I'm really considering buying the new edition hardcover, and I'm curious—what experiences have you had with the system? Where would you say the game excels, and where does it fall short?
I was thinking about running a game at the local library, since I figure the librarians are more likely to be okay with "Tolkien meets Watership Down" than "Tolkien meets...Tolkien".
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I could be wrong, but I think Evil Lincoln is the one you want to be talking to on the boards. From memory I'm pretty sure he's the biggest Torchbearer fan here, and it's built on the same base system (I think they both came from the Burning Wheel game system).
Boxed set.
Sweet!
I've been eyeballing this game for a long while now, if only for the beauty of the object itself. I guess that's the occasion I was waiting for.
Indeed, I am a fan of both Mouse Guard and Torchbearer!
This new edition of the former is likely influenced by innovations from the latter.
First and foremost, know that Mouse Guard RPG is based on a truly excellent graphic novel series by David Petersen. His art is amazing, and he not only created new art for all versions of the RPG so far, but he also consults with game designer Luke Crane on the aspects of the game itself. Thus, if you want to get a good sense of the game, try reading the books.
The game itself is driven by some meta-game concepts that can be difficult for established RPGers to fit their heads around:
- a player turn and GM turn structure
- rewarding players for portraying their characters' flaws
- open-ended declarations of purpose that drive the reward system
- an advancement system based on skill usage rather than choosing where to spend points
This stuff is all weird and new, but it all hangs together amazingly. For example, the fact that skills advance through usage is constrained by the player-turn/GM-turn structure; players are given a portion of the game to choose what to do so that they can work on skills that were not otherwise addressed... but they lose that privilege during the GM turn in the interest of expedience. Likewise, the role-play of character flaws provides a currency for additional actions in the player turn.
A common foible that new players run into is not recognizing just how different this is from a more traditional simulationist RPG.
Basically, if you value innovation and you have an open mind, this game is incredible. If you're looking for a traditional approach, basically D&D with mice, you'd probably want to look elsewhere.
I can answer questions if you have any.
First and foremost, know that Mouse Guard RPG is based on a truly excellent graphic novel series by David Petersen. His art is amazing, and he not only created new art for all versions of the RPG so far, but he also consults with game designer Luke Crane on the aspects of the game itself. Thus, if you want to get a good sense of the game, try reading the books.
Yeah, I really love those books. I think they've had a big influence on my own writing, in fact. That's why I want to play the RPG.
A few questions:
Having more than 2 or 3 players doesn't seem recommended, since each side (GM vs PCs) only gets 3 actions per round split among all members of each side.
I think we ran into an issue with the mechanic of each side choosing 3 actions, then resolving them. It quickly became very meta trying to guess if something like the Feint or Defend action was going to work or be completely wasted. It came down to knowing the person choosing the action rather than what the opponent or PC would do. For us, I think eventually we did nothing but Attack actions.
This sounds pretty wonky. So if I recruit more than three players, at least one player has to sit out each round? I know there's something to do with the group splitting into teams—is that relevant to this?
And could the two of you elaborate on the second paragraph? I'm not sure I understand how that works.
Finally, on another note, how does that GM Turn/Player Turn thing work? I assumed it was only for "combats" (I know that word applies more loosely than in D&D), but it sounds like it might be bigger than that?
I'm a big fan of story-focused RPGs like Grimm. Mouse Guard sounds very roleplaying heavy, and I really like what I'm hearing. And like I said, I adore the setting.
I have a followup question. It seems like gameplay is really streamlined—players choose a few things to do during their turn, and otherwise follow the GM's road.
How does this impact roleplaying? How loose are the roleplaying options compared to what you can do in Pathfinder? Does anything happen outside of a combat (be it a fighty combat or an argument-based one), or is everything just streamlined to get you to the next (predetermined) encounter?
This sounds pretty wonky. So if I recruit more than three players, at least one player has to sit out each round? I know there's something to do with the group splitting into teams—is that relevant to this?
This is one of those situations I mentioned above, where preconceptions from other RPGs can seriously confuse veteran players.
Every combat action in MGRPG is an opposed roll. This means that it's ALWAYS a player's turn, and it's always an enemy turn.
These turns are grouped into clusters of three where you have to declare your action ahead of time, and maybe switch weapons. It's not a "round" really, not like you're thinking.
No matter how many players you have, you're still taking player turns with greater frequency than a traditional initiative, because the NPCs don't have turns, they act every turn.
Torchbearer refined this even further by making mechanics where you can shift the damage to another player. This makes "tanking" possible, and I'd expect to see something similar in a new MG edition.
Finally, on another note, how does that GM Turn/Player Turn thing work? I assumed it was only for "combats" (I know that word applies more loosely than in D&D), but it sounds like it might be bigger than that?
To use the common RPG slang, think of it as a "Railroad" turn, and a "Sandbox" turn. To call the GM turn a "railroad" doesn't do it justice, because some level of divergent pathways are actually built into the skill resolution mechanic.
The GM turn presents challenges which the players have to confront. You're not supposed to get too clever and try to outwit the challenge, it's very straightforward. Lots of the things a player might try to do in a normal RPG will get the response "you can do that on your player turn, right now we're dealing with this".
