Using other games during Pathfinder

[capybaras]

I am currently running Skull & Shackles, about to start part 3. A few sessions ago, when the party arrived at Tidewater Rock and had to win the favor of Lady Agasta, instead of going through the slog of skill checks, I had my players run through a few hands of Love Letter, with the first player to win 5 becoming the focus of Lady Agasta's affection. This turned an inorganic series of diplomacy checks into a much more interesting session which also lent itself well to role playing.

I'm curious if anyone else has tried to incorporate other games during a campaign. I'm planning to have the players run through a game of Hanabi in place of the skill checks for setting up the feast at the end of the Pirate's Regatta, but I'm interested to hear when and what games anyone else has used. Thanks!

[Charon's Little Helper]

So - basically mini-games?

I would point out - you are invalidating the characters' skill choices.

Really though - I probably wouldn't do it just because it would detract too much from the action and I have enough trouble finding time to play it that I don't want to burn 1/2 of it on a mini-game.

Props to you if it works for you and your table though.

[capybaras]

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

So - basically mini-games?

I would point out - you are invalidating the characters' skill choices.
.

I had not thought of it that way, but that is a good point. My party didn't seem to mind however, as none of them have very much in the way of social skills (being scurvy pirates and all).

[claymade]

I've never used games as representational replacements for what would, in the narrative, be non-game skill rolls. I have, however, used games twice when the characters in question were actually playing said game as part of the plot.

The first time was when the PCs came across Death, who was curious about them and decided to check them out because they had just become Mythic (Death, in that setting, had a particular interest in mortals who started down that path). He offered them the chance to take one of four tests (or not, it was all completely optional). The Test of Intellect, the Test of Strength, the Test of Luck, and the Test of Deftness.

Anyway, long story short, the Test of Luck was playing a game of Liar's Dice with death, and for any PCs who picked that, we just plain played it out with the actual dice there. For all the challenges, if you won, Death granted you an extra point to your maximum possible Mythic Power reservoir. If you lost, he took one.

The second time was quite a bit later on, when the PCs were stuck in the depths of Limbo, without any way to Plane Shift out (since the only one who could cast it was an oracle NPC who had gotten separated from the party). So they visited a local denizen called the Player of Games, who had a large trove of magical items that he'd put up as the stakes in his games.

So they, along with a bunch of other people who had gotten sucked into that place, went to the portal to his pocket realm. He welcomed them in, and explained the game he was playing that day. Turned out to be, essentially, a variant of Go Fish with some odd rules. Among other things, the victory condition wasn't scoring points, but rather getting your hand down to zero. Also, it was never played with the same cards twice. Once the game was over, and cards left in your hand at that point became truly yours, and the game would begin with a fresh deck.

The Player of Games did a trial run playing for a potion of cure light wounds to show how it worked. Everybody anted up, and two of the PCs decided to play. I conscripted the others to play the NPCs, a Protean and a Qlippoth. The PCs won the potion, the losers took their cards, and then we started the next game, this time playing for what they were all actually here for: a Spherewalker's Staff that would allow them to get off the plane. Everybody anted up for that (a quite higher chunk of change) and the Player of Games brought out the new deck that they were going to play with.

Specifically, a Deck of Many Things.

I'd made modifications to it, of course, filling out more cards to get to the full 52 so that you could actually play a Go Fish game with it. And due to the Player of Games' magic, it worked like he promised. The cards wouldn't truly become theirs until after the game was over. So the one who won wouldn't get any effects, good or bad. But there were two PCs playing the game. And only one had a high enough Knowledge(Arcana) score to know what each card actually did. And the Player didn't permit table talk.

So, yeah, they played Go Fish with a Deck of Many Things. Pretty tense session, that one. But they managed to both win and make it out in one piece. Even got some nifty bonuses out of it, for the one who still had some cards left.

[Trekkie90909]

Speaking personally, I love mini-games; I use them fairly rarely, but I have found they draw players in and add nicely to the role playing experience.

