power19

What is your game about?

Thematically? A small band of adventurers exploring a dangerous landscape. This is zero-to-hero, or possibly more 'murder hobo' to saga.

Mechanically? The game is about speed.

What do the characters do?

Fulfil personal goals, plot, introduce their backgrounds; and fight bandits, creatures, and anything else big enough to pose a threat. They do all this throughout slowly unravelling twisted plots, introduced through the Side Quest mechanic.

What do the players (including the GM if there is one) do?

The players plan, build character history, plot, scheme, and try to work out the best moves in combat, or the most optimal knack to buy next.

The GM prepares a night with encounter tables and Side Quests. A 'main plot line' is an optional extra, as different strains of Side Quests can form their own arc.

How does your setting (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

The lack of setting allows GMs to add their own worlds.

The optional setting revolves loosely around a man vs. Nature theme, where a well-armed and vicious 'outside' constantly encroaches upon the humanoid populations of Fenestra. Humanoids are the natural prey of the creatures of Fenestra, which results in very little war, or disease (who has time for that?). Instead, death typically comes from the jaws (or beak) of a large creature which already knows how humans taste.

The solution? The Night Guard. The expendable young (or even old) of the realm, are expected to sign up, and go to protect any local farmers who request aid. The result is a group of people who consider hunting goblins and griffins to be part of a normal Tuesday, which forms a natural starting place for groups unsure where to begin.

How does the Character Creation of your game reinforce what your game is about?

Character creation is random, which allows play to start quickly. The Story Points system allows players to retrofit their backstory to the world once they've already started.

Character creation can be completed in 15 minutes with new players.

What types of behaviours/styles of play does your game reward (and punish if necessary)?

Players fulfil their own code (there's a list of suggested codes) and (optionally) by killing NPCs. The codes mean that each player will have a different belief system. Some will try to make others happy, to play pranks, and drink a lot. Others want to be the first to walk into danger, to defeat massive monsters, and to track down anyone who has previously defeated them in combat.

How are behaviours and styles of play rewarded or punished in your game?

Players get XP for their characters to boost abilities. Additionally, better tactics in combat mean a better chance of survival.

How are the responsibilities of narration and credibility divided in your game?

Firstly, the campaign books themselves have a responsibility to provide an easy narrative. Secondly, the GM fleshes out the world and ties the Side Quests together cohesively. Lastly, players are expected to use Story Points well. They can be used as you please, but telling a connected series of stories about your past, each involving a little more information on 'what you did in the great war' is better than persistently saying 'I spend 1 Story Point to know Elvish, because I once knew a guy, and he taught me elvish'.

What does your game do to command the players' attention, engagement, and participation? (i.e. What does the game do to make them care?)

Firstly, players are threatened with character death rather often. Secondly, players are invited to create some of the world with Story Points, which then gives them a reason to care if something bad happens with the NPCs they've brought into play. Third, players usually enjoy the new abilities, since gaining in power often means more options, such as additional abilities in combat, or more flexibility in spells.

What are the resolution mechanics of your game like?

2D6 + Attribute + Skill, vs 7 + the enemy's Attribute + Skill. Alternatively, the GM can roll, because there is no mechanical difference between a player rolling or a GM rolling - it's all just 'PC score' vs 'NPC score', with 2D6 variation.

This lack of distinction means that the GM can roll when an ogre attacks the players, or the players can roll to defend against 3 goblins each. Additionally, for most actions only one set of dice are rolled, and the result applies to the entire group.

Want to sneak? Someone rolls 2D6 and everyone adds their Dexterity + Stealth. The result is that it's quite plausible for 100% of the party to succeed in the roll.

How do the resolution mechanics reinforce what your game is about?

The resolution mechanics enforce speed. Having four players defend against 3 goblins each, rather than the GM rolling for 12 goblins attacking means 1/4 of the time is required to resolve that action.

Additionally, the game often feels very dangerous because of a distinction between 'Hit Points' and 'Fate Points'. While they mostly work the same, if someone loses Fate Points, this represents 'a close call', (but without any damage). The Fate Points then 'heal' quickly.

All characters have very few Hit Points, perhaps around 7 on average, and dealing 7 Damage is quite normal. This means that Hit Point Damage represents a near-death every time you lose 1, and losing even 1 represents a wound which follows the PC for some time. The regenerated Fate Points mean the PC can still operate fine, but the game feels more dangerous, even when only a couple of Hit Points have been lost.

