[Dirty Secrets] A few days ago in Chicago ...
GreatWolf:
Hey, Ron.
First, thanks for playing the game! Glad to hear that it went well.
Your insights on Investigation vs. Revelation are helpful. I’ve been corresponding with Ryan Macklin about Investigation sequences, because he stumbles over the terminology, largely for the reasons that you’re discussing. I’ve been debating if there’s a better term to have used, though, frankly, nothing comes to mind.
Your point about using Revelation to establish the investigator as being competent hadn’t actually occurred to me. In my own experience, we often use Revelations as those weird lucky flukes where the investigator just stumbles onto some important information. Pretty much the opposite of what you’re talking about, actually. Though, the rule was originally developed to allow for things like file crawls and the like to be brought into play. You know, information dumps that are necessary but boring to play through.
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In the interests of time, we did a short story, and part of our beginning dialogue concerned how short stories rely less on developing nuances and more on one-two punches in terms of plot and theme.
Well put. This is probably why I prefer the Novella or Novel lengths for the game, because it allows more time for those nuances, which I love about the genre.
I’ve also found that running a Short Story length game can be tricky for a group new to the game, since you have to jump more quickly into interconnecting details and the like. Was this an issue for your group? Did your pre-game discussion help smooth over this difficulty?
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The ins and outs of a Dirty Secrets story are hard to report in written form, even for a short story.
It’s so true! I have a hard time writing Dirty Secrets actual play reports as a result.
Also, how did it feel to play in Chicago? Did that affect the game experience for you? Or was it essentially “generic city” setting with Chicago flavor?
Personally, I’ve found that playing in Peoria results in a weird resonant connection with the fiction. While playing the game, my group can refer to all sorts of geography around town as something of a narrative shorthand. Then, when driving around town, I see these different places and am reminded of the story that we set at that location. Also, I find myself mentally collecting local places of interest so that I have a library of interesting places for my next game of Dirty Secrets. This has actually had a profound impact on my life, as I’ve found myself paying more conscious attention to the place where I live.
Now, to your rules questions.
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1. Here's our biggest rules issue: Violence, whether embedded in Conflict scene or in outright Violence scenes. We couldn't hurt anyone to save our lives. Isabel was scratched once or twice, and that's all. This just doesn't jibe with what I've seen in Dirty Secrets play at (for instance) nearby tables at cons, or read about on-line. Seth, can you explain how this is done?
Jesse’s explanations are pretty good on how to manipulate the mechanics. You don’t even necessariy have to reveal your Violence die, if it happens to match the public Violence die. Just keep bidding on the matching number. This is what happened in the real world occasion that inspired the example on page 96.
Occasionally, you can use this feature to manipulate the outcome of conflicts, simply by threatening Violence in a scene where your opponent is desperate to avoid it.
Basically, you need to choose which is more important to you: controlling the outcome, or dictating the Violence. This isn’t a thematic decision, mind you, and it’s possible to accomplish both. However, generally speaking, you’ll have to decide that one is more important than the other.
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2. Another thing confused me during play, but we were unfamiliar enough with the system to keep me from spotting it as a possible mis-play until I thought about it later. I was the Authority, and Chris and I were running a conflict within an Investigation scene. It was my first one, actually. I rolled five 4's. Chris called it at exactly that value. But we played it as if he'd won, i.e., "guess right." Now that I think about it, I'd actually won, hadn't I? Because if he calls, it's because he says I'm lying, not that I'm telling the truth? (There's even a near-identical example in the book.)
This is potentially very important because if I'd won, it would have stripped Chris of dice and his general dominance over conflicts would not have prevailed throughout the game as it did.
Chris is correct that no dice are lost during a Violence sequence. Had it been an Investigation sequence, then you would be correct. You would have won and Chris would have lost all his dice, forcing a Reflection sequence. Since it was a Violence sequence, then the outcome is simply zero Violence. (See page 54) A weird outcome, to be sure, but it can happen.
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3. Somewhat frustrated by the lack of bloodshed, even given the car bomb, I decided to bring in the second Crime which was already designated a Murder. So if I understand correctly, we could take an "unlawful act" and assign this Crime to it. The question is whether I was correct to take the unlawful act (the car bomb) and turn it into a formal Murder even though it hadn't killed anyone by the rules. Basically I assassinated poor Amir by calling the car bomb a crime, and narrationally, it was revealed later that his body had been in the trunk. Did I illegitimately escalate the unlawful act into more than it was allowed to be? Or should I have had to wait until someone was killed via Violence to make it the second Crime?
This is all completely by the book; your actions were totally legit. Violence only matters within a conflict. Outside conflict, you can narrate whatever you want (subject to Jurisdiction and Appeal, of course).
Really, you shouldn’t look at Violence as being the rules-sanctioned way to hurt and kill people. Actually, Violence is a creative constraint placed on conflict outcomes. It’s supposed to serve as something of a game-created Bang. By definition, Violence is the result of a choice by one of the Characters. So, each time Violence is introduced, the game has just said, “One of these available Characters made a choice that resulted in harm to someone else. What was that choice?” And, hovering behind that question, is another: “Why did the Character do that?” These sorts of questions help lead the players through the game.
Another question for you. You mention that Chris dominated the conflicts. Was he better at the Liar’s Dice minigame? Does this mean that he controlled the Crime Grid?
Again, thanks for playing!
Tim C Koppang:
Ron:
My memory is a bit fuzzy. I wasn't exactly at my creative peak that night after a long day at work and a couple beers.
