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Problem #32: The Rules of the Setting
3 Plays3 minutes ago
Kristian and Tracy are joined by Darrell Hayhurst in what will be two sister episodes. This week we talk about tailoring your rules to your setting. How to make them work together, compliment each other, and reinforce the intent and theme of the game. The rules of the setting can make a GMs life easier, while also immersing players into a particular world simply by interacting with what the rules of the world encourage them to do. Most of all, we talk about how to make them fun. Next week we'll continue the discussion as we explore the creation of archetypes.
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Transcript
Introduction and Topic Announcement
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to the Designing Problems RPG Podcast, where we explore RPG development and all the intentional and unintentional problems we create along the way. I'm Christian Serrano. And I'm Tracy Sizemore. We're your hosts for this fantasy of congruence. And this week, we're going to talk about problem number 32, rules of the setting.
Guest Introduction: Daryl Hayhurst
00:00:44
Speaker
We have the perfect person, I think, to help us with this discussion. Daryl Hayhurst. Hey, hey, hey. The Daryl Hayhurst. The Daryl Second time today I've been erroneously called perfect.
00:01:00
Speaker
Wow. But not incorrectly.
Customizing vs. Creating New Systems
00:01:04
Speaker
okay So, ah yeah, so we're we're kind of looking into um how do we make our setting, how do we express it better through changes or adjustments to rules, right, to the game?
00:01:19
Speaker
um You've done this a lot. Yeah, I mean, and even like, yeah, there's customizing an existing system, but there's also building a system from the ground up just to try and solve this one problem. Yes.
00:01:34
Speaker
Sometimes it's worth it. And sometimes you're like, well, I really should have gone with something out of the box. Daryl has done this. He's got, he speaks from experience. Yeah. Yeah. How, what are, what are some of those, ah those moments like, and like how far into it do you go when you're like, I should have just used this.
00:01:54
Speaker
Usually, you've got to get all the way to the end and look back on it and be like, this isn't working at all. Okay. Well, I mean, and it can work. It's just, yeah was it worth it? Right. And a lot of that comes down to audience response and your own happiness, right? of Like, well, I did it my way.
00:02:15
Speaker
right. I probably should have done it someone else's way, it turns out.
Iterative Design and Audience Response
00:02:22
Speaker
Yeah, I i mean, we've i I never seriously considered trying to create my own system because I don't think that that's my strength.
00:02:33
Speaker
And i mean, I have somebody here who could help me do that if I really wanted to. He would have done it with me. But at the same time, i'm just like, whoa no, let's not.
00:02:45
Speaker
Yeah. Would have held your hand as you dive into the rabbit hole. I wouldn't even call it a strength, but it is a compulsion. i like I just have to tinker with it. And then half the time you tinker with it and you're like...
00:02:58
Speaker
Okay, no, I should have just left that alone. Got it. But I think you have you have a bit of a spirit of of um iterative design in that regard. Oh, absolutely. Because because you're just you're're you're throwing stuff out, you're seeing what works, you're iterating, you're changing, you're adapting, and then eventually you might be like, yep, that failed. I'm going to try again yeah and do do it this way.
00:03:18
Speaker
you know Or maybe I should draw inspiration from something that exists already. Yeah, and there is a lot of value in it. taking something that far, going to the edge with it, and then walking back.
00:03:29
Speaker
Because then when someone's like, well, but if only you'd done this, you'd be like, oh I did. Yeah, it's, well, Tracy and I have talked about that, where it's like, you know, you have people like, oh, why didn't you do it this way or do it that way? It's like, you have no idea how many iterations and how much, like, thought I've spent this. Yes, exactly. Let me tell you all about why we shouldn't do that. Right, right.
00:03:53
Speaker
Now, that said, I don't think Daryl's system failed at all. and it it's i mean, it's out there. Yeah. It's out
Impactful RPG Design and Balance
00:04:03
Speaker
there. Space 1889 by, is it Strange Owl?
00:04:06
Speaker
ah Yes, it is Strange Owl Games. Strange Owl Games, yes. They're currently doing their world's largest dungeon Kickstarter, which is doing significantly better financially. Yeah.
00:04:17
Speaker
Well, who knows, you know, whether it's the system or the setting or the, I mean, who knows yeah what those factors are. the marketing. um i saw I saw this process from from close up.
00:04:30
Speaker
the The thing is, I also saw Daryl's early earlier design attempts with his Frameworks Games stuff, which I thought was great, actually. It had a lot of stuff going for Daryl, he...
00:04:46
Speaker
I think you were worried it was too iterative of other things. And so you didn't want to continue with it. I mean, there's always a little bit of that, right? Like, you know, like if this, if this is so much like this other thing, it should just be this other thing.
00:05:00
Speaker
Yeah. Right. That is an easy trap to fall into. Yeah. And I think. of when it comes to building things, like part of it is, is this, and is there an inspiration here?
00:05:11
Speaker
Is this actually pushing the technology forward? And if it is like, oh cool. And if not, you know, you're leaving behind a lot by you know, taking a bunch of elements from something else when it's like, well, if I'd just chosen one of those things, yeah i'd I'd have a built in base, you know, essentially.
