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janewilliams20I'l report back on the actual wargaming last weekend at some point, but for now, the Saturday night game. I took the Great Duck Point Boat Race along, this having been requested by the Sharrocks. I was interested to play-test my new ideas on how to handle the Dragonnewt Road, and to see what wargamers made of it.
Of my six players, only one had played in Glorantha before (RQ version), two had heard about it from me, and two had never done any roleplaying at all. One was eleven, and due to go to bed in half an hour (her place was then taken by a somewhat older substitute and a bottle of red wine).
Summary given at the start: this is not a board game, even if it looks like it. Nor is it a wargame, despite using wargaming rules. It's a roleplaying game, and the object is not to win, it's to take part and to have fun. The usual result is that no-one wins the race, but they may achieve other objectives they acquire along the way. (I then gave examples of ways in which this has happened in the past).
We started with a very cut-down summary of just as much of Glorantha as they needed, and the local history. I should probably write that up soon, before I forget what I said. Fantasy universe. This bit, Evil Empire has invaded Heroic Barbarians - think Romans and Ancient Brits. Then I explain about Ducks, and we play with accents for a bit. Back to serious business - trade routes, taxes, and contracts. The Lunars, having had no success at reviving the old trade routes here due to ducks sinking their boats, have decided to get someone else to do the trade, and then tax them. They have a contract to bring back parchment and Red Tape from Esrolia, and since this is Be Nice to Ducks time, will use a "quaint local custom" as the means of choosing who gets it. Each player is then invited to create a team who has a reason for taking part in the Race, and possibly trying to win. They are reminded that being caught cheating will get them disqualified, so if they should try to take shortcuts, attack other players, use dishonourable things like Chaos, and so on, it'd important not to be seen doing it. I introduced the Governor and his Wife as being the Carry-on version of the Brits in India - all but the eleven-year-old got it immediately.
While they thought about that, I filled in some details about the race as done for fun (inside the city, with plenty of Oxbridge racing references) and as done for "real", including what had happened in the past. Some of them picked up ideas from there, so we had another team of Mostali with an experimental ship - a hovercraft this time. My one experienced player wanted Vingans, and for others we went through the process of "does Glorantha have X?", "no, but it has Y, how about that?" In terms of tech level, I found "Vikings" was a useful standard, though not quite enough for the eleven-year-old, who wanted a piano.
So, the teams:
newtling con-men
a werewolf rock band
Vingan assassins
Traditionalist ducks
dwarven experimental hovercraft
Morocanthi slaver
At this point our eleven-year-old was replaced by her substitute.
Interaction between teams? Yes, two attempted sabotages, and an attempted seduction/assasination. The Vingans started as they meant to go on, leaving a very puzzled Telmori hero wondering what had happened.
At this point someone asked if character actions and stats were secret. What I said was that many things would be secret from the characters, but that it was often more fun if the players knew what was going on. This depended on them acting as if their characters didn't know, but if they could cope with that...? All agreed that that was the way to go.
We assigned "fight" and "paddle" ratings to each boat, and set off - I'm sticking to the turn order being clockwise round the table, same direction as the race. First encounter was the Telmori musicians stopping just outside the city walls. I mentioned the cheering crowds, and he promptly decided to stop and give them an encore. We had people leaping from boat to boat, even this early, casting smoke spells to avoid each other, persuading the "monsters" (duck bandits) to come and join them with impromptu religious ceremonies - and we hadn't even got to the first bend in the course yet!
Remember, this is a group some of whom had never roleplayed before. I can't believe how fast they got into the spirit of things. The Mostali wanted to do the James Bond speed-boat trick where you leap off a ramp and over another boat before landing back on the water, so they got a gondola to jump over. It was fun, it had no in-game effect, so of course it worked! However when he tried to make a few "adjustments" to his engine to make things go faster, I started making rolls. His engine blew up, so he went off to capture the next player boat along the route.
The morocanth slaver (a teenager) acquired the use of some darkness spirits as we developed his background, and then realised that if he could command them, maybe he could command the HUGE spirit that was hovering over the boat trying to use fear spells on his crew. That got very interesting, as an annoyed spirit tried to possess various people, often in the middle of fights. I'm afraid the morocanth ended up dead, partly due to attacks from the Telmori, partly because the player was tired and wanted to go to bed. Of the rest, two succumbed to the Pile of Skulls. It sits there and hums, and if you're magically sensitive you can tell it's casting a spell. What it actually does is infect the barrel of paperwork you're transporting as a test with Chaos, so when it's opened for inspection at the finish, it's found to contain Chaotic Goo.
