Better options for 'fighting'?

[robin]

Hi,

I've played A Dead Man's Chest at a friends and am currently preparing to host the Lei'd to Rest game. Having tried out various murder game systems (like HTHAM) i must say that Freeform games are really refreshing: they allow for more interactivity between players and really make a murder game a murder *game* rather then some dull puzzle where everyone is obliged to release certain parts of information.

Coming from pen & paper roleplaying games, there is one aspect though that I find a bit dissatisfying: the solving of a fight by playing paper-rock-scissors. Obviously you don't want people to enact real fights and even the way fights are executed in real life role playing games is - i think - a bit too much for a murder game. But for me having to do paper-rock-scissors really broke away from my in-theme experience.

I've been thinking on how to solve this problem, but actually haven't found a real good solution yet.

One option i'm considering is doing a mini-game in the game, e.g. for Lei'd to rest I'm thinking of maybe doing a limbo dancing contest between the 'fighters' or a hula hoop contest. It's still very far from being realistic, but at least it's really in theme and probably will add to the fun as well. I think for every game / theme minigames like this can be thought of to solve the fighting problem.

I'm curious as to whether people may have found other options which might push the fights in to a slightly more realistic direction as well and if they actually tried this out in a freeform game?

Obviously i'm not advocating rolling with dice or something to determine if and where somebody was hit, i'm kinda looking for a in-the-middle solution.

Cheers,
Robin

[mo]

Hi Robin,

Very glad to hear that you're enjoying the interactivity etc of our games! Steve and I both come from a long-time RPG background, so we wanted to bring some elements of that into the murder mystery structure.

I don't remember any details about alternative resolution systems people have used, although there certainly is plenty of scope to adopt something appropriate to the game's theme, like your hula mini-game (or maybe a limbo-pole equiv), which will make resolution more fun and interesting.

We have had a few people who've made the combat system more realistic, by assigning different skill levels to characters, and / or different weapon capabilities, and then requiring x number of successes from y trials... that sort of thing. But you could easily get a bit bogged down that way. A better method might be to eg. draw random playing cards from a deck against a varying success criterion -- eg. character A needs a 9 or better to hit, character B only needs a 7 or better. Basically the same as rolling dice, but without the dice ;-)

best,

Mo

[steve]

Hi Robin,

One of the reasons for keeping our combat system consistent across our games is because most of our players aren't RPG-ers, and may prefer not to have to learn a new set of rules to do effectively the same thing for each game.

We did once have a more complex combat system, but that generated an awful lot of queries!

If you do come up with an alternative, please do let us know!

[wephalina]

I'm hosting All At Sea in 3 days time and have been racking my brain thinking of a way to make the combat sequences more relevant to the game - in short, I'm concerned about S-P-S seeming a bit lame. But at the same time I don't want people to start physically fighting.
For example: for the knockout pills I'm using Tic Tacs and giving the person who wants to use them 5 minutes to get a Tic Tac into their victims drink without the victim noticing (as monitored by the host).
If you have any ideas I would love some help - with organising everything for the party all my imagination is seeping out of my skull.

[mo]

Hi Stephanie,

How about something based around playing-cards? Simplest would be each player drawing a card; slightly more interesting but still quick, they each get dealt five cards and see who's got the best poker hand; or something more complex involving actual card play if you prefer?

best,

Mo

[mistere]

I too have been struggling to come up with a mechanic to make combat more realistic/relevant. S-P-S and playing cards both seem to fall short in what otherwise is a very immersive game experience. And while I am not completely satisfied, I have come up with some ideas I would like to share.

The first idea is really just a glorified version of the playing card mechanic. It would require anyone who wants to openly contest another player to challenge them to a duel. Depending on the setting this would take on different forms (eg, a gunfight in the Wild West, a sword fight on a pirate ship, etc...) however, all would play out in a similar fashion. The players would approach the host, who would present them with a choice of weapons (actually two cards with identical faces depicting a gun, or sword, etc...). The players choose their weapon, the challenged player going first, and then they turn their cards over. One card is the winning card, the other - the losing card. Players can then act out the results if they wish. As I said, not that much different from the playing card mechanic, but I think the simulated action of choosing your weapon maintains the immersiveness by some small degree. I would like to add a strategic element to this if I could, and give some characters advantages, but have not yet figured out how to do so without affecting the balance of the game.