00:05:34
Speaker
Yeah. One of the things that I learned from Daryl's design stuff is what I loved about it. And when I, when we played it, I was just like, man, Daryl goes all the way in on your abilities. So if if you've got an ability, it's not like this half-assed little perk.
00:05:55
Speaker
It's a big thing. It's a big perk. And and i really enjoyed that because it was unusual for a lot of role-playing games to go that far.
00:06:05
Speaker
with some of the amazing things you could do. And Daryl counterbalanced it beautifully with things that that, so that, you know, it didn't, but it's so yeah you didn't take over the game with it.
00:06:17
Speaker
Right. And and that's that's super hard to do. Yeah. But it's something that I admired about it and that I took away from it and and sort of integrated in my own sort of philosophy, right?
00:06:30
Speaker
So I really loved that about it. Well, thank you. And part of that just comes from playing, you know, D&D 3.0, where it's like, okay, once I buy these five feats, now I can do the thing that I wanted to do the first place. I'm like, maybe we could just do that thing, you know, cover that niche, you know, early on. Spring attack was way too expensive of a feat. Like, you know, dodge, mobility, then spring attack at like, what, fifth level or something like that? know. Right. I mean, and there's, there's reasons to do all that, but, and that comes down to like, what character are you trying to play? Like I'm trying to play a nimble thief type.
00:07:09
Speaker
Yep. I want to be able to play a nimble thief type. How easy is literally conveying my actual personal story. Yeah. That was exactly what I was trying to do. and and those yeah It is, right? That's how I think all of us like engage with that and why those mechanics are important, right? like That's how you feel like an acrobatic thief is being able to do those things.
00:07:32
Speaker
And it's like, yeah, the wizard can't do that. Cast as many spells as you want, dude. You're not going to be able to... you know hop in, stab a guy, run away, fight him, get all this stuff stuff, right? Tumble past. Yeah, exactly. And and then you feel cool. like Even if it's not as effective as a fireball, it's still your thing and it's cool. And that matters, right? that's To me, is that's the
Rules Reinforcing Setting and Balance
00:07:56
Speaker
the secret sauce when we get to like design is how do you make that feel that way at the table other than it's like, oh, and by the way, you just...
00:08:05
Speaker
It says on your sheet that all your movement is flipping. Okay, does that do anything? No. i You just move like everybody else. But you're flipping, man. okay more Or you know another another way of that that that way that goes is you have this ability, but it's so it's not even it sounds like it's a like it's a ah useful ability across multiple circumstances, but it actually is only useful in this very specific circumstance. yeah
00:08:37
Speaker
And it's up to the GM to make it useful otherwise. um There's a ton of traps there, right? Like one is like, cause we get caught up in game balance, right? And really game balance isn't important.
00:08:50
Speaker
Player balance is yeah because the only thing you don't want to have happen is for one person to be sitting there at the table, like, wow, okay, I can flip and it doesn't do anything. And somebody else was like, and I light all of the enemies on fire.
00:09:04
Speaker
and they're dead. You're like, well, flipping does not feel that good to me. This game is not balanced. You don't actually care about the balance. You just care about my experience was good. Yeah, I want to i want to feel like yeah, i'm I'm literally having that experience in in in a 5e game where I'm playing an arcane trickster and it's like combat heavy.
00:09:26
Speaker
And right now I'm doing some, you know, stealthing around and whatever but it's like one scene out of this long campaign yeah like that hasn't happened yet you know yeah yeah yeah and everybody's like destroying all the bad guys and i'm just like um throw my dagger yeah shoot my arrow And one of the design traps that we as designers fall into is thinking, is like well, okay, so yeah, you've got all this stuff to do this, but it only applies to a small fraction of the game. It should also do something in combat, we think.
00:10:05
Speaker
yeah So that that mitigates that. But then you get this problem of, well, you bought this one thing and it's got like 17 different conditional yeah like operators. yeah It's really confusing. and It takes like two or three rounds for you to set it up. Yeah. it's like yeah it's And it's like, ah no there's there's there's easier ways to do that. And yeah like, to me, that's the hardest part of design is like, okay, and by the way, this is only going to matter when you're sneaking around. But when you sneak around, it's such a big deal.
00:10:36
Speaker
But it's just like, okay, yeah, we had a sneaking scene and I dominated it so hard. I might as well. It's the say the equivalent of a fireball killing every enemy yeah like at the same time. Like this just happens.
00:10:50
Speaker
And then you get to combat and you're like, I'm going to stab him with my D4 dagger. like That's all I got left, but whatever. I had my moment. That's I had my moment. That's, part of our point here as we get into the more formal discussion is is yeah reinforcing the setting with your rules, meaning they they work in tandem with one another. If if the setting is only about combat,
00:11:19
Speaker
If there is only combat in the settings, that's all you're going to do, then there's no point in putting rules out there that don't doesn't cover combat, right? Otherwise, what are you doing?
