Back to the Masonic Hall on a hot weekend.
And it was a remarkably non-gameful weekend, partly because I
ended up doing a lot of socialising. Still, the games began with
Fiasco, the new card-based edition. I’ve seen some Coen Brothers films
now and so I think that my feeling of “just don’t really get it” can’t
be ascribed to that any more; I just felt that the prompts didn’t
produce tension or give me any real guidance. Oh well. Maybe one day
I'll get it.
On to Turing
Machine,
still tricky to teach, but I think I’ve got the key point now: the way
you choose which one of the 3-4 tests on the card you’re going to be
checking is by picking the test numbers, because the condition that’s
true for the test numbers is the one you’re asking about for the
secret number. But I need a better way of explaining it.
An RPG session, in the Strontium Dog setting but based on the
Haunted West rules (a realistic plus magic game of the Wild West).
It was a good fit, and good fun.
Then a long game of Xia: Legends of a Drift
System,
which fell a bit flat when one player kept getting bad dice luck – but
they ended up coming third out of five so I suppose it could have been
worse.
And after supper,
Flash Point: Fire
Rescue,
a long game on the hotel board. We ended up with a loss, but it was a
fine experience getting there.
And Sunday was more socialising, then the drive home.
A question and its answer a few yards apart?
Being fair, there are other buildings of Stockport College which don't
have steel plate bolted over the front; but this one has looked like
this since I first came here a year ago.
- Posted by DrBob at
09:55am on
27 July 2023
I didn't have bad dice luck in Xia (well no more than most), I had a rubbish ship with not enough slots to absorb damage, and no plan/mission engine because none of the Mission cards I drew were for stuff I could DO. So while other people had plans and therefore made money and therefore upgraded their ships to bigger faster ones, I got stuck. I was randomly wandering about the edge of the map hoping to turn over the tile that produced orange cubes, as that was the least worst mission of the 3 I picked up. That tile didn't turn up until we were three quarters of the way thru the game. And then there was promptly an Event that meant my slow rubbish ship couldn't travel across the Zone Of Much Damage between orange cube place and mission end place.
In my first game of Firefly, I also ended up with the most rubbish ship. But I had fun in that, because the whole map was there so I could come up with a plan the rubbish ship was capable of doing and get on with it.
- Posted by RogerBW at
10:16am on
27 July 2023
Fair enough! I thought you had some pretty rubbish dice luck too.
- Posted by J Michael Cule at
11:56am on
27 July 2023
I have since sold off that copy of FIASCO (2nd Edition) to an American more optimistic than I am. I think that the earlier game had a greater density to the number of complications in the initial set up which made for better inspiration in the role-playing bit. Making it friendlier to newbies has taken some of the bite out.
And I can accept your 'I just don't get it' because I was the one who fled from TURING MACHINE because something in the way it works, in the mechanics of how the game passed information to you caused me a full on horror, almost Lovecraftian in its intensity. Seems daft I know.
- Posted by John P at
09:29pm on
27 July 2023
I messed up some of the decisions in Xia but I think DrBob is right, the choice of first ship does matter. I'm not sure that the special ability of her ship was sufficient compensation for the deficiency of the design. But I'd happily play Xia again.
But thanks for the Strontium Dog game, DrBob, it was really fun. And the psis on the run on Sunday too. Like I said, for RPGers, we didn't mess up too badly on either one, which is pretty good. I think it helps to have characters who can actually deliver on what they are supposed to be good at.
I think the dice on that hotel had it in for us though. The number of times we got explosions was horrendous. We've beaten that board before so we'll just have to beat it again.
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