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Actual Play Vignettes: Microscope: The Rat-ening

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  1.  
    • CommentAuthorJCunkle
    • CommentTimeJul 14th 2009
     # 1
    AP: Microscope

    Feedback on the specific questions first.

    1. Did the other player read the file or did you teach them?
    We sat down together and tried to play from the book. Our thinking was "few pages = simple play". We... we were wrong. What really happened was that upon reading the first page together, my artistically but not procedurally inclined wife said "You read them, then we'll play" Oh well.

    2. Which rules were used?
    All of them. We invoked tone debt, and created legacies. tone debt was instrumental to the outcome of one of our scenes. I really can't imagine play without it. As soon as you use it to good effect, it becomes apparent just how strongly tone affects the game. I imagine with a few savvy players, the tension between saving tone and spending it before others do would be pretty high.

    3. Number of sessions?
    One so far, but now that some real life concerns are out of the way, we plan on playing again. We'll use the same history when we do.

    4. What is the group like?
    I'm 31 and have been playing trad games since I was around 15. I've been lurking around Story Games/ The Forge/ Anyway for about two years.
    My wife has never played any kind of role playing games before.

    5. What were the last three games you played?
    For me, regrettably, Shadowrun 2nd Ed, Star Wars d6, and more Star Wars. (Hint: my friends are all a bit older than me, and don't care to try new things.)
    • CommentAuthorJCunkle
    • CommentTimeJul 14th 2009 edited
     # 2
    Warning: Incoming wall of text.

    Starting the Game
    Note: in this text (x) is dark tone and (o) is light tone. Except for the scenes, I'm not sure which pieces of history were added in what order. Oops.

    Premise
    We came up with the basic idea of animal-people hybrids due mainly to wifey's interest in the idea, but weren't quite sure what to do with 'em. We decided on "The fall of the Lion Emperors" (o) and "The rise of the Rat Kingdom" (x) as our ages, but we changed them before play.

    Palette
    The palette ended up being a short list. I'm not sure if that's due to our familiarity with each other, or the limited number of players failing to spawn new ideas.
    Pros:
    Humans, Too!
    Dying sun
    Cons:
    Magic
    Solutions to Dying Sun

    Nicole was having a hard time coming up with any ideas for the palette, so I reminded her that I'd be adding all kinds of stuff to the history if she didn't put a nix to it now.
    She added the Con "magic" immediately, stating that she wanted no part of it in "her" world. ha-ha.
    I added "Humans, too!" suggesting that perhaps the hybrids were gene spliced. We got to talking about it and decided to go back and change the ages we'd be starting with. We realized we were much more interested in the fall of humans, rather than "lion emperors" so...

    New Premise
    Scientists develop human-animal hybrids and the rats take over.
    So our ages became "The Age of High Science - First hybrids" (x) and "The Ascent of the Rat Clans" (o). yep, rats are better than people. :)

    Palette
    We kept the first two palette options and added another two. First she picked "Dying Sun" which frankly startled me. Cool! I picked "No Solution to Dying Sun" as a counter, mainly because I wanted that awesomeness hanging over our heads the whole time. We agreed the palette was done and started sketching.

    Sketching
    Because there were only two of us, we sketched twice each, to get a starting position more like a regular sized game.

    First Focus:
    I decided to make the focus "The nuclear annihilation of Sydney" which drew beautiful looks of horror from Nicole.
    "Why would you do that?"
    "Because I'm evil, let's play."

    During my focus we had our first scene: "Why did the owls drop nuclear bombs on sydney?"
    Location: the owl war-room moments before the decision.
    I nixed the individual who made the decision and required a journalist.
    Nicole chose to be the journalist, an Owl columnist reporter, I chose a human military advisor to the Owl war machine.

    Owl journalist: new and inexperienced "I assume they'll tell ME what to write"
    Advisor: "I'm lost among my enemies, I'd best watch my step."

    I had the reporter led into an underground bunker, where top owl military personnel were busy debating the need to use the bomb. The journalist was led in, and the conversation cut short. She was here to hear the official version of recent events in the owl nation, unaware of what was about to be decided.
    Nicole says" Underground? but, they're owls." I replied that the owls hadn't had time to develop their own bases, and were using ones taken from the humans.
    we had some discussion in character, trying to force the other into stating an in-charater reason for the bombing, and it looked like Nicole was going to push me into a corner, so I used a tone debt (x) and forced her character into a racist. (species-ist?) who found all humans distasteful. I chose to interject some thoughts, unspoken, into her head. Shortly after, she unintentionally started spouting some really nasty and warmongering advice against humans, but which was taken by the owl generals to be against the Dingo-men of australia

    Really, without tone debt, the reasons for the attack would have been one of self defense, and panic. It ended up turning the Owl nation into a xenophobic, warmongering show of force. the actual phrasing of the answer?
    "Because they could. A show of force can always be rationalized and propagandized." My sweetly smiling wife's own words. :)
    Scene Verdict? Dark Tone.

    The second scene happened far to the future, when the Rat Clans attempt to clean up the Rad-Zone where Sydney used to be.
    "Why do the Rat Clans care about dingo problems?"
    Location: A crowded ship on its way to Australia
    I placed no Character restrictions
    Nicole chose to be a dingo sailor. (With a red cap!)
    I chose to be a Rat radiation clean-up volunteer.
    Dingo: Still upset about Sydney, a cultural anguish. He blames humans for the attack, believing the owl propaganda.
    Rat: I'll use this Dingo's anger to gain allies against the Lions.

    Before the scene Nicole decide to create a Legacy. I think in part to prevent me from making the Rats totally slimy in their dealings with others. She created "The Rat Clans give their aid to humans" (o)
    During this scene we managed to define a few things that surprised us. Most humans are dead by this time, having been killed in the Rat/Lion war. That there was a Rat/Lion war.

