Prepping for The Pool: Hogwarts Class of ’79 (long)
Frédéric (Demiurge):
I'm glad to see how it worked, especially about the 75% of Characters scenes (potential intimate and school scenes), it's exactly what I'm looking for !
Ok, so I would like to know, in regard to your HP/The pool experience, if one or more of these potential additional rules would have positive impact on the game :
- What would you think about mechanics that would evaluate character's popularity which would be useful during conflicts ? (Because it's an important theme in the books, but we can merely let players chose if it's important for their characters in letting them write a trait about it).
- What do you think about Stats that would increase differences between characters (like « emotion », « body », « studiousness », « acuity »)... It sure would modify the body of the system.
- Do you think it would be interesting to make adults or older students harder to beat (in fight as in any other kind of conflict, of course) ? Maybe in demanding more than one 1 to win conflict... graduating with the difference between enemy's and PC's level.
- Did you miss sometimes articulated conflicts like in Dogs in the vineyard, or did you find the fact that one roll ends conflicts better ? Why ?
- Would it be good to present some lists of traits for example, that would help the (newbie) player to stay in the fiction model of Harry Potter ?
- Maybe we could make magic more powerful but harder or more risky to use than any other action.
Now some questions :
- Did the players totally respect the effects of their powers while telling their monologues of victory ? (Is it so important ?)
- How did you rule the spells learning ?
- How did you (the group) decide which house won which price ?
- Did the PC suffer ? I think it's quite important if we want to approach the books' dramatic intensity.
- Do you think you could play chronicles the way you played ?
As you can see, I'm wondering if The Pool is totally adequate to play Harry Potter, or if it would be fun or useful to customize it.
Frank Tarcikowski:
Hi Frédéric!
I think the dichotomy lies between two very different approaches. Our approach was that we already knew the canon pretty well and did not need anything in terms of System to help us out with it. This includes not only the setting but also the structure of the story. Thus, The Pool was very well suited for us.
If on the other hand you wanted to write a game system that enabled players without such profound Harry Potter knowledge to create a “true” Harry Potter story, you would have to provide a LOT more guidance by the System. I don’t think The Pool will be of much help with that. Also, I think that it’s BLOODY HARD.
I’ll tackle your questions one by one.
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- What would you think about mechanics that would evaluate character's popularity which would be useful during conflicts ? (Because it's an important theme in the books, but we can merely let players chose if it's important for their characters in letting them write a trait about it).
That sounds like a very neat idea, if you want to take the second approach mentioned above.
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- What do you think about Stats that would increase differences between characters (like « emotion », « body », « studiousness », « acuity »)... It sure would modify the body of the system.
I would say: Reasonably few. Maybe only the ones that are particularly good or bad, for each character.
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- Do you think it would be interesting to make adults or older students harder to beat (in fight as in any other kind of conflict, of course) ? Maybe in demanding more than one 1 to win conflict... graduating with the difference between enemy's and PC's level.
I think that requiring more than one 1 seriously messes up probabilities in The Pool, so I would not recommend it with that system. In the context of The Pool, it’s the players’ job to keep their MoVs reasonable. In our game, when Death Eaters attacked the Nymphs on New Year’s Eve, the players never even thought of narrating how their characters wiped the floor with them. They narrated how they managed to somehow hold their ground until Abigail’s dad and the Longbottoms came racing in on their broomsticks to save them.
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- Did you miss sometimes articulated conflicts like in Dogs in the vineyard, or did you find the fact that one roll ends conflicts better ? Why ?
I did not miss them a stitch. Our Shared Imagined Space was so rich and our narration so detailed that no such thing was required at all. It would only have annoyed us. I have to say that these players are the crème de la crème of the German scene. It does not get any better than this.
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- Would it be good to present some lists of traits for example, that would help the (newbie) player to stay in the fiction model of Harry Potter ?
I found the list of spells very helpful, but would not recommend example traits. I think especially if you have a source material you adore and want to celebrate, an important part of the fun is to find your own interpretation and/or addition to the source material.
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- Maybe we could make magic more powerful but harder or more risky to use than any other action.
As wizards use magic all the time and for everything, I tend to find this counter-intuitive.
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- Did the players totally respect the effects of their powers while telling their monologues of victory ? (Is it so important ?)
Yes, and yes. It’s the key.
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- How did you rule the spells learning ?
