Play Report
We had our first session today. Overall, it was positive. Our GURPS player decided he liked PbtA and wanted to try more of it.
Family and character creation made some excellent story threads for me to pull on, and everyone really got into creating our homeland.
During play, we got along well and moved ahead easily. But the game wasn’t without it’s hangups. Here’s where we struggled:
– Starting Tech and Data was confusing; we didn’t know if there was supposed to be any and they began with 0 in both.
– Surplus and Needs were easy to determine, but when to get a new surplus or need didn’t seem like it was covered in the rules. I winged it.
– Gear was awkward. If a family doesn’t have gear as an asset, do they not get that at all? (If you don’t select a weapon, do you not get any weapons? We had a couple of unarmed people.)
– Not having a “discern” type of discovery move felt odd when players tried to look around the scene. I decided it wasn’t important to the game and let perception and stealth just happen, unless they were under pressure.
– The options for Fierce Assault almost always included added chaos and terrible harm to foes. So much so that a player commented that more interesting choices would benefit (I suggested he choose them. Lol)
Finally, as predicted, the difference between families and characters felt awkward at first, but I started to get the hang of it. It’s still confusing why players would ever venture out to fight a force when their families could just do it, but maybe they’re meant for smaller activities? Our group assaulted a camp of cannibals while zoomed in, and it felt like the family may have been the ones who should have done it. Choosing between which would act was difficult.
Most of those things stemmed from our inexperience with the game. Overall, we had a ton of fun and are looking forward to our next game.