THE SUNDERED LAND: A Doomed Pilgrim in the Ruins of the Future -- play with me!
This is the chat thread!
We're playing a game of Doomed Pilgrim here on Steem and over in the game thread, that's just for the running game -- the narrative formed by asking and answering questions. This here is where the game can be chatted about.
If you want to check the game out, go to http://nightskygames.com/welcome/game/TheSunderedLand.
(I'm creating this post shortly before the actual game-post so that I have this to link to. There will be a comment appended to this with a link to the game, but it should be easy enough to find using the #doomed-pilgrim tag that is entirely empty at this time.)
So hey! I'm home from work today roasting chiles (and thus, away from my PCs). And then I'm spending the weekend at Minnloco -- our local long con. So I'll keep checking on this game, but my weekend is going to be slow, and that's already started. Just FYI!
See the game at: https://steemit.com/gaming/@clweeks/4zmeog-the-sundered-land-a-doomed-pilgrim-in-the-ruins-of-the-future-play-with-me
So, an interesting thing I'm noticing in this game, is that the GMs don't have a lot of agency. Like, I'm trying to push your character into a physical confrontation (because, hah, there are literally almost no rules for anything else in the game PDF, and from what I can tell, my goal should be to get you into a fight), but you can just walk out of it and ask a question that goes in a different direction.
@danmaruschak and @clweeks: do you get that same sense?
Yeah, I wonder if there are best practices for each of our sides of the equation. Am I asking the "wrong" questions? (Too safe?) How liberal should y'all be in interpreting my questions so that you can give an answer along the lines that you want to?
I don't know if I'd call it a lack of agency, but I definitely feel like there's not much momentum, it seems like most of the character's "turns" are equivalent to "tell me more about that" or "I carefully skirt that situation" so there's not much to play off of or actions to react to. I don't know what the actual rules look like, but I suspect that more participants and more of a high-energy pace of comments are part of the game's expectations -- if more people are clamoring to get some input in as the world then opportunities to embellish or expand are probably more easily absorbed, plus with each additional participant there's a greater chance that they'll find something inspiring to riff off of. Since some of my responses have been more in the vein of "I might as well say something, to at least keep things moving" I've found it a little frustrating.
Well, I attacked @clweeks character with his own shadow, so let's see what happens!
Welcome to Steem @steemainfun I have upvoted and sent you a tip Please work upvoted
Can I add a companion who warns you? I'm not that familiar with The Sundered Land.
I guess so! I think your only limit is that you have to answer the questions I ask.
Ah, well. Nenad answered before I got to it....
But now you know!
I'm not sure what to do in-fiction.
So, here's what I'm going to try to do.
I check in pretty regularly, at least right now. If there's a post and no reply after at least 1-2 hours, then I'll post a reply, so it'll keep the story moving. If you're stalling and waiting for a reply to a question, ping me on G+ (where I can get a danged notification, TYVM) and I'll stop by and give you one.
Unless you hate what I've been contributing. That could happen, too.
When I posted about being unsure, I went to bed and when I woke up, it was obvious what to do. So I think I was being goofy. I don't hate your contributions. :)
I do worry about the same interlocutor always responding, but as you note, it's better to have a moving game with two or three players than a stalled one!
Is that because of rule-constraints you need to deal with, or you're just not sure where you can go from the situation you're in? Are forging ahead despite the hunger or eating some of the potentially dangerous plants not good options?
I guess I was being silly. I think I'm not used to this game being a slow-burn, but maybe that's just due to small sample.
I've never seen the rules or really even followed a game before, so I didn't have a good sense of how aggressive you're supposed to be. Knowing what Vincent usually says about his games I was somewhat tempted to answer your "Does it feel like the predator knows I'm here?" question by telling you that you feel the predator biting your leg, but the thread as a whole had more of a slow burn feeling to me so I didn't go that way (and I was hoping more people would be chiming in anyway, which ended up happening somewhat simultaneously with the answer I did give).
Speaking of 'more people', I sort of hoped we'd cross-pollinate with Steemians. I wonder what that would take.
My instinct is that more people might be attracted if there was more activity, more upvoting, etc. Which is basically "if it was more popular, it would be more popular", so that's probably not an especially helpful frame to view the problem through.
So here's an interesting situation. By the rules, when fleeing an enemy: "If it remains ambiguous: 'If I haven’t gotten away, I’ll have to fight. Have I gotten away?'"
It seems like it's specifically ambiguous based on @mortaine's last answer, so I should write that.
But at the same time, based on the narrative we've built, I should be able to just run all day, rest at night, rinse and repeat until I'm out of the Quivering Dunes.
So I wonder how/when to follow the rules rigidly vs. playing it by ear.