Once players buy in, this makes the game very fast paced, which is just as well since that leaves more time for the sandbox portion.
"Combat" in the sense of "let's roll initiative" doesn't really exist in MG. You have Conflicts instead, which are highly abstract, and character driven. You use the same "rock paper scissors" mechanic for swordfights as you do for arguments.
However, your choices in the rock-paper-scissors mechanics are heavily weighted by character skills and equipment, which limits the options by all participants, and makes it less of a guessing game and more strategic.
Basically, this game really breaks up the traditional patterns of a fantasy RPG, and successfully makes "crunch" out of social combat. It doesn't diminish actual fighting, but incorporates it into the same conflict resolution system.
It's really great! But beware, veteran gamers, your instincts and habits will lead you astray here. Take nothing for granted.
I have a followup question. It seems like gameplay is really streamlined—players choose a few things to do during their turn, and otherwise follow the GM's road.
How does this impact roleplaying? How loose are the roleplaying options compared to what you can do in Pathfinder? Does anything happen outside of a combat (be it a fighty combat or an argument-based one), or is everything just streamlined to get you to the next (predetermined) encounter?
Well, for starters, half the "pre-determined" encounters are held in reserve as potential consequences for failed rolls. So right there, you have interaction potential.
Another point that's crucial to note here is "failing forward". Failed rolls are not only okay, they're NECESSARY in this system. So players are encouraged to use their character flaws against themselves to fail rolls selectively, which is excellent fodder for roleplay.
You see, in Mouse Guard, as in Burning Wheel and Torchbearer, a failed roll never means "it didn't happen." When you fail, you either get what you wanted but pay a price (usually a condition), or the situation changes entirely in a way that prevents you from getting that thing (a plot twist).
This has a huge effect on roleplay, integrating characters goals and traits into the rolls instead of using them for binary resolution.
So, I might've been unclear with my second question.
Roleplay—as in conversations, campfire talk, arguments mid-battle—seems like it's zoomed past in favor of conflicts, especially in the GM's Turn. I'm listening to a play podcast right now from the devs, so maybe I'll hear otherwise.
As for the conflict turns thing: So from what I understand, each conflict, the mice and enemies decide on their next three turns in advance. Their success in each turn is heavily influenced by whether they picked an action (like Attack) that counters the enemy's action (like Feint).
Within each turn, one mouse is the one doing the action, but can the others aid him?
Thanks a lot for your responses, I'm just trying to wrap my head around this.
Roleplay—as in conversations, campfire talk, arguments mid-battle—seems like it's zoomed past in favor of conflicts, especially in the GM's Turn. I'm listening to a play podcast right now from the devs, so maybe I'll hear otherwise.
In my experience this is a great system for role-play. During conflicts, you have broad authority to interpret the action types, which means you're getting a lot more cinematic results from battles, but the same applies to actual arguments over matters of substance.
Yes, the GM turn tends to have more tension and things are pushed forward pretty directly, but that doesn't mean there's no room for roleplay.
One of the most memorable encounters I've witnessed, for instance, was an Argument conflict between a fellow PC and his cousin, as he tried to convince her to look after her daughter while he left town to fight monsters. Remember now that "Conflicts" are inclusive of a lot of situations that would normally be just "fluff" in other games.
As for the conflict turns thing: So from what I understand, each conflict, the mice and enemies decide on their next three turns in advance. Their success in each turn is heavily influenced by whether they picked an action (like Attack) that counters the enemy's action (like Feint).
Within each turn, one mouse is the one doing the action, but can the others aid him?
You've got it right. It's a mistake, however, to over-emphasize the choice of action type. Generally there are two "safe" options (Attack, Maneuver) and two "risky" (Defend, Feint) options. You can stick to rolling what you have the most dice in, and if you're not taking risky options, you'll do alright.
So picking actions is important, but it's not really the biggest determinant of the outcome; number of dice is, certainly.
Original Mouse Guard handles groups larger than three differently than Torchbearer does. For my money, TB is better in this regard.
In Mouse Guard 1e, if you have more than three you split them into groups of 2 or more, then run essentially different combats.
In Torchbearer, people just wait their turn. I've run a TB game for 10 players one time. Let's think about how that works:
Traditional Pathfinder fight:
Player 1
Orc
Player 2
Orc
Orc
Player 3
Player 4
Orc
Player 5
Orc
Orc
Orc
Player 6
Orc
Player 7
Orc
Player 8
Orc
Orc
Orc
Player 9
Player 10
Orc
Orc
That's like 23 distinct turns, most of which are the GM resolving actions against static defenses.
Here's Torchbearer:
Player 1 vs orcs!
Player 2 vs orcs!
Player 3 vs orcs!
Player 4 vs orcs!
Player 5 vs orcs!
Player 6 vs orcs!
Player 7 vs orcs!
Player 8 vs orcs!
Player 9 vs orcs!
Player 10 vs orcs!
Player 1 vs orcs!
Player 2 vs orcs!
