Earth Resists: Site recipes

“Craggy cave mouth” by Thomas Quine, CC BY 2.0

As a design goal for Earth Resists, I want to think of adventure sites as recipes. The written description is not a prepared meal, it is a list of ingredients with some simple instructions. In fact, I want the site to have almost no instructions - the instructions are general and apply to any site. I'm hoping this will make sites for skirmishes easy to write, read, and run.

Here's an example. This site for a skirmish mission is a huge sinkhole and cave system in a tropical forest.

Locations:
(Would be shown as a simple diagram map, but I'm writing this on my phone)

Forest (cover 5, threat 1)
Sinkhole edge (cover 3, threat 1)
Sinkhole floor (cover 2, threat 2)
- trap: auto turret (2P)
Tunnel A (cover 4, threat 2)
Tunnel B (cover 3, threat 1)
- hazard: falling rocks (2P)
Cavern (cover 3, threat 3)

ET objective:

Protect the worm eggs in the Cavern location until they hatch (6-part clock)

ET units:

Snakehead (1P, 1HD) × 3
Spiderbot (2P, 3HD)
- special: drag away wounded (3P)
Grey worm (4P, 3HD)
- special: burrow (3P)

(Incidentally, I want ETs in the game to have descriptions but no names. It's left to the players to name them - maybe later in a campaign, if there's a linguistic breakthrough, that would change.)

What to do with all this?

After all PCs have taken a turn, the GM takes a turn. If all PCs are in 0-threat locations, the GM may choose any other location on the map and make a threat roll. Otherwise, when one or more PCs are in non-zero threat locations, the GM rolls for each of the occupied locations.

If the threat level is 2, they roll 2d6. If the threat level is 3, they roll 3d6, etc. Take the highest number (N), and the GM may use that to:

1. Deploy N points worth of ET units to the location. (Example: If the number is 3, the GM may deploy three 1-point units, some kind of minion type, or a stronger 3-point unit).
2. Check the map location for any special action which can be activated for N (or lower) points. This could be a trap or an environmental hazard.
3. Check any already deployed unit for any N (or lower) point action. Generally, already deployed units can be used freely on the GM's turn, but they may also have special abilities that require spending these points.
4. Hold some or all points of the total N in reserve, to spend on a future turn.

For a threat level of greater than 1, it is possible to have matches on the result (e.g. rolling 2d6 and getting 4, 4). Matches advance the overall ET objective in the area by one mark of progress (Example: repairing a crashed spaceship, or hatching ET eggs in the example above).

I know some folks may bristle at using a metacurrency for the GM to spend on moves and conjuring quantum ogres, but I'm thinking of it differently. I want to achieve the same outcome as running a more carefully prepared site, but without the same level of prep. The GM can glance at their ingredients and jump right in, without needing to know details about any particular location. (This may just reflect my GMing style, where I sometimes misread that kind of detail anyway, when things come up in play.)

I have yet to play test this, but it is coming together in my head, and I think I'll be able to try something soon.

Between hidden roles and sandboxes

I've played two games this week that involved secret information.

First was my regular Mythic Bastionland game. The company of knights had planned to visit a town where one of them grew up. Although he's from there, this was our first session in that town. Before the session, I chatted with that player about his character's history. We decided, among other things, that when he left the town twenty years earlier to become a squire, he abandoned his fiancée. The fiancée character appeared in this week's session as a member of the town's council. We roleplayed some tension between them, but he chose not to share the background information with the other players until near the end of the session. It's was a fun note to add, but it didn't change the direction of the session.

Second was Cluedo Conspiracy. It's a hidden role board game which involves some players trying to stop a murder plot while others secretly try to execute the plot. We played with five players, so there were three good guys and two conspirators. In our first attempt at playing (we were all learning the game, and I was reading and teaching the rules) one player misspoke early on and revealed their role. We decided to reset the game and played through on the second attempt. (I quite like the game, incidentally. It's like a simplified version of Battlestar Galactica, much quicker to play.)

I think it's interesting to compare these experiences because they both involved hidden information, but they are at two ends of a scale:

• In the RPG, some information was hidden which informs roleplaying. When the information was revealed it didn't have much impact, except as a dramatic beat.
• In the board game, the hidden information is at the core of the gameplay. Much of the strategy of the game is based on concealing or trying to reveal that information. When it's revealed, it shifts the focus of play and impacts what choices players have afterwards. If the secret is revealed too early, because of a simple mistake, it diffuses a lot of the fun of the experience.

