Low Trust “Traditional”

I don’t know why I have been seeing a recent uptick in discussion on the “blorb” principles method of refereeing, but it seems like it has made its way back around Discord and the various microblog scenes as of late. This is not a style I would normally comment on – I see it very outside of what I like to play, especially when the author gave a very bad-faith hot-take on FKR.

But people have been making assertions about it that seem puzzling to me – they’re recommending it as an OSR prep style, for one, where I cannot fathom how it gets associated with the very emergent, high-trust style refereeing we strive for in various OSR communities.

blorb is extremely low trust – it’s a style that proposes a rigid hierarchy for the referee to follow, going so far as to hypothetically allow players to audit prep or a module to make sure that the referee didn’t supersede prep with emergent tools or fiat. It’s effectively the same sort of justification you see in communities that will allow for toxic play to flourish under the banner of “designer intent”, only the designer, in this case, is your prep.

The whole point of the referee in traditional roleplaying and adventure games is to utilize a source of higher fidelity rulings to step in when the mechanics or situation may produce fictionally inauthentic results. Or when they could use their experience, creativity, subject knowledge, and tools to arrive at a ruling quicker than mechanization could, often with a higher degree of specificity in that they as a human could take into context more elements than any rules text could.

Take for instance this example:

You have prepped a dungeon where a maniacal gnome has created a death trap dungeon. You placed a secret door to a treasure room off of some room – you have some reason why you selected this particular room and secret door setup.

Now let’s say in play that you realize your prior location is not suitable – maybe its in a place that would be generally inaccessible or dangerous for the gnome or its minions to reach. Maybe it does not line up with other emergent properties set forth by tools. Perhaps it doesn’t make structural sense once you examine the dungeon in play.

Now, you see a room that makes perfect sense for this. No sweat – the players have yet to find any hint of this secret door. They’re still at the entrance or fiddling with other elements – you can take a break and just shift the whole thing over to a place that will be more fictionally consistent with the dungeon, as well as the established elements of the gnome – such as it being an architectural genius.

By using your in-flight creativity and expertise around the fictional world you have course corrected a fictionally-inconsistent element into one that fits the setting and established lore. If you used blorb’s rigid adherence to prep you would be introducing fictional inconsistencies.

Having had this discussion with a few of the principles’ adherents, the argument I have received around this is pretty demeaning. It leverages the above as a critical mistake that the referee must work to improve (later… in other forms of prep, but never during the game). It plays into some impossible notion that one will never prep inconsistencies, or run a module that has mistakes in it.

All of this is hogwash, of course. What is better – to assume “perfection” (which I think is a demeaning way to phrase it and one that sorely misassumes the role of the referee), admonish “mistakes”, and force people to play a game that makes less sense in lip service to some arbitrary manifesto. Or is it better to allow for flexibility, trusting a referee to use whatever tools they have at their disposal, and to trust the players to converse, negotiate, and question elements to clarify the understanding of the world – to recognize that not everything is going to be perfect in prep or play, and to allow for the referee to follow their intended role and run the best game possible?

Doomed Reach Session 2

Our party eliminates half of the Cult of the Sanguine Skull.

Characters

Florby, the Elven Alchemist
Apicius, the Farming Gorumond Fighter
Brother Murray, the Cleric of Light Above
Yarlexia, the escaped slave-turned-Witch Elf
Wulfwig the Ponderous, Cleric of Light Above
Steven the non-descript, an average mentalist mage

Downtime

Florby spent the week of downtime adventuring. They were abducted by a mad noble and their entourage looking for a tournament. Arriving at an abandoned monastery that had been turned into a statuary, the noble challenged a statue, which rose to meet them and struck down the crazed gentry. In the chaos Florby escaped, but had no chance to steal any goods.

Apicius proposed that Labrix the hireling wed his cousin, and tend to his farm, and in exchange, Apicius would eventually give Labrix his own sheep flock. The hireling agreed, and in the revelry of the wedding, Apicius became drunk and got into the losing side of a knife fight.

Brother Murray spent the week training his animals to obey simple commands, as well as investigating the locked box the party had acquired last session, finding it magical.

Yarlexia told fortunes and read tarot, receiving a working wage of silver.

Wulfwig decided to drink the week away, falling in with some bandits known as Hegrit’s Harpies, and suffered a massive hangover.

Session Report

Florby tried to pick the lockbox but got sprayed with acid, receiving notable scars to their torso, inhibiting breathing for a while. Inside lay an iron statue of a dwarf, carved into it a curse one could levy at an adversary to “ruin their fingers.”