Not only is it moving from player action to player action, but players who aren't acting (or even acting in that "round") can provide helping dice if they can explain how they're helping. This was key in running these large parties -- everyone can roll on every action, and this is how the game models strength in numbers.
Likewise, the orcs give eachother helping dice, so they roll fewer and fewer dice as they are killed off.
I love the initiative system in Mouse Guard so much I have spent much effort trying to convert it over to Pathfinder... alas, to no avail.
This might have been our GM, but we ran into problems regarding how leadership of a MouseGuard patrol works. If the patrol leader said he was ordering our scout to find the best path between town, the patrol leader had to roll Survival because he said it. If the patrol leader said that someone needs to find the best path between towns and the scout then declared he was going to do that, the scout rolled Survival. The patrol leader quickly stopped giving orders because it was forcing him to roll and fail miserably, burdening us with multiple conditions.
This sounds like the GM was using a very rigid interpretation of the "no weasels" rule.
In Torchebearer they call this "never volunteer". I tend to be more lax in my interpretation, but the spirit of the rule is to keep the action moving forward, and to keep the character with the highest skill from being the only one who ever rolls that skill. (The rich get richer, and so on).
I would not force the leader character to roll after giving the order for another to act. That's silly, and it's not really what the rule says or intends.
I think we ran into an issue with the mechanic of each side choosing 3 actions, then resolving them. It quickly became very meta trying to guess if something like the Feint or Defend action was going to work or be completely wasted. It came down to knowing the person choosing the action rather than what the opponent or PC would do. For us, I think eventually we did nothing but Attack actions.
This takes some getting used to, but once you get it, it's great.
It's not as random as it seems at first.
Skills and weapons skew people toward certain actions, so if you're up against a few guys with shields, you know that they are more likely to play Defend than Maneuver, because they'll just get more out of it. And as I already mentioned, dice pool size is usually more important than picking actions. (although in this case, a Feint would not be ill advised if you knew which turn they were going to defend on. Defend skews late in the turn, so I would put it on 2 or 3)
Attack and Feint are the only two actions that can WIN the fight, but the latter comes with a great deal of risk.
Attack and Maneuver are the low-risk options, and there's really nothing wrong with "Attack Attack Attack" if you have the dice to support it. A clever opponent can defeat this smartly, but it's still not a bad tactic.
But basically the key to the MG/TB conflict system is to let your character's and enemy's bonuses guide the things in the direction they want to go.
Remember now that "Conflicts" are inclusive of a lot of situations that would normally be just "fluff" in other games.
I get that. The impression I'm getting is that the only roleplay during the GM's turn takes place during conflicts—i.e., there are no scenes that don't contain conflict, save maybe a bit of roleplay right after or before a battle. The roleplay is very structured.
That said, I'm liking the sound of all this a lot after seeing your initiative explanation.
I would not force the leader character to roll after giving the order for another to act. That's silly, and it's not really what the rule says or intends.
I think I understand this rule, but could you give some examples of when you would enforce it?
I think I understand this rule, but could you give some examples of when you would enforce it?
Basically, I use it to prevent the guy with the highest skill from ALWAYS being the guy to roll. If you let that happen in this game, characters will just stagnate.
For example, if a character describes his action as opening a door carefully, I'm not going to let the trapfinder come from the other side of the party to make the roll for him. He committed to the action when he had the idea.
This rule is intended to thwart the very real tendency of players to overplan small actions and to use out-of-character consultation to achieve highly improbable coordination within the party.
It's especially great in Torchbearer, because when the stakes are high, this leads to people asking the guy with the highest relevant skill what to do.
I would enforce this rule right up until it became too silly, like the commander example from before. If you have an idea and you're talking about the details of getting it done, you're the one who makes the roll. You can still accept helping dice, of course, which helps to explain the scene more easily. (Command could give a helping die, for instance)
Doesn't that just result in everyone's reflex being to give their fellow mice advice, though? It's as simple as, "Hey, [orator], you should talk to these guys." And if you call them on it, they just say, "What, I'm not allowed to make suggestions to other guards?"
I can't imagine that the No Weasels rule would really come up much once people are familiar with it, and it would still result in an imbalance like what it's designed to avert. Is there something I'm missing here?
Doesn't that just result in everyone's reflex being to give their fellow mice advice, though? It's as simple as, "Hey, [orator], you should talk to these guys." And if you call them on it, they just say, "What, I'm not allowed to make suggestions to other guards?"
I can't imagine that the No Weasels rule would really come up much once people are familiar with it, and it would still result in an imbalance like what it's designed to avert. Is there something I'm missing here?
Not really.
What it definitely does for me, in practice, is allow the GM to put a hard limit on the amount of "brainstorming" before a roll in the GM turn. It's meant to be fast-paced, and this rule enforces that.
Not all groups will encounter this, depending on their table habits. I know my group has a mix of players who love creating involved plans for simple actions, and a few who really hate that. So this rule has been generally welcome. (since the planners still get their fix in the player turn)
Alright, sounds good. Now I really want to buy this game! Just gotta pick between the Boxed Set and the book.
