Who has been playing The Wildsea?

[Foodgeek]

I played a one shot (ardent rootless char AKA human ship's cook) and just did the session zero for a campaign (Itzenko Stowaway Arginaut AKA mantis person (Garden) Ship's gardener). What are your thought on the system?

 

[Arilyn]

I love Wildsea. The lore is flavourful but the game assumes that it'll become the table's game, so no expectations that players must memorize endless detail. I appreciate the mechanics being similiar to PbtA or Forged in the Dark but with a very robust character creation system. The game has alternate ideas if you want to move away from the core premise. It's just a really cool game that deserves more love and attention.

 

[Foodgeek]

I like so far. I'm going to need to keep track of the garden plots and bonuses and protections we have for the ship and plots.

 

[UnplayedRanger]

My table is currently having a blast with it.

 

[Xamnam]

Ran through their adventure One Armed Scissor, and my table had a great time. Character and Ship creation were an absolute highlight for everyone, and the fantastical world really grabbed people quickly. Whispers are an absolutely delightful idea, and the players used them to great effect. Travel and resource procedures were a bit rough in practice for me personally, and the game does use the good but personally stressful 'most common result is success with complications.' The idea of tracks (very similar to clocks, but developed separately) is such a comfortable GM pacing tool to use.

I would happily play more of it in a heartbeat!

 

[Retreater]

I played a one-shot of it for a podcast (which ended up turning into 3 episodes). It was a lot of fun and a very creative world. I didn't get to see how a lot of the rules interacted, but I'd play again.

 

[Foodgeek]

I played a one-shot of it for a podcast (which ended up turning into 3 episodes). It was a lot of fun and a very creative world. I didn't get to see how a lot of the rules interacted, but I'd play again.

There is a Wildsea discord and a Mythworks discord. You could maybe find an online campaign that way.

 

[UnplayedRanger]

There is a ongoing campaign for an new adventure supplement from Mythworks: Tigers on the Wire

 

[Willie the Duck]

We've been playing an ongoing campaign weekly since the book came out.

What are your thought on the system?

Setting-wise, the world is wildly imaginative, exciting, and IMO the primary draw of the game. It's also loose enough in interpretation that you can readily make it your own -- if your group wants the cactus-people to be venus-flytraps instead, you can readily do so. In my group, we decided that no one was thrilled with Felix's idea that a worldwide rainforest would be super-flammable, so we just omitted it.

Mechanics-wise, we really like the character (and ship) creation rules. A little difficulty with which edges and skills would apply for which activity, but nothing that group consensus can't resolve. I think some in my group thought there were a few too many skills (and languages) compared to the number of pips one starts with, and maybe a little too much reliance on damage-types + vulnerabilities/resistance as a combat prowess mechanism (personally, I don't really feel combat is a central focus for the game, but YMMV), but generally again nothing too out of whack.

Agree with Xamnam that the travel and resource (and similar) procedures are very open-ended. The group will have to feel out how challenging it should be to acquire resources vs. the chance of them being lost/expended (or needed to heal/fix/recharge aspects) compared to how challenging a game you want.

One thing worth noting is the 'cut' mechanic for task resolution difficulty. It's a dice penalty, but unlike other dice pool games I've seen, you take the dice off after the dice are rolled (the highest ones). It's a subtle difference, but the effects are significant. If you're performing an act where you really are looking for a full success (rolling a 6), the chance of success drops off precipitously, even with just a cut of 1 (varies by number of dice you are rolling, but like 1/3 or 1/6 as likely, instead of 70-80% as likely like would happen with pre-roll dice removal). This implies to me that the game is designed around the assumption that you will be shooting for partial success or better (4-6) for most tasks (where you are expected to succeed at all) where you might consider attempting when under adverse conditions. That's something the Firefly (the term for GM) needs to be aware of, especially when you already often aren't going to be rolling as may dice as something like BitD (you cannot spend stress for more dice, the assist action lets you mix and match abilities but doesn't add a die, etc.).

 

[Xamnam]

One thing worth noting is the 'cut' mechanic for task resolution difficulty. It's a dice penalty, but unlike other dice pool games I've seen, you take the dice off after the dice are rolled (the highest ones). It's a subtle difference, but the effects are significant. If you're performing an act where you really are looking for a full success (rolling a 6), the chance of success drops off precipitously, even with just a cut of 1 (varies by number of dice you are rolling, but like 1/3 or 1/6 as likely, instead of 70-80% as likely like would happen with pre-roll dice removal). This implies to me that the game is designed around the assumption that you will be shooting for partial success or better (4-6) for most tasks (where you are expected to succeed at all) where you might consider attempting when under adverse conditions. That's something the Firefly (the term for GM) needs to be aware of, especially when you already often aren't going to be rolling as may dice as something like BitD (you cannot spend stress for more dice, the assist action lets you mix and match abilities but doesn't add a die, etc.).

Also worth noting, in an interview with My First Dungeon, the designer gave a recommendation of applying Cut to roughly 50% of rolls. By the end of my three-session adventure, I agreed.