The Ducks, the only ones to be using a traditional dragon-headed racing boat, got teleported once by the Dragonnewt Road, lost their sense of direction, and re-entered the city by the way they'd come in. They declined to try again, preferring to watch proceedings from the nearest tavern.
The Newtlings, having made their way round the course by using a massive "Sneaky" ability, got caught out by their interaction with the Lunar patrol to whom they'd reported some misbehaviour on the part of another team. The Lunars interpreted this as being an obvious attempt at a frame-up and not even a good one - Mostali using necromantic magic to try to command spirits? Don't be ridiculous! In fact, what they'd said was absolutely true - this was the one time in the entire race they'd told the truth and done the honourable thing. Disqualified.
That left the Vingans. They'd flipped their boat at one point to get past some obstacle or other, and I'd made a note that the barrel had leaked. Clever player, this. He stopped short of the finish line to inspect the barrel, and dry and Repair the contents. Well, I couldn't have a player actually winning the race! Unheard of! It turned out that back at the start, when Chief Vingan was trying to assassinate the Telmori, Lunar intelligence had spotted her at it. The Telmori still thought of it as a romance of sorts, they knew better, and disqualified her for that. She got her own back, though: I got a note to say that a week after the race, she tried the same trick on the Governor. This time, she got better dice-rolls. I'll have to have his Ressurected before the next Race.
Feedback? There were a few suggestions about how I could make the rules more complicated, and some about areas of background that I should perhaps make clearer. Pre-gen sample teams were recommended.
I got a lot of thanks for running a fun game, I got congratulated on getting the timing almost exactly as per estimate without (apparently) adjusting anything or forcing anything (wrong - I did), I got apologies and thanks from the person who I'd had to shout down when the lengthy conversation about pop music was the loudest thing at the table. It looks as if I can still run a game OK. According to my experienced RPer, it was like the very earliest games, before AD&D and similar complicated rule systems came in and spoilt it all. I wouldn't know - that was long before I started gaming.
I'm pretty happy with that.
Of my six players, only one had played in Glorantha before (RQ version), two had heard about it from me, and two had never done any roleplaying at all. One was eleven, and due to go to bed in half an hour (her place was then taken by a somewhat older substitute and a bottle of red wine).
Summary given at the start: this is not a board game, even if it looks like it. Nor is it a wargame, despite using wargaming rules. It's a roleplaying game, and the object is not to win, it's to take part and to have fun. The usual result is that no-one wins the race, but they may achieve other objectives they acquire along the way. (I then gave examples of ways in which this has happened in the past).
We started with a very cut-down summary of just as much of Glorantha as they needed, and the local history. I should probably write that up soon, before I forget what I said. Fantasy universe. This bit, Evil Empire has invaded Heroic Barbarians - think Romans and Ancient Brits. Then I explain about Ducks, and we play with accents for a bit. Back to serious business - trade routes, taxes, and contracts. The Lunars, having had no success at reviving the old trade routes here due to ducks sinking their boats, have decided to get someone else to do the trade, and then tax them. They have a contract to bring back parchment and Red Tape from Esrolia, and since this is Be Nice to Ducks time, will use a "quaint local custom" as the means of choosing who gets it. Each player is then invited to create a team who has a reason for taking part in the Race, and possibly trying to win. They are reminded that being caught cheating will get them disqualified, so if they should try to take shortcuts, attack other players, use dishonourable things like Chaos, and so on, it'd important not to be seen doing it. I introduced the Governor and his Wife as being the Carry-on version of the Brits in India - all but the eleven-year-old got it immediately.
While they thought about that, I filled in some details about the race as done for fun (inside the city, with plenty of Oxbridge racing references) and as done for "real", including what had happened in the past. Some of them picked up ideas from there, so we had another team of Mostali with an experimental ship - a hovercraft this time. My one experienced player wanted Vingans, and for others we went through the process of "does Glorantha have X?", "no, but it has Y, how about that?" In terms of tech level, I found "Vikings" was a useful standard, though not quite enough for the eleven-year-old, who wanted a piano.
