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Torchbearer 2nd ed: first impressions
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8595063" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>Here is the example of play on pp 33-34 of the SG:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Dro tells Thor, “I’ll hold off the Gnolls while the rest escape.”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Thor inquires for more info, “What does Harguld do exactly?”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Dro says, “ I position myself inside the mouth of this cave, so I can see down the tunnel. Then I load my crossbow and take aim.”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Thor nods, “A Gnoll scout emerges from the shadows down the tunnel…”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">“I put a bolt in his face!”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">“Right. Fighter skill test versus its Ambushing Nature 5.”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Dro announces, “I rolled three successes: 6, 4, 4”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Thor intones, “Three successes here…It’s a tie. What will you do, little dwarf?”</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Dro could use his health 5 to make a tiebreaker roll against the Gnoll. But he rolled one 6, so first he opts to spend a Fate point to reroll that die hoping for another success. It comes up a 2. So now he has to choose to go to a tiebreaker roll or to use his trait against himself and break the tie in Thor’s favor.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">After some consideration, he opts to break the tie in Thor’s favor. Dro declares, “I am so cunning! I wait for way too long trying to lure him in.” He used his Cunning trait to get in his own way and earns two checks for his trouble.</p><p></p><p>Here is the fiction at the start - we don't know who exactly is responsible for it, or what play processes led to it being narrated:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">There is a group of PCs. They are in a cave. They are leaving the cave via some exit (unspecified in the example). There is another way into the cave - a tunnel. There are Gnolls in that tunnel, and they are bearing down on the PCs.</p><p></p><p>One of the players, Dro, declares an action for his PC, Harguld. The action declaration is elaborated in part in response to a question from the GM:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><em>I’ll hold off the Gnolls while the rest escape: I position myself inside the mouth of this cave, so I can see down the tunnel. Then I load my crossbow and take aim.</em></p><p></p><p>Obviously there is some established fiction that underlies this action declaration: Harguld is a Dwarf armed with a crossbow, etc. And this action declaration establishes some new fiction: Harguld is at the cave-mouth aiming his crossbow down the tunnel, ready to hold off the Gnolls if they advance. This new fiction also, to me at least, implies that Harguld has his back to the other PCs, the ones who are escaping. I mention this because it is the sort of thing that could be relevant to the narration of a twist.</p><p></p><p>In addition it seems worth noting, at least in passing, that the GM doesn't call for a test to see if Dro's action declaration is successful. This is consistent with the GMing advice on SG pp 216-7:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Use the good idea rule to set up big moments. Bypass the minutiae; focus on what’s important. Highlight exciting actions. . . .</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">If you focus too closely on the fine-grained details, you’ll crush the players.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">In general, good ideas move the action along, but they do not grant special benefits like +1D bonuses, advancement or rewards.</p><p></p><p>Notice the contrast with Burning Wheel, where <em>taking position</em> in itself might be worth testing (eg if Harguld has a Belief like "I will always defend my friends"), say a Speed test or even a Stealth test with Observation FoRKed in, serving as a linked test for any subsequent shot of the crossbow.</p><p></p><p>Having resolved Dro's action declaration as a Good Idea, the GM then introduces some more framing:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><em>A Gnoll scout emerges from the shadows down the tunnel.</em></p><p></p><p>To use PbtA parlance, this is a soft move. It establishes that Harguld, having taken position at the cave mouth, sees a Gnoll advancing towards him. Unsurprisingly, it prompts another action declaration from Dro:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><em>I put a bolt in his face!'