00:11:30
Speaker
Because you're you're tempting players into playing something that's not going to be fun at all, right? So, and and that's okay if it's all about combat, but if it's if it's not, if if you can find ways to have those sneaky moments and to have adventures that include those kinds of activities or those social conflict moments, and this is why Savage Rules is so great because it has all these rules for these things. Yeah.
00:11:57
Speaker
that you can easily look at and say, oh, I can mechanicize this thing that is not easily mechanicizable in other games. Yes. and Anywhere else I would be stuck here, I just throw my hands up and say, this is a dramatic task.
00:12:13
Speaker
Pick a difficulty, go. right And you're done. And you've got a satisfying conclusion, even though we were just like dancing in a ballroom or whatever. like like, don't know, man, roll your performance. Let's see how many tokens you can get dancing at that ballroom.
00:12:28
Speaker
And you're like, this rules. Suddenly my performance skill kicks ass. And the fact that I'm attractive means something, you know, like it matters at that point. yeah One of the things I i appreciate about Savage Worlds when I first got into it, and and this isn't to just talk about Savage Worlds, I'm just giving an example of something I learned from Savage Worlds.
00:12:49
Speaker
i felt I always felt like D&D was very much of what you can't do in terms of like, Yeah, you can do this, but you know you're limited. Savage Worlds was the first time i realized there's nothing wrong with the rules saying you can do all this cool stuff.
00:13:05
Speaker
You can move attack and move without needing three feats. yes Anybody can get a gang up bonus, which is flanking for sneak attack in This was how you did that. Now anybody can do this.
00:13:19
Speaker
right here are some unique properties that make you do it better. Yeah. Yeah. you know ah yeah And part of that comes down to that, you know, chasing game balance, right? Because something like Dungeons and Dragons has to serve a very broad audience.
00:13:36
Speaker
And part of that audience is very concerned about how things stack up in a... convention scenario. Right. And so they're, you know, for good and ill, like that is their path and they have to follow it.
00:13:51
Speaker
And narrative games and, you know, Savage Worlds can just kind of be like, cool, cool. We're just going to play and have fun. Yeah. And your tournament can suck it. You know, well,
00:14:04
Speaker
i But the thing is, like, like even with even with liberal rules, especially rules that that kind of bring it back to the topic that that help emphasize the setting and and what you're trying to do with the setting.
00:14:15
Speaker
If they apply to everybody, there's your balance. Yeah. Because it's not just only one person can do this really cool thing and nobody else can't. It's we can all do this together and and we can all be awesome, you know.
00:14:28
Speaker
And the thing you'll hear, every game can do everything. It's just how much work the GM has to do to like push and pull that out of people. yeah And that is where the rules take all of that. They're your crutch. They take all of that weight for you. And the the the better they do it, the less energy you as a GM have to do to enforce it and be like, by the way, everyone, we need to watch this movie before we play.
00:14:59
Speaker
so you're in the right mindset and do this. Like if it's done right, Nah, man. We're going to get a result like that movie, whether you've seen it or not. And then you'll see the movie later and you'll go, oh,
00:15:13
Speaker
That's what we did. That's cool. That's The rules enforce this. That's a really good point. yeah Yeah. I mean, it's part of one of my things is the rules. If you can do it right and well, the rules will guide the players toward what they're supposed to do. Yeah.
00:15:28
Speaker
Right? Yes. That's not easy to do, but it's so gratifying when you figure it out. when you when When you can say, okay, we're trying to recreate Horizon Zero Dawn here. How do we do that?
00:15:40
Speaker
Yeah.
Balancing Innovation and Familiarity
00:15:41
Speaker
what are we What are the iconic things that we do in Horizon Zero Dawn and how easy is it for certain characters to do it? What are the niches that are involved, right?
00:15:51
Speaker
So what what are the people who are good at this that do and what do what did the other people do? All that kind of stuff. If you can codify that into some kind of rule set that guides people without having to know it at all,
00:16:06
Speaker
then you've you've you've got something that really reinforces your setting and hopefully makes it fun in a player balanced kind of way. Gamers will burn the world down to get plus one to hit.
00:16:17
Speaker
So like if you just have that setting rule that says do this appropriate thing and you get a plus one bonus in some weird circumstance, oh, they will find it and they will do it.
00:16:29
Speaker
Yeah, exploit And that does your work for you. yeah Especially if that plus if if if the thing that they're getting a plus to is done often enough that they need it a lot. yeah right Like, oh, this is useful. like And and you know in this case of like deadlines or whatever, some people are very good at to ah what's the dueling,
00:16:50
Speaker
right yeah So dueling is a thing. Anybody can do it. Anybody can duel, right? You don't have to have a dueling character to duel. But if you have the edges that are ah that give you that bonus to dueling, then you feel like a badass.
00:17:05
Speaker
Right. Because and everybody can do it, but I'm way better at it than you are. yeah Right. Right. which can be a disaster of like what we were playing deadlands i'm essentially playing hop along cassidy so i'm like a living breathing you know wild west trope right and we have a duelist in the group but i'm the one that's getting caught up in the duel because i'm a hop along day in cassidy right and like squinting and spitting and doing the whatever and you know like I'm getting caught up in this and I'm like, oh man, I really need to not be the character in this duel.