Do characters in your game advance? If so, how?

Sure. Gain XP and you gain any stat you want.

The stat costs are non-linear, so buying up a little magic, or +1 Strength is cheap, but buying +3 Strength or the third magic sphere is extremely expensive.

How does the character advancement (or lack thereof) reinforce what your game is about?

Groups naturally pick new abilities which help each other, as teamwork significantly improves the chances of success. Additionally, when players are selecting new magic spheres or Knacks, they can be chained together to produce exponentially more powerful effects. This reinforces a feeling of quickly gaining power as characters rapidly ramp up from someone who hides from bandits, to someone capable of taking down ghouls, to killing a ghoul in a single, precise, strike, to eventually playing someone comfortably taking out multiple bandits in a single, fast, strike.

What sort of product or effect do you want your game to produce in or for the players?

Impatience. I want groups to get used to exciting combats which last 2.5 rounds on average, and make them fear death and think about their actions every time.

Also frustration. I want the Side Quest mechanic, which structures encounters, to promote persistent interest and some fear in the next encounter. Wherever players look for the 'next stage', they will often find more of some other plot, until they are embroiled in multiple plot arcs, at which point the old plots loop-round to find them again. It doesn't much matter if they choose to pursue an arc or not - the plot finds them no matter where they go.

What areas of your game receive extra attention and colour? Why?

Combat is truly tactical. It has no Fixed Strategy Nash Equilibrium. It allows players who think more about their options to get better results.

Additionally, the magic system allows players a little flexibility, so high-level miracle workers can cast spells across massive areas. While this isn't a game-changer when it comes to battle (no use casting a spell across an army if you're not fighting armies very often), casting even a simple mist spell that reaches across an entire dungeon, or across massive portions of a city gives the players a real sense of growing power.

Which part of your game are you most excited about or interested in? Why?

Random Character Creation, Combat, Side Quests, and Story Points.

Random Character creation and Story Points allow players to start the game instantly, without reading lore or writing essays about their backstory. The Side Quests allow GMs to spin an interesting narrative, often with emergent complexity, with relatively little preparation time.

Combat is simply interesting - make the wrong decision and you stand to lose a lot. Make the right decision and you can save a friend or put the enemy in their place quickly.

Finally, I'm most interested in the unique GM tools the game offers, written in LaTeX.

When you use LaTeX, you can write down \person{1}[\npc{\F}{Alice}]. This produces a female NPC with Strength 1, called 'Alice', then sets the Hit Points to (6 + Strength) 7, then sets the Damage to (1D6 + Strength) 1D6+1, while calculating weapon bonuses, Initiative, alternative initiative for knacks, then all other derived states, before finally using all of this information to calculate the total XP value for defeating Alice in combat.

As if that weren't sufficiently work-shy, a number of pre-made characters such as \gnomishillusionist, and \elf are given as generic NPCs for when you just want any old elf on your page, but don't really care if they focus on Invocation magic or the rapier.

Every time you summon another \dragon, a completely different dragon, with random stats, will appear on the page. These stats are pseudo-random but each within the plausible range, so fighters may have a number of weapons, but gnomes will never suddenly get Strength +3 or a broadsword.

This system, coupled with an extensive wiki allows GMs to write adventures quickly, while the computer takes care of the boring stuff.

Where does your game take the players that other games can’t, don’t, or won’t?

Long-term Damage. Get a real wound and you might keep that injury for the rest of the session, or longer. The character is still fully functional, because they mostly survive by using Fate Points, but the threat of death remains a little more real than it was before.

The game also includes more natural foreshadowing freedom, because the Side Quest system will have plot-points jumping out at them from every corner of the world, no matter where they go.

What are your publishing goals for your game?

It's already published under the GNU Public Licence. The next goal is to gain enough interest that people make their own versions, playtest, make changes, have disagreements, and go again. The hope is to make a real community-based RPG which a hundred sources can feed into, all at the same time.

Who is your target audience?

1. Impatient people, who like tactical combat.
2. Confused people who want help with the narrative elements.
3. Opinionated people, who want to be able to change the rules and setting, rather than make increasingly unsightly house-rule notes.