My other idea applies to assassination attempts where the would-be murderer tries to do away with another player in a stealthy manner. The tic tac idea that someone else had in this thread is wonderful, and reminds me of the inspiration for my own. In one game I played, weapon cards were used. These cards were meant to stand in for various weapons and were to be used as a sort of currency to commit murder. In most cases, all you had to do was corner your intended victim, and when no one else was looking, hand them your weapon card. And WHAMMO! They were dead. A little too easy. We had a stack of dead bodies a mile high! The only weapon card that was different was the poison card, in that it required the player to wave the card over food or drink that their target had to then ingest. This requirement both made the poison more difficult to use and emulated the real act of poisoning someone, and I liked that. I have since come up with other challenges to using other types of weapon cards- with fantastic results! Weapons for stabbings can only be used if the target's hands are otherwise occupied (so they can't put up a fight). Weapons for strangulations can only be used if the target is approached and surprised from behind. Point blank shootings are easy to carry out but result in the target yelling 'bang,' quickly directing players within earshot to the scene. Long range weapon cards have a hole in them through which players must track a target who is at least ten yards away for ten seconds without anyone or anything obscuring their line of sight. All of these rules may sound complicated, but they are clearly and succinctly written on the cards themselves, so that understanding how they work requires no memorization and is as simple as can be- even if successfully using them is not!

As weapon cards can only be used if there are no witnesses, players are very much on their honor. In the games I have run, however, I have never had a real problem with players trying to cheat. I think that is because there is so much freedom to do what you want in these types of games that people don't mind the few rules there are. Plus, I think the challenges that are posed, like those associated with my weapon card mechanic, are fun and only add to the immersive experience!

I hope these ideas are helpful to some and look forward to hearing anyone else's!

--Eric

[mo]

Hi Eric,

Thanks for those thoughts, some great ideas there! You're quite right that just a change as simple as choosing cards with pictures of guns on can make a big difference to atmosphere.

People will have to decide for themselves what's going to feel best for their particular group, but I think we've got a nice spread of possibilities in this thread now.

best wishes,

Mo

[georgeh]

We are playing A Dead Mans Chest on Friday and I want a fun and easy way to fight but not by playing paper-rock-scissors (as I have used this on other games). I have found a cheap Wii game, Pirates Hunt for Black Beard's Booty, for about £7 from Amazon. This has a mini pirate fighting game between two people using the Wii wands as swords. I will set this up ready all night for people to dual when required. I will let you know how it goes.
George

[mo]

Hi George,

That sounds like great fun! I wonder if there's some equivalent Wii game that people could use for gunfights in our more modern settings?

best wishes,

Mo

[todd]

I had been thinking that Wii or other video game equivalents could be a match.

We host a lot of murder mystery games for parties and look for unique ways to deal with this kind of situation. Of course we're used to larger groups, but all of these sound like fun and innovative ways to resolve the issue.

Any 'game of skill' would work. I'd also use a revolving set of them. Have like 6 games lined up in a row. The first 'fight' uses the first...the second the second...etc. The idea is so that you don't simply play the same one repeatedly. Also, it keeps someone that is really good at one of them from dominating the game.

Todd Rice
Director
http://www.THEYimprov.com
Comedy is Murder

[steve]

Hi Todd,

Yes, I can see how that might be fun. If you try it out do let us know how it works out.

Cheers,

steve

[elvirablythe]

What about giving people the ability to kill others the same way it is used in the game "murderer." The one where you walk around in dark rooms and have to run your finger across the other person's throat to "kill" them? I think that would work well especially if your group is already familiar with that game.

[mo]

That would be great fun! I think it would have to be a group of guests who all knew each other pretty well, otherwise it might be quite scary

[lanalehr]

We just played Davey Jones' Locker last night and it was a huge success!
Part of the reason was the 'fight room', which we also called the ballroom. I turned the bigger room in our house (not really that big really) into a 'ballroom' for the ship. My friend brought a small sound system (two mikes and an an amp) and connected it to a laptop. The fight rules were the regular rules but to fight the attacker had to choose one of the four choices:

1) A Dance-Off (the host chose the song - Gangnam Style was hilarious, so were some old Technotronic tunes) . The audience chose the winner by applause.
2) A Haiku-Slam. Each person had to create a haiku on the spot and recite it into the mics. This was surprisingly HILARIOUS, and we had the benefit of having some poetry slam artists attending who really got us going.
3) Killer Karaoke- The attacker got to chose the karaoke song and we searched it on youtube and let 'er rip. SUPER fun.
4) Roll of the dice- we had two 20-sided die for people to use if they were feeling shy. However, NObody chose the die-roll.

This added a really fun element to the party, and people are still raving about the fight portion of the game.
To theme it, I started with doing songs around reggae tunes and jigs and reels to keep in the 1700 pirate themes, but after a while people didn't care- they were going for the old 80s favourites!

I would say, though, that if you want to do any of these ideas, you may want to appoint a different moderator than the host. There were so many fights lined up that I had to stay and host that after a while. Meanwhile, though, people were still in character and working their secrets.

[mo]

That sounds fantastic! We can imagine people really going for the performance of a lifetime, when their necks are on the line