really tried to keep our ideas
for events primarily focussed around minis. that did mean a limitation
on "where" events took place to an extent, and also what kinds of
stuff could be there. So, unless we decided to call a quit to the
game, our characters weren't going to suddenly leave the jungles of
Venus and head to London, or even the more heavily colonized
settlements of Venus.
Likewise, we tried to stick to creating characters modelled on the
minis. This included the NPCs that we'd create on-the-fly. Since we
had lizardmen ( including a weird Mind Flayer/Lizardman hybrid critter
who became the Cthulhu cult leader), that's what we worked in. When we
made main characters ( I hesitate to say PCs, exactly), we based them
on what the model looked like as much as possible, and tried not to
veer off too far into stuff not represented.
Now personality, background and so forth, the kind of stuff perhaps
suggested but not built-in, we could play with and did so. The pilot
was a drunken Aussie adventurer. The MindFlayer priest was psionic and
had statsis beam gadgetry.
2) Playing as you go and mucking with the GM/Player divide
We did actually name a pair of core characters each, and describe them
a bit before play. We each took two to primarily use personally,
although even that got a bit blurry, as either of us could suggest new
ideas back and forth, with the "Main player" of the character getting
a right to agree, modify or veto as they wished. Since a lot of this
ran on consensus, and there were not truly serious combat rules, this
did allow a good bit of give. When Maynard got dragged off by lizard
men and Teddy clocked with a club and knocked out, we weren't too, too
worried, both because we each had back up characters and because the
GM/ Player line was so blurry.
What do I mean by blurry? Well, at different times, each of us played
a character much the way you would in any regular rpg. But, we also
both could step out of character and suggest things that might happen,
either within a scene, or as part of a new scene, or even events
occuring in what would normally be "off-screen" ( including some cut-
away references to what bad gus were up to). This stuff was a
combination of us spit-balling ideas, as well as using the Mythic GM
Emulator to provide us with a sort of "oracle" with its random scene
starter charts, and its simple Heck No!/ No./Yes/Yes, Waaay!!
results generator for questiopns we'd pose and resolve by die-throw.
The key thing in all of this is to be quick. Toss ideas out to the
other player, and run with it. Speak in character, and don't be afraid
to tell "secret stuff" to the other players, so they can work it in,
trusting that even though their character might be clueless, they as
players will go into it with a sporting attitude and play to your
contributions with their own follow-up input.
a minis wargame. The onlyother differentiation I'd make is that Elliot
and i weren't playing particularly competitively. rather we'd bounce
ideas back and forth, and use the Mythic GM emulator to spark ideas
when we were stumped. Characters were still in danger, but not in the
same way that it would be with something like a Games Workshop game.
Okay, so how is it different from an RPG.
1) Back to minis. As I mentioned, we really tried to keep our ideas
for events primarily focussed around minis. that did mean a limitation
on "where" events took place to an extent, and also what kinds of
stuff could be there. So, unless we decided to call a quit to the
game, our characters weren't going to suddenly leave the jungles of
Venus and head to London, or even the more heavily colonized
settlements of Venus.
Likewise, we tried to stick to creating characters modelled on the
minis. This included the NPCs that we'd create on-the-fly. Since we
had lizardmen ( including a weird Mind Flayer/Lizardman hybrid critter
who became the Cthulhu cult leader), that's what we worked in. When we
made main characters ( I hesitate to say PCs, exactly), we based them
on what the model looked like as much as possible, and tried not to
veer off too far into stuff not represented.
Now personality, background and so forth, the kind of stuff perhaps
suggested but not built-in, we could play with and did so. The pilot
was a drunken Aussie adventurer. The MindFlayer priest was psionic and
had statsis beam gadgetry.