Yarlexia attempted to summon a demon, slaying a scoundrel from the Copper Cockatrice to do so and called into her protection a humanoid pig/owl demon named Bechisi, who Yarlexia renamed Betty.

The group returned to the cult’s hideout, finding a massive wasp nest on the ascend, and ambushing the two huntsmen who served as guards, learning a bit more of the cult’s intentions, which mostly dealt with traversing through cycles of undead and rebirth.

Yarlexia took the form of one of the hunters and investigated the cave, while the others prepared to tumble rocks and even the tower if need be when enemies were drawn out.

Yarlexia spoke the cult’s secret phrase given to her by the hunter, which turned out to be a signal – the cultist she was conversing with sounded an alarm, ran behind a portcullis, and unleashed a horde of zombies. She began her escape back to the entrance, but as she made her way down the hallway – guards from the other direction were marching at her with bows, she decided to unleash Betsy upon them and make her way out of the cave.

The party waited as zombies followed out, saving the avalanche for the many cultists who came later to see if their pets had dispatched the invaders. The flesh of these dead cultists drew the zombies, and the party made quick work of them as well.

They also witnessed unusual, chaotic operations in the gully before the cult’s cave – dogmen crawling out of a bubbling pit of earth, and a massive bull-headed man disgusted by the carnage before the cult cave.

Entering into the cult complex, they found Betsy had fallen into a pit trap, and freed it – but were immediately attacked as the demon was no longer bound to Yarlexia. In the combat, Yarlexia continued to intone pacts and words of command and was eventually able to wrest Betsy back to her side.

The group proceeds north, finding four acolytes in a store room. They enter into combat and their hireling Hingle is decapitated by an acolyte. Eliminating two in combat, they get the other half to surrender, and piece out a few more details of the cult before delivering justice to these foul necromancers.

Having eliminated half of the cult’s numbers, losing a hireling, and taking some damage from the combats, they decide to make it back to Fortress Solae and recuperate before a final? assault on the cult.

Doomed Reach Session 1

Yesterday I kicked off an in-person open-table game here in L.A. using a hack of OD&D plus a lot of various hex-crawl tools mashed together.

The intent behind this campaign is to get as close to a West Marches as is feasible – I’ve run one successful West Marches late in college, and while I have tried a few times after that I’ve never breached the point of referee scheduling games to players scheduling games. I have a hope we can in this game, but I am not making it an outright goal, instead, I’m letting players loosely provide availability over the week, and if they schedule a game in my availability that’s great – otherwise I’m happy to book the sessions.

I had six players initially, for the first session I almost thought to have eight, but that would have been too difficult, as I was having trouble hearing even the middle of the table at points in the game store. So six players is a great amount, as long as I work to clarify what players say.

Characters

Our six characters were (and apologies to players if I’ve spelled the names wrong, feel free to correct me):

Florby, the Elven Alchemist
Apicius, the Farming Gorumond Fighter
Leandril, the tough-love Elven Fighter
Brother Murray, the Cleric of Light Above
Yarlexia, the escaped slave-turned-Witch Elf.
Wulfwig the Ponderous, Cleric of Light Above

Session Report

Our party met in the Copper Cockatrice, the local mercenary haunt and drinking hole in Fortress Solace. Amidst wine and banter, the party sought out a small collection of adventure hooks, including:

A map purchased from a mourning Hobbit, having lost his companions to a crow demon at the end-point of their quest for treasure.
Investigation of, and eventual elimination of a Chaos cult rumored to be abducting children, northwest of the fortress, paid for by a Bishop of the Church of Holy Law.
A mining collapse in a small village of Bryny to the West uncovered an ancient Lightbringer temple, with the Church wanting such a site cleared out and sealed off immediately.

Having questioned the drunk Hobbit, our party heard horrific tales of a crow demon that slew his companions. Citing the fact that mundane weapons could not hurt the beast, the party instead decided to pursue the more local option of investigating the cult.

They interviewed and hired a slew of hirelings, including:

Drogos the Mercenary, is a stout fellow who has experience with soldiering.
Labrix the Link-Boy. A young herder who lost his flock, and wishes to scrounge up enough silver for an impressive herd.
Hingle the Thug. A tall fellow with many notable facial scars and missing teeth, they wield a nasty hunting knife and has a conflicting relationship between his religion and his zeal for violence.

They also interviewed another henchman with wild eyes and a big beard who began shaking excitedly and licking his lips when the topic of combat was broached, but the party decided his eagerness was a step too far for their liking (as of now 😉)

While the party conducted these interviews, Yarlexia pandered traveling merchants with tarot and fortunes, playing to their egos, and earning enough payment for two silver pieces.

To The Caves

Our party marched off into the wilderness, seeking a strangely fresh forest to the northwest of the fortress. Easy going along the plains brought them to the border of these woods, whereupon they spied a Gnome burrow, a strange fellow named Fluppix had been drawn to recent migration in the area and he decided to start up a bakery and “art experience” to take advantage of the hinterland populace.

The party decided to partake in his venture, although Brother Murray thought better of the situation and kept watch. They ate the Gnome’s tasty bread and were subject to a rather rough massage (Fuppix’s chosen “art” for the day). Utilizing the time to question the Gnome, they did discover that a few dozen folks were camped somewhere nearby and that they did have Gnome-sized beings with them. Apicius provided the Gnome with an onion to feed his “children”, which turned out to include a rather portly badger.

The Gnome pointed out where they headed off to, noting that a troll cave lay between them, best to be avoided. Avoided this ominous cave they did, and found an oval-shaped valley beyond, beset by cliffs to the west, north, and south. Instead of pressing head-on, our group thought it better to circle around to the rear of these cliffs, gaining a vantage point over the many caves below.

Atop this crest, they discovered a camouflaged, but unoccupied watchtower or hunter’s lodge. Rooting around they found a spear and some items, as well as a buried lockbox in the earthen floor below. Brother Murray and Leandril kept watch and saw a hunter stalking a deer in the woods below. After felling the deer, the hunter sounded a horn, which drew members out of one cave to retrieve this deer, while the hunter made their way back to the watchtower.

Our party debated capturing or dispatching this hunter but decided discretion was better, leaving everything but the lockbox and making their way into a dense thicket for cover.

Yarlexia used her witchcraft to assume the guise of the Hunter and entered the caves below. She was met with a robed acolyte, wielding a metal staff whose end terminated in two collared zombies. Yarlexia played it off as if she had brought more food (in the form of her own sheep and goat), and the acolyte told her that the deer was more than enough to get them through the summer. He insisted instead that the goat, Luna, should have its name transcribed in the Book of Blood and enter into unlife as a new guardian for the community.

Yarlexia hesitantly agreed, but mentioned that she felt that she was ready to conduct the ritual herself, and would make her way into the ritual chamber. Passing by the guard she realized the cult’s complex was very deep, and she feared her illusion wearing off, so she turned and stabbed the cultist, calling out to any spirits or demons for protection. She was answered by a fell spirit demanding more supplication and ritual before providing aid.

Deciding against partaking in a full-blown ritual at the cave entrance, she grabbed the acolyte’s religious symbol, a blood-red skull, as well as the dual man-catcher zombie apparatus and returned to the group.

The party decided to make haste and double back to the fortress to provide proof to the bishop of the cult. They were promptly rewarded, and our session closed.

Referee Notes

Hopefully, I did the session justice, and apologies to any players whose antics or quips I may have missed. Running a pretty generative-oriented hex crawl involves juggling quite a lot of details at once, so I unfortunately sometimes misremember a few details.

Overall this was a fun session. Time was a little packed as half the session included character creation and setting summary, so I couldn’t quite get the spotlight on everyone as I would have wished, but I think there’s a decent way forward for everyone to grow and drive goals and ambitions.

I am running this game in real-time, so the party may have a week or more to carouse, do downtime, research, etc. before deciding if they want to fight this cult or go about another hook.

If you happen to be in the L.A. area and are interested in playing, definitely drop me a message and I’ll shoot you a player survey!

Late Gary Con 15 Summary & Braunstein

So about a month ago (time does fly), I traveled to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, to attend Gary Con 15. GC15 was my first convention since the initial outbreak of Covid, so I was pretty excited. I was initially planning on running an event there, but after a lot of life stuff got in the way, I decided to attend as a player for once. Going to a convention without referee slots is quite a change of pace for me, as I have had whole trips to GenCon, where I have run three sessions daily. I did grab some pick-up play as a referee and player, though, so I guess I can’t keep away from the backside of the screen.

I got to play in about 75% of the games I had wanted to try out. Unfortunately, I missed Daniel Norton‘s Unchained sessions, but I could play several other peoples’ takes on D&D + Chainmail, so that was a fitting consolation.

I met with my pal Directsun and played face-to-face with him as he ran his Seer’s Sanctum adventure. I had played in a playtest version, but I often play in adventures I have read or run, so I have no problem playing support for the other players and maybe goading characters into trying “fun” ideas. Directsun ran the game in a very “FKR” sort of style. When players showed up to the table, he had them roll up three stats, ask for something the character is good at and is poor at, and contribute whatever else they wanted, such as background, motivation, etc. I played a braggart mercenary who was adept with a polearm but very cowardly. We got through the dungeon and were able to unleash some stuff in it that the author hadn’t experienced before, so that was a blast.

