[Air Patrol] Ronnies feedback
Gryffudd:
First, the most recent post (Dust Devils/Nine Worlds):
Oh yeah, I wasn't getting them for emulation purposes, just to look at and see how they did things in general. I'm about halfway through Dust Devils, and I can see what you mean. Definitely worth reading.
Now on to the Main Post:
1) Hm, I can think of a few types of crimes they could be called in for. One broad aspect would be high technology. For the Air Patrol to be called in, I think the crime would have to involve people with high technology (enough that regular police and 'g men' wouldn't be able to handle it) or would require knowledge of high technology, an expertise that members of the Air Patrol would necessarily have.
Apart from that particular 'theme,' I could see them involved in investigated/stopping a number of different things:
- Terrorism: Mad bombers and anarchists were a bit of a holdover from the Victorian fiction period, but still appeared occasionally in stories, as well as foreign agents intent on causing problems and criminals extorting money.
- Militias/gangsters: Groups capable of undermining the law and interested in acquiring high technology to further their ends.
- Spies: Theft of military or government secrets, either by foreign agents or people trying to get rich.
- The creation of artificial life: Robots, if smart enough/sentient could cause a cultural backlash similar to some of what is currently going on in the realm of genetics (or more accurately the potential future of genetics). Against God's plan and all. Something like The Island of Dr Moreau would have a similar effect. I could see a clash between religious groups, who want robots banned, and companies that see robots as an efficient form of unpaid labour. There's a parallel to slavery there too. Do thinking robots get rights? If so, whose rights do they get in a society which was still segregated?
- The creation of other banned devices: Other technologies might be banned as well, in the interests of order. Death rays, and such. This area could also have some corruption, if I wanted to to add some grey into a black and white universe. I agree, though, that I should get the rest of the system straight before worrying about that. I think I'll avoid anything to do with time travel machines, though. Too much of a headache.*
- Ownership of restricted devices. If the advanced flight packs used by the Air Patrol are not legal to own, they would likely be in charge of making sure others don't get their hands on them.
2) Hm, this is turning out to be the hardest part to work out right now. My own thinking is that I want to have the players do what I believe is the most fun, which is the dramatic scenes, whether it's action or interaction with other characters. The actual forensics aren't, usually, the fun part. There are clues, you find them, you do something with the information. It seems to me that what's important is what happens next. You've found a ticket to a club in a dead scientist's hand, that leads to checking out the club, interviewing (or interrogating) people there, getting into a fight, or whatever the scene results in. Finding the ticket isn't the fun part, roleplaying through the scene is. Unless the scene ends up not being something important, in which case it's a waste of time. I guess I want to set it up to get people to those interesting scenes during the investigation, culminating in one or more confrontations with the villain(s) later on.
One problem I have with investigation in general is when the GM is not giving out enough clues or the players just can't put them together and the game stalls. I thought about having investigation scenes potentially give bennies as a reward and allow a player who is stuck spend a benny to get a clue from the GM, possibly suggesting the type of clue ('Do I find anything out about where X is hiding?), but I'm not sure if that's the right way to handle it.
Basically, I don't mind skipping over the boring parts of the investigation, as long as the players get to have fun playing the dramatic parts. Trying to make that work gave me enough of a headache that I took a couple days off.
3) a) Got what you were saying about a character sheet representing (in text form) a 'sketch' of the character. A while back you put up an Actual Play post that I found very interesting. It was for Zero. The idea that the character started out as almost a blank slate and added new skills (I think it was skills) based on what had happened in play was brilliant. That couldn't be directly used here, since the serials and other source material definitely follow the 'group of archetypes/stereotypes' idea, but I think the idea of the core of the character not changing, but adding things as the game goes, like new contacts, reputations, unique gear, favours owed, tricks learned, and so on could be interesting. Not major changes to the character sheet, but mostly minor notations. It could use the case file idea you mentioned. Maybe a part of the sheet where you write down the name of the case just finished and a comment on it, and add a minor benefit gained from it. It might be workable, anyway.
b) About phasing characters out, I can see it. If they change little (or not at all) in terms of ability, there's no balancing needed if someone wants to switch to a different character, though you may need to pick a new leader. Whether the phasing out is permanent or temporary, I don't see a real problem, as long as someone doesn't go overboard, making new characters every session.
c) Hm, I think it fits the genre more if the characters can't die normally, but may be able to do some sort of heroic sacrifice. If this was a gritty noir game, I'd say characters could die during any dramatic scene, but it's meant to be more heroic, with the main characters trying ridiculously dangerous things and, almost, always surviving.
4) Yeah, a lot of the stuff around the Prognosticator and the Whisperers is unformed and typed up on the fly. That's the second hardest part for me to work through right now, after the investigation part. The initial idea was that they may be sinister, but the Air Patrol uses them anyway. Near the end of the 24 hours, I decided maybe they tapped into something spiritual. At first it was something sinister, and the 'evil air patrol' guy was affected. After he disappeared, they tinkered with it more and found something they could tap into without driving anyone crazy. At the time I was thinking the spirit of the city, but something more appropriate might be the spirits of the dead.