00:17:39
Speaker
but i'm But I'm in it now. like This is just how it is. Turns out maybe I'm not going to be great at this, but I'm doing it anyway. You know what? I've got Benny's and I'm Opal on Cassidy. so Exactly. It's like Seth MacFarlane in, what is it, A Million Ways to Die? To Die in the West, yeah. Yeah.
00:18:00
Speaker
But yeah, so I don't know. I think, you know, part of the – when rules have multiple purposes, right? Reinforce the setting, reinforce the theme, which we've talked about a lot.
00:18:11
Speaker
Be fun is a really important one. huge. The most important. Because it's so easy to sit there and say, well, this feels right. This is what it should be, right?
00:18:22
Speaker
It should be really hard to do this thing. Well, that really hard – Can make it so nobody can do that thing. Yeah. Right. that's That's something I wanted to touch on is the idea. Like it's one thing for rules.
00:18:35
Speaker
It's important for rules to facilitate by providing. But there's also something to be said about getting out of the way. Right. Not creating rules that impede just so that this one person who took this edge or whatever can can do it.
00:18:50
Speaker
Right. That's so often how that space is made is, ah by setting a rule that says no one can do this, now we have created a unique niche for the one character who can. Right. Here's the exception.
00:19:04
Speaker
Everybody else is like, you know, like my pet peeve is ambidextrous. in Savage Worlds, which in older iterations of the rules makes absolute sense, right? Because you back in the day, you couldn't multi-action to do two different attacks.
00:19:22
Speaker
Now you can, so Ambidextrous is kind of like, Like in no other place does it matter which hand I'm using. Yeah. Like, yeah. If I, if I have two pistols, i can shoot and then shoot with my right hand a second time and no one cares. But if I shoot with my left hand now, I'm at minus two.
00:19:41
Speaker
Yeah. But it makes becomes, yeah. Yeah. But it it does make them the space for these other edges and like, you know, it carves that out and imparted like it's there because of the legacy, but you know,
00:19:56
Speaker
yeah It's one those like, oh. Yeah, it is one of those like. it It matters when you're hanging from the rope ladder. Yeah. And you're trying to shoot. Exactly. the thing is like, it's one of those niches. It's one of those niches that the GM has to set up so specifically yeah yeah that it it it starts to not matter anymore.
00:20:14
Speaker
Right. It's like, well, do we really need this? Is this really necessary? But no it's there because it was always there. get Right. Right. Well, and truth be told, like I feel like multi-action penalty kind of covers it a little bit already. It does. right like that's Again, that's one of those, like it's yeah sort of ah a legacy holdover to keep certain things balanced. you know right that you know i think there's a debate.
Setting Rules and Player Engagement
00:20:39
Speaker
like We know which way the debate went, and it's totally valid, but I think it's easy to debate. like By the way, we're just going to ignore this edge. No one take it. and yeah but That's it Right.
00:20:51
Speaker
But it's there. Yeah, know exactly. It's there to satisfy the certain niche of players who need that. and And in certain settings, that could be a much more important thing. Yes. Right.
00:21:04
Speaker
And that's one of the things that comes up, you know, for all expansive generic system. is catering to like, well, no, this isn't important here, but it's very important over here. yeah so like Oh, you're right-handed?
00:21:18
Speaker
Oh, your arm got cut off. Yeah. You got to learn how to use your left. Exactly. you know Right. So Christian, what did you want to talk about with regard to how much to change core mechanics?
00:21:30
Speaker
Like you had thoughts about that. Yeah, I i think...
00:21:35
Speaker
There's a philosophy that I carry where i i try whatever rules I'm working with, i try to stick close to what's there yes as a foundation. And the reason being because quite honestly, a lot of talented people have already done a lot of great work. Yes.
00:21:52
Speaker
Who am I that I'm going to invent something new or better that, you know. But the other thing, too, is I think to speak to the the point of consistency is that, you know, Savage World's Core Rules has their dramatic task. If I start creating my own system for that kind of thing, now I'm just creating fragmentation and confusion.
00:22:11
Speaker
Mm hmm. Whereas if I simply say, okay, I want to this special kind of a ritual thing for this setting. I'm just going to use the rituals that are in, say, the horror companion or the fantasy companion.
00:22:22
Speaker
I'll just refer to that because that's done. People are familiar with it. We can just borrow from that and just say that thing you already know about, just apply it here. Yeah. And we've tested the hell out of it. Right. yeah Exactly. and And if that ever changes, if that version ever changes in a future update, just use that.
00:22:42
Speaker
Just keep using that same one. you know You don't have to worry about is this compatible or not. you know Yeah. ah So i think there's a lot of value to that. And that that really just helps with, you know, helping people who are familiar with that particular system get into your setting.
00:22:59
Speaker
Yeah. they they don't you know like one of the biggest challenges i think still with savage worlds is Here's all the rules I've learned, the core rules. Oh, here's how it they kind of change a little bit.