Alright, sounds good. Now I really want to buy this game! Just gotta pick between the Boxed Set and the book.
Well, I got the original boxed set, and I felt it was well worth it.
The addition of cards to manage actions and equipment adds a lot to the game.
The only thing in the original box that was kind of useless was the mouse pawns, but I don't especially mind them either.
The character sheets, GM screen, and bonus material were all great.
Any news on this front?
Sorry, Lincoln, I didn't see your post.
I'm pretty much hovering over the "Proceed to Checkout" button on the box set. Mind if I shoot a couple more questions your way?
The impression I'm getting is that the only roleplay during the GM's turn takes place during conflicts—i.e., there are no scenes that don't contain conflict, save maybe a bit of roleplay right after or before a battle. The roleplay is very structured.
Would you say that this is an accurate interpretation?
I'm moving closer to starting the gaming group, and definitely considering Mouse Guard. Would you say it's a good game to introduce new gamers with? I do think the "episodic" pacing style would work pretty well for a regularly shifting player roster, but how about the system? Any advice you have on that front?
I am curious to see how the 2nd edition will be changing things.
The impression I'm getting is that the only roleplay during the GM's turn takes place during conflicts—i.e., there are no scenes that don't contain conflict, save maybe a bit of roleplay right after or before a battle. The roleplay is very structured.
Would you say that this is an accurate interpretation?
Not exactly, but close.
The turn structure is based on obstacles, rather than conflicts, but a conflict is a kind of obstacle. An obstacle can be a single roll, with one or more players participating. Or it can be multiple rolls strung together in the conflict system. The difference is a matter of pacing.
When the GM prepares a session, they do so by selecting which obstacles the players will encounter, and which obstacles will be held in reserve as "Twists", a potential consequence of failed rolls. (Bear in mind that failing rolls is not really bad in MG, you need to fail to advance, and Twists often make a game more interesting anyway).
The GM needs to string these obstacles together somehow, and so non-obstacle transitions are a thing. You can certainly roleplay these transitions, it just means that nothing is really on the line.
The trick here is that a lot of RPGs are basically tactical combat sims where you need to bring your own roleplay (there's nothing wrong with that!) ... MG integrates the roleplay very directly instead. Combat is just another type of obstacle, and all obstacles involve the player exploiting the character's beliefs and traits in order to engage with the currency cycle of the game (called "checks"). There's not really a moment where you stop "role play time" and start "combat time".
It's not a "battle" system, it's a conflict system, and it's meant to be used for any series of competitive rolls when you want more substance than a single opposed roll. As such, it's used for arguments, chase scenes, even overland journeys (with the Season as the opponent).
So yes, you spend very little time roleplaying outside of Obstacles during the GM turn, but every obstacle is a chance to roleplay -- especially by portraying your characters traits positively and negatively, and engaging the party to describe helping rolls and the like.
I'm moving closer to starting the gaming group, and definitely considering Mouse Guard. Would you say it's a good game to introduce new gamers with? I do think the "episodic" pacing style would work pretty well for a regularly shifting player roster, but how about the system? Any advice you have on that front?
I actually think new players would be better at MG than veteran gamers. There are definitely fundamental differences that can be hard for people coming from less character-focused and more power-focused games.
The key mechanic of playing traits against yourself seems to be hard for people who come from a game where everything on the sheet is a superpower in favor of your PC -- games where failing a roll is ideally avoided. That's not MG. The system rewards the player for characterization, even if the character fails. This is the #1 hurdle for veteran gamers coming from other games.
So for a new player, getting them to embrace deliberate failure will be easier I think.
There are more rules that directly address roleplaying as gameplay in MG than in something like Pathfinder. There's never a moment where you pause the characterization in favor of something crunchy like grid combat. Combat is just another RP scene, and you can quite easily do without it entirely.
How well a new group will adapt to this depends entirely on the GM's ability to assimilate and present the game. Suspending your own long-held habits about RPGs will be the hardest part, and it would probably go best if you had a chance to be a player first.
EDIT: Looking upthread, I see we're running into the same hurdle a few times, so I'll try and explain it here:
It seems like you're coming from a paradigm of "roleplay is what happens between rolls". I understand that, because that's sort of how I play Pathfinder as well.
MG is more like how many people handle social skill rolls, but for every single roll. You do a little roleplay before the roll, and the GM decides the modifiers in favor or against you, then you roll. Except, the details are better quantified, with more crunch and more flexibility. You have a couple of different bonuses and penalties to role-play right on your sheet, and that's the meat of the whole game.
So while an adventure might comprise four obstacles, few or none of these are "combat by default". Rather they're like "things to roleplay about." An obstacle might be something as RP focused as "an inconsolable Mouse is wailing at the town gate." There will be a roll, but the roll might well be determined by the players actions. Will the other players help? If so, they must describe how before they can add the helping die. Is the PC tapping any of their traits for the roll? If they have a trait like "Insensitive" they might choose to accept a penalty (and they must describe HOW to the satisfaction of all present), which is a way to roleplay out their personal flaws of their character and get something in return, even if their character fails to console the upset mouse.
