Yet Another Oracle
I've been working on a JavaScript Oracle tool that integrates many of the ideas I've played around with. The tool is not in its final version, so it has some warts (some of the text windows might become pages, or be hidden altogether, etc).
Chris Stieha has very kindly given me feedback many many times on a jillion things, and I am looking for one or two extra play testers so I don't bother him all the time. :) Anyone who might be interested in playing around with it and sending me feedback (questions, comments, bugs), please hit me up in this thread with your email addy (or hit me up at solorpggamer at gmail dot com), and I'll send you a private link.
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
Sunday, February 26, 2017
Chapter 2 of my "PC emulator" experiment. Daron sets out on his own for answers...
Chapter 2 of my "PC emulator" experiment. Daron sets out on his own for answers...
Saturday, February 25, 2017
A solo Scarlet Heroes urban adventure.
A solo Scarlet Heroes urban adventure.
https://dansgamingblog.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/the-slums-of-haicheng
https://dansgamingblog.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/the-slums-of-haicheng
Thursday, February 23, 2017
Tried something a bit different--I decided to follow Lone Crusaders advice and use Mythic to emulate PC actions, which allowed me to give a module a try. Here's the first part of my experiment with this style. Does anyone else run modules? Or use emulator to dictate PC actions?
Tried something a bit different--I decided to follow Lone Crusaders advice and use Mythic to emulate PC actions, which allowed me to give a module a try. Here's the first part of my experiment with this style. Does anyone else run modules? Or use emulator to dictate PC actions?
A cool dice mechanic that seems like it would make the transition between GM and player more natural and fluid. Brought to you by the author of Otherkind and Apocalypse World, and expanding on the dice concepts from the former.
A cool dice mechanic that seems like it would make the transition between GM and player more natural and fluid. Brought to you by the author of Otherkind and Apocalypse World, and expanding on the dice concepts from the former.
http://www.lumpley.com/archive/148.html
http://www.lumpley.com/archive/148.html
http://www.lumpley.com/archive/148.html
http://www.lumpley.com/archive/148.html
This is doodle of an idea for a framework for narrative yet (slightly?) objective mysteries.
This is doodle of an idea for a framework for narrative yet (slightly?) objective mysteries.
Does it work? I don't know, I haven't play-tested it yet.
Still, I thought it'd be of interest if anyone feels like reading it over and putting in some pennies.
Bonus, there's a link in the post to my solo-narrative-gamebook theorizing from a few months ago if that's of interest.
What do you think?
https://exposit.github.io/katamoiran/2017/02/23/to-make-a-murder/
Does it work? I don't know, I haven't play-tested it yet.
Still, I thought it'd be of interest if anyone feels like reading it over and putting in some pennies.
Bonus, there's a link in the post to my solo-narrative-gamebook theorizing from a few months ago if that's of interest.
What do you think?
https://exposit.github.io/katamoiran/2017/02/23/to-make-a-murder/
Two Oracle ideas floating in my head
Two Oracle ideas floating in my head
I'm working on an oracle that is based on rolling 2d6 with a +3 to - 3 modifier. Because I want symmetry in the odds, I've decided that any result of 7 (the mid point of 2d6) will be a "special" result of some kind. This special result will be one of two things: A ripple(see links below) from a previous branching story point being felt NOW, or something else.
Let me talk about the ripple first, which I already know how I will implement, before I talk about the "something else," which I'm hoping to work out here. What the Oracle will do is spit out a previous story branching point at the player. The story branching points will most likely be whatever questions or statements the players put to the oracle-- including ones that get 'no' answers. When the Oracle spits such a branching point at you, it means that a chain of consequences has rippled through time as a result of the turn that point took. If you got a 'yes' for that particular question/statement, the ripple happens as a result of that coming in to existence. If you had got a 'no', the ripple instead happens as a result of that NOT coming into existence.
The player is responsible for figuring out how that affects their present moment. Whether they use the oracle to figure that out or use something else is their concern. Whether they want to figure out what the chain of events was or they are satisfied with knowing only the impact it has on the NOW is also up to them. I'm pretty set on this idea, but feedback is always welcome.
Something else
I also want to have another kind of "special" result. This result can stil be a yes or no, but with a twist. The twist itself is more about adding some interesting color or flourish that you perhaps would not have thought to add with a plain yes or no. "no, but" and "yes, but" are too open ended for what I want.
For example:
"Is he blonde?"
Do not want to prompt ideas that have nothing to do with hair color:
"yes, but he's really smart!" / "no, but he's really dumb."