00:23:11
Speaker
Now you have to reference the setting book, this companion and the core rules. So trying to minimize that as much as possible, I think is crucial. Yeah. Yeah. Especially when we really should say out the gate, by the way, ignore all of this.
00:23:24
Speaker
Right. There's literally eight pages of this game that you're going to use and care about. And when we start a dramatic task, I'm going to add two pages to that list. But you can forget about them right after.
00:23:37
Speaker
yeah right Right. we we know I know something. There's something for this. yeah i can look up in those extra rules and, oh, there's dramatic task. Let me just read quick and then we'll do this. yeah And that's cool, right? That's what's so good about it.
00:23:52
Speaker
And I'm with you. I... i part of the selection of the rule set is how much do I feel like I would need to change? Right. Right.
00:24:03
Speaker
And that was partly why I finally, i mean, I love Savage Worlds anyway, but I settled on Savage Worlds for Haunt Cluster because it just fit. Yeah. It just fit. Like powers fit the, the way that the, the, it's philosophy fit, you know, this sort of,
00:24:23
Speaker
Riding the edge, riding the edge of danger um and triumph that Savage Worlds so codifies so well and with their rules, fits so well. And all I had to do was a little bit of tweaking, a little bit of additional setting rule stuff. I mean, really, it's all about whatever the setting needs now.
00:24:47
Speaker
And trying to to follow what the core rules are make the setting work with the core rules as much as possible until it doesn't.
00:25:00
Speaker
yeah then I worry about it. but i all Yeah, but also don't be afraid to expand into that space yeah when you need to, right? Like as X ghosts, it's not like there's another system that's just like, by the way, we've got these ghosts that you can just use. It's like, well, right that might've made this easier, but nothing like that exists. So nothing like we're going to have to add that. like Yeah, so I had to add it. There's going to some work there. It took...
00:25:24
Speaker
it took Years. It took years. like I mean, it it was iteration after iteration, like mistake after mistake. And and like this doesn't work after this doesn't work.
00:25:36
Speaker
Just like a new system would be, is to come up with these particular rules for this particular aspect of the setting but because it's so different than everything else. I finally think we have something that is workable and consistent and like simplified enough that people can understand it But it took years to do that.
00:25:57
Speaker
And the last thing I want to do is create a new system or around with the rules that already exist you know when I don't have to. And the thing to be very like attuned to when you're testing that stuff, for those of you creating stuff in those spaces,
00:26:14
Speaker
is you can always make it work at the table. right like But what you need to be attuned to is, did I have to fight this to make it work?
00:26:24
Speaker
Because I know how it should be, so I know like I'm going to ignore this thing or forget about this thing or make something up on the fly.
00:26:35
Speaker
but you just have like as you're doing that, it's like, okay, Now that we're done, think back and go, all right, I had to do some work there. yeah that's That's an issue. Can I smooth that out so that the poor next dumb GM you know isn't having to tap dance you know like really fast to try to make this work? Because if if they don't know, they can't do it. Yeah.
00:27:00
Speaker
Yeah, it really is a ah it's kind of a usability issue in a lot of ways in, you know, not just running it at a game, you know, but um honestly, just how it reads and how, you know, how much cognitive load does it take to to process what it's doing and why it's written that way and how can you remember it and so on.
00:27:23
Speaker
um and And I think that, you know, going back to if you have something that's familiar already, that's less work. yeah yeah But if you do feel the need to, you know, if you feel like it really, really, really has to have its own thing, try to keep it simple.
00:27:36
Speaker
i don't Don't get into, you know, five pages of just how to execute this one thing. And maybe, I mean, it's okay to do that at first, right? yeah Sometimes that's what you have to do is say, okay, so I want all this kitchen sink stuff to to be part of this mechanic that I'm trying to create.
00:27:55
Speaker
But after a while, you'll start to realize what's important and what's not. And what's too hard and what's not. What's too easy and what's not. And then you can just like, okay, is this fun? Yeah, yeah. And to be clear, if those five pages are like flavor and and, you know, like just sort of like additional context and things like that, but it's not like just diehard, you know, mechanics straight through, you're okay.
00:28:19
Speaker
If it's like steps all the way through, you probably to backtrack. Well, and but and when you're building, right, it's like, you know, the ancient sculptors, you know, they would see what what was in the stone and chip the stone away until they got to that image inside.
00:28:36
Speaker
Sometimes you need a lot of damn stone.
00:28:40
Speaker
You know? It's like, we're going to be doing a lot of chipping here, but we got to start somewhere. but and and We've talked about this in the past is like, yeah, removing until you can't anymore. Right. yeah Like just keep deep.
00:28:55
Speaker
How much of this do you really need to keep the essence of what you're trying to convey? And then step back from that because you can always remove too
Specificity vs. Flexibility in Game Settings
00:29:03
Speaker
much. That's my biggest weakness is like, I can make this simpler.
00:29:08
Speaker
But I have lost the core fun thing about this in doing so. right yeah right yeah I think a good example of that is you know the poor maligned ah Dungeons & Dragons 4.0 skill challenges.