You could quite easily have an entire adventure that was all "Roleplaying" scenes such as this. And here's the trick: combat is just another such scene. When things turn violent, you look at your sheets, pick traits to include and argue for, describe how you're helping one another, and roll the dice. If the GM wants to draw it out into a whole scene, you use the conflict system to create a string of rolls, but you could just as easily handle a quick fight in one roll.
I hope this is making things more clear. I actually quite enjoy explaining it, since I had to discover this all on my own, more or less.
It seems like you're coming from a paradigm of "roleplay is what happens between rolls". I understand that, because that's sort of how I play Pathfinder as well.
Yeah, I think I'm getting that. I actually see Pathfinder's combat as a time to roleplay, too, but that may be my play-by-post experience talking. What sticks out to me is that in Mouse Guard, it's almost the reverse—roleplay is what happens when you're rolling, and therefore, when you aren't rolling, you probably aren't roleplaying.
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It seems like you're coming from a paradigm of "roleplay is what happens between rolls". I understand that, because that's sort of how I play Pathfinder as well.Yeah, I think I'm getting that. I actually see Pathfinder's combat as a time to roleplay, too, but that may be my play-by-post experience talking. What sticks out to me is that in Mouse Guard, it's almost the reverse—roleplay is what happens when you're rolling, and therefore, when you aren't rolling, you probably aren't roleplaying.
It's more like rolls in Mouse Guard represent dramatic tension, so any time you're roleplaying a good story there will be rolls. Like I said, there's nothing preventing players from sitting in a tavern and speaking in character. Some people love that, and they can do it an any game, because the mechanics need not support it.
My mind keeps returning to the social skill analogy from yesterday's post, maybe because it seems to be a hot topic elsewhere on the boards.
MG / BW / TB doesn't simulate an objective reality, it simulates a story. There's never really a roll so objective that it doesn't involve your character's personality somehow.
Pathfinder is very rigidly quantified. 5 feet is 5 feet, and how high you can jump in feet if determined by your jump skill. This logic extends to every part of the game; there's a simulation, and your actions are either adjudicated by the mechanics or they are not. (I feel the need to remind people that I quite like Pathfinder for what it is.)
"Roleplay" is almost entirely left to player preference, with very few rules directly interacting with characterization. Even when the rules *do* interact (alignment, and most people's handling of the social skills) they tend to be very descriptive rather than proscriptive.
Traits in Mouse Guard are proscriptive. Your first duty is to portray your character accurately, whether or not that results in success. Imagine if – in Pathfinder – you could only level up by portraying your alignment convincingly.
I'm right there with kobold cleaver on being about an inch from pulling the trigger on this one. Looks so interesting Damnit.
This could be the #1 system if you're looking for something completely different from Pathfinder and very story-oriented mechanically.
I can't imagine someone being disappointed with it if that's what they're after.
And again, if mice with swords aren't doing it for you, you could start with Torchbearer. Same game, but more old-school dungeon feel, and it would be cheaper than committing to the boxed set.
You can also just get the hardcover. I went with the box set because I want to run this for a group of new players.
So, Lincoln, did you have any particular ideas about starting a group out with this game? Tips, or things to avoid?
Actually, Lincoln, could you explain a bit about Torchbearer? Namely, how does anyone go about turning "old-school dungeon crawls" into a roleplaying-centric RPG? XD
Oh my god.
I guess they got tired of mice and decided to take a look at the opposition.
"Image not found" can be a beautiful thing...
Did you have any particular ideas about starting a group out with this game? Tips, or things to avoid?
Both TB and MG are complex games with emergent properties galore. Make sure your players don't stress over failure; teach them that this game rewards interesting failure every bit as much as success. Maybe more!
You can't stress that enough with new players. Failing forward is very counter-intuitive, but it is really the best part of the game. While failing does earn Checks, you might also want to point out that you need failures to advance your skills, that's usually easier for newbies to wrap their brains around.
But the most important thing is that YOU assimilate the new rules, and spend some time considering how they go together. For each scene, plan some potential plot twists to hold in reserve (MG 1st ed gives specific structure to this, not sure about 2e). Really learn what the new role of Failure is in your game, if you've been working with a simulationist definition for a long time this is a hard habit to break.
The GM gets to choose between Twists and Conditional Success pretty often. I recommend Twists in the first half of the session and Conditions in the second half -- it helps you finish on time.
Let the players make mistakes. Explain the rules, but avoid advocating a specific course of action. It takes a few sessions to really get a sense of all the moving parts; dealing with consequences until then is part of the fun!
Could you explain a bit about Torchbearer? Namely, how does anyone go about turning "old-school dungeon crawls" into a roleplaying-centric RPG? XD
Well, there's retro-gaming and then there's Torchbearer. Retro captures the Dungeon Crawl feel by reverting to the old way of doing things. Torchbearer looks at what those games were trying to evoke, and creates new and innovative rules to get the "feel" just right.
I think there are two great examples of how TB does this (and these are specific to TB, not MG): Inventory and Trap Finding.
