Looking forward to a quick look over at Furnace :D

Regards

;O)Newt
D101games -An Imaginary Company
Come to Furnace Sheffield 20-21 Oct 2007, gowan Andrew Kenrick is !

Look forward to seeing it at Furnace :)

I know we've already got some Sharpe fans, one of the GMs regularly runs a Sharpe BRP game.

Regards

;O)Newt
D101games -An Imaginary Company
Come to Furnace Sheffield 20-21 Oct 2007, gowan Andrew Kenrick is !

Fantastic. Hope I get the chance to playtest it.

Graham

I was reading about Waterloo the other day and this game came to mind. It's avery evocative period, and I'm keen to see how the game reflects that.

And to add to the excitement, the image for the cover was delivered today. I am very pleased with it - it depicts the two signature characters from the game.

http://www.omnihedron.co.uk/dhcover.jpg

Kind of exciting really.

Neil

Very nice! Is all the art going to be in a similar style?

I'm a big comics fan and I like that sort of true-to-life yet slightly fantastical look. Peter, the artist, is doing all of the art at the moment.

Neil

Excellent. It's good to hear that you are still pushing on with the game. Do you have any changes or further elements you'd like to talk about in relation to it?

Cheers
Malcolm

Contested Ground Studios

Yeah, the big change has been the development of the Missions and Challenges system. When I presented the game initially it was that sort of vanilla chargen+resolution affair. I wanted something that brought it all together and added a little military planning to the game as well as giving a whole truckload of player authoring too.

So I stole Quests from World of Warcraft. No, honestly, that was my inspiration.

So now the characters have Missions. So one of the examples in the book is:

Name: Deliver 200 Rifles to Spanish Guerrillas
Challenges: 4
Compulsory: Gain the trust of the Spanish Guerrillas
Deadline: Before the nearby French column crosses the southern river ford
Reward: +1 Favour Reputation with Guerrillas
Failure: Honour and Favour (Colonel Johnson) are DAMAGED

So what we have here is a pretty bog standard Mission. The players need to succeed in four Challenges related to this mission in order to complete it, one of which must be 'Gain the trust of the Spanish Guerrillas'. They have to do this before the French cross the river and if they succeed, the gain Reputation with the Guerillas. If they fail, their Honour and Favour Reputations are damaged and have to be redeemed in the future.

No this might look quite simple, but it forms the very core of the action of the game. Each character will have about SIX missions running at the same time - some will be military, some romantic, some illegal, some political - whatever. A challenge in one Mission can be woven together with one from another Mission to link two stories together. One of your challenges and another players may be combined so that you can team up and kill two birds with one stone - or they may be opposed and thus only one of you can come out of the Challenge as a winner.

Moreover the Challenges and Missions form the basis of the adventure design. At the beginning of each session (for the sharper minded GM) or at the end of the previous session (for the GM who needs a little more prep) the players have a Planning session where they address what challenges they would like to see in a particular Mission that is being addressed.

So, for example, in the above Mission the players might decide that the four challenges should be

1. Avoid the French Cavalry
2. Gain the trust of the Guerillas
3. Be accused of stealing from Guerillas
4. Be rode down by Cavalry on the return

Now, if the leader of the Guerillas happens to be the brother of the Spanish officer who is harassing the player Sergeants mistress then the stealing issue could feed into one of his missions. Similarly, the players choose cavalry because they are having an ongoing spat with a French cavalry Captain and they want to get one over on them again.

And yes, if you have a Mission that says 'Kill Captain DuPont' with six challenges, you CANNOT narrate him as dead in challenges 1-5. You can injure him, capture him, embarass him, beat him up and generally abuse him but he will always escape and come back to annoy some more!

Thats the big difference thats come around recently and I'm very happy with it. It combines a scene setting mechanic, an adventure generation system and a reward and experience system all in one - and it is all generated by the players, with the GM there just for a little balancing guidance when needed.

Neil

That's very neat and I like how that gives a definite military/tactical aspect t the game. From your description, it seems that you could combine the action of two or more missions into the one set of encounters. Would it be possible or, even, desireable) to have one challenge be releated to, say, 2 missions? Or do you feel this would disrupt the game?

For example:

Mission 1: Find Senora Consuela and bring back the information that she has gained

Challenges

1: Gain the trust of local guerillas so they will guide you through the mountains
2: Successfully navigate the mountains
3: Defeat the French patrol
4: Find Senora Consuela

Mission 2: Get 20 barrels of powder to the guerillas around the village of Sagres.

1: Gain the trust of local guerillas so they will tell you how to get to the village on the other side of the mountains
2: Ambush the French cannon train
3: Slip through the French defensive line
4: Make sure the guerillas know how to successfully lay the charges

So, if missions 1 and 2 were running at the same time, would it be possible for challenge 1 in both of them to be combined: you meet one group of guerillas who will cover both challenges?

Moving away from that, if each character has six missions running at the same time, how much of a burden does this place on the player and the GM? If you have 4 characters, that's potentially 24 missions all going on. And are we talking about 24 totally unique missions, or will some of them overlap? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this.

Cheers
Malcolm

Contested Ground Studios

Thats it! As the players run through the challenges it is in their interest to weave the story elements together in order to contribute to two missions with one challenge. And if another character has a Mission which includes a challenge which involves betraying the position of the guerillas - gold!

Of the mission that each character will have, your company will all share the same 'Military' mission - ie. the activity that you have been sent to undertake by your superior officer. Each character will also have a 'Promotion' mission which is personal to them but only pops up once per session usually.

The frequency of the involvement of the other missions is up to the planning session. Obviously it is also dependent on matters such as geography etc. The idea would be that each player would be able to address a couple of challenges within a couple of missions per session alongside their Military mission.

When the missions are designed, the GM can lengthen or shorten the number of challenges required to complete a mission, thus controlling the pace of the campaign. Small number of challenges - loads of advancements and a very rapid turnover of events. Lots of challenges? A longer, more drawn out resolution. Slower advancement and a bigger BAM! when one is resolved.

Neil

Excellent.

Will you be making the playtest draft available? I'd like to give it a go, if I may.

Cheers
Malc

Contested Ground Studios

I printed out a few copies for Furnace but since then I have noticed a few areas in the text that are ... well, loosey-goosey would be the most charitable way to put it. I was editing them last night and should finish tonight and then I will be posting the playtest with some sample characters and missions.

Neil

I've been reading through it in my lunch hour and over breakfast and have enjoyed it greatly so far! I really liked character generation - very involved and you end up with a really richly detailed character, yet much simpler and quicker than, say, Burning Wheel.

I've resisted the urge to whip my red pen out so far, but can do so if you want me to!

...with the red ink of your editing prowess!

Last night I was cringing at some of the fragmented sentences, half finished paragraphs and simply empty passages where I managed to say everything EXCEPT how to do what was supposed to be done! Like I said to Iain - needs a thorough rewrite and going over.

Oh and testing!

Neil

Looking at your own work with a critical eye is a valuable process to engage in, and very worthwhile in the long run. I'd be very keen to see a playtest draft of the game when you feel it is up to snuff. In fact, I've already started asking for playtest volunteers (for Umlaut as well) over here in Wellington and have received positive responses. Hopefully I'll be able to get sessions of both games going in the near future (availability of the text permitting, of course).

Cheers
Malcolm

Contested Ground Studios