So, the teams:
newtling con-men
a werewolf rock band
Vingan assassins
Traditionalist ducks
dwarven experimental hovercraft
Morocanthi slaver
At this point our eleven-year-old was replaced by her substitute.
Interaction between teams? Yes, two attempted sabotages, and an attempted seduction/assasination. The Vingans started as they meant to go on, leaving a very puzzled Telmori hero wondering what had happened.
At this point someone asked if character actions and stats were secret. What I said was that many things would be secret from the characters, but that it was often more fun if the players knew what was going on. This depended on them acting as if their characters didn't know, but if they could cope with that...? All agreed that that was the way to go.
We assigned "fight" and "paddle" ratings to each boat, and set off - I'm sticking to the turn order being clockwise round the table, same direction as the race. First encounter was the Telmori musicians stopping just outside the city walls. I mentioned the cheering crowds, and he promptly decided to stop and give them an encore. We had people leaping from boat to boat, even this early, casting smoke spells to avoid each other, persuading the "monsters" (duck bandits) to come and join them with impromptu religious ceremonies - and we hadn't even got to the first bend in the course yet!
Remember, this is a group some of whom had never roleplayed before. I can't believe how fast they got into the spirit of things. The Mostali wanted to do the James Bond speed-boat trick where you leap off a ramp and over another boat before landing back on the water, so they got a gondola to jump over. It was fun, it had no in-game effect, so of course it worked! However when he tried to make a few "adjustments" to his engine to make things go faster, I started making rolls. His engine blew up, so he went off to capture the next player boat along the route.
The morocanth slaver (a teenager) acquired the use of some darkness spirits as we developed his background, and then realised that if he could command them, maybe he could command the HUGE spirit that was hovering over the boat trying to use fear spells on his crew. That got very interesting, as an annoyed spirit tried to possess various people, often in the middle of fights. I'm afraid the morocanth ended up dead, partly due to attacks from the Telmori, partly because the player was tired and wanted to go to bed. Of the rest, two succumbed to the Pile of Skulls. It sits there and hums, and if you're magically sensitive you can tell it's casting a spell. What it actually does is infect the barrel of paperwork you're transporting as a test with Chaos, so when it's opened for inspection at the finish, it's found to contain Chaotic Goo.
The Ducks, the only ones to be using a traditional dragon-headed racing boat, got teleported once by the Dragonnewt Road, lost their sense of direction, and re-entered the city by the way they'd come in. They declined to try again, preferring to watch proceedings from the nearest tavern.
The Newtlings, having made their way round the course by using a massive "Sneaky" ability, got caught out by their interaction with the Lunar patrol to whom they'd reported some misbehaviour on the part of another team. The Lunars interpreted this as being an obvious attempt at a frame-up and not even a good one - Mostali using necromantic magic to try to command spirits? Don't be ridiculous! In fact, what they'd said was absolutely true - this was the one time in the entire race they'd told the truth and done the honourable thing. Disqualified.
That left the Vingans. They'd flipped their boat at one point to get past some obstacle or other, and I'd made a note that the barrel had leaked. Clever player, this. He stopped short of the finish line to inspect the barrel, and dry and Repair the contents. Well, I couldn't have a player actually winning the race! Unheard of! It turned out that back at the start, when Chief Vingan was trying to assassinate the Telmori, Lunar intelligence had spotted her at it. The Telmori still thought of it as a romance of sorts, they knew better, and disqualified her for that. She got her own back, though: I got a note to say that a week after the race, she tried the same trick on the Governor. This time, she got better dice-rolls. I'll have to have his Ressurected before the next Race.
Feedback? There were a few suggestions about how I could make the rules more complicated, and some about areas of background that I should perhaps make clearer. Pre-gen sample teams were recommended.
I got a lot of thanks for running a fun game, I got congratulated on getting the timing almost exactly as per estimate without (apparently) adjusting anything or forcing anything (wrong - I did), I got apologies and thanks from the person who I'd had to shout down when the lengthy conversation about pop music was the loudest thing at the table. It looks as if I can still run a game OK. According to my experienced RPer, it was like the very earliest games, before AD&D and similar complicated rule systems came in and spoilt it all. I wouldn't know - that was long before I started gaming.
I'm pretty happy with that.