Difference between revisions of "Talk:Black Sun, White Moon Alternate System"

Latest revision as of 12:14, 21 September 2009

The One Shot:
We followed Franklin, Quentin, Mohammed, and Fernando, a coterie of vampires, on two adventures: their violent expulsion from Seattle ca. 1850 and their triumphant return in 2009. After defeating Gabriella's vampiric spawn, the character's fled under the cover of a convenient fire to avoid the assault of a werewolf and two elder vampires, who had conspired to destroy their sire. In 2009, with power destabilized in the region, they returned: after killing a VA police officer and blaming it on another of Gabriella's unwitting enemies, they then ambushed said enemy when he came to seattle to straighten things out, along with Gabriella's new childer, Wilhelm. Ferdinand, the enemy of gabriella, was convinced that he was being setup: meanwhile, the characters executed wilhelm and used their dark arts to make it look as if Gabriella's two main thugs had been responsible. Thereafter, they went on vacation and let the pot boil over: on their return, Gabriella's thugs had come to blows, with one dead and the other fled, and Gabriella, an Artiste and politico, was left without the muscle to defend herself. The characters ambushed her and allowed Ferdinand to deliver the coup de grace, thereafter resuming control of their old hunting grounds.
Fin

Thoughts/Discussions: Feel free to add comments or questions here, everybody.
1.) The players thought that combat was too inflexible: traits were used up too quickly and there were perceived to be too few viable bidding methods.
GM's thoughts on this: I'm on the fence on this: I think the next playtest I do, I will leave things as they are. Consider: in most games, noncombat characters are largely incapable of doing anything, no matter how they roll (barring a 1% chance of a natural 3/20/whatever) against skilled characters. I don't think that's any different here. But for a combat to stay dynamic, I agree that regenerating traits should be easier. Then again, tabs flow freely, and that's something those can accomplish. Bottom line: I'm not sure about how to change this, or even if it should be changed.
2.) GM comment: Player participation in the story was excellent, which was basically the point of the system. Combat was relatively quick and fluid. Characters were diverse and able to contribute in most situations in unique ways. All of that with a 5 minute character creation system. Overall, I thought it was a really fun one shot that perfectly captured the "feel" I was looking for and ran smoothly. Of course, I may just be enamoured of my own cleverness.

JASON: I felt like the combat was very restrictive in the same way that virtually all rules lite systems tend to be. Quinton had an Action of 3, which should be average among PCs, but I found myself wasting my combat actions most of the time. I couldnt even shoot all 12 shots from 2 six shooters before something bad happened and I didnt have a catastrophic failure. Because my Background was only 1 (in the past), even when I went to get a pitchfork it still only did the same as any weapon I might have given myself. I could have just pulled a paperweight from my pocket and done the same. In a way it stifled creativity because it was so deterministic that there wasnt a motivator to find something interesting to do. I strongly disagree that in most systems non-combat characters are largely incapable of doing anything in combat. In Warhammer the worst possible combat character hits a little more than 1/5 times for an average damage within 2 points (about 20%) of your brute (and its unlikely the baddy has a parry sitting around considering everyone else has gone ahead of them). In Hero a Dex 3 character hits a Dex 20 enemy 1/36, which is similar to your example, but they also got 21 points back (1/7th their total value) to do something wicked with. A Dex 10 character hits a Dex 20 enemy about 1/3. Eds character, however, with his 1 Action not only couldnt hit anyone (its impossible since ties go to defender), but he couldnt run away, grab a radio or do anything else during combat time unless he spent traits. My character had a 3 Action, as mentioned, but all of my traits were defensive. This meant I couldnt do anything cool on the attack.

My suggestions: In any test people get their associated characteristic automatically as their action number. Each character may bid any number of relevant traits, and each one gives them up to the number of dice in the associated characteristic. The player chooses how many to use. On a 4-6 that die adds one to the action number. On a 1 the trait is spent for the scene, all subsequent 1's remove successes. All dice are rolled simultaneously, and the GM doesnt tell you his total until after the roll. If you bid multiple traits, roll different colored dice so you know which traits may be exhausted. Characters may add chaos dice of any size to any test they wish, and they are exhausted as any other trait, and work like thed do in the rules as written. In character generation 1's assigned to characteristics give them an automatic 2 number, but the assigned number in traits. So a 1 in Action gives the character a 2 there, but they only get 1 associated trait.

BEN: I see what you are saying. I don't think I want to go the route you are suggesting, though. I agree that for grabbing the pitchfork, you should have gotten "bonus" to your attack: maybe chaos should get changed into "circumstance" or "dramatic editing" or something, that you can bring in to/by manipulating the environment. That was my bad. I will also think about how to create a larger "pool" from which characters draw to get a better score by being creative/determined: I don't think Ed felt useless in combat, his zombies ate face and he blew wilhelm away. But I could be wrong about that. I think the tabs may be the best way to do it, actually, but I'm not sure yet.

JASON: I think the point is without the zombies or things like that, he cannot succeed in anything action oriented. The system makes it impossible. Another thing that sometimes gets lost is players like to roll dice. Its fun. The only truly deterministic combat system I have ever felt was exciting is Dune. Yet, I dont think that would work here. What you have accomplished is making something that moves fast. The game rushes by and blows through roadblocks. It lacks detail (on purpose) and tension (as a side effect), and given how quickly everything moves, slowing the action down to create these things might be very difficult. If this is what you want, leave it as it is. Remember, the less there are rules, the more it is like sitting around a campfire telling ghost stories.

Edmiao great system for a one shot. would not like it for a main game cus its too simplistic and restrictive, similar to dogs in the vinyard. i think there's a lot of similarities to dogs, and both work well for a one shot. especially the ease of character creation - essentially ranking the categories 1 thru 5 and fill in the blanks later. that's fantastic for a one shot. With a complex character generation system we couldn't have cinematics like...oh i suck his soul out. and that was fun for a one shot. wouldn't mind some dice in combat. the bidding system encouraged me to go all or none because i didn't want to waste my points.