I ran the last session of Hearts
of Wulin PbtA yesterday. I tied together several character threads, put two
PCs in the spotlight, and significantly changed some entanglements. Down below I’ve
put links to the session videos and my previous posts on the system. Today I
want to consider some of the material I need to develop if I want to make this
a full-fledged game. This isn’t everything, but its where I plan to start.
Side note: I used a PbtA “Love Letter” this
weekend. That’s not a technique I’ve used much before. But we had a player miss
session three and return for four. It generated cool story changes and worked
well. I need to remember these for longer campaigns with characters dropping
out and popping back in later. Here’s the letter’s text:
You went
to protect your brother and remove him from the dangers, but also to consult
with your parents about the potential marriage arrangement. When you confront
your parents, roll. On a 10+ they hear your words and understand that what they’ve
done may be premature. However to keep face they require something significant
of you. What is it? On a 7-9, they’re upset with you and it creates a rift. They
will instead offer your brother’s hand in marriage to Zhen Ai. How does this
reshape your entanglements? On a 6-, they command you to accept the marriage
and formally announce it.
GM PRINCIPLES,
AGENDAS, AND MOVES
I ran this rough draft of Hearts of Wulin without a formal set of GM practices. Instead I
relied on my sense of the genre and conventions. Now I need draft guidance for
what that actually means. Looking back at sessions, I’ve spotted opportunities,
moments where I could have deepened the setting without too much intrusion.
Based on that I’ve assembled a preliminary set of GM elements—complementing more
universal PbtA admonitions.
GM Principles/Agendas
- Establish the Wulin World
- Emphasize the Split between Wulin and Normal World
- Everyone Knows Each Other, Except When They Don’t
- Entanglements Change
- Remind Them of Duty and Family
- Everyone Speaks Obliquely About Feelings
- Things Always Happen Without Warning
- Show the Parallel World of Imperial Authority
- Set and Maintain Your Level of the “Fantastic”
- Apply Long Suffering Wounds
- An Ally’s Accidental Betrayal
- Force a Struggle
- Mark a Condition
- Face the Past
- Engage a Rival
- Have a Challenger Appear
- Draw Them Together
- Hint at Corruption
- Invoke Loyalty to Teachers & Mentors
- Threaten Family
- Suggest Future Devastation
- Bring Loyalties into Conflict
- Reveal History’s Hidden Truth
- Catch them in Revenge by Association
- Peel Back a Disguise
- Level Accusations
- Send a Mysterious Invitation
- Change Someone’s Scale
SUPERNATURAL STORIES
As it stand right now, Hearts
of Wulin could include supernatural elements. There’s no reason to keep
that out of the fiction. But the mechanics don’t incentivize or enhance that. I
want to develop an optional material to help simulate movies like Bride with White Hair, Green Snake, and Zu Warriors. There’s a fine line between the heightened abilities
of martial arts in these movies and actual supernatural forces.
I can think of three parts to support that: a) new roles for
the playbooks; b) new standard moves; and c) material covering supernatural
forces in the setting (ghosts, wizards, gods).
I would be cool (and symmetrical) to have a new role for
each playbook. Off the top of my head, I’ve considered: Exorcist, Alchemist,
Monster Hunter, Taoist Magician, Cursed, and In Human Guise. This last one
would represent supernatural forces who have taken another form to interact
with humanity: Susu from The Sorcerer and
The White Snake, Monkey from Journey
to the West, or Xiaowei from Painted
Skin. We’d handle that as an open secret at the table.
I imagine the Exorcist/Monster Hunter would have the ability
to resist the influence of and interact with their respective sphere of influence.
For each they’d also begin with an entanglement related to their work: a ghost
who loves them, a monster they protect, a creature seeking revenge but tied to
someone they care for. The Taoist Magicians often deals with ghosts, so maybe
it doesn’t need its own role move. I’d also like to steer away directly from
things with real world analogues. I’m not sure about the Alchemist and what
they could do. Both Qin the Warring Era
and Legends of Wulin have systems for
this, but I don’t want anything elaborate. Maybe more an herbalist.
