[Poison'd] The Resolute's last stance
Arturo G.:
About the new rules for pursuit, they look nice and they solve the problems we were finding.
Question: What are the real (not fiction) consequences of "falling behind". I have a discussion about if that means that another pursuit may be engaged immediately, or only if properly justified by the characters actions in the middle.
As the rules say, losing a roll means action fails "or else succeeds to no advantage". Yes. I'm forgetting that option too often. In my example I was only realizing that there were other options I was not previously considering.
And, of course, we never force a character (neither due to rules or due to fiction) do something that the player feels inconsistent with the character logic. This is a lesson we learned the hard way long ago.
Anyway, I think I have now a better understanding of the rules, and I can see better how they are really covering all possibilities for developing from/to the fiction.
A minor observation. In the escalation sidebars: Sword and gun fights say that the loser is under the power (or submitted to the will) of the winner. Is it not also true for Fist and Knife fights? Or does the loser of fist/knife fights have the possibility to draw a sword or get a pistol and "escalated" to the really dangerous kind of fights?
I mention it because I would say it is an important rule of the fight. You always fight for something. At least one of my players was worry about not finding the consequences of the different levels of escalation really relevant for many possible situations, because he was missing the "submitted to the winner will" point.
And it is also related to the consequences of ship fights. Cannon and Broadside fights are really a meaning of diminishing the other ship power before boarding, which is the only real way to submit it to your will. However, the mechanic that allows the loser to inflict the same damage on the winner with the use of one/two Xs makes it very very dangerous to use that approach. I'm not saying it is not consistent in the fiction, because it really is. I was just noticing it and comparing to the personal fights.
Quote from: lumpley on July 26, 2008, 09:06:26 AM
If it's the disconnect I think you mean, it's on purpose - essential to the design, in fact. It's quite possible that committing more sins, suffering more violence, fulfilling or abandoning your ambitions, will have absolutely no effect on the game's fiction. It's also quite possible that those will be the only thing that really matters. The disconnect allows the rules to leave it up to the game in play, a product of both randomness and the group's human creativity, to determine which.
This is intimately related to the rules for leaving play, by the way, and follows Sorcerer's lead very closely.
I see. Now I think that even if we were using them for some flashbacks, we were somehow preventing ourselves to exploit them in other circumstances. This is the reason we were feeling it like a lack. I think I read a nice example of actual play in your blog talking about how the sufferings coming from Brimstone Jack were naturally creating an idea of who was him during play. I would say it is related. The players are the ones that choose the relevance of those details in the fiction and they introduce them in the way they prefer.
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This one though, yeah, it's kind of too bad. I just couldn't figure out a way for the size of a crew (for instance) to matter differently than its relatively bloodthirstiness (for instance).
Well, we were using it to justify fictional events and also creating some ad-hoc rules. After the casualties, The Dagger's crew could not keep the other ship, and they were very near to lose so many people to be even unable to sail their own ship. I was playing with the idea that each time that the crew suffered losses I was decreasing the crew size by one "range". Then, spending Leisure to get new crew members and increase the crew range again.
I can also imagine a penalty or a bonus brinkmanship dice for pursuits or non-fight maneuvers depending on the size and readiness of the crew. It is more or less implicit in some bits of the text.
I was also thinking on what I would have done if they were able to keep the other ship. There are consort and fleet rules. But, how many Leisure points may award to sell a damaged royal navy ship to other pirates?
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That's why it's called Brinksmanship! Winning is the more dangerous position. I love that effect with all my little heart.
I'm not sure. I will need to think and reconsider it (surely in actual play again).
I cannot see all the implications on the resolution and on the relation between resolution mechanics and fiction. But I really like to be pushed forward.
BTW, brinkmanship is one of those words that broke my head. I was not finding any translation in my usual English-to-Spanish dictionaries. Thanks a lot to the English on-line dictionaries.
And finally, about bargains... yes, yes, yes. More options we were not considering.
This game is really a nice piece. My expectations to play it again (and enjoy it better) have increased.
lumpley:
Fantastic, thank you.
Quote from: Arturo G. on July 28, 2008, 01:10:05 AM
A minor observation. In the escalation sidebars: Sword and gun fights say that the loser is under the power (or submitted to the will) of the winner. Is it not also true for Fist and Knife fights? Or does the loser of fist/knife fights have the possibility to draw a sword or get a pistol and "escalated" to the really dangerous kind of fights?
I mention it because I would say it is an important rule of the fight. You always fight for something. At least one of my players was worry about not finding the consequences of the different levels of escalation really relevant for many possible situations, because he was missing the "submitted to the winner will" point.
Oh no, your friend's quite right. Even sword and gun fights - standing over someone with your sword at their throat or your gun to their head STILL doesn't reliably mean you get what you want. Fighting for something is overall a bad way to get it. If you want something from someone, but you get into a fight with them, you'll usually find that at the end you've beaten them up instead of getting what you want.
The solution is bargains. Use fighting as a threat and a punishment, and use bargains to get what you want.
The sword-at-their-throat or gun-to-their-head is really just a strong bargaining position anyway.
-Vincent
Arturo G.:
Quote from: lumpley on July 28, 2008, 05:52:01 AM
The solution is bargains. Use fighting as a threat and a punishment, and use bargains to get what you want.
The sword-at-their-throat or gun-to-their-head is really just a strong bargaining position anyway.
I see. Could we say it is like negotiating the bargain "with a stick"?
lumpley:
We might, at that.
-Vincent
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