</em></p><p></p><p>At this point, it is established in the fiction that Harguld is shooting. It's not established, though, what happens as a result of that shot. And the GM, recognising that this is an <em>exciting action</em>, calls for a test. Everyone at the table knows that this test will determine what that result is - the fiction is "suspended" while the dice are rolled and their implications worked through. In storytelling terms, this would be like the director and editor giving us (the audience) a close up on Harguld, about to pull the trigger of the crossbow, and then cutting away, leaving us in suspense for a brief moment. Of course, in the Torchbearer case the moment of suspense is less brief!</p><p></p><p>The dice are rolled and the tie noted. We are still in suspense - what has happened to Harguld's shot? Dro spends a Fate point to open-end his six, but gets another wyrm. We are still in suspense - in our minds, we see that bolt has left Harguld's crossbow but it still hangs in the air, it's final destination unrevealed. And we still don’t know exactly what was happening when he shot.</p><p></p><p>Finally, Dro decides to break the tie against him with a trait. And now we see what has happened, in the fiction.</p><p></p><p>So first, we get something like a retcon. In cinematic terms, we could imagine that the cut from the Harguld about to shoot moves our perspective: we are now looking from behind and over the shoulder of the advancing Gnoll scout:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The Gnoll advances cautiously, wary of this tunnel mouth and the danger it poses.</p><p></p><p>We don't know whether the fiction includes the Gnoll seeing Harguld or not. In my mind's eye, we cut back to Harguld:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Harguld, hand on the crossbow trigger, waits for the Gnoll to close, luring it in to get a good shot.</p><p></p><p>And then the climax.</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger.</p><p></p><p>But what happens to the bolt, to Harguld, to the Gnoll? Notice that we <em>can’t</em> know what it is that follows, in the fiction, from the declaring of the shot and then the triggering of the trait and Harguld's failed cunning, without also hearing the GM's consequence narration and building that in.</p><p></p><p>Page 36 of the SG tells us that the GM responds to the failed check with success plus a condition:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Thor declares that Dro's Dwarf Harguld drives off the Gnoll scout with his cunning shot. "But Harguld knows there are more out there and he's running out of options. For the first time, he feels fear in his heart. Mark the Afraid condition!"</p><p></p><p>In that case, here's the fiction I envisage:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide but the Gnoll, startled by the shot, fall back into the shadows. Harguld's heart pounds and his hands sweat in fear!</p><p></p><p>An alternative, from a more generous or a more bloody-minded GM, would have been killing rather than driving off</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"> The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The Gnoll collapses in front of him, dead, as his heart pounds and his hands sweat in fear!</p><p></p><p>Here another alternative, that assumes that the GM narrates a twist rather than success with a condition:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide and the Gnoll is upon him!</p><p></p><p>The twist I'm envisaging here is a conflict, either a Kill or a Capture conflict, depending on where the GM is going with the Gnoll's Devouring and Worshipping Nature.</p><p></p><p>Upthread, AbdulAlhazred posted a different idea for the twist:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"></p><p>In effect, what is being posited here is framing the PCs into a Flee conflict - perhaps with Harguld also having dropped his bow, and with the additional possibility that Dro might offer the death of Harguld as a trade-off for the other PCs escaping automatically.</p><p></p><p>Ignoring the "good idea" of Harguld being eaten, here's my sense of the fiction looks with AbdulAlhazred's twist:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"> The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide and the Gnoll is almost upon him! Harguld drops his crossbow, turns and runs!</p><p></p><p>The changes are subtle - mostly turning on the introduction of an "almost" - but they support the framing into a Flee rather than a Kill or Capture conflict.</p><p></p><p>So, to summarise, I see 5 points in the fiction:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">* The initial framing - the party in the cave, trying to escape;</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* Action declaration - Harguld takes up his defensive position - this is resolved as a "good idea" and thus is clouds-to-clouds;</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* More framing - a Gnoll scout emerges - this is more clouds-to-clouds;</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* The crucial action declaration - Harguld shoots. This is clouds-to-boxes, but we don't know the exact fictional circumstances of Haguld’s shot until the mechanical resolution, including consequence narration, is complete - this is the practical effect of FitM resolution, and involves plenty of boxes-to-boxes before we get some boxes-to-clouds;</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">* Something happens next, which includes the Gnoll getting closer than Harguld wanted. I’ve sketched four possibilities above, all consistent with the fiction up to the point of the dice being rolled, and all consistent with Dro’s use of his trait break the tie in the Gnoll’s favour. These are the clouds that flow from the FitM boxes, and also from a fair bit of decision-making by the GM within the rather wide parameters for consequence narration that Torchbearer permits.