00:29:24
Speaker
yeah Very simple. But, and they were fine, but there was like, it it was a pachinko machine. You just poured in, roll dice five times, something happens.
00:29:36
Speaker
And like, oh, they simplified, but they lost that thing that happens there, you know? Yeah, and I ran into just, I'm working through now, like some final stuff in HonCluster. My final read through of the PDF was like, I generated a few notes that are just monster, oh my god, what do I do with heavy armor, for example.
00:30:01
Speaker
And then it's like, okay, now I got to think about this because I'm cleaving to the core rules as much as possible. I'm not just going to get rid of it because it causes all kinds of other trouble. So I have to figure something out, right? And and and that's that's part of that that iteration of of making it simple and yet not ignoring what needs to be done, right?
00:30:25
Speaker
Or how unique X-Gear works in in in the sense of Both like how it works from an availability standpoint, from a whether you can copy it or not standpoint and how that fits in with the campaign and the Xgear you need to do this inoculation stuff.
00:30:41
Speaker
That's to me, it's super, super important to make that consistent. And it's it's easy, like Daryl was saying, at the table, you can just like hand wave it and whatever, who cares?
00:30:53
Speaker
But when you want to create something that's a setting that people can consistently play. Or someone else. Yeah, and do something with, like, okay, we have these tools we can play with and there's consistent rules for them.
00:31:06
Speaker
If you don't have those consistent rules, it's easier for you. But it's not, it's it it's not, it doesn't, won't have the legs that it could have if it was consistent. And those are the things that, you know, that chipping away, chipping away the stone until you've got like a little tiny figurine from huge block from the quarry because that's how it ended up having to be.
00:31:29
Speaker
We went past 28 millimeter heroic and we're down to 25 millimeter. And to your point, Tracy, like you've said before, you know, like the next, for example, is is is it's a very specific thing. That's a very specific part of the story.
00:31:46
Speaker
and And how that is interacted with, I think, is is really important. And so that's that's you know that's a space where, yeah, you want to make sure that the those setting rules are approachable so that the players and the GM embrace them.
00:32:02
Speaker
Right. If they get too complicated, then they throw it out and they're just like, we're just going to do it this way. Yeah, and you wouldn't believe how complicated it was at first. and I was just thinking, oh, you know, we should have situational penalties for next interactions and blah blah, blah, blah, blah. And the thing is, I couldn't at that point have figured out how to simplify it in the way that it's simplified now. yeah I couldn't i couldn't and until I played through it multiple times and messed it up and watched people watch people try to bounce off of it.
00:32:34
Speaker
Oh, this is what's important. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. This is what's fun. Right. That's where you see in practice, you know, the the pieces that kind of fall off, but it still works.
00:32:46
Speaker
And then you're like, oh, I guess I don't need that. Yeah. Like, yeah. Or the piece that you don't think is load bearing that you discover later. Yeah. Yeah. Daryl has done that too. He's like, oh, this all falls apart. In 2000, I did this game called hard vacuum. Like it's a space combat thing.
00:33:06
Speaker
I've like went back to rewrite it. Like, oh man, I'm so much better now. Like 20 years later, let me revisit this and I'll change this one thing. I'm like this does not work. It turns out this broken ass thing from that is absolutely critical to the gameplay. If you touch it, this whole thing collapses like a house of cards. Good to know. yeah So, and the other thing I wanted to mention about all this is rules for a role-playing game.
00:33:35
Speaker
I'm, ah it's it's weird because I've got this sort of dichotomy going where I'm heavily inspired by card games.
Empowering GMs and Maintaining Game Spirit
00:33:43
Speaker
So, watching what they do and there's, you know, card games, the card games that I play are very specific.
00:33:50
Speaker
They're very demanding in terms of this particular thing is important and this, you know, you do this and this particular, you know. it but the way they the way they express that specificity is valuable.
00:34:06
Speaker
in this in the sense of you're creating rules that are consistent and that everybody can follow and that people can have fun with, right? But at the same time, in a role-playing game, it's you need to be flexible too.
00:34:19
Speaker
And you need to mi ah be able to find a way to create rules that do both, that give the GM just enough of what they need to To have fun and not have too much load, like Daryl was saying, but also give them the flexibility that this is a role-playing game. where we're We've got to have flexibility in what players do.
00:34:42
Speaker
right And the rules have to reflect that in some way. right So i that's just something that I mentioned because it's ah it's one of those balancing acts that I fight with all the time.
00:34:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's a struggle because yeah it it's it's nice if there's a setting rule, for example, that if they decide to not use it, the game still plays. Right? And it plays well.
00:35:08
Speaker
i I struggle with understanding if Han Cluster could pull that off, like if you just ignored the next rules altogether. like you know so i don't i don't know there There's some things they could ignore.
00:35:20
Speaker
Yeah, some things, yeah. but you could for sure yeah i think you absolutely could, but it would be like a weird it would be like a spinoff show Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, it'd be like, oh, we're playing Joanie and Chachi, not Happy Days. and Right, right, right. Or The Mandalorian. right yeah know Great. It's a great story, but there's no Jedi. you know like yeah Well, I think i think that that's that's if you've done it well...
