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Directed Promotion: [Virtual Play] Episode 39: Is Trail of Cthulhu Broken, or Is It Just Me?

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  1.  
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 25th 2009
     # 1
    While my brother Mel is posted overseas, I'm helping fill in on his actual play podcast Virtual Play. My second "guest host" spot is up, called Is Trail of Cthulhu Broken, or Is It Just Me?. I talk about my experiences running TOC, good and bad, and back it up with some entertaining (and brief) AP excerpts, which focus on the character of Irving Thalberg, Hollywood boy wonder producer, as played by Mel White in one game and Lowell Carson in another. I hope you'll listen and find it interesting; the whole episode clocks in at just under 24 minutes.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009 edited
     # 2
    How fascinating. Thanks, Bill. I love the Actual Play recordings.

    You're totally right, I think, that Trail Of Cthulhu is an example of Design What Doesn't Matter. It gets the investigation mechanics out of the way, so you can concentrate on how your character reacts to the horror. What matters isn't the mystery, per se, as what it does to you.

    You mention a problem which I don't think is a problem: that the mechanics don't completely get out of the way. Of course, there's a moment when you say "I spend a point of Reassurance", but I've never found that breaks the mood. It breaks the mood much less than rolling for Reassurance, failing and then rolling again.

    But if that does break the mood, there are things you can do: I'm fascinated by your idea of Key Phrases. You could absolutely say that, for example, when someone says "I put my arm round her. I'm trying to Reassure her." that that's a cue for Reassurance being used. Perhaps it could be accompanied by a hand gesture, just to make it clear.

    I don't know much about the Magic system, but I do know that you absolutely shouldn't be rolling for something, again and again, trying to get a success. And the player narrated every failure, too! Painful to listen to.

    I'm fascinated by your style of being a Keeper. You mention it's centred on the players, and perhaps it is, but to me, it seemed very Keeper-centric. For example, you started one scene by basically saying:

    You see Greta Garbo in her room and
    You notice a crystal dodecahedron on her shelf and
    A two-point Reassurance spend will get you some information.

    Personally, I'd have sat back and let the players find that stuff out.

    You also, I think, set stakes for various rolls, and told the players what their characters wanted out of the conflict. That was interesting. I personally wouldn't use stakes in Trail of Cthulhu, but it was interesting to hear how they might be used.

    Really interesting stuff. Thank you. I will record one of my sessions soon and let you criticize me back.

    Graham
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009
     # 3
    Hey Graham -- One of the things that I like about doing this podcast is the extent to which I learn about my own GMing style and how to fix it, in the sense of bringing it more in line with what I believe is good play. The title of the episode was not a rhetorical question: it is entirely possible that the thing that's broken is me -- or, more precisely, that what is revealed is the circumstances under which I break down as GM. Mel has gotten entire episodes out of such moments of disconnect between what I say I believe about GMing and what I actually do.

    So this episode is about me grappling with TOC. When you say:

    Posted By: GrahamYou also, I think, set stakes for various rolls, and told the players what their characters wanted out of the conflict. That was interesting. I personally wouldn't use stakes in Trail of Cthulhu, but it was interesting to hear how they might be used.


    I think what you're talking about is the first excerpt, where Irving Thalberg (famous Hollywood producer) and Dorothea Lange (then-obscure but now well-known photographer of the Depression in the U.S.) are in a hobo jungle, independently, filming what's going on there in order to either prove that the poor were shiftless ne'er-do-wells or that they retained some essentially human quality of dignity, respectively. That set-up was part of the opening scene of the scenario the first time I ran it, intended to get the action going with the characters all in one spot -- essentially how I'd run SOTC. As I said in the episode, that was a mistake. TOC doesn't want to run like that, and the scenario doesn't open with that scene any more.

    The scene with the magic is actually more subtle than it first appears. On the surface, my mistake is in dragging out the magic rolls by letting Irving retry (because I want so badly for his effort to pay off). When you listen more closely to what Lowell is saying, though, it turns out that he's fine with failing; he's doing what he's doing not to be effective in his efforts to use magic to defend against the Mythos, but in order to wave a big red flag at Nyarlathotep saying "Come and get me!" And I wasn't clever enough to pick up on that in the moment.

