Jason Cordova – Page 143 – The Gauntlet G+ Archives

Episode 4 of the Gauntlet Podcast landed this morning.

Episode 4 of the Gauntlet Podcast landed this morning. In the opening segment of this one, we have a terrific discussion about a game from UK Role Players called Cheat Your Own Adventure. The main topic for this week are what we call our gaming ‘old yellers,’ and what can be done about them. Enjoy!

http://gauntletpodcast.libsyn.com

We’re making Burning Wheel characters. Look how much fun everyone is having!

I have often made ‘joking’ reference to the Gauntlet hierarchy.

I have often made ‘joking’ reference to the Gauntlet hierarchy. In fact, this organizational scheme is real. I am sharing it with you now for the first time.

Each one of you is in a circle. Those of you who are in the best circles have earned a level of trust and admiration from me the others can only fantasize about, and have access to a number of perks of which you may not even be aware. For example, if you needed a ride to the airport, I would actually consider doing it before urging you to call a cab.

Here is how it works:

Circle Rainbow Circle Rainbow is the very best circle. It always contains myself, and usually one other person. Before Rob died, for example, he was in Circle Rainbow.

Circle Star This is also a very nice circle to be in. There are only two people in Circle Star. One of these people will ascend to Circle Rainbow in the event there is an opening. Collectively, Circle Star and Circle Rainbow make-up the Gauntlet High Command.

Circle A This is another very good circle. Anyone can be in Circle A, so long as you meet the following criteria: 1) You have good taste in roleplaying games, 2) you regularly attend Gauntlet Meetups (at least once per week), 3) you are a good roleplayer, and 4) you are fully engaged with the Gauntlet community (i.e. you listen to the podcast, you participate on G+, and so forth).

Circle B This is where most of you are slotted. Circle B is not a bad place to be, but it’s not the best, either. Circle B is for people who regularly attend Gauntlet Meetups, but who have shown something resembling fealty to things outside of the Gauntlet. I mean, really, family is very overrated. We’re the only family you need, right? No? Well, then, by all means, enjoy your stay in Circle B.

Circle C A number of you are slotted in Circle C. Circle C is for people who regularly attend Gauntlet Meetups, but who have still not managed to gain my trust. This is usually for one of the following reasons: 1) You have shitty taste in games, or you show a general lack of curiosity about roleplaying games, 2) you don’t engage fully in the community aspects of the Gauntlet, or 3) you are, in ways both subtle and overt, undermining the mission of the Gauntlet in some way.

Circle D Circle D is for people who have previously attended Gauntlet Meetups, maybe even semi-regularly, but who, without explanation, have stopped coming. ‘D’ stands for ‘dead to me.’

Circle F There is only one person in Circle F. There is always one person in Circle F. That person’s name is written on a piece of paper I keep in my desk.

Outside of the above hierarchy is a series of Special Circles. They are as follows:

Circle Austin This is for people who would solidly be in Circle A, if not for the fact they moved to Austin.

Circle Derek This is for people who would be in either Circle Star or Circle A, if not for frisbees.

Satanic Circle The only person in this circle is presently being prepared for sacrifice to the Dark Lord.

Circle Doyle This is for people who, in a parallel universe, waited for us to come along, and who now enjoys membership in Circle Rainbow or Circle Star.

Circle Regret This is for people who would be in Circle A if their spouses actually loved them and let them have one goddamn day a week to pursue their hobbies.

Circle Baby This is for people who would be in Circle A if not for babies. This is a very large circle.

Good time with Grim World tonight.

Good time with Grim World tonight. 4 of our 6 characters died (!!). It turns out those awesome Death Moves (and they are awesome) can be a bit of a problem when they chain react.

Thanks to everyone who came out: Scott Owen Russell Benner Jorge Salazar Gary Wilson Daniel Fowler and Ferrell Riley

After a long holiday break, the podcast is back! For this one, Ferrell Riley joins us to talk about PvP mechanics.

Our goal is to release a new episode every Friday morning.

http://gauntletpodcast.libsyn.com/size/2

Every single spot for the Mandatory Fun Club in February is now taken.

Every single spot for the Mandatory Fun Club in February is now taken. That’s what I like, people: brutal, exclusive efficiency.

There was a lot of really cool, free stuff in the Story Game Newsletter this week.

There was a lot of really cool, free stuff in the Story Game Newsletter this week. Among those cool things was a link to a huge PDF of all the Golden Cobra entries from last year’s contest. It’s LARP-tastic!

http://www.goldencobra.org/pdf/golden_cobra_anthology_2014.pdf

Over the last couple of years (and hundreds of game sessions) only three games have completely blown my mind and…

Over the last couple of years (and hundreds of game sessions) only three games have completely blown my mind and changed my feelings about what a roleplaying game can be: Dungeon World, The Final Girl, and The Society of Dreamers. Well, after tonight, I’m going to add one more to that list: Cheat Your Own Adventure.

Wow!

It is so good.

Here’s the thing: we were supposed to play Monsterhearts, but because of a few cancellations, we decided to do something else. None of us had played Cheat Your Own Adventure before, but I remembered hearing about it on The Twitching Curtain and thought we could try it out. To get started, you use a couple of tables to generate a Choose Your Own Adventure-style book title (such as “The Swamp of Despair”). From there, one person, the Reader, begins narrating the story in the second person. Once a decision point is reached, each other player offers an option, in the form of “If you choose to do X, turn to page XXX.” Whoever presented the option the Reader likes best rolls two dice. If he rolls higher than the lowest number on a sheet (from 1-12), then he becomes the new Reader and continues the story. If he rolls lower than the number, he narrates the character’s death. The original Reader then gets to ‘cheat’ and flip to a different page instead, and that new person becomes the Reader and narrates an automatic success.

The game leads to some really terrific storytelling, and the options being presented by the players on each round can lead to all kinds of crazy possibilities. We played the game three times tonight. The first two times were very adventurous stories, filled with lots of derring-do and humor. They were terrific. But then . . .

But then . . .

We had the idea to interpret the name of the story generated sort-of metaphorically. We wondered, ‘Could we tell a story that is more serious and dramatic?’ Does The Swamp of Despair have to be a literal swamp?

In that spirit, Dan got us started on the third story by setting the scene between a woman and her dying husband. She asked her dying husband what his favorite memory of her was, and that was the first set of decision points to be presented by the other players. From there, the story we told was about one man going through the necessary motions of preparing for your imminent passing. There were visits to the hospital, matters of what to do with his stuff he’d be leaving behind, and the need to reconcile with an estranged son. It was a story that was just devastating, and very tough to get through. It had flashes of humor, as the dying man tried his best to cope with the situation with a smile, but these little moments of levity only made the overall story that much more sad.

It was fucking incredible. Several people had tears in their eyes at the end.

From a gameplay standpoint, there were several times when options were presented by the players which, if chosen, would take the story in very different directions, and I loved that about this game. Sometimes those options were very scary. Like, in the case of the dying man, there were times when he could have chosen a more embittered path, or we could have introduced elements of his past infidelity to his wife.

Anyway, it was a magnificent time. Thanks to Daniel Lewis Russell Benner Kristen D Scott Owen Ferrell Riley and Gary Wilson.