Preliminary Ideas

[Mike Olson]

Seized + Pain + Non-dice/non-card randomization

I have a vague idea for, basically, "Seize Him!": The RPG. Players take the roles of minions of a Ming-the-Merciless-style megalomanical villain out to capture an upstart hero-type in the vein of Flash Gordon.

This has, of course, a strong tendency to dip into -- if not bathe in -- Paranoia, so I'll have to figure out some way to deal with that. An obvious "twist" would be that one or more of the minions are, in fact, allied with the guy they're pursuing, but that's straight outta Paranoia so I probably won't go that way. Besides, I think I like it better if the PCs are more along the lines of 21 and 24 from Venture Brothers: loyal, not too bright, and mostly incompetent, with dreams of somehow moving up in the organization.

The PCs' ultimate goal is to track down and capture -- or "seize," if you will -- the elusive hero. I see it as a one-shot kinda game, where the scenario and characters are created and played to completion in a single session. I think both the villain and the hero should be randomly created so as to keep everyone on their toes. E.g., one session could involve a pulp mob boss pursuing a two-fisted do-gooder, the next could be about an animal-themed supervillain and a superhero, and the next about a villainous swords-and-planets-style alien ruler tracking down a meddlesome Earthman.

Players would make their own characters, but there would also be a mechanism for influencing the boss's whims and/or the narrative. After all, the goal is to progress in the organization, and you can't do that if the guy next to you ends up looking better than you do. The characters themselves would vary with the setting, but they'd always be minions, henchmen, underlings, and the like.

Oh, the randomization thing. Can someone please point out the potential flaws with this idea, barring lying? One player not involved in the task at hand thinks of a number between 1 and 10. The player involved in the conflict says a number aloud, also between 1 and 10, then the first player announces his secret number. The numerical result is the difference between those two numbers.

[Arpie]

What might be neat is if there's something like a "sympathy" score or some risk that a player might end up admiring or sympathizing with the guy they're pursuing.

You know, if your "admiration" or "sympathy" of the hero/heroine you're supposed to pursue is too high, you CAN'T perform your vile duties. You can do various things to lower your score or raise it, depending on what you want to see the PCs doing.

Like, if you want to see the PCs bumbling like stereotypical henchmen, then making stupid mistakes (Hey! Did you hear something? Nah. Just a cat.) might lower their admiration/sympathy for the hero while doing something you want them to avoid, like defying the master ON PURPOSE or, say, acting humanely toward their loved ones, might raise their admiration/sympathy.

Just a thought.

[Jonathan "Buddha" Davis]

Hmmm... the only real issue regarding randomization I can think of, other than the "lying" thing, is that by choosing 5, you can ensure that the other player never gets more than a 4. I had a similar idea for my own previous imaginary d4 game. The way I worked around the problem is that one person chose a number, the other person chooses a number. The GM's number (or in your case, the secret number) counts as the number 1, and then you count up from it and around the corner to the other person's number... for example:

Secret Number is 3-

1) Player chooses the number 6... his result is 4 (if 3 =1, then 3, 4, 5, 6 = 4)
2) Player chooses 2... his result is 10 (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, around the bend.. 1, 2 = 10)

And for the whole cheating thing, you just have people write down or physically indicate somewhere what their number is (like holding a token with a number between 1 and 10)...

Anyway, hope that helps/sparks some ideas!!

[Mike Olson]

I managed to look at this not at all over the weekend, thanks to Comic-Con, but I did think about it a bit. (The following is pretty rambly.)

Arpie, I like the sympathy concept -- for another game. For this one, I'm going for minions who are actually loyal. They might not be especially competent, but their loyalty isn't in question. I point to The Venture Brothers' 21 and 24 as prime examples. For whatever reason, they're totally devoted to the Monarch. They might even be on friendly terms with the Venture clan sometimes, but not to the point of letting them go. A few weeks ago, for example, 21 called a "time out" while chasing after Hank, had a little conversation about him, then shot him in the chest (with what he thought was a lethal dart). I want PCs who are eager to please their boss, or at least don't gain anything by displeasing their boss.

I dropped the "No Dice" ingredient. Jonathan, you brought up a good point that I had -- as usual -- failed to notice myself (I seem to have a blind spot for these types of things), and I thought it'd be easier to just go with another ingredient instead of coming up with some complex randomization method that would be more annoying than innovative.

So now the ingredients are Seized (sparking the titular "Seize Them!") + Initiated (in re: "admitted into an organizaton or group" -- probably the single most important defining feature of the minions/henchmen is that they all belong to the same group) + Explicit Losing Condition (whoever doesn't have the most Brownie Points at the end loses, but he with the least Brownie Points loses more). Brownie Points are won by capturing the Hero or his companions (below), or by solving problems they create (not below).

PCs are defined by five traits:
Fitness: Physical conditioning, stamina, strength, speed
Training: General skill-based competence, bravery, rank
Access: Familiarity with headquarters/hideout/base/town/etc.
Wits: Intelligence, craftiness
Resources: Gear and access thereto

I only have a general idea of play so far, but rounds consist of one player declaring a challenge, a la Agon, and everyone competing to win it. Winners build up a store of Advantage Points which can be used to improve rolls and exert a degree of narrative control, while losers cede Advantage Points to winners. (I have a vague notion to implement something like The Mountain Witch's trust mechanic, but it's no more than that right now.) Example challenges would be things like using Access to "figure out" where the Hero may have gone or Resources to see who has the right equipment for the job.

There's obviously a competitive aspect to these rolls, with the high roller earning rewards, but tasks in which the opposition is provided by someone or something other than the other players also have a target number to be overcome -- if you don't exceed the target, even if you do better than your fellow players, you fail at the task. An example of this would be combat.

In addition to the RPG aspect, the game also involves collaborative world-building. The game starts with a mostly blank piece of paper on which the GM draws the starting location -- a rectangle or oval or something will do, with a few notes written inside, as necessary (e.g., "Throne Room"). The players determine additional locations as play proceeds. For example, a player wouldn't ask the GM "What other kinds of rooms are there in the base?" Instead, there'd be an Access challenge, with the winner getting to declare a location, such as Hangar, and then everyone declaring details about it commensurate with how well they did on the roll. The how of that is a fiddly bit, but you get the idea (I hope).

One use of Advantage Points is to declare details about the Hero, including his companions. This also involves, say, a Wits roll, to "know" about the Hero. Capturing a companion earns a number of Brownie Point

[Mike Olson]

Well, it's pretty clear to me now that there's no way I'll finish this by the deadline -- I barely have mechanical underpinnings, and I'm not clear on what, exactly, game play involves -- but I'm still interested in the idea and will continue to develop it, somehow/where or other.