A game of competitive narration
This game is designed to be played without a game master, or equivalent. Everyone plays the part of a writer for their own episodic narrative, that take place in the same universe.
As a writer, you will be telling your own story within the broader, connected narrative. You will be controlling a number of **Players**. **Players** can be individual characters, small groups (such as a gang of thieves, or the crew of a ship), or even global powers. The core mechanics of the game will revolve around changing the various **metrics** of the **Players**, by playing cards.
Decide on what kind of shared universe (or multiverse?) you want to play in together. Discuss tone and content beforehand. I personally recommend that you only decide large-scale things beforehand, like geography, technology level, magic (if you want any), and an outlines of the political situation. Discuss where each person's series should take place, as interaction between the **Players** of different **Writers** should be kept to a minimum. Crossovers are special.
Example:
Alice, Bob, and Charlie are playing this game for the first time, having been introduced to it by Dylan.
Alice wants to write in a world that borrows heavily from a certain grim-dark miniature game they play, but Bob points out that his cousin Edward, who is eight, is visiting, and might want to watch, or even join in. Charlie recommends a Steampunk Epic Fantasy Space Opera universe (with airships going through wormholes), with a semi-serious tone. Dylan asks to add dragons, and Alice large-scale battles. An agreement is reached, and the world of Baseia is born.
Next, decide what kind of media format you are "writing" for. Something that makes impressive visuals in a TV series can quite easily be boring exposition in a radio show. This decision is a per-writer decision, but it should be shared with the group for the **the Audience Reaction** phase.
Dylan is going to be writing for an online multi-media experience, because he feels he's up for the challenge. Bob goes for a novella series, while Charlie a TV series. Alice decides to write for a series of online videos, framed as an in-universe docudrama with a military focus.
Next, decide how many **Episodes** are going to be in each **Season**, and how long each one should be. For new players, I recommend something like 6 **Episodes**, with two **Cards** each. This doesn't necessarily have to be the same for everyone, but I definitely recommend it. Notes on how to balance uneven "Screen time" might be added later.
As most people are new, the first season of each work will only contain six episodes. However, they decide to go with three cards instead, to allow for a loser analogue of the three-act structure.
Finally, everyone draws a number of **Cards**, enough for four normal episodes. Consulting the Card Guide, come up with an outline of a plot for your show. Based on that idea, write down the names and descriptions of the **Players** you plan to introduce in the **Pilot**.
It is highly recommended that you have at least one **Individual**, to be your main character, although an ensemble cast is also an option (all of them should be Individuals). For other options and special rules, see Players.
For every **Player**, set all three **Audience Scores** to 0, and choose a score between -1 and 1 for all the **Character Scores**, based on how you imagine the personality of said **Player**. Keep in mind that the **Pilot** is twice as long as a normal episode, so you will be able to play more cards.
Everyone draws their cards, three per episode times four episodes each.
Dylan was considering a story focusing on Dragon-riding pirates, so is quite pleased he drew both the king of hearts, which corresponds to the *Powerful Ally* **Card**, and the two of spades, which corresponds to the *Foolish Gamble* **Card**. With these, assuming he can put on a good enough show, he will be able to quickly establish his protagonist as a merchant, who lost a precious cargo, but found and befriended a young Dragon.
Looking at his other cards, Dylan realises he doesn't have the cards to actually pull off the Pirate story straight away, so instead he decides to start with an origin story, where the merchant's loss isn't until the end of the Pilot.
With this in mind, he writes up his Players:
* The merchant, an Individual, with a Dishonest Trustworthiness, an Idealist Philosophy, and neutral Power and Resilience. (-1,1,0,0)
* The crew, a Band with metrics of 0,1,-1,-1
* The Weather, a Theme with -1,-1,1,1
* The Dragon, an Individual 1,-1,1,1
* The Government, a Faction -1,-1,1,1
The others also write down their Players.
Now, you can decide if you want to Promote a Player, or not. If not, go to Gameplay.
The Writers may decide to try to influence the opinions of the Audience before the Pilot. To do this, they declare which Player they want to inform the Audience about, and show a card that they claim will be played in relation with that Player in their Show. A card must also be discarded, to represent the loss of budget. A short description may be said, but only with as many words as the number of the discarded card. If desired, more cards may be discarded for more words.
The other Writers, acting as the audience, then decide privately how that card will influence what they think of that Player. Then, a vote is held (by raising hands or similar) as to which of the three audience scores will be influenced. If there is a three-way tie, the public's opinion is divided, and overall, no change is made to the scores. If there is a two-way tie, the people who voted for the third option vote between the two other options. If there is a tie again, the same thing happens as when there is a three-way tie.
The Writer who is promoting their work may not communicate in any way during this period.
If the which score to influence has been decided, a vote is held which way to move the score. At this point, should the promoting Writer have any applicable cards, they may be used to influence the vote.
Example:
Charlie has the following player:
The Wormhole Network: Theme; (0,0,0),-1,0,1,1
They would like the Audience to be intrigued by it's mysteries. That is to say, they would like a negative Audience Knowledge score.
To achieve this goal, they declare that they would like to publish promotional material in conjunction with The Wormhole Network and display a four of clubs, which corresponds to the *Lost Family* **Card**. While the others read the details on what the card can do, they look through their hand, and decide to discard the three of hearts, *Love Triangle*. That card will only get in the way of their Star Trek-inspired exploration story.
When everyone is ready, Dylan vote for Sympathy, while Alice and Bob votes Knowledge.