    As for the scene with Greta, I'm willing to cop to rushing things to get to the climax, given that the 4-hour slot we were in was rapidly nearing its end. But to a certain degree, I could argue that I was merely trying to implement TOC's design philosophy: if there's something there, give it to the players. Why make them pixel-bitch? On the other hand, the ham-handed intrusiveness of "Pay 2 Reassurance and I'll give you more" doesn't strike anyone as good form, I don't think. It occurs to me that one could let the action go until the end of a scene and then levy Investigation points from the investigators: "In that scene, you got extra info from the cop, so give me one Cop Talk."

    In any event, it is all very interesting stuff. I look forward to hearing your AP. I hope you'll give us permission to extract excerpts for a future episode of Virtual Play.

    -- Bill
  4.  # 4
    Thanks for this episode, Bill. While it's true I was in the first, imperfect run of the adventure, I don't think this show has mollified my concerns about the system. I really dislike the central conceit, the "cool thing" about the rules, which is that you can spend points to avoid interacting with the system. I love interacting with the system. Married to that is the fact that it seems that the game has to have a thoroughly pre-planned plot, so that all player choice is meaningless. Is there any way in which this game does not require railroading and illusionism (or participationism) that I'm missing/wasn't present in the podcast?

    I found playing the game very frustrating, and the only enjoyment I got was a few moments of character embodiment (my own, and others'). I really think this isn't the game for me.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009 edited
     # 5
    That sounds right, Rob, it isn't the game for you.

    Trail of Cthulhu, in my opinion, gets unfairly branded as illusionistic/railroading. Of course, there's a sense in which the investigation is railroaded: you progress through a known sequence of scenes. But that's not the point*. The investigation isn't the story. The story is what happens to your character: and, in that, you have all kinds of choice. In that sense, it's no more illusionistic than, say, Grey Ranks.

    I don't quite understand the bit about spending points to avoid interacting with the system.

    Disclaimer: I have written a Trail of Cthulhu scenario and, hence, get money from peddling my dysfunctional illusionistic wares.

    Graham

    * Imagine this entire post is said in a nice tone of voice, so that I'm saying "I don't think that's the point", rather than "You're missing the point, moron!".
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009
     # 6
    Rob -- Let me say up front that I'm working on the sound quality. Expect much better next episode.

    The degree to which TOC can be "story-gamed up" is a little bit at stake, pace Graham, so it's worth talking about. I had some good success in the second run tying Cthulhu Mythos skill spends to player-authoring of the fiction in terms of the secret-historical aspects of the game. But I think it's important that the GM's first instinct should be to call for a Stability test when a character is in a bind, rather than let the player narrate themselves out -- and I don't mean that in a Czege principle violation sort of way, but rather in a thinking-outside-the-box sort of way (which does and should work in SOTC).

    That said, the difficulty I noticed is the extent to which my understanding of the Mythos as very bleak makes me feel an obligation to confound optimistic player efforts to do something clever that I would reward in a different game. So when you had Upton Sinclair dream his way to the throne of Azathoth, I wasn't sure how to handle it, so it fizzled. Ironically, Lowell Carson would have been amenable to much more soul-crushing than I was in fact able to bring myself to inflict.

    So I'm not sure I can assuage your concerns. I think TOC is and should be a high-prep game. I think the mechanics may be "over-optimized" for investigation type stories in a way that makes it hard to run this particular story, where PCs may find themselves also dealing with and participating in political skulduggery, but I can live with that.
    •  
      CommentAuthorrenatoram
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009
     # 7
    Uh... how is spending points avoiding contact with the system, Rob? Can you expand on that?

    Spending points(*) kinda is the system. What you are avoiding is the chance of failure where it makes no sense. In a way, you "say yes" because acquiring the clues is not the point; the point is interpreting those clues, and experiencing the mystery.