Most of the games I played were what I would recognize as what Mike Monard described in his original FKR post on the odd74 forums. I think this is a testament to the toolbox nature of D&D’s original three little brown books (and also how vague and obtuse they are, necessitating hacking, I say lovingly). Not to get too into yelling at a cloud, but I think sometimes people chase some big secret when it comes to these sub-niches of games like they need to find some perfect mechanic or principle when it is – play games with people you trust and talks about the fun you want to have. That’s an aside from the con, though.

The highlight of the convention was getting to play a session of Braunstein I with David Wesley. If you are unaware, Braunstein was a “war game” that Wesley ran for his wargaming group, which included Dave Arneson. In this game, everyone played individual characters in a tense situation. Wesley needed to come up with rulings on the fly for all the unexpected hijinks the players got up to. What he thought was a failure became the spark igniting the tabletop roleplaying hobby.

The session lasted six hours, with an hour and a half of setup and discussion. This length of time might seem like a lot. Still, it was an absolute gem of a session for me – Wesley overviewed how and why he proposed the game, the history of how it happened, and the following Braunsteins he ran to eventually arrive at the notion of what made them fun. He also gave a historical overview of the scenario behind the game – noting that many of his original players were familiar with the political situation given their wargaming, so he wanted to highlight the political and religious underpinnings of the adventure.

Wesley immediately handed out a few characters based on contributions and answers to questions he asked during the history section. For example, a player who could recite a quote from Jefferson was handed the role of a dissident student. I was “Student #3”, imprisoned with other students who had incited violence (or defended against it, per their report). I will not go into deep detail on the scenario as I know David Wesley is running this at many more conventions to come, and I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone who does want to play it. My character had a cushy job and a somewhat mysterious past, and my goals related to keeping that position, not being expelled, and discovering the details of my background.

Every character had a collection of different, secret goals. While we were supposed to accomplish them, many of us found additional avenues for fun, messing with other characters, repairing or ruining extraneous situations based on the players, and hijinks.

The game is played much like one might think of as a parlor larp. We had sections of the room to represent different sections of the town – the prison, with tables representing cells, various buildings, the university, and a town square. We didn’t have all the players for every single role, so our Referee would go about the players portraying them. For example, he showed up as a corrupt guard to my cell looking for an easy payout, which my cellmates and I jumped at the chance to contribute to on promise of immediate release.

The experience was one of the best games I have played in. After the game, David Wesley signed a copy of Olde House Rules‘ Barons of Braunstein (a book he contributed the forward and some extra materials to). We also had time to discuss historic details I had questions about with the Major and players from his group. I’ll probably collect them in a future post to get further information after I correspond.

Overall, the convention was a lot of fun, definitely one of the better ones I have been to, and I don’t think that is just because it is the first I’ve attended in about three years!

2 Clacky Cubes

a MOSAIC Strict resolution module

Introduction

2 Clacky Cubes takes a time-tested resolution system and makes in-line with the Mosaic Strict guidelines, free to be used with any tabletop game you see fit, adding some commentary and examples on how it might be used at the table. All you need is two six-sided dice (abbreviated as 2d6) and a situation where one or more characters attempt a task that has an interesting chance of failure. In many traditional games this may be called for by a Game Master (GM), but depending on how your table plays – this could be other players or perhaps even be yourself.

Setup

Before resolving anything, the table needs to be clear about the present situation. Communication in tabletop games can be difficult, so the entire table is encouraged to ask questions, clarify, and negotiate until everyone has an understanding of the following:

Conflict – what is the overall situation, what threats and challenges exist?
Intent – what is the overall goal the character is trying to accomplish? What impact will this have on the situation?
Task – what actions are the character taking to reach the stated intent? What tools are they using? Do they have any particular advantages or situational elements aiding them?
Risk – what does the potential failure look like, or what will happen if the characters do not act or react? What disadvantages and conflicting elements are at play?

Basic Resolution

Once the above is understood, the player picks up and rolls 2d6. If the total sum showing on the dice results in 8 or greater (written as 8+) they have succeeded at their intent. Any less and what they were risking manifests.

Using this basic resolution system there are no “modifiers” and nothing is added or subtracted from a roll, instead the table adjusts how effective the character is at succeeding in their intent, or scaling the amount of risk involved.

We have a character on the run from some guards in a fortress they were infiltrating. It’s a rainy night, and as they round the corner they discover a dead end. Looking up they estimate a climb is doable, and the thorny overgrown vines may pose a problem. But because of their sleek, black cloak, if they can just get beyond the walls of the fortress there’s no way any guards will be able to spot them in the field under the dark of night.