I'm curious to consider what might lie between these two ends of the scale, so I've been trying to deconstruct them a little.

In the Cluedo Conspiracy game, there is a binary division: Some players are tasked with killing Mr Coral and some with protecting him. It's adversarial and all-or-nothing. After the secret is revealed you have no common ground with the other team.

In the Mythic Bastionland case, you're playing in a sandbox so there aren't strict goals. Revealing that a knight once ghosted his partner could conceivably lead to some new objective, or influence how the group respond to a problem, but it is less likely to redirect the flow completely. Rather than the binary, team A or team B, it's team "here is some new information, do whatever you want".

One way to extend this is to have more than one strict objective. In the Cluedo case, you could have kill/protect Mr Coral and also steal/protect Mr Coral's treasure. You go from two opposing teams to (potentially) players with four different objectives:

• Kill the guy, steal his money.
• Kill the guy but because of another motive. Leave the money for his heir.
• Protect the guy, steal the money (I'm a thief not a murderer).
• Protect the guy, protect the treasure (we're trying to have a society here!).

In this extension, a secret could be revealed about a player without necessarily breaking the game into a completely adversarial contest. When you have some goal in common with another player, there is room to negotiate and coordinate.

Another extension, into the space between the two ends of the scale, is to make the secret information itself more complex. 

• I want to kill Mr Coral because his true identity is a war criminal.
• I want to protect Mr Coral so that he can be put on trial for his crimes.

This idea (more complex information) seems to tend towards play where players choose their own goals. But I'm trying to find the middle ground, not going as far as a sandbox, so maybe it looks a little more like this:

Your character has beliefs / alignment / bonds. Initially, you work with the information you have, and work towards the goal that fits those. As hidden information is revealed, you filter that through the beliefs / alignment / bonds and it updates your objectives. (This is very like roleplaying in a sandbox, but I'm imagining it as a little more mechanical / board gamey - character traits overriding player choice.) That might mean you switch from team "protect the guy" to team "kill the guy", when you get more information.

I had some more thoughts about why bothering with secrets at all, but that's kind of a tangent. Wrapping it up here!

Earth Resists: Skirmish map

 

A test map for Earth Resists (ignore the text on the bottom left)

(I believe this may be mappy enough to count for Prismatic Wasteland's map bandwagon.)

I first mentioned my X-COM inspired game here. This post collects some ideas about how I intend to handle the skirmish missions in the game. As I said before I want to lean into feelings of tension and drama rather than simulation.

The map above shows 6 locations in a North American city. This is the GM-facing version. The player-facing one would show the layout but the labels and numbers would not be present at the start (details are added to adjacent locations when they move around).

At each location there are two numbers – the top is Threat and the bottom is Cover. The Subway Station, for example, has Threat 0 and Cover 5. These numbers are known to the players (added to the player-facing map) for the location they are at, and for adjacent locations. It's information that helps them make meaningful decisions.

Cover

If a PC is at the Subway Station and wants to take cover, they roll a d6. If the result is less than or equal to the Cover number for the Subway Station (5) then they are in cover. Players can glance at the map and have a good sense of what the opportunities for cover are. But it's also not guaranteed, so there is an element of risk to balance. I'm hoping to create meaningful tactical decisions without needing a grid or defining a bunch of terrain detail in advance. There may be some ways to increase your odds of getting into cover (dedicate more time to it, have a relevant skill).

Threat

The world sheet mentioned in my first post also uses a number for Threat. I'd be tempted to use a different name for this idea in the skirmish map, but I kind of like the mirroring of things at the big scale and little scale.

If the PCs are at the Subway Station they can see the Threat is 0. This essentially means the Subway Station is safe. They won't be attacked there. Why include a safe location in a skirmish map? There are plenty of other things that could happen there – they may find civilians who need to be escorted out of the area, or interviewed for intelligence, or they may find some discarded alien technology that could be collected for research.

At the Subway Tunnel the Threat is 2. My current thinking is that after the PCs act, the GM can then roll 2d6 (one d6 for each point of Threat) and the result determines how the GM can act. The higher they roll the harder the move. Maybe a 1 is a sound of an ET moving nearby. Maybe a 6 would see the PCs coming under fire. This is kind of an initiative system, but I think if an ET shows up and is in an ongoing firefight, they won't have to rely on a Threat roll to take a turn – it's more about the unseen threats building.

Again, I like the idea that the players can see this Threat number and know what it means. They can plan an approach that tries to manage the risk.

