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I'd never heard of this kind of solo-playing RPG, but having just tinkered around a little with Ironsworn I'd definitely say it's more of a creative writing exercise or 'structured daydreaming' than it is the typical RPG experience. My go-to recommendation for people that want that old RPG crunchy rules feeling is the board game mage night. It's a great solo play and presents a really complex puzzle to solve. Engaging with the rules and systems fills my need for tabletop goodness when I can't be around with friends. Since so many of our D&D games just end up being combat-monster encounters in published modules, Mage Knight fills my need there. I feel like Ironsworn fills a need to be creative reasonably well and provides one with a number of good prompts. In my brief ~90 minute session today at least two scenes came up where I felt the emotion could be unpacked enough to write a little story, and I got inspiration for a couple of scenes that would be fun to paint. I just wish one of these activities filled the need for person-to-person role playing. The only way I'm going to scratch that itch during COVID is on a Warcraft RP server or something.
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Feb 15, 2021 22:11
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Here's a question for you...what systems do people usually use the Mythic GM Emulator for? Since it's a semi-logical Q/A system, it can slot in to most anything, but I think for solo gaming in particular there will be a give-take between narrative and systems. I don't think playing something like D&D solo with the GM emulator would be very satisfying. On the other end of the spectrum, a heavily narrative game like Ironsworn probably doesn't need the GM emulator except as an idea generator.
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Feb 16, 2021 14:28
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Drone posted:Ironsworn can do this easily with its Bonds system (and also by swearing Vows to people and your relationship to them rather than "go to the mountain and kill the dragon" style quest vows), but it doesn't really meet the player halfway by underlining that terribly explicitly in the rules. The book itself mentions that this is a good use of a Bond/Vow a few times, but it's mostly glossed over in an effort to underscore what else Bonds could be (an attachment to a place/thing/organization, etc.) To my mind, Ironsworn is capable of creating a lot of different kinds of games but it's largely dependent on the creativity of the solo player and their willingness to engage the systems as is appropriate to the growing narrative. In that sense, the player also needs to understand the systems of the game well enough to know which moves to call for which situation. It's possible to make every character interaction in the game highly confrontational with combat moves or journey moves, but ultimately the social moves and bonds are important and help drive the dramatic narrative forward. The potential problem with a solo RPG is the player may be inclined to push the story ONLY in directions that interest them, or they may wish to move the story away from conflicts that feel too stressful or complicated to get involved in. In a real tabletop RPG these sorts of situations will necessarily arise because there are other people around the table who have characters with agency and who want to move the story in a particular way. The GM also has an agenda and input as well. In the end this collaborative storytelling experience creates something larger than the sum of its parts. To give an example from my own play of Ironsworn, my character's vow is to find a way to forge unbreakable iron, which will create tools and weapons for the village that never wear out. The initial hook was to follow-up on rumors of a mystic with unbreakable tools who will be at a great Moot of village leaders on the first day of summer. This was the part of the story I was personally interested in, and I initially wanted to start the story from the point where my character had found the mystic. However, I decided to start with the journey to the moot. I though this would be an easy task and give me a chance to understand the game systems a little before getting into the meat of the play. I decided also to add some spice by charging my character with accompanying the local village leader to the moot. The dice were not kind to me on my journey and I ended up waylaid by bandits, losing several days holing up during a violent storm, and eventually getting lost. We missed the great Moot completely and I lost my chance to meet the mystic. During all of this, the NPC was an additional complication and through the evolution of the character interactions we discovered that the NPC leader did not want to lead and did not want to journey to the moot. By the time we missed the Moot the NPC had convinced my character not to return to the village and to instead continue to pursue the mystic as a team. None of this where I initially wanted the story to go but I found the NPC/character interaction over time to really interest me. I think all of us play these games hoping to see the story move in interesting ways. In a multiplayer RPG, story movement comes from character interplay and the PCs bouncing off each other as well as the GM supplied moving parts. In a solo RPG all of the agency lies with the player, and the player needs to challenge themselves to think outside the box and perhaps let the story go in ways that don't interest them. Personally I find myself devoting a fair bit of mental energy and game time coming up with interesting twists and turns and I'd like to spend more time actually playing through the interesting twists and turns. I'd like a solo RPG to provide more of these without me spending that time and energy.
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Feb 16, 2021 15:00
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Selecta84 posted:I just ordered my copy of Ironsworn which should arrive in 2-3 weeks. Probably significantly better than solo. It’s nice to have someone to bounce ideas off of. If you’re not used to narrative style games you should read up on Apocalypse World and PbtA systems. The big focus is on player agency and the moves they do shape the narrative, and thus the world. If the players don’t take an active role in the game then the engine fails. Nothing happens. Traditional RPers can get hung up on the style if they’re used to a DM spoon feeding them. Some players just don’t like it because it requires everyone to buy in to the fact that they’re creating a shared narrative and there’s nothing to stop That Guy from gaming the system. A friend of mine once described it as, “meta-gaming by the rules.”
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Feb 17, 2021 15:06
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