    (*) Also, in 90% of the cases you shouldn't spend a point: you simply get the clue. Spending is for extra info that helps connecting the dots. (but I guess this is tangential and not the point)

    Disclaimer: I am too a kinda interested party since I and my buddies publish the gumshoe stuff in Italy, and I'm mostly talking from an Esoterrorists POV, since I don't know ToC in detail (the cthulhu stuff is out of our domain).
  8.  # 8
    Posted By: Robert BohlMarried to that is the fact that it seems that the game has to have a thoroughly pre-planned plot, so that all player choice is meaningless.


    First, the game does not have to have a thoroughly pre-planned plot, and second, having a pre-planned set of scenes does not make player choice meaningless. Why do you think it does?

    I'll address the first objection. GUMSHOE allows you to create pre-planned adventures, and makes it likely that if you do, they won't bog down. It's no more or less rail-roading to offer a point spend as it is a die roll. It does not prevent players going off in their own directions (certainly not in playtesting, nor in any game I've run or played in). It can also be used explicitly for improvisation. The important thing is to incorporate player suggestions for skill use. We'll be releasing a Trail of Cthulhu supplement called The Armitage Files which does exactly that.

    As for the spell failure in the actual play - if you needed it to work for the game to continue, then the consequence of failed rolls should not be a failed spell, but damaged Stability or Health. This is covered under general rolls.
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009
     # 9
    Well, clearly I did it wrong. But maybe it's a false economy of text not to point GMs to those rules in the magic section itself. Still, it's a poor craftsman who blames his tools, and it's obvious how I should have handled it in retrospect. I'm beginning to adopt the position that I'm a bad GM.

    I read Rob's point as having to do with the potential obtrusiveness of the mechanics when unskillfully deployed. He probably should have said "setting" or "roleplaying" rather than "system" though; it doesn't make sense to me otherwise.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009 edited
     # 10
    I've recently tried putting Stability checks in the hands of the players. Going mad is superb fun, so I give them the Stability check sheet and tell them to call for a check whenever they want one. First one to go mad gets a prize: I don't say that, but I like to imply it.

    Also, Interpersonal Skills, in my opinion, should be seen as roleplay tools. Rather than this:

    Player: I spend a point of Reassurance.
    Keeper: OK, cool. Here's what she tells you...

    I prefer this:

    Player: I spend a point of Reassurance.
    Keeper: Go on, reassure me. What do you say?
    Player: [Roleplays reassurance]
    Keeper: OK, cool. Here's what she tells you.

    ...with a subtle implication that, if the Reassurance isn't roleplayed convincingly, I won't give the clue. Which is occasionally true.

    And you can improvise adventures, of course. There are various ways: The Armitage Files gives some good ways to do it. Alternatively, you could simply use the Inspectres trick: when a player spends a point, ask them what clue they find.

    Graham
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 26th 2009
     # 11
    Graham -- I like all of those techniques. Thanks for mentioning them. -- Bill
    •  
      CommentAuthorrenatoram
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 12
    Something I've done in both Esoterrorists demos I run at FirenzeGioca last weekend: if you peek at the character sheets (or ask, or, better, if you have a nice grid with all the Investigative Skills of the PGs) you can simply let the narration run. People tend to stay in-character and in 'first person', and you can apply their 'auto successes' from Investigative Skills without even mentioning them.

    When and if there is something more to be had with a point spend, it's ok to say "if you want to spend a point, you can discover a bit more".

    Am I doin' it wrong? A clue that is not "additional stuff" is found *without* spending your precious single point of Investigative Skill, isn't it? Simon?

    Should people point out explicitly to the fact that they have the skill? Or a CSI tech can simply say "I take a look at the logs of the computer" and I as GM look at his charsheet, see that he has Computer Forensics, and reply "You notice that the logs have been tampered: several entries in the timeframe of the homicide are missing". And maybe add "Oh, and if you are willing to spend a point there's some detail to be had". If he accepts I add "Calling your colleagues at the central you manage to get some history logs from his ISP, and discover that someone visited 'bustychulhubabes.com' in that timeframe from this house's IP".
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 13
    No, you're doing it right. Most of the time, that's how I ran it too. But the rules for dishing out bonus clues leave it up to individual groups to figure out a specific procedure for regulating how you switch back and forth between iC and game-mechanical play. If you're not expecting to have to do that, it can be disconcerting. The episode of Virtual Play tosses out some suggestions for that. And it's important, because otherwise you'd be better off just going freeform and awarding bonus clues for effort -- assuming that you are interested in "immersion."
    •  
      CommentAuthorGB Steve
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 14
    In Trail it deifinitely pays off for the GM to know which characters can get which core clues, that way you can hand them out without breaking the narrative flow of the game. Some players might not like this so it's probably a good thing to discuss it at the start of the game. But if you do have this in place, then any pushing from players implies a point spend, if they want to.