In most games tracking inventory can be a total bore. In Torchbearer, the slot system very deliberately forces you to choose between things you might need to survive, and the ability to bring more loot out from the dungeon. Failing forward means that anything you brought can be lost to do a spelunking-related mishap (bags torn open, waterskins lost, pests in your rations). There's a lot of roleplaying around who's carrying what, I've seen at least one fight break out (I've also seen a character choke to death trying to smuggle a pouch of gems past his allies). The Grind, a relentless application of conditions that advances with each roll, ensures that Rations and Lighting are a matter of games strategy and not simply book keeping on an imaginary schedule. (You generally track how many rolls a torch lasts for, but you never really think about what time it is.)
That last one, The Grind, is what makes Trapfinding and avoiding hazards less of a pain, too. Torchbearer completely embraces the ten-foot-pole style of dungeon crawl by changing the role of failure in the game, but also by rewarding that play style. If you use common sense measures for trap detection, the GM is meant to allow those to automatically succeed (the Good Idea rule) which interacts with the way turns progress, saving you valuable resources. Even if you do fall victim to a trap, there's a huge arsenal of consequences beyond mere "hit point" damage that the GM use.
The result is to get players really thinking about the environment and dreaming up common sense solutions to obstacles using their mundane gear.
These are tropes that have been around for a long time, but they are generally disliked because the implementation was boring (especially with an ever growing list of super powers creeping into the various rulesets). Torchbearer very adeptly takes these (and other) trappings of the dungeon crawl and uses brilliant new rules to make them into fodder for roleplay.
I really like Mouse Guard, but I *LOVE* Torchbearer.
I could go on, but I should break up the wall of text a bit.
Thanks again, Lincoln. Feel free to go on whenever you want—it's always interesting stuff.
But Torchbearer sounds like a fairly death-heavy game compared to Mouse Guard. Wouldn't it make it somewhat harder to build a likeable character when that character is pretty likely to die on his first or second expedition? That's kinda what I meant by "how do they make it center on roleplaying?".
But Torchbearer sounds like a fairly death-heavy game compared to Mouse Guard. Wouldn't it make it somewhat harder to build a likeable character when that character is pretty likely to die on his first or second expedition? That's kinda what I meant by "how do they make it center on roleplaying?".
My anecdote was somewhat misleading, death is really not all that common in Torchbearer, and it is totally not arbitrary.
Rather than a health meter, both games rely on conditions alone to track the health of the character. The GM is encouraged to hand out conditions first, in fact, you're only supposed to kill the characters if they already have one or both of the two worst conditions (sick and injured).
In the case of Gorlac MacGreedy, who died swallowing gems, he already had BOTH conditions, which deprived me of my first inclination (awarding the sick condition on a failed roll). So before he attempted to swallow the gems, I said "This will be a Health roll, but you ought to be aware that with both the Sick and Injured condition, if you fail this roll, the character will die."
He chose to take the risk, and we all agreed that it was not only completely in character, but an entirely appropriate end to Gorlac's miserable career.
Death in Torchbearer frequently involves this kind of story-based negotiation. It helps to ensure that characters die when it makes sense for them to die, not arbitrarily to a bad roll.
The book goes further in describing that the players should wish for death by the time they get through a mission. They'll be hungry, exhausted, afraid, angry, sick and injured, crawling out of the dungeon mouth with all their gear missing or destroyed, and if they're lucky, with a king's ransom in tow.
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The difference between Torchbearer and Mouse Guard in regards to conditions is thus: Torchbearer has the Grind (every four turns a new condition is given, in a special order). Mouse guard doesn't.
You need to earn Checks to spend to alleviate conditions. Mouse Guard gives every player one free check during the player turn, plus whatever checks they've earned through roleplay. This makes it much easier to recover from one or two conditions, especially since they're not guaranteed to crop up with no Grind.
Torchbearer awards no free checks. During the camp phase, you have only the checks you earn. This means unless you know what you're doing, conditions hang around for a long time. Mind you, as I explained above, misery is not death. It's hard to die in Torchbearer, but it is easy to become a shambling mess.
The net result is that Mouse Guard is a much more relaxing experience, and Torchbearer is the perfect game for players with masochist tendencies (or players who can very quickly grasp the metagame, we've had a few). Death, however, is exceedingly rare in both.
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I'd like to resurrect this thread for a few more words of advice.
With the 2nd ed. book already in stores and the box set only a few weeks from being ready to ship on the major online retailers, which would you recommend for the player completely new to the system and why?
Is the system any more "kid friendly" than others in terms of rules complexity? I own the Pathfinder beginner box which I'm saving until my boys are just a few years older.
I get that this game has its own rich source material in the graphic novels. Any 2 or 3 you'd recommend to really get a feel for the setting?
Thanks for any advice you're willing to share!
I looked through the 2nd Edition book in the store the other day and couldn't notice any significant difference from the first edition, other than simply being in-print.
That doesn't mean that there aren't small fixes in there somewhere, just that nothing was so major that I could tell on first inspection.
@Osric: As mentioned, the first and second are basically the same game as far as I can tell.