This is a deadly game. Walking into a dangerous place, failing to get into cover, and getting shot, will likely cause a PC to be out of action. I need to do testing to see how likely that is, and how frustrating it is. But it's also designed so that new PCs can be generated very easily, so you could quickly dispatch another character from the entry point into the map (if you have enough personnel to allow for that).

Scene Transitions

I'm not sure how this will play, but I want skirmish missions to be played in parallel with other types of missions which I'm tentatively calling Shadow War missions. The skirmishes are the open warfare part of the game, and the Shadow War stuff is more focused on investigation and espionage. In a game session the GM will lay out the details of the two scenarios, players will select or roll up their characters (players will routinely be using more than one character), and then they deploy.

In the skirmish, when the PCs move from one location to another, we put the skirmish on hold and switch our attention to the Shadow War scenario. At an appropriate moment in the Shadow War scenario, the spotlight will move back the skirmish.

Example:

Seb and June are soldiers searching for ETs in the Subway Station. They see blast marks from energy weapons on the walls, and in the tunnel ahead they can see sparks and blinking lighting from a damaged train. The players look at the Subway Tunnel on the map, and see that the Threat is increasing in that direction. They decide to proceed. The GM then lays out the scene at a power plant in Australia where several engineers have gone missing. Two investigators, Dahlia and Rickard are talking to the plant director who seems likes he's hiding something.

I can imagine some players wouldn't want to shift attention away from a scene when things are getting interesting, but my hope is that multiple things will be getting interesting alongside each other. Might be tricky to work out, but I think it could be quite neat.

Earth Resists

I've been thinking for awhile about how to make an X-COM like experience in a TTRPG. I played a lot of the 1994 original back in the day, and the emergent aspects of play left a huge impression on me. I might dig into the detail of that in another post.

(I know there is already a board game based on X-COM, though I've never played it, and I would imagine there is some kind of similar RPG out there already, but I think it'll be fun to make my own stab at it.)

Here are the principles I've been trying to bring to this:

1. I don't want this to be a bunch of spreadsheets. Video games are great at simulating complicated stuff, but I want something very light. Vibes over formulas.
2. A feeling of being up against the odds, maybe even that you only have a slim chance of victory.
3. Investment in characters - surviving a dangerous mission is a big deal.
4. Extraterrestrials not being used as a stand-in for otherness among humans. I don't want to tell stories about people being scared of other people coming to their homeland. The working title, Earth Resists, is a nod to this - focusing on a united effort from humanity.
5. Expanding on the inspiration. X-COM is about resource management and tactical skirmishes. I want to explore some other possible aspects of resisting an invasion - uncovering plots through investigation, as one example. Maybe also exploring ideas about the organisation breaking apart but still functioning in some form.

The world sheet

Front and centre is a page showing a map of the earth divided into six regions. (I'm leaning into d6s for everything, unless something steers me towards introducing other dice.) A d6 can be placed on a region to indicate the threat (0 - 6). When you need to generate an event in a region roll d6 + threat (for a value from 1 to 12).

Reconnaissance (ETs studying Earth and humanity)
1. UFO sightings
2. Evidence of incursions at key locations
3. Reports of individual abductions

Panic (Direct contact, civilians under threat)
4. UFO landings
5. ETs sabotaging facilities
6. Mass abductions

Foothold (ETs establishing bases of operations on Earth)
7. Destruction of satellite / radar monitoring of an area
8. Construction of ET facilities
9. Xenoforming of environment

Total war
10. Military capability of a country destroyed
11. Critical infrastructure lost
12. Complete occupation of a region

One pressure on the players will be trying not to let the threat level increase in any region. But there may be times when they have to choose between protecting a power station in one location or rescuing civilians in another location. When they don't respond to an event, the threat is likely to increase there.

Morale

The second function of a region's threat is that it contributes to the morale of characters from that region. The best morale score is 6. When creating a character from a region with threat 3, roll 3d6. For every 1 rolled, reduce their morale by 1.

During play, events can trigger a morale check for a character. This is typical stress / insight type stuff, from games like Cthulhu Dark.

Character creation

Speaking of characters, I want them to be mechanically simple, but to have the potential for players to grow attached to them. I'm borrowing from Lasers and Feelings to have a single number for character stats. I think a lot of L & F hacks go for something cute with the labels for the number, but currently I'm going with Force / Precision. I think that can be meaningful when dealing with skirmishes and also stuff like a diplomat trying to convince a government not to withdraw funding.