    Perhaps the key phrase could be "I'm pushing" as in "I'm pushing my interrogation", the GM can respond either with more information, or if it requires more points can explain what the resistance is. If the player doesn't push more, or if they get no further information, they get the points back. You always get something worthwhile for your investigative points in GUMSHOE.
  15.  # 15
    Guys,

    I played this once, about a year ago. I'm not equipped to really have a debate about it. I'd be willing to try it again sometime to see if my impressions were wrong, but I felt like they were largely confirmed by listening to this episode.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGB Steve
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 16
    I'm going to listen tonight, although I'll say at the outset that having played much GUMSHOE, it's definitely not broken. It is more likely that it doesn't conform to your expectations, or just isn't the kind of game that you like. Pelgrane are going to be doing some recordings of sessions as game support and I expect we'll likely record some of the games we play too.

    There is a recording of me running an early game of Trail on the yog-sothoth.com but there is a lot of stuff about character generation at the start which is not particularly well structured. I'd do things better now. Still it might be worth a listen. You can find it here (you may need to be a member to get it, I don't know). It's 94 minutes long. Marvel at our accents!
    •  
      CommentAuthorfnord3125
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 17
    Posted By: renatorambustychulhubabes.com
    I am very disappointed to discover this website does not exist.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGB Steve
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 18
    Listening now.

    In the first piece of play, you weren't using the investigative rules correctly. You should just pay a number of points for supplementary clues or benefits, not make rolls. You used the rules correctly in the second example.

    In the third example, it wasn't particularly clear what was going on, could you give some more details? That said, Ken Hite is creating a more expanded magic system that does something along the lines of what you're suggesting.

    Also, can we run your scenario?
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 19
    Hey Steve --

    Yeah, I was doing something funky in that first excerpt on purpose to get the characters engaged in the scene, and while it proved to be sort of fun -- largely through good play -- my assessment was that it didn't do what I needed it to do to hook the characters. That's what I meant when I said I was trying to run it like Spirit of the Century.

    Background for the third excerpt: Irving Thalberg has learned how to create the Sign of Eibon, and wants a set of cufflinks crafted in their shape, as well as one painted on the wall of his office.He fails, and I encourage him to keep trying. I missed a chance to have the character confronted by hidden cultists surrounding him. That's about all the context I can give unless you have specific questions.

    I'll happily give you the materials for this adventure; whisper me an e-mail address and I'll send them to you.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009 edited
     # 20
    Posted By: Bill_WhiteBackground for the third excerpt: Irving Thalberg has learned how to create the Sign of Eibon, and wants a set of cufflinks crafted in their shape, as well as one painted on the wall of his office.


    Why does he want this, Bill? Why is he doing this rather than investigating the mind-numbing horror? Or is this part of investigating the mind-numbing horror?

    I usually find the first scene of Trail of Cthulhu easy. It's either the scene where:

    • They are gathered together somewhere, probably a strange place, and they spend the scene getting to know each other and the place or

    • There is some weird shit they need to investigate now.

    Those are the two classic ways to start a Cthulhu adventure, I think, and they don't require much effort to get the players involved.

    Graham
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 27th 2009
     # 21
    Hey Graham --

    In the moment, I thought he was doing it as a way of protecting himself from the mind-numbing horror, which he had reason to believe was targeting him in a real and threatening way. I now suspect that it was the player's way of painting a big red target on himself and saying, "Come and get me!" So it was in fact part of investigating or at least confronting the mind-numbing horror.

