Triangle Agency: impressions, and what da hell is it?

[Vinicius Lessa]

Hi. This is my first post here in a long while, probably because, among other reasons, this little game simply took me out of TTRPG retirement, so flabbersgasted I became with it. I've just finished reading it and have a couple questions.

1) What are your reading impressions or actual play experiences with it?

2) What da hell is it from a playstyles / cultures point of view? It seems so wild I'm curious how the folks here that see through that lens would classify it. And here I apologize for my rudeness, but I'd be particularly curious for how these folks see it: @pemerton , @Ruin Explorer , @AbdulAlhazred , @soviet and @hawkeyefan . I hope I'm not infringing some rule or conducting in bad form by name-calling like this (I'm also not a native speaker so there's that).

I recently saw someone describing some of those styles like:

"Classic/Trad emphasizes setting over situation and characters.
Neotrad emphasizes characters over setting and situation.
Story Now emphasizes situation over setting and characters".

Where would Triangle Agency fit in that, if at all?


EDIT: here's a teaser to the game's premisse, followed by Quinn's review of it, for those who don't know the game.

Spoiler

Spoiler

 

[hawkeyefan]

Hi. This is my first post here in a long while, probably because, among other reasons, this little game simply took me out of TTRPG retirement, so flabbersgasted I became with it. I've just finished reading it and have a couple questions.

1) What are your reading impressions or actual play experiences with it?

2) What da hell is it from a playstyles / cultures point of view? It seems so wild I'm curious how the folks here that see through that lens would classify it. And here I apologize for my rudeness, but I'd be particularly curious for how these folks see it: @pemerton , @Ruin Explorer , @AbdulAlhazred , @soviet and @hawkeyefan . I hope I'm not infringing some rule or conducting in bad form by name-calling like this (I'm also not a native speaker so there's that).

I recently saw someone describing some of those styles like:

"Classic/Trad emphasizes setting over situation and characters.
Neotrad emphasizes characters over setting and situation.
Story Now emphasizes situation over setting and characters".

Where would Triangle Agency fit in that, if at all?


EDIT: here is a quick intro to the game's premisse, followed by Quinn's review of it, for those who don't know the game.

Spoiler

Spoiler

I’m afraid my knowledge of the game pretty much begins and ends with Quinns’ video. But, as with most of the games he reviews, I was definitely intrigued.

I’m unsure of any of the other folks you’ve tagged have mentioned it at all, so I don’t know if they have more to offer… but hopefully they do!

(Also, nothing wrong with tagging people as you have!)

 

[pemerton]

Unfortunately I don't know anything about this RPG. What's its about?

 

[Vinicius Lessa]

Unfortunately I don't know anything about this RPG. What's its about?

The teaser vid in the OP is a good intro for the vibes. I never played the game myself, but finished reading it these days. What made it enter my radar was winning a lot of awards recently (that I thought would go to Mythic Bastionlands, another neat game worth a look).

Basically it's a mission-based, paranormal investigations + corporate horror game with a dose of satire. Players are field agents for a company capturing dangerous anomalies. Think Control (the videogame) plus Severance (the TV show) with a tone of Paranoia (the RPG). The book is a ready-made "campaign" of sorts, with preset "tracks" where players unlock classified pages to progress individualy on (so they can - and should - pick distinct paths, the game incites a sort of soft PvP). These paths are related to the Agency in the title, which is supposed to rise suspicions about it's true agenda, they're not fixed "story paths" like in PF's Adventure Paths and such (the way the missions and the Branch that players are a part of develop, is emergent).

Spoiler:

Spoiler

the Agency is trying to control reality in a Mage the Ascension-like consensual reality metaphysical affair. There's an anomalous entity inside the agency's vault trying to escape and change said reality, and it's reaching across to communicate with, and persuade the players into helping it. The different paths cited above are about this: there are three "tracks", each making a player side with one entity (the Agency, the entity at the vault, and one that's about running away and abandoning the conflict entirely). Every step of the tracks unlock "classified" pages in the book that confer not only new abilities for the player, but also entirely new rules that change the game. These pages are supposed to be hidden from the group, optionally even the including the GM, so they get surprised when unlocking them. Eventually the players understand there are distinct advantages and usefulness for both killing and letting the anomalies escape alive, as both options advance the different entities agendas (this is the source of the soft PvP), and there's a system for resolving conflict between the players. Along the progress tracks there are also steps where the player can retire their character early, like in a Blades in the Dark game, and start over with new ones, and also points of no return where "it's do or die from now on". There are also proper, different endings for the campaign, with definitive outcomes for the region of the local branch of the Agency they work at.