So characters will have a morale score, and a single stat to cover all rolls. They'll also have a couple of skills (just words for things they are trained in).

There's no health points. I think injuries will be represented as a number of weeks to heal. (Ticking down healing clocks during an upkeep phase is sliding into spreadsheet territory, so maybe I'll try to simplify that - maybe no upkeep, but when you want to check if they are ready to come back into action you can do a roll for it.)

Missions

This is the bulk of the thing. One thing I'm currently considering is running two types of missions at the same time. Something like a skirmish, but cutting back and forth to a separate mission of espionage or research. Rather than having phases of play with very different focuses, mush it all together with some guidance for managing spotlight.

I'm also trying to resist my normal bias towards long-running games. This game could be well suited to a short campaign, where tension ramps up quickly, and you have to make a big swing at the end or lose the conflict. If it's shorter then the missions can be a little more directed / curated, rather than trying to have lots of generators for coming up with countless missions.

More on all this next time.

A tool for pacing

This is a half-baked idea for managing the pacing of RPGs. You have a restricted amount of time in a play session, and plenty of flexibility in how much in-game time that can represent. (Consider something like Microscope, for the extreme example of covering eons of in-game time in a single session.)

Groups form habits about when to zoom in for detailed scenes or zoom out for montages. Maybe they read cues, spoken or unspoken, to make those decisions. Maybe the specific game gives direction on it.

I'm aiming here to have a modular mechanic that can be thrown into any game to handle this.

On the table, place a sheet with three circles marked on it. One circle is marked "play the scene", another is marked "resolve the scene", the third is marked "cut away".

During play, when a clear idea of the next scenario/scene has formed, each person places a d6 in the circle of their choice.

Putting your die in "play the scene" is a quick non-verbal communication of "I like the sound of this, let's zoom in and play through it".

Choosing "Resolve the scene" is a way of saying "I'm interested in the outcome of this situation and I want to get straight to the consequences. Let's use some mechanics of the game to quickly resolve how this turns out."

"Cut away" says "This is not what I want to focus on right now, let's skip onwards."

A player may also not place their die, which I think communicates "I'm just going with the flow," which is fine too.

What I think this would achieve is a really quick declaration of how people want to manage the next chunk of session time.

The most gentle application of this idea, is that the GM glances at that, and uses the polling data to inform (but not dictate) their decisions. (Or if it is a more democratic style game, the group do the same thing.)

To be more directed - go with the majority. If there's a tie, roll the dice to see which comes out on top.

I think everything so far is kind of not very useful. It is all equivalent to just having a quick chat. It is *maybe* a little quicker.

Where this *might* become more useful is that, while playing through a scene, you could move your die. It is a silent (hopefully non-disruptive) way to say "I think we've actually just answered the important question here, and I'm ready to move on". (I'm conscious that silent forms of communication aren't accessible to all players, maybe their are other subtle cues that could be used.)

In practical appearance, it might look something like a safety tool, but with an entirely different purpose. It is purely for the pacing of the session.

Maybe, because it's a die with numbers, you could also rotate it to show emphasis. A 1 for "I'm happy to move on, but also happy to hang out in this scene," and higher numbers for "Come on, let's move on." (I imagine that 1,2,3 give enough granularity for those opinions, and if you ever use a 6 you are banned from the group for life.)

Could this be a way for people to be rude and basically give a thumbs down anytime they don't like someone roleplaying in depth? Yes, that sucks, and I can only suggest to be cool.

I probably don't read enough games to know whether there is already something like this in use. Do let me know if there is.

Wanderlust

I'm thinking about making a game that focuses on traveling between places, and the end state of the game (or of one PC) is the PC settling down and ending their journey.

The mechanic I'm currently considering is to have a character attribute called wanderlust. It has a value between 1 and 20. When you roll equal or under (d20), you are content to travel onward. If you roll greater, then you have a connection to this place, and traveling onward is affected.

Rather than tracking this with a number alone, I'm thinking of drawing 20 cards (standard playing cards, face down). The player holding this hand has a tactile representation of their character's desire to travel. 20 cards feel substantial. As the hand is diminished, I would hope that it feels significant. The character is visibly coming to the end of their journey.

My thought is to have a "push your luck" feel to the journey. Engaging with a location means playing a card and diminishing your wanderlust. When you later plan to leave, there's a possibility that your interest in the place will hold you back.

The cards come into play as prompts for new aspects of locations. I'll need to write some tables for handling this part. For example, 8 of Clubs could give the prompt "Their history is based on a lie". If you want to learn more about a place, or significantly impact the place, you have to spend more cards.

