Mid-Range Game 6: A Venture in Atium

[Curious Anamaximder]

This was great.

[the winter system]

Thanks! I'm glad you liked it.

[little wilson]

I really thought it was impossible for the village to lose with the unbalance of roles. So I figured "Let's rebalance it by messing with the rules!" *shakes head at foolishness*

 

I think it was the request to not share housemates that killed things for the village more than anything else with the rules (well, that and the marriage contract affecting alignment). It crippled them in terms of working on the marriage contracts and combining houses. That was really the biggest thing going for them. Even with the restriction about houses only marrying once, that was workable, but that request made even mentioning that someone might be innocent an issue. Combine that lack of thread communication about houses with the fact that the marriage contract is null and void if it's used on someone who's already married? 

 

The breaks in the game are easily fixable, I think.

 

1. Role distribution balance. You don't want to give the village too much firepower, and a Mistborn, 2 Coinshots, and 3 Lurchers is definitely too much firepower, particularly when the spies only have a Mistborn. There are many ways to balance roles, depending on what you want to do with the roles. I know you wanted to do vote manipulation for this game, but a lot of people ended up giving up their votes in order to gain atium, so the vote manipulation didn't work so well. I almost think this would be really interesting filled with Coinshots, Lurchers, and Thugs, if you were to throw a couple protective items in.

 

2. Reduce the number of minor houses and include the spies in those ranks. The spies had a huge advantage when it came to collecting atium, since they had a bigger house, so to balance things out there, it could be useful to put 3-5 members in each minor house. And definitely have the spies infiltrating the houses, so the marriage contract can't be abused. I'd probably keep the rule about how the spy can't purchase a contract and use it (since they're main affiliation is with their Great House and not the minor house they've infiltrated), but if their minor house is merged into a bigger minor house, they're folded into the bigger minor house (so you could easily end up with a house with multiple spies in the ranks).

 

3. Atium doesn't disappear when losing bids and failed marriage contracts stay with the owner. I'd suggest that instead of taking the atium from every person who bids on an item, you only take it from the winner. I like the increasing price, but taking the atium from the losers was another thing that affecting the village negatively, especially since the spies had the atium advantage. Getting rid of failed contracts also was a problem. You'd have someone would just spent 5-7 atium for a contract, only to try to marry a house that had already been married and then they'd lose their contract. Since the contract technically never got used, it would make sense for the owner to retain it so they can use it again.

 

All in all, the breaks seem a lot worse than they are, and I think by fixing them, this game could be a ton of fun. The atium mechanic and the bidding and the marriage contracts are great ideas. Same with the potential alignment changes with the kandra. I definitely think you should run this game again after balancing it. I'd love to play it again (and hopefully survive past the first night. ).

 

And last of all, good job, Winter! Despite the breaks, this was a good game, and you did a really good job. You stayed on top of the PMs and the questions well, and I know you learned a lot, and those are two of the most important things when it comes to GMing. Next time, it won't be nearly as rough.

[Orlok Tsubodai]

It really was great fun! Gamma betraying you himself didn't make much difference - we were buying a contract to use on gamma to gain access to an experienced player following Wilson's demise...

[the winter system]

Thanks, Wilson! Maybe when I get a bit more experience I'll run this game again!

[Mailliw73]

Thanks, Winter! It was fun even with the bumps along the way. And even though I died first cycle, I was really excited to play and the dead doc was fun.

[the winter system]

Thanks! I'm glad that it wasn't unbalanced to the point where it wasn't fun anymore. 

[The Honey Badger]

I loved this game, thanks Winter for GMing it. I agree with Wilson, a few changes need to be made. But I still had a lot of fun. I think the PM rules should be more lax, I think the lack of communication between villagers was one of the reasons, the spies won fairly easily.

[the winter system]

Thanks! I'm really amused by the eliminator friendly fire. Has that ever happened?

[Kasimir]

Thanks! I'm really amused by the eliminator friendly fire. Has that ever happened?

 

Shiv, the Darkfriend Channeller, killed me (Good Guy Fain, the second Eliminator faction) with a fireball in LG6. I think I have the unfortunate distinction of being the only Eliminator killed by another Eliminator (literally (un)friendly fire much?). Gamma wasn't an Eliminator at the point of the killing.