2) Playing as you go and mucking with the GM/Player divide
We did actually name a pair of core characters each, and describe them
a bit before play. We each took two to primarily use personally,
although even that got a bit blurry, as either of us could suggest new
ideas back and forth, with the "Main player" of the character getting
a right to agree, modify or veto as they wished. Since a lot of this
ran on consensus, and there were not truly serious combat rules, this
did allow a good bit of give. When Maynard got dragged off by lizard
men and Teddy clocked with a club and knocked out, we weren't too, too
worried, both because we each had back up characters and because the
GM/ Player line was so blurry.
What do I mean by blurry? Well, at different times, each of us played
a character much the way you would in any regular rpg. But, we also
both could step out of character and suggest things that might happen,
either within a scene, or as part of a new scene, or even events
occuring in what would normally be "off-screen" ( including some cut-
away references to what bad gus were up to). This stuff was a
combination of us spit-balling ideas, as well as using the Mythic GM
Emulator to provide us with a sort of "oracle" with its random scene
starter charts, and its simple Heck No!/ No./Yes/Yes, Waaay!!
results generator for questiopns we'd pose and resolve by die-throw.
The key thing in all of this is to be quick. Toss ideas out to the
other player, and run with it. Speak in character, and don't be afraid
to tell "secret stuff" to the other players, so they can work it in,
trusting that even though their character might be clueless, they as
players will go into it with a sporting attitude and play to your
contributions with their own follow-up input.
Robert
Oct 30, 2008, 3:18:31 PM10/30/08
to troupe berkeley
Part Three: Mythic GM Emulator
Mythic itself is used by more than a few solo wargamers, and i have
sen some folks writing that they've used it as an rpg itself,
especially when they have a small group, and no one person wants to
consistently GM.
Mythic provides a mechanical, scene based structure, with built in
ways to ramp up or slow down tensions. In practice, Elliot was the one
who was really keeping this part on track, and was honestly much more
likely than myself to trust the system to provide interesting stuff.
having watched him navigate it successfully, I feel much more
comfortable letting the "machine" do its thing than I started with.
Effectively, specialized mechanics are built on consensus of what
seems right crossed with a chart use that references just how manic
things should be at this point in the story (Called the Chaos Factor).
It seems to work pretty well for action-y genre stuff, at that. This
then sets at least the outline for Precedent in future situations
invovling similar events, and in fact the text provides forms to aid
you in keeping track of this stuff. the result can be a system that
ends up being very much crafted to the collective group vision of how
exactly "world" works.
The other major thing that the game system provides is some structure
to events, by tracking things like scenes and "goals" and story
threads. In brief, threads get started, primarily around a given
character's goals. When all threads are completed (or dropped, which
I guess is another sort of completion), the story you've been playing
has effectively ended, at least for that adventure. It actually works
pretty well in practice, and very basic methods help determine
wheteher a scene soemhow is there to hopefully bring a character
closer to completing or farther from completing a given thread. Again,
forms can be used to keep track of this stuff.
Finally, there is an optional rule for using a very limited referee.
This is an extremely limited role, and can easily bepassed from player
to player. The book recommends it passing say, every half-hour. I
might suggest a simpler scene-based rotation. In any case, it is a
simple facillitator role and a tie-breaker vot capacity when there is
a, well, a tie. it is decidely less than a GM, and could be handled by
even a complete novice player.
> > More in a minute.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Mythic itself is used by more than a few solo wargamers, and i have
sen some folks writing that they've used it as an rpg itself,
especially when they have a small group, and no one person wants to
consistently GM.
Mythic provides a mechanical, scene based structure, with built in
ways to ramp up or slow down tensions. In practice, Elliot was the one
who was really keeping this part on track, and was honestly much more
likely than myself to trust the system to provide interesting stuff.
having watched him navigate it successfully, I feel much more
comfortable letting the "machine" do its thing than I started with.
Effectively, specialized mechanics are built on consensus of what
seems right crossed with a chart use that references just how manic
things should be at this point in the story (Called the Chaos Factor).