Design-wise it's pretty wild. It uses elements from all across the hobby design space, including stuff from outside too (like boardgames). As described above the campaign has a format akin to a "legacy boardgame", if you know that. The system is rolling a pool of 6d4 and counting 3s or multiples of (the setting has an obsession for 3s and it always brings luck - the Agency is represented by a red triangle, for eg). The main way players express within the game is through their anomaly powers, and a move called "Ask the Agency", where they mentally ask the agency to change the causal reality at hand so they can surpass an obstacle. This works like an improv-game where they say things like "I ask the Agency to make so the factory door guard had a belly ache this morning, and so there is this gap at schedule where the factory door is left unguarded for a brief moment, which means we can enter". And then there's this metacurrency system in place where PCs stats are small pools of points they can spend to adjust the rolls. The game lacks a formal "combat system", and most conflicts seem to be about spending resources to change reality into favorable positions so the team succeed at the missions. So, more improv -heavy than tactics -heavy.

The agents' anomaly powers feel like Pbta moves in structure. "When X.. then Y", with "Yes, and" and "Yes, but" conditions.

There's also a relationships system in place where players create and nurture those relationships at downtime, that can be compelled to show up at missions by the players (to help the mission) or by the GM (to hinder or be threatened).

It's more or less this. Hope it's not too much. I'm not a native speaker.

 

[Fenris-77]

I am also unfamiliar, but now I need to check it out.

 

[overgeeked]

The thing to remember is you’re not meant to read the whole book, even as the referee. The back 1/2 or 1/3 are meant to only be read when the text tells you to as a result of play. Reading it early spoils a lot of the story surprises of the game. As such you’ll be able to get 1-2 great campaigns out of Triangle Agency but no more. At least there will be no more big story surprised left.

 

[Fenris-77]

The thing to remember is you’re not meant to read the whole book, even as the referee. The back 1/2 or 1/3 are meant to only be read when the text tells you to as a result of play. Reading it early spoils a lot of the story surprises of the game. As such you’ll be able to get 1-2 great campaigns out of Triangle Agency but no more. At least there will be no more big story surprised left.

Ok, I'll admit, I'm now less interested, but it might still be really cool.

 

[Vinicius Lessa]

The thing to remember is you’re not meant to read the whole book, even as the referee. The back 1/2 or 1/3 are meant to only be read when the text tells you to as a result of play. Reading it early spoils a lot of the story surprises of the game. As such you’ll be able to get 1-2 great campaigns out of Triangle Agency but no more. At least there will be no more big story surprised left.

I've read it all and it made me even more excited to play. Haha

 

[Vinicius Lessa]

Here, an example anomaly with one of the abilities it confers to the agent it's fused to:

This anomaly manipulates space. "I know a shortcut" here allows the player to pull some crazy stuff like, just out of the mission briefing where the team is assigned a target anomaly to capture, in a house basement 10km away from HQ,, the Manifold agent can declare "I know a shortcut to that basement, it's turning that corridor over there", and BAM! he's at the basement facing the anomaly.

(the anomaly appearance is an amalgam of concepts and things related to space traversing - birds, the road runner, map pins - and it would be visible only from the "Lobby", how the game calls the "other-side" to reality, like an astral plane. Think of anomalies visuals like demons from Chainsaw Man anime, which are embodiments of human fears. Here anomalies are embodiments of strong ideas being thought by groups of people, or a particularly obsessed mind)

 

[Vinicius Lessa]

"Classic/Trad emphasizes setting over situation and characters.
Neotrad emphasizes characters over setting and situation.
Story Now emphasizes situation over setting and characters".

Heh, I think I'd change that to..

Classic emphasizes setting
Neotrad emphasizes characters
Story Now emphasizes situation
Trad.... emphasizes whatever the GM wants that week. Haha