00:35:45
Speaker
You've got um the setting is intuitive enough for a GM to say, oh, I get the idea of this. Yeah, right. And i can I can do this and I don't need all the specificity of the rules that they've that they've presented. I can just do it my way. And that's okay. That's what people are going to do.
00:36:03
Speaker
yeah and then when it breaks, they can run home to mama and find the real rule. That's true. That's true. That's right. ah Savage Worlds in general is this way. You use maybe, what, 30% of the book, Daryl? If you're lucky, yeah, less than that. And it still plays fine, yeah right?
00:36:20
Speaker
But when you've got mastery and you care enough to really dive into how this stuff works, it can be really satisfying in a different way. And yeah I think, I hope that the Honk Luster is the same way. I think that a lot of Savage settings are.
00:36:34
Speaker
And I think that when you've done rules well, um GMs will feel empowered enough to to be able to wing it, but also feel like it's valuable to go back and revisit those rules because they're not that hard yeah to actually use them as written.
00:36:52
Speaker
I don't know. I think there's – that flexibility needs to
Dynamic Settings and Character Opportunities
00:36:56
Speaker
be there. And everyone has got to have that like, oh, I can mess this up the first time. Sure. Like it's fine. Like, oh, it's my first time in a chase. I'm going screw everything up and then I'm going reread it and it's going to make a lot more sense and we'll do better next time.
00:37:09
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. That's just how games work. The Savage Worlds police aren't going to come knocking on your door like you did this wrong. Like you guys are having fun. Unless you're publishing an article about it. Right. Well, yeah, then there's there's issues there. Not that that's happened to me. Oh, yeah. Oops.
00:37:26
Speaker
But yeah, you know, back to to what we're saying before is like, you know, getting out of the way. like Making sure those those setting rules don't get in the way of of the cool, fun thing, the awesome thing that you want players to be able to do that's unique to the setup.
00:37:41
Speaker
Exactly, unless that awesome thing is not something that should be happening in that setting. Oh sure, yeah. yeah Where it's like, okay, I want to do this. Like, man, no, like that's just not how it works here.
00:37:51
Speaker
No, no, no. Specifically the things that you want the setting to emphasize. Yes, yeah, yeah. Right, right. It's easy, like we've touched on this already, but doing what's fun, not what's balanced, I think is important.
00:38:03
Speaker
Because um especially with a game like Savage Worlds, it can look on paper. Like, this doesn't seem right. This doesn't seem balanced is enough. it's It's not hard enough or or it's too easy or the the or something. you know It's like it's not there's not enough of a difference between what characters can do here.
00:38:26
Speaker
Like, you can think that when you look at it on paper. But when you play it, if you played it the way you think it should be, it can really kind of fall on its face because your your penalties are too high or because you're you're you're trying to do something that um that feels right to you but actually is not fun for the players.
00:38:50
Speaker
And that's that's, I think, and it's important, I think, to remember, do what's fun, not necessarily what's balanced. And balance is important, but I think what Daryl said is most important, which is balance between what heroes can do rather than balance between the the the baddies and the heroes. Yeah.
00:39:08
Speaker
and And even that's more feel than anything else. Like, you know, people will put mathematical values on that stuff and that can be a valuable thing to check against, but it's also a trap.
00:39:21
Speaker
Yes. Because you get in that, well, this is 0.5 more powerful than this. It's like, well, but it sucks if we take that 0.5 away. There are so many. No one will ever do this. There's so many nuances to the situation and the story yeah that can change all of that.
00:39:36
Speaker
yeah That can throw those numbers out the window. And that's why, you know, really is about. what's What's memorable? What are you going to walk away with? The math takes into account two million different player situations.
00:39:48
Speaker
Right. Yeah. yeah I used to be that guy. That's why I'm doing this. Yeah, and it's it's interesting because that the part of my philosophy of of setting design, as as we've talked about over this entire podcast, which is to create variety of but among the things that you do.
00:40:08
Speaker
yeah So it's not just about fighting. And if fighting is great. Don't get me wrong. Savage World's... Tactics and on the battlefield are one of my favorite things to do. But at the same time, I also like to play characters that are faces and that sneaky and that are repair gurus or whatever.
00:40:29
Speaker
And I want opportunities for those characters to shine. yeah I want them as GM and I want them as players. So I think you know when you have... When you create a setting like that and to be able to create something dynamic about it is important.
00:40:45
Speaker
It's important. And if you can do it well, it will make certain players feel fantastically awesome doing something they really want to do rather than just what a lot of the games dictate that you do.
00:40:58
Speaker
yeah You know what I mean? If that makes any sense. But we're going to get into that more next episode because we're going to talk about creating archetypes for yourself. Yes. Yeah. Well, and in a practical way, because I've got to mention archetypes and adventures, right? If you're designing something, you know, and want to know, is this fitting, right?