I would say that vs. Pathfinder, the game is definitely more kid friendly. The "Plot Twist" element of failed rolls (as opposed to the "closed door" interpretation of failed rolls in PF) is especially fertile in the hands of young imaginations. A failed roll can mean almost anything! Veteran roleplayers sometimes strain to re-learn the possibilities in such a system, but for those without acquired hangups, it can be very giving.
But, Mouse Guard is not a "lite" RP system. There's a lot of depth to the rules, a lot of interlocking parts. The math is simple, but the rules are actually quite complex in a way. There's not a lot to memorize, but the interactions are many. If a child is expecting that RPGs are like video games, then Pathfinder is closer to the mark.
Start with the first graphic novel, "Fall". Then move to "Winter". Please bear in mind, these are only "kids" books according to an older sensibility -- they are at times very dark and sad, as befits the life of a prey animal in a dangerous world.
Hey, Lincoln, are you still about?
I now own the Mouse Guard sourcebook, in no small part thanks to you. Can't wait to play something! I have just one question.
When running the GM's Turn, I give the mice certain obstacles and conflicts to overcome. Do I also need to give them the method to overcome such obstacles? For instance, if they see a merchant stranded in the middle of a river, do I have to tell them, "This is either a Health test to push through and reach him or a Science test to concoct an overcomplicated pulley system to lift him out"?
I'd prefer to let them come up with their own solutions, but it seems like I'm expected to keep everyone really strictly on-the-rails during the GM Turn. Is my interpretation correct?
EDIT: Also, one change I noticed is that it looks like they switched from "Deceiver" to "Manipulator" in the skills list. Or was it already like that?
EDIT EDIT: God, I love this book, but some of these examples are abysmal.
[For example,] Saxon has the Fearless trait. His player says, "I'm fearless. I want to use that trait against myself as I try to convince Kenzie and Lieam to go out and fight the snake. It's actually a bad idea!"
[Same page, five paragraphs later]
Players may not use traits against themselves in player vs. player situations.
The GM turn presents challenges which the players have to confront. You're not supposed to get too clever and try to outwit the challenge, it's very straightforward. Lots of the things a player might try to do in a normal RPG will get the response "you can do that on your player turn, right now we're dealing with this".
Once players buy in, this makes the game very fast paced, which is just as well since that leaves more time for the sandbox portion.
Come to think of it, this sort of backs up my interpretation.
Yeah, I'm still around! I'm glad to hear you got the second edition. I'm happy to answer questions about how I play, although I have only played Mouse Guard for a few sessions. Mostly I do Torchbearer, which is almost the same, so here goes:
When choosing Obstacles for the GM turn, I would definitely have a skill roll in mind ahead of time. But it is a role-playing game, and creativity should be rewarded, so if there's a really good alternative plan suggested by the players, run with it! It certainly doesn't affect the rules either way.
Just don't let them spend a bunch of time debating how to solve the problem. It's the GM turn, keep the pressure on! I try to allow only a level of discussion that would be appropriate in-character at that time. Every time they waffle, I'll throw in some tension-raising description to prompt them to act.
Basically, the spirit of the rule here is: "This problem is happening now, what's your first reaction?"
- If the players describe an action that lines up with the skill Ob you had in mind, awesome.
- If they describe something else that might work, that's fine too.
- If they're stuck for ideas, just call for the original skill you had in mind. They'll get another chance to roleplay during the test with Traits, Help and Wises. ("How are you helping?" and "How does that trait apply?" are the most effective roleplay reinforcement rules I've ever used.)
- If the situation calls for a roll but simply wouldn't allow players to choose their approach, such as a trap or a lansdslide, just call for the roll and RP around it. This is covered more explicitly under traps in Torchbearer, but should apply to MG as well.
- If they plan to try and build on specific skills by always dreaming up solutions involving those skills, they had better be REALLY good at that. And fast. Otherwise, they'll have to wait for the Player turn, that's what it's for!
This means that sometimes the GM turn obstacles are more railroady, and sometimes not. You are within your rights as a GM to throw nasty weather out there, with such a high Ob that they simply cannot succeed -- just in order to introduce a twist to your liking.
In some games, that's just mechanically unfair to the players. In Torchbearer (er, um, Mouse Guard, I mean) an impossible Ob is great in several ways: firstly, anyone looking to raise a skill that needs failure can make the roll. Secondly, it's a gift-wrapped opportunity to earn some checks -- you were going to fail anyway so the penalty doesn't matter.
Thanks for your response! That's very clarifying and sounds pretty fantastic.
Now to just work out how Weather Watcher works...
I believe that in Mouse Guard, the Weather Watcher skill allows the player to define the upcoming weather in their advantage. For the most part, this shouldn't wreak too much havoc since it requires a check at the least, and the earlier edition at least outlined some potential consequences (drought if the player never lets it rain) that could be applied as Twists.
I often find myself reminding players that Twists are a thing -- if they do something risky ("we'll leave our packs here... they'll be safe.") or if they fail a roll and I don't want to explain too much what happened ("Everything seems to have gone ok, but I will be using this failed roll as a Twist when the time comes.")