I have an idea for The Cursed, but it’s rough: You have an
additional condition called Friends & Family. Any time you mark a
condition, you may mark this instead. If you do so, a future scene will
showcase a terrible event or encounter having happened to a close NPC. They
might be injured, haunted, or even simply angry at you for an unclear reason.
You have to deal with their problems to clear this condition.
I wonder if additional Basic moves would be needed. There’s
a trope in many of these movies that supernatural elements terrify the hardiest
unless they have preparation. I might not need anything except Overcome and a
consideration of Scale. As for going detailingr the supernatural—probably worth
assembling some general discussions of those tropes and maybe laying out some
fronts.
REVISING BASIC MOVES
As you saw in my Basic Moves post a few need significant re-tuning. I don’t think require complete retooled, but we will see. With more
play we might discover which moves get used and which get forgotten. In a
couple cases how I ran at the table varied from their text. I need to reconcile
that. For example, I originally intended that the Comfort & Support move wouldn’t
clear Conditions in a conflict situation, only outside of that.
At the table I let the players do clear those in a fight
because it felt right. Not permitting that would have shut down interesting
choices and limited things. In a PbtA game aiming for tragic pressure on the
players that might be right. But for one that embraces empowering action it
wasn’t. So I need to stress test other moves to see if we’ve got other frayed
edges.
REVISING THE PLAYBOOK
MOVES
Changing Comfort &
Support in turn meant I had to change at least one playbook move. In
general I’m happy with the starting playbook choices. They reflect the kinds of
characters I expect from this setting. Some of the moves seem a little
derivative and I need make them feel like they’re part of the wulin world. I
like eight moves each; I wouldn’t want to do too many more. They’d have to be
pretty cool to add them.
On a related note the playbooks right now say that players
can create custom moves for their style as an advancement. I need to provide examples
of those and guidelines for building them. I don’t necessarily want to go down
the rabbit hole of pre-built styles but I need to figure out what those could
look like.
GENRE SUPPORT
If I want to write this up as a formal (and publishable)
project, I need develop materials which can help someone get into and run this
genre. The GM Moves will establish some of that. Tweaks to Basic and Playbook
moves to deepen flavor will help as well. A list of suggested viewing and
reading’s a must. To supplement that I want to go through some of the classic
movies and books examine them in the context of the game. Jianghu Hustle does a great job of analyzing films to draw out
their wulin and gameable elements. I’d like to do something similar, but
talking about what moves occur at particular moments in these movies. I’d also
like to walk through some of the best wuxia TV series to show what a great resource
they can be.
OTHER CONCEPTS
I had additional concepts I didn’t develop for this first
draft. I don’t know if they’ll be worth pursuing. For example I thought players
transitioning might transition between the five archetypal playbooks as their
characters grew. Moving from X to Y playbook would open up a special move tied
to that shift. For example a character changing from Loyal to Outside might
have the “Disillusioned” move; from Aware to Student might gain “Broken Path;”
from Student to Bravo could have “Worldly.” I don’t know if it’s a worthwhile
goal to come up with twenty of those or not.
AWARENESS
I love these movies and stories but I’m also an old, white
dude. If I tune this publication I want to have Chinese and other Asian readers
look it over. It’d be great to have someone familiar with Chinese wuxia series
especially give their input. These are flashy, melodramatic stories—often soap
operatic-- but I don’t want to end up with a parody or something that just
revels in exoticism. I also need to get someone familiar with Korean swords
& history dramas. How do they differ and what kinds of tools might we need
to better serve those?
ORIGINS
I always take one of my own games to Origins Games on
Demand, though they’re often not picked by players. Last year I did all Tales of the Loop and The Veil; I never got to run Magic Inc. I’ll try again with HoW. With some tuning it could work as a
one-shot: two entanglements, list picks for names, pre-set factions, simple
playbooks. I might create NPC cards with pictures from my Pinterest board to
help evoke the setting. If I’m going to do that I’ll probably run a couple of
two shot sessions for the Gauntlet Hangouts in May. A split online two shot’s
probably the equivalent of a f2f four hour game.
I still have a bunch of work to do, but that’s the basics.
Thoughts?
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