With the guards in fast pursuit, the table decides that because of the storm failure means the character will fall flat on their back, leaving them prone when the guards arrive, and the large thorny growth on the wall will tear through the cloak they are wearing, ruining it for the time being.

Advanced Resolution

The Basic Resolution system can work perfectly for most games, but there are groups that prefer modulating the chance of success based on contributing factors, rather than just adjusting the outcome.

To do this – the table should take note of each disadvantage imposing on the conflict and assign a value of -1 to the upcoming roll. If the GM/group would say the negative circumstance as being “very” disadvantageous – make it -2, and the most extreme would net a -3.

Now go about the same process for advantages, skills, gear, etc. that the character may have – adding +1 for most benefits, +2 for large ones, and +3 for massive boons.

Add the net result to the roll, and again if the outcome is 8+, the intent is achieved, otherwise the consequences of the risks are suffered.

In our above example, with the knave running from guards looking to scale a wall covered in sharp vines in the middle of a rainstorm, the GM decides that both the rain and the vines net the character -1 each. The player notes that the character has a background as an acrobat and is thus skilled in climbing – giving a +1 advantage. This nets the character an end result of -1 to their roll.

Some tables may wish to gauge certain tasks as being inherently easier or harder from the initial premise, before considering further modifiers. If this is useful for your group the following table is suggested to modify rolls with:

*Task Difficulty*	*Roll Modifier*
Very simple	+4
Easy	+2
Risky	0
Hard	-2
Extremely difficult	-4

Contested Resolution

When multiple sides are in conflict, and each side wishes to roll (for example if two player characters are arm wrestling), every side does so.

If only one side succeeds – they achieve the full intent of their task. If more than one side succeeds, whoever rolled highest gets most of their intent, but at a compromise, as the other successful parties achieves a small amount of their intent.

Ties or all sides failing results in a stand-still, or if the referee/table finds both sides suffering their risk more interesting, the side that rolled lowest faces more of what they were risking than those who failed with a higher result.

A goblin is racing to grab a priceless vase and make off with it. An elf guard wishes to physically impose on the goblin and apprehend them from doing this. The goblin rolls an 10, while the elf rolls an 8. So both succeed, but the goblin succeeds “better.” The group decides this means the goblin has snatched up this vase, but the guard dove and grabbed onto the goblins leg, being dragged behind and slowing their escape.

Aiding Others

Whenever characters are directly helping another in a conflict, consider all allies as an advantage for the character in conflict, reducing the risk and/or heightening the impact success has, when using the basic resolution method. Or by adding to the character’s die roll based on how impactful the table finds their aid when using the advanced resolution.

A character is trying to force open a door by ramming into it. One of their allies decides to stand alongside them and batter the door in unison.

When using Basic Resolution – the referee/group decides that this would allow the party to breach the door in one strike instead of several, surprising anyone on the other side of the door.

If using the Advanced Resolution – we decide the ally, while not particularly strong, is enough to help the endeavor – giving the first character +1 to their roll.

When characters are aiding others in an indirect fashion, each character must roll their own contest, with success benefiting later conflicts they are aiding. This is for situations such as when a character is crafting an item for another to use, or when a character is securing a rope for another to traverse up a cliff.

Unlicense

To the extent possible under law, Justin Hamilton has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to 2 Clacky Cubes. This work is published from: United States.

But It’s Fiction All the Way Down!

One of the responses to Free Kriegsspiel-inspired adventure gaming that I see often is the idea that anything occurring in a tabletop game came about from individuals creating fiction. Either through pure fiat, or interpreted from prompts and random results, or directly from an author publishing pre-determined elements in the form of a module or like material.

Since this is obviously true, the argument is that it does not matter if the content is created via the Referee, or Players, or anyone else. And while this is true of some players, its extremely reductive of many players’ drive to game. This is not to disparage any particular playstyle, but I know for myself included I largely look to gaming as a method of participating in fictional exploration – either through the lens of a character discovering things, or as a Referee presenting a world and situation to the players and seeing how those worlds collide. Ben L. has a fantastic post going over this in detail. I like the “traditional” setup (although I think that term is a bit misleading) – a Referee communicates the world and adjudicates situations with input from whatever rules they feel like using, and the conversation at the table. The Players take on Characters to respond to this situation and interact with the present world, driving for their own goals.

Given this, saying “well why have the Referee be in charge of the world, what does it matter if Ref Sarah or Player Bob decides what’s in the treasure chest or what the villain’s plot is” to me reads a little bit like if an author of a novel stopped midway through, gave the reader a prompt, and said “ok you pen the next chapter.” Writing is a fun activity, I love to do it – but 99% of the time when I pick up a novel I’m looking to lose myself in a tale, not tell one myself.

