Folio Engle Matrix Game at Gen Con

[MatrixGamer]

First - to be up front - I publish these game. BUT this is based on my playing in one as a player (keeping my mouth shut about how it should be run.)

The game I was in was "Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Dead Duke".

The game master/referee laid a color laminated map down in front of us. It is a folio game so the map folds up and the rules are on the back - along with the front and back cover (retail $9.95 and hopefully will be in stores soon because I got distribution!) above the map were pictures of characters and short descriptions of who they were. We characters picked out characters and placed cardbaord counters on the map to show where we started.

I chose the Gypsy character, Madam Pokipsie, and placed her with Lady Penelope - the daughter of Duke Richard. Interestingly no one picked Sherlock Holmes!

The referee should have read the scenario opener to us (it was on the back of the map - grrr I don't write that stuff for nothing - the other Matrix Game referee did read it out and her players seemed to really like the intro to the story.) Instead he looked to the edge of the map where the "Plot Track" was. The plot track suggests to players the type of things that need to happen in a murder mystery. The first item on the track is "Find the body." This is followed by "Find clues: means motive opportunity".

The referee went around the table and asked each player to make an argument about where the body was found. They would make a short statement (like "He was found face down in Hyde Park lake") The referee then decided how "strong" our argument was (which set what needed to be rolled for the argument to succeed.) Then the player would roll. If they rolled their target number then the argument happened. It became part of the history of the world and the story built from there. Failed rolles were not punished in any way. The only penalty was that the argument did not happen.

That is 90% of the rules of the game. We were allowed to jump in and counter-argue against arguments we didn't agree with (at the referee's discression). When this happened, the players would roll for their own arguments. Successful rolls allowed the player to roll again. Rolling kept up till only one player remained or all rolled out.

The first turn was a little slow since players were not familiar with being able to take control of a game like this, but after one time round everyone seemed to get into it.

Many of use started making arguments for what the investigators found. I tried to get the police to arrest the maid of the house early on (when there was insufficient evidence - just like Inspector LeStrad always did in the stories.) This failed so I argued that my character and Lady Penelope were together at the time of the crime. Sadly my alibi fell appart and at the end of the game I was convicted of the crime.

Along the way the players "Made up" the clues that told the story. They established that the Duke was killed by a blow to the back of the head by a bronze statue, the Duke Richard had be cowardly in the Zulu War (along with two of the player characters). A second murder took place across the street from the house - the woman turned out to be Duke Richard's illegitimate daughter. Account books were found showing who was being paid off by the Duke (this is what sunk me - it turned out the Duke had cut me off - I was hiding his secrets abut cowardness and adultery.)

I can't say the game was gamist since we were not competing over resources. It wasn't simulationist because were were doing little role playing - we more talked about what happened rather than acted it out. It was much like a big kibitz. We did tell a story and part of that was following the plot track so I guess in Froge terms it was narrativist.

I had to leave early to go and close down the booth for the day - which probably sealed my doom. It tooks three hours to play and people came by the next day and bought the folio games I had at the booth - so it worked well for me.

My test market of the Folio Matrix Games (Sherlock Holmes and Cthulhu on Campus) went great. I sold out on Saturday and then sold the games used by the Game Masters the next day. This is definitely the game I'll be pushing in my marketing. They complement the books well.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

[komradebob]

It wasn't simulationist because were were doing little role playing - we more talked about what happened rather than acted it out.

Did it feel like a Doyle Mystery? Did anyone try to go out of genre with rules/events introductions, and if so, how where these handled by the group?

[MatrixGamer]

Well it wasn't stuffy like some of Doyle's stuff. The players did take it in certain sexually inuendo directions. My move to tone this down was to look askance and suggest more subtle working. The referee then reigned in the players a little. The clues that emerged were mystery like. They fit but the players were laughing and having a good time so it was not stuffy without devolving into straight comedy.

[Larry L.]

Chris,

The adding of board game components to the system is interesting. Matrix Games don't usually have "props" except for a single die, right? Did the map and track have any "authority" over what was happening in the shared imagination space? Or was it merely a visual aid and suggestion?

How are the folio games different from the books?

Congratulations on you sales success. What was your booth? (You'd previously mentioned you'd be sharing.)

[MatrixGamer]

I had my own booth - 302 - the one with the marionettes.

As to the plot track it is all just suggestion. All the elements of the "Matrix" of Matrix Games are suggestive. In the end the player can make whatever argument they want and the referee decides how strong it is. So the player controls what is created and the referee is the oracle for the dice gods.

You're right that the games I've mentioned on the Forge only use the d6 as a prop but there is a map and written descriptions of characters and locations in the book. The folio idea is really harkening back to what I've done in convention games for 15 years. A map (printed or sculpted) and character tokes (counters or figures) along with the written material and dice were what people played with. For years I did big miniatures games (MGs were billed at Gen Con as Home Grown miniatures rules till the 1998 when I started calling them RPG rules). The figs and terrrain pulled in players but did not sell the idea. I think people thought it was fun but then said "But I can't afford the minis or terrain" and then dropped it. I had to sacrefice my historical miniatures roots on the alter of selling the idea. Minis didn't help so they had to go.

I think the folio gives people the same anchor to sail their game around but at an affordable price.

The darndest thing is that the books and the folio are the same games. What is different is that the books give more background information (little essays on subjects such as mental illness, what decomposition like, life in a police state, and pesky technicalities your civil rights) where as the folio has a large shinny map and character counters. The rules are essentially the same (though they emphasize different things. The folios use a round robin approach (go around the table argue and reolve as you go) while the books advocate simultaneous argument resolution (which I think is more fun and dramatic but harder to describe to people who haven't played before.)

This connection is good for sales. It lead people to buy both products rather than just one. It added value.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press