Sorry, a bit of a tangent there. A more explicit answer is, no, I don't see the Protagonist/Whisperers being sinister now. Just a weird science tool that perhaps no-one really understands, but they use it since it works. It may be creepy, but not evil.
I had heard of fanmail, but hadn't thought about it during the initial writing. Going back to what I wrote above about the investigation phase, maybe I could say that a benny spent on getting a clue is effectively given by the Whisperer whispering something to them.
Maybe the Whisperers are more directly connected to the Prognosticator and allow some sort of communication with HQ. Iffy on that one too.
As for success breeds success and adversity breeds success, I do have the possibility of the character's weakness being used to automatically fail at something and get a benny. What if normally bennies were gained by success? Make success breeds success the norm, but with an ability to use the character's weakness once each session to turn adversity into a benny. Or maybe instead of the weakness creating a failure to get a benny, make it that if the character fails at something, and they can involve their weakness in the failure, they can get a benny from it. If they can't explain how their weakness was involved, no adversity benny.
Bennies could then be spent on clues, bonuses, or whatever they're set up for.
5) Agreed. The Tesla-style flight packs are supposed to be Air Patrol only. I could see making it illegal to have them if you're not the government. Everyone else has to use an Edison flight pack, which is not remotely as good, but it's cheaper and it can fly, so it has its uses if you're not a sky cop. Basically, the Edison type is about as fast as an average car and can fly 10 miles or so. The Tesla one can fly much faster, as fast as a fast aircraft, maybe, and generates it's own power, so it has potentially infinite flight time. Is that the sort of ability you were meaning, or did you mean a more active ability, like a power? I did some thinking on maybe having each Air Patrol flight pack have it's own special thing due to each one being made by hand rather than on an assembly line. It may be too super-hero-y, though.
6) Agreed. Actually, the (very extensive) rewrite I never finished for After the Fall used a similar idea. Rolls were a dice pool, with the average die roll giving you one success. Therefore the average roll was equal to the level of the skill in the first place. If the GM wanted to make things faster, they could have only PCs roll, and use the NPC's static skill number as a difficulty. It wouldn't be hard to work that idea into the rules, since the only dice rolled at the moment are risk dice for combat and in case you need to push your skill beyond it's normal level outside of combat. I think it might still need some difficulty modifiers, though. That is, if the difficulty to hit an NPC is their skill score, the difficulty to hit them while they are in fog/darkness should be higher. I could have modifiers be just a general idea rather than a big list, though. Slightly more difficult, +1; up to veery much more difficult, +3.
Or maybe there are no modifiers, you use the one set of difficulties currently used for unopposed rolls. The difficulty to hit someone then depends on the situation they're in, but if it's lower than the level they have in the skill they're defending with, they can use that skill level instead. If they want to boost their skill level with risk dice defensively, they can, at the risk of complications cropping up as normal.
7) Hm, I'll have to think on that. I was initially thinking of the complications always being negative, so that you won't want to always roll 5 risk dice every time. If complications are going to be more neutral in nature, then I think some other negative will have to be put onto the risk dice to keep them a risk. I'll certainly remove the actual skill penalty from them, however. It's something else I threw in in the final hour of working on it, to help cover up the fact that I was having a hard time coming up with complication ideas right then.
* Not that I intend on detailing the world much. I'm thinking I want to have examples of villains, plots, and such, though, and I'll be avoiding time travel ones. Good for stories, not good for most rpgs.
Thanks again for the assistance, Ron. It is a lot of help. I think most of it can be working smoothly shortly. The only real problem areas I see (unless I've gone of the deep end somewhere) are investigation and the connection to Whispers.
I'll try to have an updated pdf ready by Friday afternoon.
Thanks muchly,
Pat
PS: Any really odd typos are due to the spellchecker on here, honest.
Gryffudd:
Almost forgot 'It Wasn't Really Me.' Still not sure what to do with it, but maybe finding out if the villain has that as an ability could be handled as part of the investigation. Or it could just be dropped. I like the idea, but I'm not sure it'll work out.
Pat
Gryffudd:
Going to try to get the pdf updated and posted Tuesday night. Wasn't able to get much done this weekend, and reading something Vincent posted (I forget if it was a recent post or old one) got me thinking about 'what I want from the game' vs 'what the people I want to play the game want from it.' I definitely need to take a bit and think about how I play a game as compared to how the people I write a game for play it. Urg, low sleep is not grammar's friend. Should still be able to get most of the pdf updates done tomorrow, though.
Pat
Ron Edwards:
Hi Pat,
I've been working up a big reply which unfortunately got steamrolled by the demands of my weekend. I'll try to get it posted this afternoon.