</p><p></p><p>Hopefully that’s all clear enough!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8595063, member: 42582"] Here is the example of play on pp 33-34 of the SG: [indent]Dro tells Thor, “I’ll hold off the Gnolls while the rest escape.” Thor inquires for more info, “What does Harguld do exactly?” Dro says, “ I position myself inside the mouth of this cave, so I can see down the tunnel. Then I load my crossbow and take aim.” Thor nods, “A Gnoll scout emerges from the shadows down the tunnel…” “I put a bolt in his face!” “Right. Fighter skill test versus its Ambushing Nature 5.” Dro announces, “I rolled three successes: 6, 4, 4” Thor intones, “Three successes here…It’s a tie. What will you do, little dwarf?” Dro could use his health 5 to make a tiebreaker roll against the Gnoll. But he rolled one 6, so first he opts to spend a Fate point to reroll that die hoping for another success. It comes up a 2. So now he has to choose to go to a tiebreaker roll or to use his trait against himself and break the tie in Thor’s favor. After some consideration, he opts to break the tie in Thor’s favor. Dro declares, “I am so cunning! I wait for way too long trying to lure him in.” He used his Cunning trait to get in his own way and earns two checks for his trouble.[/indent] Here is the fiction at the start - we don't know who exactly is responsible for it, or what play processes led to it being narrated: [indent]There is a group of PCs. They are in a cave. They are leaving the cave via some exit (unspecified in the example). There is another way into the cave - a tunnel. There are Gnolls in that tunnel, and they are bearing down on the PCs.[/indent] One of the players, Dro, declares an action for his PC, Harguld. The action declaration is elaborated in part in response to a question from the GM: [indent][i]I’ll hold off the Gnolls while the rest escape: I position myself inside the mouth of this cave, so I can see down the tunnel. Then I load my crossbow and take aim.[/i][/indent] Obviously there is some established fiction that underlies this action declaration: Harguld is a Dwarf armed with a crossbow, etc. And this action declaration establishes some new fiction: Harguld is at the cave-mouth aiming his crossbow down the tunnel, ready to hold off the Gnolls if they advance. This new fiction also, to me at least, implies that Harguld has his back to the other PCs, the ones who are escaping. I mention this because it is the sort of thing that could be relevant to the narration of a twist. In addition it seems worth noting, at least in passing, that the GM doesn't call for a test to see if Dro's action declaration is successful. This is consistent with the GMing advice on SG pp 216-7: [indent]Use the good idea rule to set up big moments. Bypass the minutiae; focus on what’s important. Highlight exciting actions. . . . If you focus too closely on the fine-grained details, you’ll crush the players. In general, good ideas move the action along, but they do not grant special benefits like +1D bonuses, advancement or rewards.[/indent] Notice the contrast with Burning Wheel, where [i]taking position[/i] in itself might be worth testing (eg if Harguld has a Belief like "I will always defend my friends"), say a Speed test or even a Stealth test with Observation FoRKed in, serving as a linked test for any subsequent shot of the crossbow. Having resolved Dro's action declaration as a Good Idea, the GM then introduces some more framing: [indent][i]A Gnoll scout emerges from the shadows down the tunnel.[/i][/indent] To use PbtA parlance, this is a soft move. It establishes that Harguld, having taken position at the cave mouth, sees a Gnoll advancing towards him. Unsurprisingly, it prompts another action declaration from Dro: [indent][i]I put a bolt in his face!'