What is your game about? The doom is coming. What are you willing to do to survive? Is there something you'd give your life for?
What do the players do? Prioritize their character's goals.
What do the characters do? Whatever they need to in order to meet their goals.
Is this sufficient to answer these questions? Or do I need to think about this more?
Friday, September 30, 2005
Friday, September 23, 2005
What I'm looking for from this game
I have this vision of a couple of ideas coming together in one game. I'd like to see characters that put something ahead of their own survival, whether that is selfish (find the hidden gold or die trying) or selfless (willing to die to ensure the group's survival, or maybe their last act is trying to get a last message out to their loved ones or to warn society at large of the impending doom). I'd like to see characters who put their own survival ahead of everyone else's. I'd like to see characters backstabbing one another. I'd like to see the best and the worst of humanity come out in a pressure cooker.
I'll post more of my disjointed ramblings on the game soon, I promise.
I'll post more of my disjointed ramblings on the game soon, I promise.
Thursday, September 08, 2005
More coming
There will be more coming soon. I'm currently suffering from information overload, perhaps for obvious reasons.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
The game
LIFEBOAT RULES
Survive, Or Die Trying
un jeu de Chris Goodwin
Pretty much what it says on the tin. This is a game about survival in a small group, life or death circumstances. It doesn't have to take place in a lifeboat, though the title refers to that. Whether it does or not, the characters are referred to as Passengers.
The thing that is going to kill you is called the Doom. If you don't do anything (and quite possibly even if you do) it will kill you.
Hazards are other things that may kill you, but won't if you are smart and avoid them. These can be things like radiation, zombies, giant sharks, giant apes, pod people, etc. Monsters are a specific subset of hazards, referring to mindless creatures whose only purpose is to kill you. Mindless only means they can't be reasoned with or talked out of it; they can be intelligent, even smarter than you, and might still kill you. Monsters can't necessarily be fought, as in combat, tactics, etc.; they will eventually overwhelm anyone who stops and fights. But you can escape them until the end of the scene, at least.
Note: If your character dies, you aren't out of the game! You can still spend and receive karma, roll dice, etc.
Everyone has two goals, one of which is survival. The other is open, and up to the player. One of these is the primary goal, and one the secondary goal. Which is which is up to the player. It's possible to have survival as your secondary goal, in which case you'd rather die than fail at your primary goal. (Think of it this way. If you don't make it, what will the rescuers find your body attempting to do? If it's something like crawling to the last escape pod, or breathing your last from an empty air bottle, your primary goal is survival. If they find you slumped over that final letter to your granddaughter or trying to scratch your way into the compartment where the gold is, then survival is your secondary goal.)
Possible goals:
* Everyone survives
* Maximize the number of survivors (NOT the same thing)
* You survive, but you don't care whether anyone else survives
* You and one or more specific other people survive
* Make final contact with your family
* Warn others of impending doom
* Be in charge. Rightly or wrongly, you believe you are the best choice to be "captain" and that the best chance for the group's survival lies with you.
* Kiss up to the "captain"
* Kill a particular person
* Take a particular person down with you
Ideas for doom:
* A bomb in the plane
* You're in a lifeboat from a sinking ship
* The space station or moonbase has taken a meteor hit
* You're a bunch of criminals sitting in the hideout after a failed heist
Possible mechanics:
* Comfort level. What to call this? This is the sort of "hit points" of the setting. Everyone has a positive number of these. When you reach 0, you are about to lose it. At any time, you could lose it; losing it usually means you start by freaking out, somewhere in the middle say "We're all gonna die!" and end up trying to do something stupid like opening up the airlock to let all of the vacuum in. At this point you're usually killed by the other passengers, your body dumped unceremoniously. Things that can reduce comfort level: finding a body, someone else losing it, having to kill someone, realizing the doom is getting closer, hearing a countdown start, etc.
* Personality. This is your force of personality and force of will. This helps you talk other people into doing your bidding.
* Special skill. This is relevant to surviving the disaster; it could be something like leadership skill, survival skill, medical skill, knowledge of the location of a cache of food and water, or even a moderate special ability like reduced oxygen consumption.
* Weakness: This will kill you sooner than the doom. It could be something like diabetes or an aggravated wound, where you'll die in a few hours if you don't get the right treatment.
* Relationship map? Come up with either a positive (+), neutral (0), or negative (-) for every other PC. You have to spread them out evenly, and give at least one negative.
* Some amount of resource points you bet for dice rolls.
* Possibility: Craps mechanic. Either you win, crap out, or keep rolling, possibly with mounting stakes.
* You can bet your life or your alternate goal. If you win, you get them both, if you lose you die. This could be the only way to die, aside from someone deliberately killing you.
* Conflict resolution. Every conflict has intent and stakes.
* Rescue is some number of minutes, hours, or days away. Doom comes in fewer time periods than that (example: rescue is three days away; the doom will be here in two). Your options are to either postpone the doom (either by directly affecting it or by moving further away), to escape (defined as rescuing yourself(ves)) or to somehow bring about rescue sooner (get to the radio and call for help).
* Working with your primary goal gives you two dice. Working with your secondary goal or any other trait gives you one die.
* Possibly compare them as if you were playing Risk; each player takes turns showing their highest die, keeping the others secret. This is sort of blow by blow, and you win the conflict if you get in the final blow. Every time you bring out a die, the high die narrates the result. (Note that you have to have higher dice, and it's all one to one. If all of your remaining dice are lower than your opponent's lowest die, then they at least stalemate you; they can't make any more progress, but you can't affect them.)
* Voting: It may come up where you need to vote, either for a new captain, vote someone off the island or out the airlock, etc. All players, even those whose characters have already died, get to vote. Politicking and threats, veiled or otherwise (in-game only!) are encouraged.
