David Berg
First Post
A while back, I played 2 sessions of Polaris with my friends Daniel, John and Terry. Daniel had played once, long ago, and served as our rules guide.
We had a lot of fun playing. I credit this in large part to the game's rich and evocative flavor.
Before I ever sat down to play Polaris, I had a few game color ingredients rattling around in my head. Heroes & tragedy (from an online chat with the game's author, Ben Lehman), utmost north (from the subtitle), ornamented antiquity (from the cover) and a star (from the title).
Our group was short on time, and didn't carve out a "tell about the setting" period. Instead, we discussed what we needed in order to get to char-gen: "Polaris is a city in the cold surrounded by the Wastes and the Mistaken. The people of Polaris are a fading civilization under siege, and we play knights who resist that siege. We like the stars. Warmth and sunlight are bad. Go."
Well, actually, there was one other step: to facilitate a short game, we decided that we were four of the last five knights, and we all took the same Fate: "Perseus, the lost 5th knight". This enabled us to get to the meat of the story quickly.
Filling out my character sheet consisted of:
• Writing down the game's starting scores in Zeal, Ice, Light and Weariness.
• Picking a star name.
• Writing down the Ability "Lore of Demons". Writing down the Blessing "Starlight Sword". Writing down the Office "Knight of the Order of the Stars". Writing down the common Fate we had all decided on: "Perseus, the Fifth Knight".
• Looking through some short (7-10 items) lists (with no definitions or explanations) of optional other Abilities, Blessings, Offices and Fates. I picked one I liked, and made up another.
• Making up my demon. Choosing other players' demons to be my family and official relationships.
We then dimmed the lights, lit a candle (as the book says!), turned some creepy music on low volume, and began roleplaying.
In the first scene, we defined "Starlight Swords" as solid but softly radiant blades, "Wings of the Stars" as basically angel wings, and Polaris armor as ice-crystaline.
The second scene brought my demon to life, combining the notes from my sheet ("multi-colored land shark") with Terry's family relationship ("ex-wife Hydra"). Hydra had eyes that sparkled a certain palette, and those were the shifting hues of the ethereal shark, which glided on and through the ice with Hydra's voice coming from somewhere deep inside it. The Wastes were defined as crags, cliffs, and chasms of ice.
The third scene (introducing Arcturus and his wife, the keeper of records), gave us a tall, dark, ancient archive.
The fourth scene gave us an abandoned chapel, a gaunt knight, and a vision of my Fate "Event: the Vanishing Stars" wherein Perseus was the only constellation that remained.
All this was done in a highly collaborative fashion. Polaris structures play in turns, with each player taking on a new role each turn. The players in the Mistaken (GM) role leaned heavily on the Moons (NPC players) to act in Heart (spotlight PC) scenes. This worked well, sometimes with pure improv, and sometimes with the Mistaken preparing the Moon beforehand. Example: with John GMing for Daniel, John took Terry aside to tell her how he wanted her NPC to act, the better to put the screws to Daniel's PC.
These role labels took us a few tries to remember, but I think they added to the flavor of the game, mirroring the components on the character sheet (mistaken=demon, new moon=family, full moon=office).
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Highlights from the fiction:
Winged knight Altair tells his daughter she's not ready to prove herself fighting in the wastes, then accidentally gores her in a duel to prove his point.
Depressed knight Algorab fasts too long in a forsaken tower and sees all the stars vanish from the sky except for the constellation Perseus. His lost son appears (demon? hallucination?) and tells him to seek the vanished knight Perseus in the wastes, as Perseus is the key to Polaris's survival.
Altair goes to the archives, where the voice of his demon taunts him, revealing that his daughter has lost her leg. Altair sets the place ablaze.
Algorab tries to give Altair his sword to fly up and give to Perseus (the constellation), but grief-stricken Altair ignores him.
Knight Tarazed, out on patrol, meets an ethereal ice shark the color of his lost wife's eyes, and speaking to him with her voice.
Later, the Polaris high priest echoes the shark's entreaties to forsake the knights, drawing a third eye on Tarazed's head to "show him the truth" of the demons. Tarazed burns the "eye" out with a candelabra.
--------------------------------------------------------
After play, I was thinking about how the game helped us to spew out all this great, colorful narration, and I think some keys were:
(a) common ground to work from (e.g. the game subtitle, "chivalric tragedy at the utmost north")
(b) hooking our curiosity with material that needed to be fleshed out to be played (e.g. what's a "starlight sword"?)
(c) broad ability to creatively contribute to the fiction (various roles, few exclusive authorities), and
(d) something engaging to do (confront armageddon, etc.)
In the first session of play, we began and ended scenes based on pacing consensus, and had a lot of "conflicts" end in "yeah, all this is cool, so be it" agreements. The situations we'd set up provided a plentiful source of drama, and we made our way through scenes relatively leisurely, fleshing out whatever details caught our fancy.
In the second session, having given the rules a more thorough reading, we were determined to play a lot of conflicts and roll dice, the better to experience the game's core reward mechanism (turning Zeal into Weariness). Scenes instantly turned into conflicts, and color was less abundant. It was still inspired at times, though, like when Daniel began a conflict by saying, "I take Cassiopeia to the top of the Tower of a Thousand Steps to exorcise the demon from her." Despite having no formal role in the conflict, I was able to riff off that and throw in descriptions of the place's perilous nature.
The Zeal -> Weariness arc made sense (doomed heroes), but wasn't very satisfying crammed into a few hours. The game is clearly intended for longer play (though not extended campaigns). I hope I get the chance some day.