    "I, Governor" (the name of the adventure) is an atypical Trail of Cthulhu adventure because it takes place against a backdrop of campaign intrigue and political skulduggery, with characters "ripped from history." I think I have the at-start figured out now; it's a version of what the TOC book calls "the hook" (weirdness gets displayed) but in a somewhat more oblique way. It definitely works, though.

    I want to make it clear that you're hearing excerpts from two games in that episode: the first time I ran the game, and the second.

    -- Bill
  22.  # 22
    Posted By: renatoramWhen and if there is something more to be had with a point spend, it's ok to say "if you want to spend a point, you can discover a bit more".

    Am I doin' it wrong? A clue that is not "additional stuff" is found *without* spending your precious single point of Investigative Skill, isn't it? Simon?


    Yes.



    Posted By: Bill_WhiteWell, clearly I did it wrong. But maybe it's a false economy of text not to point GMs to those rules in the magic section itself. Still, it's a poor craftsman who blames his tools, and it's obvious how I should have handled it in retrospect. I'm beginning to adopt the position that I'm a bad GM.


    Not at all. First, you players sound like they are having a whale of a time, second, it's our fault if information was not at your fingertips, though the Screen helps in this regard. And, as Steve said, by popular demand, we are including a Magic skill in a forthcoming release, Bookhounds of London.
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 28th 2009 edited
     # 23
    Oh, now I get what Rob was saying. He wants to engage with the system, not get the system out of the way. I understand that preference; I'd argue that it's central to "Forge-inspired design," where the whole point of mechanics is to reinforce and reward particular behaviors (generally, thematically appropriate ones). That gets back to one of the points I was trying to make: TOC doesn't work like that, exactly. Dave Berg can tell you about his conversation with Ron Edwards about TOC's reward cycle, in which losing sanity is connected to learning cosmic truths, but there's a game-mechanical lacuna between those two parts that has to be bridged with role-playing. Which means it won't necessarily be bridged.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 29th 2009
     # 24
    Totally. The mechanics get out of the way, largely, and if you don't like mechanics that do that, you won't like Trail of Cthulhu.

    Importantly, though, the system, in the Forge-style sense of "Everything that goes on around the table", doesn't get out of the way. The system of Trail of Cthulhu is largely separate from the mechanics: it's about how the Keeper reveals the mystery; how the Investigators interact with each other and the weirdness; and how everyone goes slightly mad.

    Everyone knows how to play Cthulhu and it doesn't particularly involve mechanics. You could easily play a Cthulhu game without mechanics. So what the Trail of Cthulhu mechanics do is get out of the way and let you play that Cthulhu game. That's the system you engage with: the "Cthulhu-playing" system encapsulated in social mechanics, not the written rules.

    (Is one way of seeing it).

    Graham
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 29th 2009
     # 25
    Yes. The distinction between system and game mechanics (the former includes the latter, but is not solely the latter) is worth keeping in mind.
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeMay 29th 2009
     # 26
    Yes. The distinction between system and game mechanics (the former includes the latter, but is not solely the latter) is worth keeping in mind.
  27.  # 27
    So if you don't need the system, why buy the book or use the system?
    •  
      CommentAuthorGB Steve
    • CommentTimeMay 29th 2009 edited
     # 28
    I don't think Graham's saying you don't need the system, the system deals with those things that might otherwise get in the way of the stuff you want to do in such a way that minimises their impact. It's a mystery, you, like a viewer of CSI, want to get to end of the mystery and confront (or be confronted by the horror), that's what Cthulhu is all about. With GUMSHOE you will.

    It's actually quite a balancing act in games dealing with the needs of plot and actions without one squishing the other. I've found that GUMSHOE does this pretty well.

    But for some gamers, this is a false dichotomy. If the game is charater-driven then there is no plot, so how can their be a conflict?

    [GUSMHOE can also be played as character-driven, in fact the next supplement will deal with that, but it's not the way most people play]

    So I've got the book. But I don't think you need it.
    •  
      CommentAuthorGraham
    • CommentTimeMay 29th 2009 edited
     # 29
    Posted By: Robert BohlSo if you don't need the system, why buy the book or use the system?


    Well, it's hard to explain, Rob, because indie gamers don't get this sort of thing.