00:41:16
Speaker
The two exercises that you must do, and it kind of turns me off when I see a game rule book that doesn't have either archetypes or adventures in it because it tells me they didn't do these exercises because if they did, it takes so much time. You're putting it in the damn book because, you know, yeah I didn't do that work for nothing. right But the archetype exercises, well, can I build the characters that would feel right for this?
00:41:42
Speaker
yeah and And do those characters play right? Like, do they feel Yeah. And part of that too, and again, you have to be attuned to is how hard was it to make a character that could do this? Like, oh, I could barely make this work, but man, I had to jump through some hoops, you know, like turns out being a Jedi, it costs 15 points. So I had to take on all these hindrances and dah, dah, dah, dah.
00:42:06
Speaker
was like, all right, that's too hard. Like we've got to take a step back and figure something out here because it's half the players are going to want to play this kind of character. yeah like we have to fix that. And then they when you get it and you're like, well, I mean, that didn't, I didn't feel like I got the name, but yeah I can't do it. like you know and and and And to touch or to expand on that a little bit further, i think a good setting that has edges and hindrances that have interplay with
00:42:39
Speaker
the setting rules. I think that's, that's another key component, I think in terms of surfacing oh yes that feel of setting with the character play. Right.
00:42:50
Speaker
Because you get that specificity like, Oh yes, I have a very specific niche that I want to fill. Here's the, how do I do that? Oh, have you looked at the edge called that niche? You know, ah Hey, that's what I was looking for. Yes. This seems to cover it quite nicely. Yeah. yeah emma And then likewise, make those adventures for other people to run.
00:43:15
Speaker
And though if you're finding like, man, how do I do something for this situation? You have a gap in the rule set that you're that yeah you're trying to use, right? Like we we're accustomed with Savage Worlds. We've got this giant toolbox for all these different things.
00:43:32
Speaker
Not every game system is going to work that way. So you're like, yeah. it if if I'm not punting to add this toolbox here or there, it isn't happening.
00:43:43
Speaker
yeah If I've got to make it up custom every time, that's just not a thing GMs will do. You got to put it in your book, then they'll do it. And suddenly that's a part of your setting. yeah that fill the Fill the gap if its if there is a gap.
00:43:56
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Yeah. and and And to that point, um you know, I wanted to mention to that setting rules, know, Yes, you know create setting rules for your for your setting as needed, but also don't hesitate to look at the existing setting rules that are available in the core rules.
00:44:16
Speaker
Because things like heroes never die can go a long way to having that pulpy action hero you know that that is going to survive. you know, against all odds.
00:44:27
Speaker
Right. Yeah. If it's already there, if it's already there, yeah, just, just borrow from it. So, you know, lot I think sometimes people will overlook those and forget like, Oh, I, you know, so like with Savage Eberron, I actually did a list of recommended setting rules. Like if you want to focus on these things, use these setting rules. If you want to focus on this, yeah do this, you know. Yeah. On cluster has, here's what I,
00:44:49
Speaker
really think you should have and here's some optional ones right you know four wound cap is an optional one uh some of the like heavy metal that's optional from from science fiction companion stuff like that but i'm like look it will it will help you yeah it will it it's fun you don't have to have it though right yeah right there's lots of ways to do this but there are certain ones that are like yeah no you really really should do this yeah And I think one of the better models for setting rules out there was fate.
00:45:21
Speaker
When you create your game world in fate, the game world itself has two aspects. Yes. That you're supposed to be able to use for your benefit and also get abused by to get resources.
00:45:36
Speaker
And that really helps sell the world. Like, it doesn't really matter what your character is. This is what the world is about. yeah And I think that's how the world is going to interact with It is. And I think that's a good model to look at when look at your own settings and go like, all right, well, what would those aspects be? How would I use them?
00:45:56
Speaker
yeah Now, how can i tweak that to make it used in other game systems? So it's the same thing. It's like, ah, here's a, this is a drawback everyone faces. Ooh, here's a benefit that you get for it and vice versa. So to just bring it to the table and make it a little more real.
00:46:13
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. That kind of stuff makes you do the work. Like if there's a, if there's an aspect out there that's for this setting and it's supposed to be almost always applicable, what is it gonna be yeah yeah you know and that's tough that's not easy to come up with and underline it right like by the way everyone this is important this why this is why this plays different from pulp yeah like this is its own thing it's really like making the setting itself another character yeah right yep yep anything else
00:46:47
Speaker
I think we covered it.
Conclusion and Community Invitation
00:46:48
Speaker
I thought it was a pretty good one. Yeah. Me too. If you ask me. You might even say perfect. Sure. Perfect. We all know why. Erroneously.
00:47:01
Speaker
Well, thanks, Daryl, for coming on. Really, really appreciate it. It's always a pleasure to have you. Always a pleasure to be here. Thanks for putting up with me. Thank you for listening to the Designing Problems podcast. We want this to be more than a podcast. We want it to be a community.
00:47:14
Speaker
If you'd like to engage directly with us, share your creative triumphs, your roadblocks, or simply interact with a cool group of supportive people, we do have our own Discord server. Please come by join the discussion, and share some inspiration.
00:47:27
Speaker
Until next time, keep designing your problems because you're bound to solve a few along the way.