It seems to work pretty well for action-y genre stuff, at that. This
then sets at least the outline for Precedent in future situations
invovling similar events, and in fact the text provides forms to aid
you in keeping track of this stuff. the result can be a system that
ends up being very much crafted to the collective group vision of how
exactly "world" works.
The other major thing that the game system provides is some structure
to events, by tracking things like scenes and "goals" and story
threads. In brief, threads get started, primarily around a given
character's goals. When all threads are completed (or dropped, which
I guess is another sort of completion), the story you've been playing
has effectively ended, at least for that adventure. It actually works
pretty well in practice, and very basic methods help determine
wheteher a scene soemhow is there to hopefully bring a character
closer to completing or farther from completing a given thread. Again,
forms can be used to keep track of this stuff.
Finally, there is an optional rule for using a very limited referee.
This is an extremely limited role, and can easily bepassed from player
to player. The book recommends it passing say, every half-hour. I
might suggest a simpler scene-based rotation. In any case, it is a
simple facillitator role and a tie-breaker vot capacity when there is
a, well, a tie. it is decidely less than a GM, and could be handled by
even a complete novice player.
>
> - Show quoted text -
Robert
Oct 30, 2008, 3:27:01 PM10/30/08
to troupe berkeley
What goes next:
So that covers most of the ground.
For the next event that I'd like to run, I'll be bringing a "themed
minis kit".
basically, this will simply be a collection of miniatures I have that
seem like they might fit together. I don't really have a story/
adventure in mind, although I very liekley will have a soup of ideas
in the back of my mind, that may or may not be used as the GM Emulator
and other folks' ideas start coming into play. If the same pattern
holds as last time, events will probably start small, and it wouldn't
be surprising to find that some initially craeted characters become
less important, and some others brought in on the fly loom much
bigger.
It's quite possible that only maybe a third or less of the minis will
ever be used for much more than background. In the dino game, except
for an initial stampede and t-Rex attack, they mostly just acted to
remind us that we were in a Lost World type setting, much like the
palm trees that dotted the table top.
My own playstyle tends to be that of a Wing-It GM, of the sort that
has funny little characters to play off the important folks ( Main
charactres/PCs) and I try to incorporate and run with the kinds of
stuff other players come up with, and turn that into the main focus of
play, regardless of what I thought was going to happen (after all,
choosing the collection is already a pretty big step towards directing
the thing!)
And that's pretty much it. If you have minis that seem to fit whatever
the basic, broad outline is, feel free to bring them, but it isn't by
any means necessary for play. Be willing to share ideas, and accept
die-roll results where they fall, and be interested in the other
players' fun as much as your own. that's about it really.
So that covers most of the ground.
For the next event that I'd like to run, I'll be bringing a "themed
minis kit".
basically, this will simply be a collection of miniatures I have that
seem like they might fit together. I don't really have a story/
adventure in mind, although I very liekley will have a soup of ideas
in the back of my mind, that may or may not be used as the GM Emulator
and other folks' ideas start coming into play. If the same pattern
holds as last time, events will probably start small, and it wouldn't
be surprising to find that some initially craeted characters become
less important, and some others brought in on the fly loom much
bigger.
It's quite possible that only maybe a third or less of the minis will
ever be used for much more than background. In the dino game, except
for an initial stampede and t-Rex attack, they mostly just acted to
remind us that we were in a Lost World type setting, much like the
palm trees that dotted the table top.
My own playstyle tends to be that of a Wing-It GM, of the sort that
has funny little characters to play off the important folks ( Main
charactres/PCs) and I try to incorporate and run with the kinds of
stuff other players come up with, and turn that into the main focus of
play, regardless of what I thought was going to happen (after all,
choosing the collection is already a pretty big step towards directing
the thing!)
And that's pretty much it. If you have minis that seem to fit whatever
the basic, broad outline is, feel free to bring them, but it isn't by
any means necessary for play. Be willing to share ideas, and accept
die-roll results where they fall, and be interested in the other
players' fun as much as your own. that's about it really.
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