I think the problem I'm having with it is that it's rather sterile. The mystery isn't particularly pressing, there's no major drama or conflict to it at all (either inferred or actual, physical or interpersonal). There's no real excitement. I also think that a lot of the italicised notes aren't necessary. I don't think you really need to tell anyone that the GM is narrating the scene for instance, it's pretty obvious from the context what is going on. Similarly the part that states "The GM agrees with this" confuses matters. What the GM says is following directly on from what the player says, on the same line. It's not entirely clear as a result of this whether it's the GM speaking or the player elaborating on his initial claim, having been given the nod from the GM. If you're going to write in a script-like style (where each line is preceded by the name of the person speaking it) then it's best to stick strictly to that style, rather than swapping occasionally to a more narrative style.

When I'm doing a sample of play, I always put in-character speech inside "speech marks" and out-of-character speech outside of them, to clearly differentiate between the two. It might be worth seeing if this method works for you too.

To sum up, I'd've put the first few lines like this:

GM: So there the two of you are, stranded apparently alone on this little knoll in the middle of the flood waters. There is a church at the top of the hill, a broken mini-van at the bottom, and little else.

John: There should be old gravestones as well, and a wall with a little wicket gate.

GM: Yes, old gravestones all covered in moss, and a little path from the gate to the church gates. (Here the GM allows another player to contribute to the initial Narration.)

Susan: And a small crowd of villagers, also escaping the flood.

GM: No, there are no people. (Here the GM uses his Veto.)

(I know, it's largely personal preference, I just think this format makes things a lot clearer. You might also prefer to use just (parentheses) or just italics to differentiate between actions and words, it's up to you)

Thanks for the comments!

I agree that it's not exciting ... I think when I wrote it I had convinced myself that I had to actually make it follow the course of the actual playtest, although I changed some of it to leave out mechanics that didn't work and so forth.

The style comments are appreciated too, I realize that at the moment it is too long, for example as well.

So I think you are saying there are three main points to address at the moment

1 It is too long winded, some notes can be dropped and the style can be tightened

2 The layout can be altered to make it easier to read, using various devices

3 The story being told is not very exciting, with no conflict or the like, mostly because it never happened in the playtest :)

I think it's 3 that I need the most help with. I need something that doesn't take up too much room (i.e. there is only room for 2 or 3 scenes), that shows off the mechanics (so it has to have at least one interaction over narrative and veto, and a reality change, preferably more than one, with one succeeding and one failing), but that has excitement and action.

So any suggestions on the story that should be told in the Playtest? I want to keep with the basic scene (especially since I have commissioned some artwork for it) and characters, but everything else is subject to change.

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

Actually I don't think the length is too bad per se, it just rambles too much. Try and keep it concise. It shouldn't be too tricky to add a little excitement either. We just need a reason to care about what the players are doing, I think. There are lots of ways you could do it. You could inject elements of the supernatural (There's blood all over the walls and arcane symbols scratched into the floor! Aieeee!) you could make time a factor (Flash! Flash! I love you, but we only have 34 minutes to save the Earth!) or you could throw in some opposition (Damn you, Doctor Diablo! You won't get away with this!) You definately shouldn't feel restricted to what happened in the playtest though. Actual Play reports can be interesting, but an example of play has to showcase clearly the primary mechanics in the game, as well as showing what might typically happen during a session. I don't think I've ever used playtest reports as examples, because they tend to be far less exciting on paper than they are in real life. In that respect however I thought the example was fine. You show off plenty of the mechanics inherent in the game, and it's fairly clear (even without reading the rules themselves) what is going on.

Ash

I agree with Ash on the layout, the script style makes it easier to follow.

As for the narrative, it could do with showcasing more of the mechanics and less GM blocking.

+++
JoE
+++

Prince of Darkness Games
Rock N' Role-Play....

By GM Blocking I assume you mean the various bits where the GM says 'no, its not like that' and uses his Veto to insist the players make a change of reality to have something happen? Or do you mean the fact that even though they do change things their desired goal is not fully achieved?

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

Okay I have an idea, if people were willing to help.

Since the action of the game is, of course, meant to be created by the players and group together, what if I outline the opening scene and you tell me where you would go with it? Then I can take that story and write that into an example of play, adding the rules text and the like?

Sound interesting (I may post it on Story Games as well).

So if you are interested here is the premise :

Player 1 is Kurt Stardust, who wants to be the world's greatest rock star, be loved for his music, and find fame, except that deep down he knows that music isn't the answer to what he needs and that he is always destined to be a follower and not a leader.

Player 2 is The major, who just wants a world of peace and orderly tranquility, but who deep down knows he could never really be part of it, because he is a drunk, and has anger problems, and doesn't belong in that world.

The two of them (who both understand that there are strange things in the world, both people like them, and evil forces) find themselves stranded on an island in the middle of flooded england. The initial opening description (in the current version) has a forbidding looking church standing on the top of this drowned hill (though that could be added by a player I guess).

So what would you do next as either player?