The specific roles and responsibilities we take on while gaming can certainly vary, but reducing the whole experience down to an isolated look at the end result greatly diminishes the various joys one may find in the process of a particular style of play.

FKR & Storygames

I find myself in discussions pretty frequently about the nature of FKR games and storygames, so I thought I would make a short little post elaborating on this. That way I at least have a single place to reference.

So the FKR is a modern “movement” or set of communities devoted around an idea proposed by Mike Monard on the odd74 forums about seven years ago. This idea was that behind many of the classic games was the inspiration of Free Kriegsspiel – Braunstein, Blackmoor, Greyhawk, etc.

He posited that instead of a rules text giving authority, play was a conversation among the table, with players taking the roles of characters in a fictional world, and the referee representing this world, responding to them, and making adjudications. The rules in this style of play are tools for the referee. The referee doesn’t break rules as they aren’t mandate to begin with.

Why this movement is a thing at all is because many of us are enthused about this style of play. We see many games and play styles out in the wild that say the opposite – that the rules text is the be-all-end-all, that you have to play games with some heed to the “designer’s intent”, that you can’t trust anyone to fairly adjudicate even though we all agree to these games and roles by way of free association. The FKR is a contrast to all of this.

Storygames, on the other hand are their own tradition. Like any other niche or acronym in gaming its a little “depends on who you ask”, but usually I mean games that focus on a distribution or complete removal of the more traditional referee role. They can range from the PbtAs which still have a referee, although the assumption of what they do is a little different, and they have players – but those players are often leveraging the system to inject some things that traditionally a referee would do. Or they can go more on the referee-less (or “referee-full”) where no one person occupies that, and instead everyone does.

So I’m always surprised by the large amount of people who imply that you can have an FKR game without a referee, or when utilizing mechanics to distribute referee powers. They’re obviously at odds with each other. You cannot on one hand say you prioritize a style of referee-adjudication-as-entire-system, and then say also say “but yeah, only in the case where the players aren’t spending their fate points or answering a Fortune-in-the-Middle Move or there are no refs.”

This is not a value judgement on storygames – I enjoy quite a few time to time. I think they’re worthwhile games to try out and see if they are for you, and even if they’re not you at least hopefully learned something new, or maybe picked up a technique or two to take into other games. Labels are useful to communicate, and its fine for things to be different – storygames don’t need to be FKR. And you can play one, or both, or neither without that being any fault.

As someone who massively enjoys FKR games I am a little peeved at the amount of discussion by people who either don’t play FKR or outright dislike it trying to “deconstruct” it (in supposedly FKR places, at least). I think it obfuscates the discussion around actually interesting topics FKR brings to the table, like trust, a real examination of authority, setting consistency, subject expertise, etc. I feel it also prevents newcomers from trying out this fantastic style of play.

Anyway, I’m not really going anywhere with this, just felt like I should get it off my chest because I find myself in these discussions more and more frequently. What are your thoughts on the matter?

FKR: It’s not the amount of rules

A bit of a preamble for anyone not familiar with the acronym – there’s a movement or set of movements known as the FKR, standing for Free Kriegsspiel Revolution, a (mostly) joke term intended to contrast with the OSR to focus purely on a relationship to rules in gaming – namely that the referee is the interface between the fictional world and the player characters.

These movements tend to primarily focus on very small rulesets – often stuff like “d6 roll for low” or contested 2d6 rolls, just because these kinds of rulesets allow the referee to really focus in on rulings. I think there’s also a bit of fondness for how Bob Meyer runs Blackmoor.

So from the outside lots of people are starting to assume the FKR means nearly no-rules roleplaying games. But if you look at Kriegsspiel itself, or even the kind of rulesets Arneson seemed fond of writing – sometimes there are a lot of rules. And this to me is an important thing to note. It’s not the amount of rules.

FKR to me is purely a relationship to rules. If your table is composed of a referee who portrays the world opting to use rules as a tool whenever they wish, and players portraying characters responding with what they would do if they were in whatever fictional situation the ref is describing – that to me is FKR. It doesn’t matter if the ref is using a single coin flip, or if they decide to sometimes opt into Mythras, or their own hack of ASL, or anything else. The amount of crunch doesn’t impact the FKRishness, its if the table is focusing more on the fiction over the mechanics. This is obviously easier with light systems, but if the ref feels using something heftier “behind the screen”, that’s a perfectly valid approach.

That’s just me though.

