Ian Absentia
01-07-2002, 02:14 PM
I'm bouncing this line of discussion out of the Faln thread and into its own, due mostly to inspiration from Mithras' following comment:
I can forsee some beautiful situations arising over what a character doesn't know, but does really. Kind reminds me of that surreal movie ... Mnemonic (?). In fact for most of it's early stages, I think a game of Faln might resemble this fractured, dreamlike film. Well it would if I ran it, anyway. People know you, you don't know them. It'd be time for some extreme paranoia.
That'd be "Memento", and man what a troubling (but good!) film that was. Though it would be an incredible stretch for a GM, I think this is a scenario where Grow-as-You-Go would really shine. Players have to spend points from their pool to keep recent events and abilities in active memory; roll against your Short Term Memory to see if you succeed in using it. Each scene would start with the pool refreshed and recent memories erased. It would be a challenge, not only for the GM, but for the players to purposefully exclude knowledge that their characters can't remember.
At first I figured this sort of game would work only as a one-on-one with a GM and a single player, but it occurred to me that people with rare conditions such as the one in "Memento" tend to be referred to specialist clinics for diagnosis, observation and treatment. Thus, you'd have the opportunity to gather a small handful of people with the same condition together, then set out AMA (Against Medical Advice) to pursue some sort of ephemeral goal. It'd be like "Memento" meets "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest".
Increasingly, I'm growing excited by the potential uses for Grow-as-You-Go in premises that are normally defeated by fully detailed character sheets -- amnesiac games, "newborn" games, past life recollection games, etc. It occurred to me that one could even use this sort of chargen method for a Werewolf: The Apocalypse game where your characters explore previous incarnations in the form of their ancestors -- the Gnosis attribute becomes one's ability to "remember" what your ancestor was really like.
Just to sort of concretise the Grow-as-You-Go method, I envisage a character initially being comprised of only two important characteristics: Memory (or Self-Awareness or whatever) and an Ability Pool. During play, players roll against their Memory to recall some knowledge or ability, and if they succeed, they may spend points from the Ability Pool to keep and use it. After that, they may roll against the ability instead of Memory.
Hmm...I have a few more ideas on how it could be used, but I'll hold off on those to let them ripen. More in a little while.
Gone,
Ian
I can forsee some beautiful situations arising over what a character doesn't know, but does really. Kind reminds me of that surreal movie ... Mnemonic (?). In fact for most of it's early stages, I think a game of Faln might resemble this fractured, dreamlike film. Well it would if I ran it, anyway. People know you, you don't know them. It'd be time for some extreme paranoia.
That'd be "Memento", and man what a troubling (but good!) film that was. Though it would be an incredible stretch for a GM, I think this is a scenario where Grow-as-You-Go would really shine. Players have to spend points from their pool to keep recent events and abilities in active memory; roll against your Short Term Memory to see if you succeed in using it. Each scene would start with the pool refreshed and recent memories erased. It would be a challenge, not only for the GM, but for the players to purposefully exclude knowledge that their characters can't remember.
At first I figured this sort of game would work only as a one-on-one with a GM and a single player, but it occurred to me that people with rare conditions such as the one in "Memento" tend to be referred to specialist clinics for diagnosis, observation and treatment. Thus, you'd have the opportunity to gather a small handful of people with the same condition together, then set out AMA (Against Medical Advice) to pursue some sort of ephemeral goal. It'd be like "Memento" meets "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest".
Increasingly, I'm growing excited by the potential uses for Grow-as-You-Go in premises that are normally defeated by fully detailed character sheets -- amnesiac games, "newborn" games, past life recollection games, etc. It occurred to me that one could even use this sort of chargen method for a Werewolf: The Apocalypse game where your characters explore previous incarnations in the form of their ancestors -- the Gnosis attribute becomes one's ability to "remember" what your ancestor was really like.
Just to sort of concretise the Grow-as-You-Go method, I envisage a character initially being comprised of only two important characteristics: Memory (or Self-Awareness or whatever) and an Ability Pool. During play, players roll against their Memory to recall some knowledge or ability, and if they succeed, they may spend points from the Ability Pool to keep and use it. After that, they may roll against the ability instead of Memory.
Hmm...I have a few more ideas on how it could be used, but I'll hold off on those to let them ripen. More in a little while.
Gone,
Ian