(For those who haven't read the rules your basic options as a player are to do things without changing reality, where the result is pretty much up to the GM, or to change reality to achieve something in line with your vision of the world, even if the GM says that it doesn't happen)

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

First thing on my agenda, particularly as the Major (who is presumably a military man and minded towards tactics) would be to climb the bell tower in the church and assess the scope of the tragedy. A vantage point like that ought to give a good view of the surrounding countryside, and may even be sufficient to spot a few survivors, especially if a pair of binoculars are on hand. If I were Kurt, I'd be thinking more along social lines, looking for someone ostensibly to talk to, but secretly to tell me what to do. I'd follow the Major into the church, but would be easily distracted by small details especially if there were any civilians in there.

Ash

If there were no civilians mentioned would you add them as Kurt? Would you want your hangers on (as happens in the current example) or some other people?

How about a charity concert for the evacuees?

It sounds like there would be no messing about outside the church for you, just straight there to find something interesting (people or viewpoints), yes?

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

If I was Kurt, then I'd feel I needed my groupies to give me validity and confidence, but I also wouldn't expect them to be coincidentally the ones that survived. If they were there, I'd be expecting to have to change reality to get them there, but I wouldn't have a problem with doing that either.

On top of a hill surrounded by water with (likely) no electrics and very little equipment, the best you could hope for is to strum a few tunes on an acoustic guitar. If that were possible, yes, I think I'd do it. I don't think it'd be the time or the place for Live Aid though, and even Kurt I think could see the wisdom in helping those in immediate danger before tending to the morale of the survivors.

For the Major, who I see as a straightforward military veteran who's seen too many battlefields to enjoy them any more, then yes, that's very true. Kurt I think would be more prone to hanging around the graveyard and lamenting the tragedy, but I also think he seems too self-interested to do so when there isn't an audience. If there's nobody in sight, he'd follow the Major.

That's how I see it anyway. Anyone else have an insight?

Ash

I see the Major putting on a whistling kettle to draw anyone in earshot into the room to speak to him, and the GM saying "no one comes, maybe they didn't hear the kettle whistling" and the Major saying "Oh, but, everyone hears a kettle making tea." and going to the mechanics.

Ok, first off, I'd tweak that situation within an inch of its life before you continue with this. Really. It's flat, no tension or conflict. Too passive. There's no engagement (why should I care about the character's situation?) and no drive to do anything.

(tangent, does Solipsist provide any situation generation process? How does it work in play? It kinda feels like ACME RPG, "there's something going on and you investigate it to foil the plot")

Create a situation with some zing. Start with the character limitations and obsessions. Pick two of each, work them into your situation.

Maybe Kurt has crashed his van into the church. Maybe the Major is trying to ban Kurt's performance at the local Fete. Something to embed the characters in some kind of tension.

-Matt

Realms Publishing

I'm a little restricted to it having something to do with the spooky church on the hill in the flood, having commissioned some artwork for that (I hope).

Matt, Solipsist is explicit that the starting state of the game is the world exactly as it is right now (england was flooded when we did that game), and the world then (rapidly in the case of the last playtest) diverges from that as the characters impose their own vision of reality on it.

Interestingly Per seemed to object previously to the fact that the playtest he was in started with too much of a hook and left too little to the player's choice.

However given that this is an example of play there is nothing wrong with starting in media and assuming the characters already have some purpose at the church. They don't need to be meeting there, they could have arrived together.

Suggest making a point of showing that the water level is slowly but steadily rising, or making some pointed comments about the Great Flood, y'know, the one with Noah, since that is mentioned in several religions. (Useless fact-ette, according to some theologians, the approximate date given for the great flood coincides with the end of the last ice age and the sinking of the fabled continent Atlantis, not to mention a known 'time of strife' during which a great many animal species suddenly became extinct. I don't know how accurate these claims are, but I've seen a few sources claiming them so it may be worth investigating.)

Ash

I was dreaming about this last night, and I'm thinking having it start with a strong reason for them to be at the church (i.e. mid-game), having one of each sort of change (pass, fail, overshoot, shadow) and culminating with some evil sort of shadow manifestation, is the right way to go.

On the flood ...

• Creation of the Earth (young earth version) = around 6 thousand years BP (before present)
• Great Flood = around 2500 BC or 4.5 thousand years BP (according to biblical dating)
• Last Glacial Period = around 10 thousand years BP

So no the flood doesn't tie up with the end of the ice age, but it might tie up with various eruptions and the like in the Med, I think Thera is the main candidate?

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

Ok, cool I'd say to beware of doing the standard gamer thing of getting distracted by minuitae and losing sight of the purpose. You could do that in real play, but that's not what this is for.

You're exactly on target with the "have a reason to be there" and including one of each type of transition that exists in the system.

When writing the example always come back to the following question: What's the point of this example of play? Make sure that everything comes back to this. If it doesn't help, cut it. You've got three aims as far as I can see:

- Show why the game's cool
- Show the system (processes included, not merely mechanics) in action
- Make the reader feel like they want to play it, now.

-Matt

Realms Publishing

Thanks Matt, I do agree that the current example wouldn't make many people want to play :) I want to capture some of the feel of Carl's Actual Play, which made me want to play my own game more than the sessions I ran :)

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/

Doing bad stuff to the church!

+++
JoE
+++

Prince of Darkness Games
Rock N' Role-Play....

Thanks Joe, I have some great ideas now!

I'm waiting on the artwork now, so I can see how it matches up to various options for ideas, and then I'll write a new version and see what people think.

Thanks everyone for the help its been brilliant (not like Story Games ... grumble grumble .... not one reply there)

http://www.solipsist-rpg.com/