Next, everyone votes for Mysterious, which is what Charlie wanted.
Thus, Charlie will start with The wormhole Network's metrics being (0,0,-1),-1,0,1,1.
If the game continues for more than one season, the Shows may be promoted between every season.
Decide which Writer's Pilot should premier first. After that, play continues around the table.
The Pilot works mostly like a regular episode, with the only difference being that it is double the length of a normal episode, as in it uses twice as many **Cards**.
Triggers for things to happen:
The Writer of the episode talks through the plot of the episode they wrote (notes are a good idea). The Episode is divided into Scenes, one Scene for each card (this having been decided at setup). Note that there is no need for there to be ant relation between Scenes and scenes, you can have as many scenes as you like. However, it is only Scenes that actually do things to the characters.
As the Writer talks through their episode, at any point they may:
When a card is played during an Episode, the description of the card is read from the card guide. An example:
## 🂾 (K♥, King of Hearts): Powerful ally
Played on one or two Players.
Requirements:
* The two Players' Audience Sympathy may not be more than 3 different. If this is failed, take a penalty.
* If played on a Theme, its Audience Knowledge may not be -1,0 or 1. If this is failed, take a penalty.
* One of the Players must have a Power of +1 or more OR One of the players must have a Resilience of -1 or less. If this is failed, take a penalty.
Description:
* A Player is revealed to be, or becomes an ally of another Player. Together, they become more powerful.
Effects:
* If you played this on one Player, introduce a new Player. The new Player's Audience Scores start at half (rounded up) of those of the Player they are introduced as an ally of.
* The Power of one of the Players is incremented by one.
* The Resilience of one of the Players is incremented by one
Penalties:
* Lose interest: Bring both Players' Audience Attitude closer to 0 by one step.
* Lose budget: Discard a card
* Jarring: Lose a Narrative Token
Structure:
New Players are Introduced when they appear on-screen, when they get a metric changed by a card, or when a Scene focuses on them for more than a quarter of its duration (as a rule of thumb). When a Player is introduced without a card, or if the card doesn't give instructions, there is a vote to decide the initial Audience scores.
All Writers other than the one who is presenting give a score between -2 and 2. An average of this score is then calculated, and rounded towards 0 (negatives rounded up, positives down). This is repeated for each Audience score.
When the scene ends, there is a vote, in which one of the metrics of one of the Players is changed. First a Player who was active in the scene is chosen, then one of the metrics is chosen, then a value between -3 and 3 is voted on. The chosen metric of the chosen Player is averaged with the value (rounded away from 0).
Also, the Audience votes on a value between -1 and 1, based on how good they thought the Scene was. This amount is added to (or subtracted from) the number of Narrative Tokens the Writer in question has, and the Writer draws 2+ this number cards.
Sometimes, it may be advantageous to borrow another Writer's Player, or even share all of them. In this case, we are dealing with a Crossover. These are special, and shouldn't happen more than once per Writer per Season. In a crossover event, the two (or more) Writers involved either collaborate, writing the episode together, or negotiate over characters. Other solutions are, of course, allowed.
Conflict between two Players is resolved in the following steps:
1. Who does the Writer want to win? This step doesn't apply if multiple Writers are collaborating, although a negotiation is, of course, possible. However, simply deciding who wins a conflict is a missed opportunity. What can happen instead, and is, in my opinion, more interesting is the following:
2. Is the conflict a straight-up contest of skill? An honourable duel? something like that? If it is a physical contest, compare the each Player's Power with the other's Resilience in absolute value (ignore the sign). If one (and only one) Player's Power is greater than the other's Resilience, they are the victor. If neither Power is greater than the other's Resilience, the contest ends in a stalemate. If both are greater, it's a close contest. For battles of wits, you may use Philosophy instead of Resilience, and Trustworthiness instead of Power.
3. In a close contest,
A Writer has to build up the audiences interest in their story, represented by Narrative Tokens. Some cards may require them as payment or part of a trigger (e.g. you must have 4 NT to play this card), or penalize them.
However, they may also be used at any time (including when it isn't your turn) to do a number of things:
Bringing back a sacrificed Player on-screen needs a card.
A single person. A character in the classical sense of the word. Most rules assume they are dealing with an individual.
Player Type Number: 1
A group of 4-25 people. A close-knit community. For the purpose of the narrative, the collective is more important than the individual.
Player Type Number: 2
A group of 20-500 people. A large group with internal subdivisions, and multiple levels of delegation. Has at least one leader figure (who may or may not appear on-screen).
Player Type Number: 3
A company, society, agency, city, country, or movement. The number of people in it is unimportant, but it's probably measured in the thousands or millions. Usually represented by authority figures, such as police.
Player Type Number: 4
An abstract thought granted agency. Be it a theme of the narrative, a weather phenomenon, an ideal, or a vehicle, it also acts as a Player in the Narrative.
Player Type Number: 5
Note that the sign of the numbers are not actually important, they are just a way to note down a "save-file" quickly. Of course, to avoid confusion, positive numbers are going to be associated with heroic or enjoyable traits, while negative ones with villainous or annoying ones. When approaching these metrics from a numbers point of view, you want your **Players** to have a range of values to keep your **Show** interesting. What you want to avoid is neutral values, especially for the audience scores.
Audience Attitude:
Audience Sympathy:
Audience Knowledge:
Trustworthiness:
Philosophy:
Power:
Resilience: