Okay, so I recently sat down and worked on the coming up with reference sheets for the PbtA version of Just a Game…

Originally shared by Thrythlind aka Luke Green

Okay, so I recently sat down and worked on the coming up with reference sheets for the PbtA version of Just a Game and in doing so wrote down an actual agenda and set of principles.

In doing so, I realized that the agenda that most fit trapped-in-the-game style stories (at least in my opinion) did not complete fit the MotW base that I had used in the original playtest.

I’ve mentioned this in another post earlier this week.

I what I found came up with for agenda was this:

Make the world dramatic.

Make the player’s lives center stage.

*Play to find out what’s real.*

And among the standard PbtA Principles, I had this:

*Blur the line between reality and simulation*

*Apply video game logic*

*Make the normal absurd and the absurd normal*

Let the characters punch out Cthulhu

*Leave the truth always in question*

And this is what occurred to me.

Trapped-in-the-game is really a cosmic storyline. I’m not going to say cosmic horror because really, these sorts of story teeter between wonder and horror.  But the cosmic part, that’s certain.

Stories like Tron, Captain Power, dot/Hack, Sword Art Online, Log Horizon, Ready Player One, The Gamer, Accel World and so on are stories where the basic foundation of reality is in question.

Even in as outwardly simple situations as “stuck in a VR simulation that will fry your brain if you die in game” such as in SAO the question of just what the dividing line between real and simulation is comes into question.

Mostly these stories end up focusing on the beneficial potential of these realizations and so they generally tip over towards cosmic wonder but there are almost always individuals that get sucked down into insanity as well as any Lovecraft character and, for that matter, the people that decide to embrace a digital life or even dual life might be regarded as insane by people who haven’t witnessed their story directly as we, the audience have. While we can see that they’ve taken a healthy, rational approach (based on the idea that their experiences and conclusions are real) the majority of the world might consider them just as strangely imbalanced.

In any case, this realization has shown me that I need to rework the PbtA version of these rules (this is to be expected as it was a first version playtest).

This isn’t really a new thought…I never really liked the Harm mechanic in the PbtA version.  It works well for MotW, but given the ridiculous way health and endurance fluctuate in video games it felt a poor substitute. The Stress/Consequences system of Fate Core and the Health/Stability system of GUMSHOE still work well (though my GUMSHOE experience is limited). But Harm/HP for this PbtA agenda doesn’t feel right.

There’s also nothing in the MotW base I pulled to simulate the potential downward spiral of a character into an UNHEALTHY reaction to the fabric of reality becoming uncertain.

Having encountered Masks and heard about the Airbender-esque IGoA and their methods of using Conditions rather than HP/Harm helped me figure out what was giving me trouble, but what settled it was the making of the agenda.

So since this is Golden Week now, I’m going to take some time to rework the Persona and Avatar books as well as the basic moves.

I don’t own IGoA, but I am pulling my copies of Urban Shadows by Andrew Medeiros and Masks by Magpie Games  to compare some notes between that and Michael Sands MotW as well as Spirit of ’77.  Though I admit that the majority of what I’m taking from Spirit of ’77 is the use of characters being a combination of two types of playbook.  For another example of that and dealing with powers and another example of binary playbook construction, I plan to look at Worlds in Peril as well.

The binary playbook really looks to fit the feel of a character that is split between two perceptions of reality and trying to find a balance of what is actually real and what isn’t.

In that regard, I’m not sure either Worlds in Peril (where the binary is Origin and Drive) or Spirit of ’77 (where it’s Role and Story) are exactly right.  Spirit of ’77 is closer to what I have in mind (which is the RL Persona matched with the created Avatar) but still not quite right.

So I might likely have another PbtA playtest version out in a little bit. Mostly just reference sheets and playbooks though, similar to what Masks has released so far.

Though given my resources I imagine my finished products won’t look too much different save for being more cleanly edited, more focused each particular game system and with a fair bit more examples.

I hope also to get this out to some of the AP podcasters I watch to see if they might be interested in helping me with some playtests. But we’ll see.