Ghost Town Slow Crawl

This is my entry to Jim P’s Play Worlds Not Rules Design Challenge. This is kind of my love letter to small towns, night roads and strange fiction.

“Genre”

Ghost Town Slow Crawl is weird cause its less a genre but kind of a feeling of a few genres. Its inspiration is small town gothic Americana, things that border on or maybe turn the dial up on magical realism, Welcome to Nightvale or maybe even Addams Family. Games like Kentucky Route Zero and Night in the Woods. American Elsewhere, Gravity Falls, David Lynch, some of the “New Weird” fiction. Wovenhand and Nick Cave. Time period is “modern”, but most likely at least a decade past, if not more. Basically anything kinda eerie without being outright horrific, sorta dark but not overly grim, full of black humor without forgoing earnestness.

Tables

d4 What is something unusual that happened yesterday?

Something fell out of the sky and has everyone worried.
A lighthouse directly in the middle of town, destroying the town hall.
A curse was decried by a local wise-person, dooming a bloodline or tradition.
The town sprung into existence out of nowhere, with the implication of a prior history.

d6 Where is this town?

Beside an eerie forest, where nothing seems to stick in one place.
On a storm-kissed turbulent span of plains, stretching as far as the eye can see.
In the shadow of an ominous peak of which the locals rarely discuss.
Overlooking a deep lake, always reflecting the stars of night even midday.
Just off a desert whose winds leaves the impression of footsteps in the sand.
Deep in the delta, whose waters seem to hide everything lost and forgotten.

d8 What darkness lies below the surface of the town?

A foul magical tradition traces its lineage here, as does the order founded to keep it in check.
Drug trafficking of the paranormal variety.
A tome bearing a title akin to “Haec verba creare deos” was found in an antique shop. The proprietor doesn’t recall who it was sold to, but a worrying amount of new deities have begun demanding worship.
A massive storm, the townsfolk whisper about – personifying it as a beast.
Ominous beings from the wilderness abduct individuals every full moon.
A massive corporation has bought up all of the industry in the town, but seem to be seeking something other than just profits.
A shadow version of the town can be seen in reflections on some moonless nights, and the inhabitants there do not seem pleasant.
A sprawling abandoned city literally below the surface of town, full of disquieting images.

d10 What kind of person came here? (pc or npc ideas)

An investigator, looking to resolve something in this town.
An occultist, trying to pick up overlooked practices.
An outsider, from a weird place, not sure how to get home.
A ghostly local, bound by something intense.
A sentient animal, a little in the know.
A door-to-door salesman, on the lookout for new thrills.
A band lost on tour, with an avant garde sound bordering on violence.
An ookie family from somewhere else, enthusiastically looking to exchange cultures.
A property investor, seeking remote tracts of land and unusual estates.
A loved one, unsure of their distant cousin’s address.

d12 What are some carried items?

A cassette player that always starts a different tune every time it is played.
A pocketful of coins, all minted in fictional lands.
A journal, trying to describe the author’s rendition of an documentary describing an archaeological dig discovering highly technological artifacts in the wilderness.
Pouch of herbs, whose smoke provides lateral insights.
A replica dagger, bearing the crest of a doomed order.
A large piece of driftwood, with a map of the old town burned into it.
Wood-carved icons of nature spirits.
An antique revolver, wrapped in burgundy cloth.
Two over-sized walkie talkies, who sometimes pick up on a third converser’s signal.
A rose whose color shifts vibrantly in the moonlight.
A tarot deck of historical figures, some of whom you haven’t found in any history books.
A very filthy straw hat that never comes clean.

d20 What is an unusual aspect of this community (roll as many as you like)?