Ps,
-David
We had a lot of fun playing. I credit this in large part to the game's rich and evocative flavor.
Before I ever sat down to play Polaris, I had a few game color ingredients rattling around in my head. Heroes & tragedy (from an online chat with the game's author, Ben Lehman), utmost north (from the subtitle), ornamented antiquity (from the cover) and a star (from the title).
Our group was short on time, and didn't carve out a "tell about the setting" period. Instead, we discussed what we needed in order to get to char-gen: "Polaris is a city in the cold surrounded by the Wastes and the Mistaken. The people of Polaris are a fading civilization under siege, and we play knights who resist that siege. We like the stars. Warmth and sunlight are bad. Go."
Well, actually, there was one other step: to facilitate a short game, we decided that we were four of the last five knights, and we all took the same Fate: "Perseus, the lost 5th knight". This enabled us to get to the meat of the story quickly.
Filling out my character sheet consisted of:
• Writing down the game's starting scores in Zeal, Ice, Light and Weariness.
• Picking a star name.
• Writing down the Ability "Lore of Demons". Writing down the Blessing "Starlight Sword". Writing down the Office "Knight of the Order of the Stars". Writing down the common Fate we had all decided on: "Perseus, the Fifth Knight".
• Looking through some short (7-10 items) lists (with no definitions or explanations) of optional other Abilities, Blessings, Offices and Fates. I picked one I liked, and made up another.
• Making up my demon. Choosing other players' demons to be my family and official relationships.
We then dimmed the lights, lit a candle (as the book says!), turned some creepy music on low volume, and began roleplaying.
In the first scene, we defined "Starlight Swords" as solid but softly radiant blades, "Wings of the Stars" as basically angel wings, and Polaris armor as ice-crystaline.
The second scene brought my demon to life, combining the notes from my sheet ("multi-colored land shark") with Terry's family relationship ("ex-wife Hydra"). Hydra had eyes that sparkled a certain palette, and those were the shifting hues of the ethereal shark, which glided on and through the ice with Hydra's voice coming from somewhere deep inside it. The Wastes were defined as crags, cliffs, and chasms of ice.
The third scene (introducing Arcturus and his wife, the keeper of records), gave us a tall, dark, ancient archive.
The fourth scene gave us an abandoned chapel, a gaunt knight, and a vision of my Fate "Event: the Vanishing Stars" wherein Perseus was the only constellation that remained.
All this was done in a highly collaborative fashion. Polaris structures play in turns, with each player taking on a new role each turn. The players in the Mistaken (GM) role leaned heavily on the Moons (NPC players) to act in Heart (spotlight PC) scenes. This worked well, sometimes with pure improv, and sometimes with the Mistaken preparing the Moon beforehand. Example: with John GMing for Daniel, John took Terry aside to tell her how he wanted her NPC to act, the better to put the screws to Daniel's PC.
These role labels took us a few tries to remember, but I think they added to the flavor of the game, mirroring the components on the character sheet (mistaken=demon, new moon=family, full moon=office).
--------------------------------------------------------
Highlights from the fiction:
Winged knight Altair tells his daughter she's not ready to prove herself fighting in the wastes, then accidentally gores her in a duel to prove his point.
Depressed knight Algorab fasts too long in a forsaken tower and sees all the stars vanish from the sky except for the constellation Perseus. His lost son appears (demon? hallucination?) and tells him to seek the vanished knight Perseus in the wastes, as Perseus is the key to Polaris's survival.
Altair goes to the archives, where the voice of his demon taunts him, revealing that his daughter has lost her leg. Altair sets the place ablaze.
Algorab tries to give Altair his sword to fly up and give to Perseus (the constellation), but grief-stricken Altair ignores him.
Knight Tarazed, out on patrol, meets an ethereal ice shark the color of his lost wife's eyes, and speaking to him with her voice.
Later, the Polaris high priest echoes the shark's entreaties to forsake the knights, drawing a third eye on Tarazed's head to "show him the truth" of the demons. Tarazed burns the "eye" out with a candelabra.
--------------------------------------------------------
After play, I was thinking about how the game helped us to spew out all this great, colorful narration, and I think some keys were:
(a) common ground to work from (e.g. the game subtitle, "chivalric tragedy at the utmost north")
(b) hooking our curiosity with material that needed to be fleshed out to be played (e.g. what's a "starlight sword"?)
(c) broad ability to creatively contribute to the fiction (various roles, few exclusive authorities), and
(d) something engaging to do (confront armageddon, etc.)
In the first session of play, we began and ended scenes based on pacing consensus, and had a lot of "conflicts" end in "yeah, all this is cool, so be it" agreements. The situations we'd set up provided a plentiful source of drama, and we made our way through scenes relatively leisurely, fleshing out whatever details caught our fancy.
In the second session, having given the rules a more thorough reading, we were determined to play a lot of conflicts and roll dice, the better to experience the game's core reward mechanism (turning Zeal into Weariness). Scenes instantly turned into conflicts, and color was less abundant. It was still inspired at times, though, like when Daniel began a conflict by saying, "I take Cassiopeia to the top of the Tower of a Thousand Steps to exorcise the demon from her." Despite having no formal role in the conflict, I was able to riff off that and throw in descriptions of the place's perilous nature.
The Zeal -> Weariness arc made sense (doomed heroes), but wasn't very satisfying crammed into a few hours. The game is clearly intended for longer play (though not extended campaigns). I hope I get the chance some day.
Ps,
-David