    Firstly, you do need the system, in the sense of the informal rules that govern Cthulhu stories; but you don't necessarily need mechanics to play a Cthulhu game.

    Having said that, reasons you might buy the book include:

    • The mechanics ensure the mystery progresses, leaving you to concentrate on the fun stuff like how your character goes mad. Those are the mechanics that "get out of the way", the Design What Doesn't Matter mechanics.

    • Many of the mechanics, like the Stability and Drive mechanics, do add to the fiction. Those are the Design What Matters mechanics.

    • There's huge amounts of background material: for example, Ken Hite's take on the Mythos. The nature of the Mythos is a huge part of the Cthulhu system, even though it's not enshrined in the mechanics.


    So there you go. Stuff like that. It's a good game, but in the way that D&D is a good game, not in the way that Poison'd is a good game.

    Graham
    • CommentAuthorJudd
    • CommentTimeJun 20th 2009 edited
     # 30
    I am thinking about the failure with the guy who wanted to make jewelry that was unspeakable and magical.

    Would it be possible to say that the jewelry was made but the jeweler went mad and killed himself and attempted to kill his family by burning the house down. The cufflinks were seized by the cops as evidence, as they were in the mad jeweler's hands when he barred the doors to his house from the inside, slit his own throat and then lit the house on fire.

    Is that an option, to us a BWish kind of technique of having failures count as successes but with dire consequences?

    EDIT: Listening to the show right now as I type. Sorry. Yeah, Bill, we could have the above happen with stability loss as you said.
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeJun 20th 2009 edited
     # 31
    Judd --

    I really like the idea that failure = success with dire consequences, especially for TOC, since it's resonant with the genre and when you listen closely it's what the player wanted in the first place. I wish I had been more on the ball in the moment, but I think I'm getting better at that kind of thing

    -- Bill
  32.  # 32
    Posted By: Bill_WhiteJudd --

    I really like the idea that failure = success with dire consequences, especially for TOC, since it's resonant with the genre and when you listen closely it's what the player wanted in the first place. I wish I had been more on the ball in the moment, but I think I'm getting better at that kind of thing

    -- Bill


    We do mention this option in the rules; where it's necessary to succeed in a General roll in order to move on, you get past the obstacle but suffer negative consequences, although our example is much prosaic than the jewelry one.
    • CommentAuthorJudd
    • CommentTimeJun 22nd 2009
     # 33
    Posted By: Pelgrane
    Posted By: Bill_WhiteJudd --

    I really like the idea that failure = success with dire consequences, especially for TOC, since it's resonant with the genre and when you listen closely it's what the player wanted in the first place. I wish I had been more on the ball in the moment, but I think I'm getting better at that kind of thing

    -- Bill


    We do mention this option in the rules; where it's necessary to succeed in a General roll in order to move on, you get past the obstacle but suffer negative consequences, although our example is much prosaic than the jewelry one.


    Thanks, Simon. I am just reading through ToC now.
    • CommentAuthorBill_White
    • CommentTimeJun 22nd 2009
     # 34
    Posted By: PelgraneWe do mention this option in the rules; where it's necessary to succeed in a General roll in order to move on, you get past the obstacle but suffer negative consequences, although our example is much prosaic than the jewelry one.


    Simon -- Sorry, yes, good point. I didn't mean to imply that I thought Judd had provided a rules fix so much as a GMing technique that I'm working on getting better at: coming up with dire consequences to impose as an alternative to outright failure. -- Bill
  35.  # 35
    Posted By: Bill_White
    Posted By: PelgraneWe do mention this option in the rules; where it's necessary to succeed in a General roll in order to move on, you get past the obstacle but suffer negative consequences, although our example is much prosaic than the jewelry one.


    Simon -- Sorry, yes, good point. I didn't mean to imply that I thought Judd had provided arules fixso much as aGMing techniquethat I'm working on getting better at: coming up with dire consequences to impose as an alternative to outright failure. -- Bill


    Actually I think the example was very useful, because I hadn't thought of using the rule in this context - that is - I wasn't stepping in defensively; I was just happy with the idea.

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