General Buffy Game Info
If you're playing the game, you're going to need to take the cast questionaire. You can email me your answers.
Just to let you guys know what to expect, I'm going to give a few, uh, things to expect.
This game is based on a tv show. Good, you noticed! OK, so as Director, I feel it is my duty to make this feel as much like a television series as I can, while still making it a game in which you can foil my every plan, totally change the plotline, and basically rewrite the script. In order to do this, I am going to need some help from you. OK, a lot of help from you. So here's what I'm going to be attempting, and what you can do to help me out. The first one's a biggie, but they get shorter after that.
1) TV series have episodes with their own happy (or not so happy) little plots, that generally contribute more or less to a big plot that ends on the season finale. Buffy seasons have 22 of these little guys. In order to give the game this feel, you'll notice I've created titles for every night. Those titles are not drawn from a hat. Each night has it's own complete plotline. Well, except one which is the requisite two-parter ep. This means that you have to solve a story every time you come over. If you don't, this could take a few years to finish. I don't want that. You don't want that. So, here's some things we're going to do to facilitate finishing an episode a night:
- Serve dinner before the game. This group does a pot luck / somebody brings dinner tonight thing. I will set a GAME time. Come earlier for dinner. Game time will probably be 6:30. I don't want to run later than 10:30 for those of us who have day jobs, so this will still give us 4 hours to play. Please be seated with food by 6:30, not wandering in at 6:30. Come at 6:00 or 5:30 even. I'll be here. Yes, I'm mean to impose time rules. I'm a teacher; I can't help it. You're tardy!! Go to detention!!!
- Start on Time. Thought I'd kinda re-emphasize this here. If I have created an opening sequence that requires you to be there, and you are not there, I may send your character to the hospital in spite. And this is for me, too. If I'm not seated and ready to go by 6:30, everybody who is gets a drama point. So, yeah, it isn't just important that we get our food early. Although food is important. Especially if Beth cooks.
- There will be commercial breaks for chatting, getting Cokes, and all that good jazz. I'm hoping that with "game time" and, uh, "not game time" everybody will be more excited to play the game and get involved in the storyline when it's game time. This way, too, I get to cut things off just when it looks like the cast is really screwed and watch you squirm. hehehe.
- My biggest responsibility is making sure that you have a focussed plotline to follow each night. Nothing big and vague. Dude got cacked by a glowing demon. You must stop the demon. That kind of thing. You will notice that I have set the story in a small town. There just aren't that many places to go in McKennit. Usually you will have some clue as to where to start, but if you don't, go somewhere. You will find a useful person place or thing by process of elimination faster than by debating where to start for half an hour. And debating where to start for half an hour has a serious yawn factor.
- Finally, play your characters. Those of you who've watched Buffy know that many of the plotlines actually revolve around mistakes that the characters make. If it sounds like I'm trying to get you to do something that you KNOW your character would do, but you as a player KNOW that this is a really really bad idea, do it, please. Otherwise we will be waiting around for a few hours for a plotline to start while I hit you with every form of persuasion I have and then send your character to the hospital out of spite. But honestly, I could just make things happen to you, but that isn't anywhere near as interesting as the stories you can create by making mistakes, fixing them, and learning. That's what makes Buffy so cool.
- Just kidding about the finally thing. During game time, I will not be looking up rules. You will not be looking up rules. If we don't remember, I'll make something up and we'll look it up during a commercial break. No, we can't go back and do it again if I'm wrong. Life's unfair. :)
- I'm going to be really mean about delays amidst fighting. You will have to state your intention before each round begins. If you hesitate, you will lose your action for the round. I will be happy to have practice fights before we start or anytime between sessions for those who would like more practice with the fighting rules. But, really, people, in a fight, you don't have five minutes to sit and ponder the best next course of action. You'd get your ass kicked. Do that in a game, and you'll be in the hospital. Or dead. Same goes for rolling. Roll your friggin' action before we get to you. Roll your action while we're declaring intentions. It's not like you'd really know what everybody else is going to do anyway. Watching you roll die is boring, except on that rare occasion when your roll is vitally important. I will make a few exceptions for that so that we can all collectively hold our breaths. EVERY roll you make is NOT vitally important. Get over it.
2) I told you that one was big. OK, in other news... each night we'll pick a quote of the night to go up on the website. There will be a napkin. When somebody's character says something funny, cool, or really Buffy-esque, somebody grab up that napkin to nominate it for quote of the night. At the end of the episode, we'll take a vote. Winner gets a drama point and their quote on the site. Any other quotes I deem worthy will garner drama points as well.
3) Experience points will be handed out during the opening credits of the next session. You can use your first commercial break to bump your character up if you wish, so come with an idea of what you want to do with her.
4) I will be doing some weird stuff with editing. Sometimes in gaming we find that characters split up. Usually, the gm works with one group for an hour and then moves to the other. This is not how tv works. If there are multiple group things going on, unless they are really important character points, they will be short and intercut. I'm really going to need your help with this. Another thing that will frequently happen, is character moments. Sometimes (and I'll usually give you warning) I will want just a sentence or two from you describing what you are doing. "I sit in an empty train station crying, the faded rose dangling from my clinched fist." See, we don't need a monologue and five conversations with NPC's to determine that you are sad that you got left. It's much prettier with a picture. If you help me set up those moments, I think we can do some cool stuff AND cut down on time by dealing with complicated issues in a different way than hammering them into the ground.
5) I will ask you to roll a bunch of perception and will checks at the beginning of each session. It would actually help me if you would just roll them and hand me a piece of paper with the checks before we get settled. Let's start with 10 each for now. You will rarely need that many, but just in case. It always bugs me when the gm calls out, "Listening checks!" and then when everybody rolls like a 2, they spend the next ten minutes asking for spot checks or search checks and then trying to convince the gm that they weren't surprised when they got attacked because they were "on high alert." Give me 10 perception rolls, I'll cross them off as necessary, and then I'll tell you when you made one. And you'll have no idea when you didn't. Much better. muahahahaha...
6) Check the website before you come to play. You might specifically want to check the supporting cast page or the McKennit page. I will post new places and/or people of interest up before game night so that you can get a look at them.