    Nicole was hitting the xenophobia button pretty hard for the dingo. I wanted something a little different so I had the Rat tell a story about a human who saved the rat's family from gunfire. I used her Legacy to "convince the dingo not all humans are bad."(o)
    She got tripped up by that and soon asked me the scene question directly, in character. She realized what she had done and did a facepalm. ha-ha.
    I answered the question to my satisfaction, of course. "We don't want what happened to humans to happen to you. And we don't want what happened to you to happen to us..."
    Scene verdict? Light Tone
    • CommentAuthorJCunkle
    • CommentTimeJul 14th 2009 edited
     # 3
    Second Focus
    Nicole chose "the Age of Science!" as the focus.

    Scene three: "How did the hybrids feel about humans during this time period?"
    Location: A conversation in a lab's cage room, between a scientist and a hybrid
    Nicole's character restrictions were that one of us must be a human scientist, and one of us must be a hybrid rat or hybrid lion.
    I chose the Hybrid Lion, Nicole was forced to be the scientist.

    Lion: I'ma EAT this guy.
    (Nicole goes "No! that answers the question." I grumbled a bit, then said..."Those pansy Rats showed me up again today, I'ma eat THEM!")
    Scientist: I've got 1000 things to do... maybe the Rats will help me.

    The scene opened as the scientist spilled coffee in front of my cage.
    We parried back and forth a bit verbally. I tried to convince the scientist to let me out of the cage (so I could eat him) but it was no good. I decided to ramp up the action, since most of our game had been talking, and discussion.
    I burst out of the cage, and stalked menacingly, etc, etc. So the scientist scrambles behind a desk, and I leap on top of it and bite his throat! Er, well, try to. Nicole uses her one NPC action for the scene to have a Rat burst from his cage and tackle the lion. I grab the rat in mid air and throw it to the side. Meanwhile the scientist ducks out the security door, and locks it, trapping me.
    I start tearing the door apart, but Nicole uses the Rat Legacy to bring the Rat back at me. The effect is "The rats bring the Lion's wrath upon their heads by saving a human life."(x)
    the question is answered by agreement "Lions are aggressive and hate humans, rats will do noble sacrifice"
    I used (x) debt to add a post script, and ATE the Rat that helped the scientist to escape. (I said I was gonna.)
    We rule the scene dark overall and accrue light tone debt.


    We stopped here, half way through the second focus.

    Our Final Position:

    Age of high science - First hybrids (x)
    - Scientist discover a solar hydrogen theft device (x)
    - Humans invent hybrid animal slaves to help with their daily lives (o), 1 debt
    - - Scene #3 (x)
    Animal nations rise through violence (x), 1 debt
    - Giant owls pacify western europe (o)
    - Dingo-men try to stop humans from nuking Australia (o)
    - Dingo-men invade Australia (x)
    - - Scene #1 (x)
    The Sun turns red - complications of a dying sun (x)
    War between Lion and Rat Folk (x)
    - Rat Folk try to clean up Rad-Zones (x), 1 debt
    -- scene #2 (o)
    The Ascent of the Rat Clans (o)

    Apologies for spelling/editing. It's late, but I promised Ben I'd get the report up tonight. :)
  4.  # 4
    I love the point and counter-point of your palette. That's exactly how Microscope should play.

    And yes the rules are definitely too much to play "cold" -- at least one person reading it through to get the whole idea is essential.

    Posted By: JCunkleI decided to make the focus "The nuclear annihilation of Sydney" which drew beautiful looks of horror from Nicole.
    "Why would you do that?"
    "Because I'm evil, let's play."

    Okay, yeah, you are absolutely playing Microscope right.


    She got tripped up by that and soon asked me the scene question directly, in character. She realized what she had done and did a facepalm. ha-ha.

    Oh, that's beautiful. Both the error and realization of the error -- you guys totally got the system.

    Man, that's a really great game summary Jeremiah. No, seriously. Your write-up really highlights how Microscope is supposed to work. Kudos to you and Nicole.
  5.  # 5
    Posted By: JCunkleGiant owls pacify western europe

    Quote of the day. Just sayin'.
    • CommentAuthorTristan
    • CommentTimeJul 15th 2009
     # 6
    So nice. I am more and more convinced that this is a game I could play over and over and over again. :D

    I was worried that I might not be able to talk my whole group into playing this. Now I can try to play this one-on-one with my girlfriend, and be confident it would work.

    Any other considerations about trying it too?
    • CommentAuthorJCunkle
    • CommentTimeJul 15th 2009
     # 7
    Game-wise I suggest sketching twice, just to fill out the outline a bit. Everything else is pretty well oiled.
    Modally, we found our characters in conversations a great deal. Likely due to our relationship? I dunno. We talk alot anyway.
    When I realized it was happening, I pushed for MOAR AKSHUN! Maybe thats's a two player-microscope-thing, maybe it was just us. Let us know if you see it too.
    • CommentAuthorderthnada
    • CommentTimeJul 15th 2009
     # 8
    I've got a two player game on tap for tonight, so thanks for the timely AP and advice!
  9.  # 9
    We've had lots of people getting whacked inside scenes, but because there isn't a conflict resolution system per se, Microscope play tends not to be about action so much as the summary of action -- the outcome of action rather than a blow-by-blow.

    Either both sides agree to what happens ("I shoot him!" / "Umm, okay he's dead..."), or someone Takes Control ("I shoot him and he dies"), neither of which makes an action sequence an interesting activity in and of itself -- at least compared to a game where you face off and then roll to see who wins, with everyone on the edge of their seat waiting to see how the dice fall. And that's intentional.

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