Ghosts make their presence known with surprising regularity.
The animals here may speak the human tongue, they just usually choose not to.
A portion of the population is experiencing time in reverse, and it doesn’t look great where they came from.
The flora is all connected and exhibits eerie intellect, and have begun arranging themselves into shapes that resemble buildings and factories in the wilderness.
The devil himself has a seasonal home here, and he’s a very active member of the community.
No-one wakes up where they went to sleep.
The shape of all things hold secrets to their inner nature. One must be careful when associating certain dimensions and number of sides with others, lest the items be angered.
The kids have gotten into competitive fortune telling, and ever since they split into oracular gangs everything’s gone sour.
Every person has an identical twin, and the town has enacted draconian restrictions to them ever meeting.
Every once and a while someone is lost down a deep dark mine or cave. Days later a haggard and aged person appears in town claiming to be them, begging for the burrow to be caved in.
Fairies leave offerings for the townsfolk, concessions begging for their domain to remain untarnished.
Some of the skeletons of the passed are found returned to their homes, unrealizing of their deceased nature.
Just outside of the corner of anyone’s vision automatons can be seen spying on us. But they are able to disperse or camouflage when direct contact is attempted.
10% of everything produced or created in town are placed into an empty lot. Every night a blinding spotlight appears from the sky, levitating everything into the sky until it disappears. The locals refer to this as “the tithe.”
Every person wakes up to find a manila envelope providing them a new role within the town. When they return home at night they find a report card indicating how well they performed. Everyone sweats fearing failing marks.
The profession of “angel investor” is strangely high for the population. While they seem to be terrible investors, they are pretty adamant about their divine origin.
The local clergy proselytizes the worship of “iconic” – rubber duckies, long dead celebrities, old social movements and art forms, etc.
The buildings grow and shrink of their own accord, and articles of
Several occupants are creatures from mythology, beings of legend, and ideas manifest. They don’t really talk about why they’re here.
The local gum randomly phase people in and out of existence, sometimes for minutes, sometimes years.

Advice

As for advice on how to play this – obviously play up the weirdness but don’t go overboard. Make some strange things normal – maybe aliens are contributing members of society, but always keep the presence of the occult – hidden things, secrets, and dark tidings people would sooner ignore.

Run this as a mystery, paranormal investigation game, a slice of life experiencing some oddities, a wizard duel, or as a community coming together to address a flaw or threat. Think of dark nights on a long road, strange things found in the back of antique shops, and the hand notes on unusual family photos of people you’ve never met. Dream of local urban legends and mythology, but definitely be sensitive to source materials and any beliefs inspiration is drawn from. Slow down play and be willing to really hold onto scenes longer than you think is necessary. Open up to a bit of dream logic as you play – find symbols, patterns and recurrences at your table, and use them as your grounding if logic gets a little mercurial.

Also be mindful of prejudices against small towners, but also of prejudices found within small towns. Talk to your table about comfort levels and what you want to explore.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this!

Nausicaä FKR Catch-Up (Session 4)

Playing catch-up on the session reports for my Valley of the Wind game over on the FKR Collective Discord. We took a bit of hiatus off for the holidays as well as some work scheduling difficulties, so we played one session months ago, and one session just last week which I will make a post for soon. So this is a report for a session we played back in November.

This will be the short format I’ve been trying out on my Barrowmaze reports. Feel free to leave feedback, especially if you are a player in this game and I’ve forgotten details.

Cast

Player Characters

Ezel the wanderer, played by Truzzy_02
Gaspar “Sarge” Brunel, pilot and sharpshooter played by ceacelessCarbine
Nessa, a spy-on-the-run, played by Ven (gendernihilist).

NPCs

Olmay, young child found aboard a downed ship
Belsinde, Olmay’s mother and military scientist for Torumekia
Imnion, Torumekian mechanic

Summary

Returning to the group in a circular viewing chamber, looking down into a three-story room filled with the grey substance, the horrific man-shaped creature with the shiny dome helmet, and multiple prisoners latticed up in the goo.
The group coordinates a dual plan, many utilizing an ancient elevator shaft to get down into the first floor, while Gaspar shoots the creature with his seed cloud gun, freezing it temporarily.
Nessa and Ezel make their way to free two captured prisoners, but the helmet on the monstrous figures falls into the pool, animating into a worm-like shape, that slams and strikes both of them, injuring them both.
Nessa’s captures “helmet” falls into the goo, producing yet another threat. (I think I forgot to mention in the last report that they fought a dog-like creature with one of these, Nessa found her nullification effects temporarily held it off and was able to retrieve the helmet after Gaspar shot the creature).
Ezel utilizes a pressurized container taken from the circular, slamming into the creature but knocking him back.
The party continues to scramble, multiple gambits are run as the group frees Olmay’s mother and another prisoner.
Ezel is knocked unconscious and dragged by one of the creatures, heading towards a northern section of the complex as the party is separated.
Circling through the halls, the group reconvenes on the other side of Ezel as he is coming to, slowing and distracting his captor.
Ezel utilized a quick flint and spark wheel to immolate the arm of his capture. The flames turning the twisting gelatinous structure into cracked and brittle char.
Regrouping, the party plans their escape.

Thoughts

Lots of fun, lots of planning, and a lot of hectic rolls as many of the characters came very close to the risk of death – something I always leave on the table when anyone is wounded but making risky actions.

Lots of fun, inventive play. Lots of awesome in-character planning, coordinated attacks, fun use of powers and equipment, and overall a great environment.

Some of the details may be a bit sparse because this is off of notes I made months ago, so anything I forgot or got wrong I apologize for.