[Hyrus]

I like the occasional mini game. For the Skull and Shackles game my friend is running, he is using Red Dragon Inn for the Hurl gambling game, with each each character playing a roughly representative deck. Each player has a maximum Fortitude, in the mini game, equal to their character's actual Constitution, and the player takes enough damage at the end so that their Con is where their RDI fortitude ended up Due to how horrible the rum is, we rarely play, and it's a nice diversion when we do.
That said, I would reccomend against minigames that detract from player enjoyment, or decisions they made with their character. And any GM planning on doing something similar should definitely run it by their players, explaining the impact it would have on game time.

[Tyinyk]

I ran a gameshow dungeon where I had the players play six minigames, with a floor of dungeon to break them up.

We played Chess, The Price is Right, Wheel of Fortune (Which was basically hangman, except they rolled loot also.) Crazy Eights, Would you Rather, and Who Wants to be a Millionaire.

The players had a great time, but I wouldn't do it more than once, maybe a second time way down the road.

[UnArcaneElection]

^For a second I misread that last game as Who Wants to be a Miniature . . . .

[Knight Magenta]

claymade wrote:

the Player of Games brought out the new deck that they were going to play with.

Specifically, a Deck of Many Things.

Holy s!&*! That's pretty hard-core! I really like this approach to the mini-game aspect because parts of the character's motivation affect the goals in the game. And if that's not roleplaying I don't know what is.

I don't like puzzles in general because they are usually dissociative. How does chess represent a negotiation? What is my character saying when he moves his pawns or takes pieces? How does me running detect thoughts affect the chess game?

That being said, while skill checks are fine for minor interactions, if you want to have a non-combat event as the climax of a story arc then they are lame. No one wants to resolve a tense peace negotiation with one die roll. I don't know what the solution is though.

[Johnnycat93]

I thoroughly believe in throwing out almost all rules for Diplomacy, Intimidation, Bluff, and Sense Motive. The exceptions are when those skills have actual in-game effects (intimidation to demoralize, bluff to feint). I've yet to be convinced that they add any depth to a game, and mostly I consider them a detractor from roleplaying. However, I wouldn't swap them out with a mini-game (that'd be even more complex and unnecessary, though I think mini-games themselves are charming). 'Course, they're such a main stay of games that I basically have to deal with them so I guess they're not so bad.

Unfortunately, Ultimate Intrigue came out and pushed things down the opposite road. Luckily I've never had to deal with it.

I do think there is room for mini-games but I wouldn't be surprised if GMs avoided them because they're so much work. It would be cool to see someone run something with a bunch of Professor Layton style puzzles.

[Tyinyk]

Knight Magenta wrote:

I don't like puzzles in general because they are usually dissociative. How does chess represent a negotiation? What is my character saying when he moves his pawns or takes pieces? How does me running detect thoughts affect the chess game?

When we were doing chess, the party mesmerist kept using Bungle on the character they were playing against, so whenever they failed they save, I'd make an intentionally stupid move.

[Balkar]

capybaras wrote:

A few sessions ago, when the party arrived at Tidewater Rock and had to win the favor of Lady Agasta, instead of going through the slog of skill checks, I had my players run through a few hands of Love Letter, with the first player to win 5 becoming the focus of Lady Agasta's affection.

capybaras wrote:

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

So - basically mini-games?

I would point out - you are invalidating the characters' skill choices.
.

I had not thought of it that way, but that is a good point. My party didn't seem to mind however, as none of them have very much in the way of social skills (being scurvy pirates and all).

What if the person with the best Diplomacy skill needed to win 1 or 2 less hands or something along those lines?

Basically, skew the requirements to pass the mini-game with [the number of ranks + stat mod] of the skill then normalize around the average (the middle most person needs to play the mini-game like normal and everyone else gets a handicap/penalty)?

[Daw]

Back when I ran Cyberpunk games I had several custom size/density minesweeper boards used for the hackers.