Twists are terrific. They really are the mechanic that makes MG/TB inclusive of all the nitty-gritty things that just don't fit on a combat grid.
Yeah, I just don't really get when it's used what what the practical benefit is. Since the GM chooses obstacles, and obstacles are very abstract, ruling out one type of obstacle doesn't seem that useful to me.
I know you probably don't have answers for this, since you aren't as into Mouse Guard. I'm just griping.
Also, I think MG has a different Twist mechanic than TB. Twists in Mouse Guard aren't something you hold on to—they happen as the direct consequence of a failed roll, and go away right after. Doing something risky like leaving a bag behind doesn't cause a Twist.
Yeah, I just don't really get when it's used what what the practical benefit is. Since the GM chooses obstacles, and obstacles are very abstract, ruling out one type of obstacle doesn't seem that useful to me.
I know you probably don't have answers for this, since you aren't as into Mouse Guard. I'm just griping.
Also, I think MG has a different Twist mechanic than TB. Twists in Mouse Guard aren't something you hold on to—they happen as the direct consequence of a failed roll, and go away right after. Doing something risky like leaving a bag behind doesn't cause a Twist.
Well, I recall that the advance of the seasons is based on the number of weather-related twists that the GM uses... so it might be possible for a savvy player to delay the onset of a harsher season by using the skill. However, that's a bit wonky and I doubt that's the intention of the rule.
Leaving a bag behind in itself doesn't cause a twist -- but it is fodder for a twist if a roll is failed. Let's switch to a Mouse Guard scenario, let's say the guardmice try to leave a dead drop to pick up later when returning from a mission. Leaving the dead drop may not require a roll, in the GM's estimation, but finding it again afterward might be a Pathfinder test. If they fail that test, a twist could very well be that something happened to the cache of goods while the players were absent.
OR! If the player did require a roll (Scout perhaps) to conceal the dead drop and that was failed, the GM can still resolve it with a twist -- but he can wait until the players try to recover the stash to tell them that someone else got to it first.
Twists are incredibly open-ended. They can either cause the failure of the skill roll or result from it. You can use them to fill in the world and include all of those trifling survival issues that other games can't handle due to the sheer number of mechanics you would need to simulate them.
As far as I know, TB and MG have identical Twist mechanics, but I can't say for certain that the clause about the GM being able to wait and reveal a twist down the line is in MG. It shouldn't matter though, the Twist can reveal itself whenever it would be discovered.
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For those who have run sessions, would you say that you detail out all of the obstacles and twists ahead of time? Or do you wing it a bit at times to add to some of the uncertainty of things?
Mouse Guard has a prescribed method. Pick four events for your GM turn: Mice, Animals, Nature, and Weather.
Pick any two of these to be your default obstacles. Hold the other two in reserve for twists.
This is the advice from the first edition, I don't know if it made it into the second.
Now, there's nothing saying you can't use more than four, or double up on Animals, for example. But following this format should provide you with a very well-rounded GM turn. A little short, maybe, but exciting.
My preferred method, however, is not to specify any Obs before the game, and just factor them as I go. The MG skills section (and GM screen) is awesome for that. You're best off just creating a really vivid, detailed scenario. The numbers will usually take care of themselves.
I'm trying to wrap my brain, too, around combat. Actual combat. I'll summarize how I think it goes:1. Determine disposition (is this for the party or each member?)
2. Patrol Leader (PL) picks actions for each patrol member (PM)
3. GM and PM #1 go; resolve
4. GM and other PM's take actions; resolve
5. Repeat 2-4 until one or more parties reach 0 dispositionI think I have that right, but I want to make sure before I get into a game and have to try to wrap my brain around it in the moment.
This is basically correct, yes.
Try and scrub with word "combat" out of your mind. In MG they are Conflicts. Some may be fights, but not all. And the resolution system is wide open, so relying on a traditional RPG structure, even by analogy, is likely to mess you up.
Why make the distinction? Because in an RPG combat system, the mechanics don't really tell you when the fight is over. If the characters are defending the tower from an onslaught, do they only succeed when they kill to the last man? Or do they succeed when they defeat enough to drive the rest off in fear?
This system is very much about the narrative value of victory, rather than the actual measurement of each warrior's endurance in the battle (and there is NOTHING wrong with that, BTW. Just different games.)
So, if there's a step missing here, it's step 6: Compromise.
Everything you do narratively in the fight will be working with the objectives in the scene. Depending on the level of compromise and the scene elements, characters may be injured or even killed-- or they may simply be carried off by a bird of prey and dropped far away from the party.
I would also add in step 2.5 -- Declare weapons. Even for Animals. Especially for animals. For both the players and the GM, the choice of weapon is your strongest clue into which actions might be played, and so it is necessary to keep the ADFM Conflict system from becoming totally arbitrary. For example, if you're fighting against three mice, and the weapon declaration phase goes:
Mouse 1 - Axe
Mouse 2 - Knife
Mouse 3 - Shield
What can you infer from that? How will you then play your actions? Weapons and the ratio of remaining disposition are the basis for all strategy in Mouse Guard (and Torchbearer).