Edited May 20, 2015 by Kasimir

[the winter system]

Yes, but at the time they killed Feligon, he was. Oh, oops. Should've put Urbain as his House Title because of the order of actions. Well, let it be known he was not a Wardwick at his time of death, but an Urbain.

[Kasimir]

Then you have an Eliminator friendly-fire rate of one. Hardly the highest ever, since it's just the existing rate. Wilson still doesn't count.

[Orlok Tsubodai]

Well, that and we ordered the Kandra we controlled to be killed in the last night phase - even having tried once already and knowing he was our kandra - I think winter cut the game a cycle short though so we didnt see that

Edited May 20, 2015 by OrlokTsubodai

[the winter system]

Yeah. There's that as well.

[Emerald101]

good game everyone, even if i wasn't really here for the last third of it.

 

Thanks to winter for an enjoyable game.

[the winter system]

Thanks for enjoying it!

[Gamma Fiend]

Heh, so after reading the Spec/Dead Doc, I do gotta say I love my notoriety for my penchant of joining the 'Dark Side'.

I mean, this game did have Urbains in it as Spies (which I honestly didn't even know until I had already signed up as an Urbain!) so it really was just inevitable!

Even if I wasn't going to join Team Evil, I still would have been an aggressive coinshot this game, I had of course decided that the first cycle. But after the (quite broken) Spy Marriage Contract, my hit-rate became almost 100% again. XD

To be fair though, most of my thread posts this game did contain actual semi-helpful advice for villagers. You were able to trust your Doc mates. Not talking in the thread made our jobs as Spies a rust ton lot easier, and forced almost no pressure on us at all. Despite that though, a lot of players did have as just about pegged by the time we started taking them out, so we were quite lucky in that regard!

I would totally like to see a game like this with the slightly revamped rules for more of a "Spying" flavor and balancing tweaks, though! You can always count on House Urbain making their way into Luthadel House War Games.

Once again, many thanks to Winter and everyone that played! 

Edited October 10, 2016 by Alvron

[Feligon]

I can say that I totally expected the Urbain inquisition.  Dying to the eliminators one action before our houses joined was kinda funny, though.  Almost like the shot themselves in a foot they didn't know they had.   That analogy made more sense in my head.

[Bort]

If it wasn't for your backstabbing Gamma, this would have been the first game I survived. damnation you!!! *Shakes fist* "I'll get you next time, Gamma. Next time...." Cue Inspector Gadget end credits.

 

Thanks for running the game Winter. It was fun, even if my housemate bailed on me after wasting our atium on a marriage contract.

[Gamma Fiend]

Gin looked back once as he bound through the rooftops of the silent streets of Luthadel, the newly dubbed lights of Keep Urbain just a dim glow shrouded in the mists. He heard the creaks and snaps of the wagon in the streets underneath carrying Locke; he would hop in at the gates but figured he'd fly up above while he still had the chance.

 

The Urbain Overlords will sure be happy that the mission was a success, Gin thought, smiling, pulling out his metal flask and taking a sip as leveled off in the air. Gaining a new recruit and gaining the resources and contracts with the Great Houses should please them greatly.

Gin took one last look at the dim shadows of the keeps behind him as he flicked a coin behind him, pushed, and flew forward. I'll have to keep my head down, though. It seems that people will remember what happened here. He sighed. Sometimes, it just couldn't be helped.

Eh, some random RP to help get things closed out. Figure this thread can be left open for another day or so if anyone has any last minute comments or feedback they want to get in before it get's locked up.
 

[Gamma Fiend]

And that's a wrap! Many thanks to Winter for running such a fantastic game, once more! And thanks to everyone, as always, for signing up!
 

As always, if anyone would like to try your hand at running a game, please get a hold of Myself, Wilson or Meta. Not only will we get you added to the list, but I'm sure we'd be more than willing to help out in any way we can as well!

 

You can also ask questions and get some hints and feedback from everyone over here in our Art of Game Creation thread as well. With all the games that we've run so far, we have plenty of experienced GMs that can help you refine any game you're thinking about!

 

We currently have Long Game 12 up and running for those that want to watch and spectate -- and possibly end up joining as a "pinch-hitter"!

Edited May 30, 2015 by Gamma Fiend