I totally left that to the players to decide, with one exception: When Prof. Mantis taught them the Anti-Intruder-Jinx, a very difficult spell, I announced that whoever wanted to master it would need to roll some dice.
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- How did you (the group) decide which house won which price ?
The Quidditch matches were all played out and decided by one or several rolls (except the ones against Ravenclaw, as no PC was on that team, so I just narrated them briefly). These games also carried a lot of thematic weight because Sheamus, the Slytherin guy, was a beater who went by the nickname of “Killer”, so it was always interesting to see whom of his friends he would aim at or not… in one game, he actually aimed at one of them in the crowd!
The result of the house cup was just ruled by the tyrannical GM. I had mentioned several times that Slytherin was in the lead. When the final banquet came, Dumbledore announced some last minute changes (d’oh). Sheamus’ player said something to the effect of, “Yeah, of course now Gryffindor wins again.” So I decided, right there, that Slytherin would win by the points Sheamus gained.
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- Did the PC suffer ? I think it's quite important if we want to approach the books' dramatic intensity.
They suffered and rejoiced like only a 15-year-old can. ;o)
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- Do you think you could play chronicles the way you played ?
With those players? You bet. Unfortunately, I only see them twice a year for a forum meet-up.
- Frank
Frédéric (Demiurge):
Wonderful !
You're analysis of the dichotomy seems pretty right.
Thank you so much for your detailed answer.
I have only one thing to say : let's playtest !
I'll first try a play with the system of The Pool without changing anything, an then, I'll try to modify what deserves it, according to my feeling of course.
Thanks again.
Frank Tarcikowski:
I wanted to add some thoughts on the plot-driven aproach I took with this game (as opposed to the bang-driven approach that I use e.g. in my Sorcerer games). How to run plot-driven adventures is really not a secret; most role-players are much more familiar with it than with the bang-driven approach. If it’s well done, the PCs get involved with the larger events at some point, they figure out what’s going on, and then it’s up to them what to do about it. The trick is to have a strong connection between the PCs and the plot, and a strong back story so the plot makes sense and you can easily tell how the PCs’ actions will change the course of events.
In this game, I was aiming to create a plot to resemble the novels. I had to be flexible as to how to relay the necessary information to the players: Some of it they found out by looking for it, and they drew the right conclusions quicker than I expected. Some of it I basically threw into their face (joking OOC about the bluntness of it).
There was one difficult part, though: In every Harry Potter novel, the heroes get isolated at some point so they have to fight the Evil on their own without help from the grown-up wizards. I used the OWL exams as a springboard because it was pretty unlikely they would not turn up there. The Death Eaters released a bunch of ghost dogs as a distraction and then the Wolpertinger did its magic squeal and sent everybody running (except for the PCs who were blocking their ears). Of course, no silence spell could stop it. This was probably a bit of railroading, but nobody tried to resist it because it was just obviously “the right thing to happen”. (Also, it was already 2:30 a.m. and we were, well, not rushing it, but going straight for the final.)
I found that running this plot-driven scenario worked out very well, especially in the context of a 13 hour convention game. Of course, the majority of play did not have anything to do with the plot. Through the personal relationships and romantic interests they had established between their characters, and through their actions in play, the players kept creating bang-like situations for each other all the time and I could just lean back and sometimes, at the right point, pour some oil into the fire or offer some way out.
I also found that it was extremely helpful to have two players in the group who favor author stance, as a balance to two other players who strongly favor actor stance (the fifth one switches between both, I think). Since I’ve played with all of these people before, I composed the group like that on purpose. In fact, I resisted quite some social pressure in choosing one of the author stance players over another player who would also have been an actor stance guy.
(As an aside, the player I did choose – Poppy’s player – contributed to play fantastically even though she was suffering from a headache that turned into migraine in the evening. She only quit play after vomitting her soul out, around 1:00 a.m., and the rest of us were totally baffled because we hadn’t even noticed up to then. When she quit, she was so disappointed she was close to tears.)
- Frank
Frank Tarcikowski:
One more addition, just in case this isn’t obvious to everyone:
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Of course, no silence spell could stop it. This was probably a bit of railroading, but nobody tried to resist it because it was just obviously “the right thing to happen”. (Also, it was already 2:30 a.m. and we were, well, not rushing it, but going straight for the final.)
Of course they could have easily resisted with a roll. No player has to accept railroading in The Pool.
- Frank
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