[/i][/indent] At this point, it is established in the fiction that Harguld is shooting. It's not established, though, what happens as a result of that shot. And the GM, recognising that this is an [i]exciting action[/i], calls for a test. Everyone at the table knows that this test will determine what that result is - the fiction is "suspended" while the dice are rolled and their implications worked through. In storytelling terms, this would be like the director and editor giving us (the audience) a close up on Harguld, about to pull the trigger of the crossbow, and then cutting away, leaving us in suspense for a brief moment. Of course, in the Torchbearer case the moment of suspense is less brief! The dice are rolled and the tie noted. We are still in suspense - what has happened to Harguld's shot? Dro spends a Fate point to open-end his six, but gets another wyrm. We are still in suspense - in our minds, we see that bolt has left Harguld's crossbow but it still hangs in the air, it's final destination unrevealed. And we still don’t know exactly what was happening when he shot. Finally, Dro decides to break the tie against him with a trait. And now we see what has happened, in the fiction. So first, we get something like a retcon. In cinematic terms, we could imagine that the cut from the Harguld about to shoot moves our perspective: we are now looking from behind and over the shoulder of the advancing Gnoll scout: [indent]The Gnoll advances cautiously, wary of this tunnel mouth and the danger it poses.[/indent] We don't know whether the fiction includes the Gnoll seeing Harguld or not. In my mind's eye, we cut back to Harguld: [indent]Harguld, hand on the crossbow trigger, waits for the Gnoll to close, luring it in to get a good shot.[/indent] And then the climax. [indent]The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger.[/indent] But what happens to the bolt, to Harguld, to the Gnoll? Notice that we [i]can’t[/i] know what it is that follows, in the fiction, from the declaring of the shot and then the triggering of the trait and Harguld's failed cunning, without also hearing the GM's consequence narration and building that in. Page 36 of the SG tells us that the GM responds to the failed check with success plus a condition: [indent]Thor declares that Dro's Dwarf Harguld drives off the Gnoll scout with his cunning shot. "But Harguld knows there are more out there and he's running out of options. For the first time, he feels fear in his heart. Mark the Afraid condition!"[/indent] In that case, here's the fiction I envisage: [indent]The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide but the Gnoll, startled by the shot, fall back into the shadows. Harguld's heart pounds and his hands sweat in fear![/indent] An alternative, from a more generous or a more bloody-minded GM, would have been killing rather than driving off [indent] The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The Gnoll collapses in front of him, dead, as his heart pounds and his hands sweat in fear![/indent] Here another alternative, that assumes that the GM narrates a twist rather than success with a condition: [indent]The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide and the Gnoll is upon him![/indent] The twist I'm envisaging here is a conflict, either a Kill or a Capture conflict, depending on where the GM is going with the Gnoll's Devouring and Worshipping Nature. Upthread, AbdulAlhazred posted a different idea for the twist: [indent][/indent]In effect, what is being posited here is framing the PCs into a Flee conflict - perhaps with Harguld also having dropped his bow, and with the additional possibility that Dro might offer the death of Harguld as a trade-off for the other PCs escaping automatically. Ignoring the "good idea" of Harguld being eaten, here's my sense of the fiction looks with AbdulAlhazred's twist: [indent] The Gnoll suddenly rushes the tunnel mouth. Harguld has waited too long to take his shot: as the Gnoll looms before him, Harguld looks into its face and pulls the trigger. The bolt goes wide and the Gnoll is almost upon him! Harguld drops his crossbow, turns and runs![/indent] The changes are subtle - mostly turning on the introduction of an "almost" - but they support the framing into a Flee rather than a Kill or Capture conflict. So, to summarise, I see 5 points in the fiction: [indent]* The initial framing - the party in the cave, trying to escape; * Action declaration - Harguld takes up his defensive position - this is resolved as a "good idea" and thus is clouds-to-clouds; * More framing - a Gnoll scout emerges - this is more clouds-to-clouds; * The crucial action declaration - Harguld shoots. This is clouds-to-boxes, but we don't know the exact fictional circumstances of Haguld’s shot until the mechanical resolution, including consequence narration, is complete - this is the practical effect of FitM resolution, and involves plenty of boxes-to-boxes before we get some boxes-to-clouds; * Something happens next, which includes the Gnoll getting closer than Harguld wanted. I’ve sketched four possibilities above, all consistent with the fiction up to the point of the dice being rolled, and all consistent with Dro’s use of his trait break the tie in the Gnoll’s favour. These are the clouds that flow from the FitM boxes, and also from a fair bit of decision-making by the GM within the rather wide parameters for consequence narration that Torchbearer permits.[/indent] Hopefully that’s all clear enough! [/QUOTE]
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