* GM comes up with the basic setting and the doom; players flesh out the setting with their goals. (For example, if one character has "Find the money" as a goal, then there is money hidden somewhere that you can find.)
* Possibility of secrets? Everyone writes down a secret (about themselves or the setting), then passes them all into a hat, and everyone draws one. If you draw your own, put it back and draw a second time, but if you draw your own again you keep it.
Survive, Or Die Trying
un jeu de Chris Goodwin
Pretty much what it says on the tin. This is a game about survival in a small group, life or death circumstances. It doesn't have to take place in a lifeboat, though the title refers to that. Whether it does or not, the characters are referred to as Passengers.
The thing that is going to kill you is called the Doom. If you don't do anything (and quite possibly even if you do) it will kill you.
Hazards are other things that may kill you, but won't if you are smart and avoid them. These can be things like radiation, zombies, giant sharks, giant apes, pod people, etc. Monsters are a specific subset of hazards, referring to mindless creatures whose only purpose is to kill you. Mindless only means they can't be reasoned with or talked out of it; they can be intelligent, even smarter than you, and might still kill you. Monsters can't necessarily be fought, as in combat, tactics, etc.; they will eventually overwhelm anyone who stops and fights. But you can escape them until the end of the scene, at least.
Note: If your character dies, you aren't out of the game! You can still spend and receive karma, roll dice, etc.
Everyone has two goals, one of which is survival. The other is open, and up to the player. One of these is the primary goal, and one the secondary goal. Which is which is up to the player. It's possible to have survival as your secondary goal, in which case you'd rather die than fail at your primary goal. (Think of it this way. If you don't make it, what will the rescuers find your body attempting to do? If it's something like crawling to the last escape pod, or breathing your last from an empty air bottle, your primary goal is survival. If they find you slumped over that final letter to your granddaughter or trying to scratch your way into the compartment where the gold is, then survival is your secondary goal.)
Possible goals:
* Everyone survives
* Maximize the number of survivors (NOT the same thing)
* You survive, but you don't care whether anyone else survives
* You and one or more specific other people survive
* Make final contact with your family
* Warn others of impending doom
* Be in charge. Rightly or wrongly, you believe you are the best choice to be "captain" and that the best chance for the group's survival lies with you.
* Kiss up to the "captain"
* Kill a particular person
* Take a particular person down with you
Ideas for doom:
* A bomb in the plane
* You're in a lifeboat from a sinking ship
* The space station or moonbase has taken a meteor hit
* You're a bunch of criminals sitting in the hideout after a failed heist
Possible mechanics:
* Comfort level. What to call this? This is the sort of "hit points" of the setting. Everyone has a positive number of these. When you reach 0, you are about to lose it. At any time, you could lose it; losing it usually means you start by freaking out, somewhere in the middle say "We're all gonna die!" and end up trying to do something stupid like opening up the airlock to let all of the vacuum in. At this point you're usually killed by the other passengers, your body dumped unceremoniously. Things that can reduce comfort level: finding a body, someone else losing it, having to kill someone, realizing the doom is getting closer, hearing a countdown start, etc.
* Personality. This is your force of personality and force of will. This helps you talk other people into doing your bidding.
* Special skill. This is relevant to surviving the disaster; it could be something like leadership skill, survival skill, medical skill, knowledge of the location of a cache of food and water, or even a moderate special ability like reduced oxygen consumption.
* Weakness: This will kill you sooner than the doom. It could be something like diabetes or an aggravated wound, where you'll die in a few hours if you don't get the right treatment.
* Relationship map? Come up with either a positive (+), neutral (0), or negative (-) for every other PC. You have to spread them out evenly, and give at least one negative.
* Some amount of resource points you bet for dice rolls.
* Possibility: Craps mechanic. Either you win, crap out, or keep rolling, possibly with mounting stakes.
* You can bet your life or your alternate goal. If you win, you get them both, if you lose you die. This could be the only way to die, aside from someone deliberately killing you.
* Conflict resolution. Every conflict has intent and stakes.
* Rescue is some number of minutes, hours, or days away. Doom comes in fewer time periods than that (example: rescue is three days away; the doom will be here in two). Your options are to either postpone the doom (either by directly affecting it or by moving further away), to escape (defined as rescuing yourself(ves)) or to somehow bring about rescue sooner (get to the radio and call for help).
* Working with your primary goal gives you two dice. Working with your secondary goal or any other trait gives you one die.
* Possibly compare them as if you were playing Risk; each player takes turns showing their highest die, keeping the others secret. This is sort of blow by blow, and you win the conflict if you get in the final blow. Every time you bring out a die, the high die narrates the result. (Note that you have to have higher dice, and it's all one to one. If all of your remaining dice are lower than your opponent's lowest die, then they at least stalemate you; they can't make any more progress, but you can't affect them.)
* Voting: It may come up where you need to vote, either for a new captain, vote someone off the island or out the airlock, etc. All players, even those whose characters have already died, get to vote. Politicking and threats, veiled or otherwise (in-game only!) are encouraged.
* GM comes up with the basic setting and the doom; players flesh out the setting with their goals. (For example, if one character has "Find the money" as a goal, then there is money hidden somewhere that you can find.)
* Possibility of secrets? Everyone writes down a secret (about themselves or the setting), then passes them all into a hat, and everyone draws one. If you draw your own, put it back and draw a second time, but if you draw your own again you keep it.
Since this is a game design blog...
I've got a game design that I'm working on. I'm going to post bits and pieces here for critique. Some of it is pretty readable, some of it is snippets, notes that I've posted about cool ideas and concepts I'd like to fit in somehow.
Watch this space for more.
Watch this space for more.
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