From what I can remember, the final scene took place at an Indian run casino outside of Chicago. Maya was essentially desperate. She was gambling away all of her money at the roulette table, trying find some comfort. Isabel showed up and the two had it out. I too am having trouble remembering how the the dialogue went exactly. It certainly involved feelings of intense betrayal. The action came to a head when Isabel pulled a gun. Maya made it clear that she wasn't going to give herself up. The last image I have in my head is Maya floating face-down in the lake behind the casino. But I'm racking my brain trying to remember how she ended up dead. Did Isabel (or the cops) shoot her, or was it a suicide?
Seth:
The violence scenes were a bit weird for me. The fact that Ron kept calling for violence scenes where no violence occurred felt unsatisfying. Then again, Chris was actively angling to avoid violence. As Ron said, Chris was anticipating as best he could how to keep the difference between the bid and the dice at zero. I think with a better grasp of Liar's Dice, Ron could have forced at least one point of violence. As it was, Chris's better understanding of the mini-game definitely helped him guide the story towards his preferences.
Another interesting way that Liar's Dice shaped our game came when I lost my entire dice pool very early in the game. This neutered me as the Authority during investigation scenes. In addition, Chris had no incentive to call for revelation scenes because he never seemed to lose any dice. (For those of you who don't remember, all of the players replenish their dice pool after a revelation scene.) With some hesitation -- because he knew I would get all of my dice back -- Chris did ask for the single revelation scene the Ron described. But for a good chunk of the game, Chris was quite dominate.
Tim C Koppang:
Quote from: GreatWolf on June 05, 2009, 04:49:51 AM
Another question for you. You mention that Chris dominated the conflicts. Was he better at the Liar’s Dice minigame? Does this mean that he controlled the Crime Grid?
What do you mean "controlled the Crime Grid"? I thought the investigator is the only one who can add to the crime grid regardless of the dice? Is that wrong?
Ron Edwards:
Hi Seth,
I remember the end better now, with that prompting. Maya did end up dead in the stinky water of southern Lake Michigan, but if I’m not mistaken, Isabel did not shoot her and I think Maya shot herself rather than be taken by the cops.
Regarding the Investigation term, I don’t think there’s any reason to change the term itself. I do think that when introducing the game to others, I’m going to make that the first and most up-front point, just as I did this time. I also told them about which scenes end chapters and which scenes (or specific outcomes, like losing dice) require specific following scenes. The downloaded help-sheets did help, but I think that verbal description is a required introduction to understanding what they say.
Regarding the content of Revelations, the way I see it is not what that particular kind of scene is for, but what Investigation isn’t for. The Revelation itself could be luck, technical research, an insight based on a clue, an insight based on reflection, or who knows what. The point to me is that Investigation isn’t any of these things, specifically because its content (totally) lacks the certainty of the Revelation.
I was thinking that The Big Lebowski is a fine example of an Investigation-only story. The Dude indeed figures out what’s really going on, but that corresponds in Dirty Secrets terms to the actual revealing of the Crime, not the result of a specific investigation or even a revelation in a pre-climax scene.
Therefore if a player wants his or her Investigator to be demonstrated as a competent finder-outer, and I suggest that this is such a common thing in role-playing as to be practically axiomatic in many people’s minds, then Revelation will serve (as opposed to being always for) that purpose. I also suggest that people who aren’t habitual role-players may not have this issue.
Regarding the short-story form, we had no difficulties. Our pre-game discussion merely touched on something we all already knew and probably didn’t need even to mention, once the term “short story” had been stated. Besides, this is a group familiar with Spione, carry, Sweet Agatha (for two of us), Dead of Night, and many other games in which picking up extant material and making it into interconnecting details is a primary activity.
Regarding playing in Chicago (or rather, in the local-now setting), you’re singin’ a song I learned a long time ago. I started doing this back in 1985, with Champions, following the example of the earliest Marvel comics from two decades before that. All the virtues of doing so – and I think they are distinctive and many – became clear to me over the next eight years or so of playing that game, and confirmed every so often since. The difference between doing this and what people call “modern-day setting” is tremendous, but strangely it’s hard to find in role-playing texts. There’s a game called Heroic Do-Gooders and Dastardly Deed-Doers whose text expresses precisely why better than I can, and I think it’s the only example.
I should clarify to you that in our Violence scenes, neither Tim nor I was especially invested in dumping the violence directly onto the Investigator so much as adding violence to the story itself in some way. OK, maybe Tim was after Chris a little at one point, but mainly not.
The one Violence scene Tim references is the one in which I rolled five 4’s. What I didn’t understand at the time was that harm done was based on the difference between the bid and the reality when it was called, so I was oriented toward “winning” the match and called five 4’s. Which I did win, when Chris called it … but I thought that was going to give me 5 harm done, and was disappointed to learn it was 0. So the issue wasn’t the Liar’s Dice but my understanding of the rules. If I’d understood them better, I would have bid low 4’s and kept returning to 4’s at higher numbers if Chris had escalated.
You may be interested to know that in every violence-including scene, which Investigation or Violence, the most done was one weensy level.
Minor correction to Tim’s post: he means Reflection, not Revelation.
Chris won the Liar’s Dice procedure a lot, although not every single time. He never lost dice or if he did, very few. I don’t know whether that means he was better at it than us, but I also know that I learn such procedures slowly, over many experiences. As for “controlling” the grid, I’m not sure. I think he wrote in all the names, or almost all of them, if that’s what you mean. Which I thought was perfectly all right, as every name he wrote in made a lot of sense to me based on what was going on. None of us enjoy competing for “story control,” so such mechanisms operate for us in an, “oh boy, who’s he going to add” fun way.
Best, Ron
GreatWolf:
Quote from: Tim C Koppang on June 05, 2009, 06:07:27 AM
What do you mean "controlled the Crime Grid"? I thought the investigator is the only one who can add to the crime grid regardless of the dice? Is that wrong?
Whoever finally won the conflict (after Pushes and the like) gets to add the name and move the Witness.
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