When you fail a wanderlust roll, it means you have a newfound connection to this place and you hesitate to leave. I'm thinking of a checklist you can use to resolve that and move on. If you run out of items to check, then you have no choice but to stay in the location. The checklist could be something like this:

• Take a memento with you, to remind you of this place. 
• Leave something you cherish in this place. 
• A companion from this place joins you for the onward journey.
• Make a promise to someone who lives here.

And so on...

With a wanderlust that can only be reduced, it would limit the play time. If you wanted to extend it, you could have events that allow you to recover wanderlust - it could be something as simple as draw d4 cards when you travel onward. Or perhaps it would be linked to encountering wondrous things on the journey which inspire you to continue.

To summarize:

1. During character creation, set the wanderlust attribute between 1 and 20. A dedicated traveler can begin with 20.
2. Draw a number of cards (face down), equal to the wanderlust score.
3. When taking an action that shows personal interest in a place (investigating, protecting, challenging), turn over a card and resolve the associated prompt. The card is discarded and the wanderlust attribute is reduced by 1.
4. When deciding whether to leave, roll d20 versus wanderlust. Equal or under is a success and travel can proceed without issue.
5. On a failure of the wanderlust roll, either end your journey in this place, or check one of the unchecked prompts for connections to places you have visited.
6. Optionally, recover your wanderlust when you travel onward.

I have a little more in mind for the game this might fit into, but it might also make sense as a MOSAIC Strict text that could be used in different games.

My idea for Mythic Bastion-Jam

A Mythic Bastionland game jam will be launching soon on itch.

My enthusiasm for game jams tends to exceed my follow-through, but just to put something into the ether, this is what I have in mind.

A mini-game for advancing time between Seasons and Ages

This isn't something that I think is needed. The rules for advancing time are simple, clear, and work well. I'm just exploring the idea of switching gameplay styles briefly, and the gaps between Seasons and Ages might be a nice place for that. Plus, everyone gets a bonus character!

When advancing time by a Season or Age, everyone (players and referee) will play in a GMless mini-game, inspired by Wanderhome. Everyone takes on the role of a storyteller or chronicler who lives in the realm. The goal is to collaboratively give a little more detail to events in the realm. Each chronicler has opportunities to add to the narrative - "I met a farmer who was saved by the company..." Maybe some lesser consequences of the Company's actions can be fleshed out.

This isn't a replacement for the existing rules (players still need to choose pursuits for their knights, and the group still needs to find out how Unresolved Situations progress. It is just a way to add some additional gameplay and roleplay into that framework.

Some things I would want to include, if I get around to doing this:

• Inspired by Wanderhome, define actions that allow you to gain a token or spend a token. 
• Define traits ("things you can always do" from Wanderhome) for each chronicler. Maybe (eek) d72 of them?
• Define places that the chroniclers may come together to discuss the changes in the Season / Age.
• A gentle mechanic for protecting elements where the group doesn't want to share complete narrative control - the Referee may have something in mind for some drama in a holding, for example, or a player may not want their knight dragged into some scandal.
  
• Maybe something about the idea of unreliable narrators. The meeting of these chroniclers may not reveal the factual history of the realm, but just their version of it. (And the realm can be pretty hard to pin down anyway.)

That's it for now, but I hope to return to this.

The other type of mail

In Mythic Bastionland, knights roam around the wilderness, seeking the myths. When they want the major news of the realm, they can return to a holding. But is there another way to stay updated?

This is a homebrew rule for using carrier pigeons to communicate with holdings. The company travel with a pigeon, trained to fly to a holding of your choice, and return to you.

When you want to send a message or ask for news, count the number of hexes to the holding. Roll that number of d6s.

Speed: How many 1s were rolled?

• 0 The pigeon returns on the next day. 
• 1 The pigeon returns d4 days later.
• 2 The pigeon flies to the wrong holding and returns d6 days later. 
• 3 The pigeon never returns.

Quality: What is the highest number rolled? 

• 1-3 The information returned is incomplete.
• 4-5 The information is complete.
• 6 The expected information comes, along with some additional news.

Does this make sense? It seems logical that a greater distance would increase the risk to the pigeon. Why should the information quality improve over a greater distance? I'm imagining the holding's postmaster (pigeon master?) being overworked and having little regard for mail from people who are within a day or two's ride. They scribble down a message and think it's good enough. Messages from greater distances are taken more seriously.