Do not want to completely negate the "blond" part:
"no, but he has red hair"
What I want to encourage:
"yes, but he dyes his hair black(i.e. technically no)." / "no, but he dyes his hair blonde (technically yes)"
Another example:
"I jump. Do I make it over the chasm?"
Do not want to prompt ideas that have nothing to do with making it over the chasm:
"yes, but an angry goat is waiting at the other side." / "no, but you hold on to a branch and make it safely to the ground below."
Do not want to completely negate "making it over the chasm". It has to be at least technically true:
"no, but you hold on to a branch and hang there."
"no, but you fall safely into the river below."
What I want to encourage:
"No. Your feet did land on the other side's edge, but you are falling now because you lost your balance and your foothold."
"Yes. You missed the other edge due to a bad jump, but a handy jutting branch allowed you to climb up."
I would like to find a phrasing that encourages the thing being asked to be either true though technically false, or false though technically true. I find this kind of subtle and directed modification to the fiction fun.
I'm also duly noting that an oracle like that is not to everyone's taste, but rather than get sidetracked on a discussion about the merits of that, I'd rather that this discussion focus on finding a way to succinctly get that idea across as an Oracle result.
####################################
For context you could read these posts, but it's "not exactly" necessary:
Ripples In A Pond
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/4eXHjfnCWXm
2d6 +3/-3 probabilities
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/7uBwhGBz5Yb
"Not Exactly" as an Oracle result
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/T94UKssaBLD
I'm working on an oracle that is based on rolling 2d6 with a +3 to - 3 modifier. Because I want symmetry in the odds, I've decided that any result of 7 (the mid point of 2d6) will be a "special" result of some kind. This special result will be one of two things: A ripple(see links below) from a previous branching story point being felt NOW, or something else.
Let me talk about the ripple first, which I already know how I will implement, before I talk about the "something else," which I'm hoping to work out here. What the Oracle will do is spit out a previous story branching point at the player. The story branching points will most likely be whatever questions or statements the players put to the oracle-- including ones that get 'no' answers. When the Oracle spits such a branching point at you, it means that a chain of consequences has rippled through time as a result of the turn that point took. If you got a 'yes' for that particular question/statement, the ripple happens as a result of that coming in to existence. If you had got a 'no', the ripple instead happens as a result of that NOT coming into existence.
The player is responsible for figuring out how that affects their present moment. Whether they use the oracle to figure that out or use something else is their concern. Whether they want to figure out what the chain of events was or they are satisfied with knowing only the impact it has on the NOW is also up to them. I'm pretty set on this idea, but feedback is always welcome.
Something else
I also want to have another kind of "special" result. This result can stil be a yes or no, but with a twist. The twist itself is more about adding some interesting color or flourish that you perhaps would not have thought to add with a plain yes or no. "no, but" and "yes, but" are too open ended for what I want.
For example:
"Is he blonde?"
Do not want to prompt ideas that have nothing to do with hair color:
"yes, but he's really smart!" / "no, but he's really dumb."
Do not want to completely negate the "blond" part:
"no, but he has red hair"
What I want to encourage:
"yes, but he dyes his hair black(i.e. technically no)." / "no, but he dyes his hair blonde (technically yes)"
Another example:
"I jump. Do I make it over the chasm?"
Do not want to prompt ideas that have nothing to do with making it over the chasm:
"yes, but an angry goat is waiting at the other side." / "no, but you hold on to a branch and make it safely to the ground below."
Do not want to completely negate "making it over the chasm". It has to be at least technically true:
"no, but you hold on to a branch and hang there
"no, but you fall safely into the river below."
What I want to encourage:
"No. Your feet did land on the other side's edge, but you are falling now because you lost your balance and your foothold."
"Yes. You missed the other edge due to a bad jump, but a handy jutting branch allowed you to climb up."
I would like to find a phrasing that encourages the thing being asked to be either true though technically false, or false though technically true. I find this kind of subtle and directed modification to the fiction fun.
I'm also duly noting that an oracle like that is not to everyone's taste, but rather than get sidetracked on a discussion about the merits of that, I'd rather that this discussion focus on finding a way to succinctly get that idea across as an Oracle result.
####################################
For context you could read these posts, but it's "not exactly" necessary:
Ripples In A Pond
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/4eXHjfnCWXm
2d6 +3/-3 probabilities
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/7uBwhGBz5Yb
"Not Exactly" as an Oracle result
https://plus.google.com/108395059461267285712/posts/T94UKssaBLD
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