Best, Ron
Ron Edwards:
Hi Patrick,
1. It's great to see you considering the crimes. I suggest that you focus on the social aspect of the crimes, i.e., what actual harm they do, and against whom. It's useful to consider that law enforcement is at least as much about preserving the institutions of power as about stopping or preventing harm to ordinary citizens. I don't bring that up to be all edgy but rather to provide the kind of range that makes any cop drama more than Boy Scout propaganda (rather, if it isn't merely such propaganda).
Regarding technological crimes, I urge that you avoid circular logic: "New technologies are dangerous, they're dangerous because they're new technologies." Conceiving of the real danger is a big deal because it validates the fictional presence of the Air Patrol in the first place.
Ah ha, ROBOTS! Here's the reference for you, and note the publication date: 1920. See the R.U.R. Wikipedia entry and the actual R.U.R. script.
2. I'm going to extract your own words from the investigation section to show that you've already reached a conclusion, and that all you have to do is slough off the expectations and habits of highly-ingrained but essentially stupid play.
Quote
... I want to have the players do what I believe is the most fun, which is the dramatic scenes, whether it's action or interaction with other characters.
... There are clues, you find them, you do something with the information. It seems to me that what's important is what happens next.
... I guess I want to set it up to get people to those interesting scenes during the investigation, culminating in one or more confrontations with the villain(s) later on.
... Basically, I don't mind skipping over the boring parts of the investigation, as long as the players get to have fun playing the dramatic parts.
See what I mean? You've totally answered the question. So my question as I read through all this was, why is he repeating this over and over? It's like stomping around in sticky mud. I think it's because this is so unfamiliar even though you totally recognize the truth when you see it, the expectations and habits are still all over your shoes and pants. You're engaged in the uncomfortable but ultimately productive process of scraping it off.
Quote
One problem I have with investigation in general is when the GM is not giving out enough clues or the players just can't put them together and the game stalls. I thought about having investigation scenes potentially give bennies as a reward and allow a player who is stuck spend a benny to get a clue from the GM, possibly suggesting the type of clue ('Do I find anything out about where X is hiding?), but I'm not sure if that's the right way to handle it.
And that bit is the mud not on your pants, but the whole swamp that's doing its very best to drag you back in. All that kind of talk is based on the idea that the events of the investigation (the clue-finding and the clue-content) actually move the events of play forward, i.e., that the players are investigating and actually finding things, which if they didn't, would make play stop. As I said in my post above, no, they're not doing any such thing; all that is an illusion thinly covering the crashing boring reality. In much traditional play, we fuck around in what my friend Terry calls the Panama Canal model, where you investigate and investigate in the Atlantic Ocean until the GM decides it's time to shepherd you through the Canal into the Pacific, where the planned ending or next clue is.
If that's the way one was trained, considering play that starts in the Atlantic is a little bit scary. It's creates the sensation of saying, "But but, what do we do?" and conjures up images of beginning and ending with one fight scene, and that's it. I think that's your headache.
And going by what you said four times, I know very well how to cure it. The answer is, the way to handle it is not to fuck around with "if they get enough to move forward," at all. There will be "enough," because moving forward will be a given feature of play. I am not saying to pretend the investigation is real, either. Instead, just as you said yourself, and therefore I'll piece together your own words: We play the dramatic scenes during and at the culmination of the investigation, when the players announce what their characters are doing in response to the information, whether action or interaction with other characters, where the fun is.
Instead of imagining characters jumping through your GM hoops and the players being so awed and appreciative of your mad GMing skilz, imagine the players deciding what their characters do, and doing it.
4. What I'm thinking of, is a situation in which the characters are indeed launched on an investigation and they will indeed find the bad guys. But the trouble is, if they don't investigate well, then the confrontation will be stunningly unsuccessful. I'm thinking in terms of relevant knowledge and the choices and actions the players can make on their own.
- finding not only the direct perpetrator, but the associates and networks which benefit from his crimes
- the abilities, back-story, and intentions underlying the crime
So it's definitely not whether you can find him; we'll take that as given. The question is what you'll do when you find him, and whether you have a fighting chance to bring him in. And that does depend greatly on what you do at dramatic steps during the investigation itself.
Quote
6) ...
Or maybe there are no modifiers, you use the one set of difficulties currently used for unopposed rolls. The difficulty to hit someone then depends on the situation they're in, but if it's lower than the level they have in the skill they're defending with, they can use that skill level instead. If they want to boost their skill level with risk dice defensively, they can, at the risk of complications cropping up as normal.
With that last paragraph, I think you got your system! NPCs don't roll. There are no modifiers, merely difficulty which is affected by circumstances. Effectively, you can go with hit or miss as set by your skill level, theoretically, and risk dice are always an add-on if you want.
I think you should assess bennies in that context.
7. Don't let me mess you up about your own game! Complications can stay negative. I still suggest they should arrive on a 6. My rationale is simple: getting what you want, but with complications (as long as they don't undercut the success) is a lot of fun.
Best, Ron
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