H3KnucklesBut we decide which is rightand which is an illusion.Registered Userregular
edited February 2017
@Delmain God you have no idea how tempted I've been to PM the host with my speculation of who's who just to have someone I can be like "See! I knew it!" if I turn out to be correct (probably not, though).
H3KnucklesBut we decide which is rightand which is an illusion.Registered Userregular
edited February 2017
Okay, since you guys asked for it here's my excel file for the netherball II phalla. Apologies for it looking pretty garish, I'm on an old computer, and the version of excel it has doesn't support custom background or font colors, but I like using them to help me keep track of various things. Also, I've really gotta start using that player notes sheet more. It's a good idea that I was using in worksheets for previous phallas, but I'm terrible about actually filling it in with observations or speculation. Let me know if there are any issues or if you have any questions.
Okay, since you guys asked for it here's my excel file for the netherball II phalla. Apologies for it looking pretty garish, I'm on an old computer, and the version of excel it has doesn't support custom background or font colors, but I like using them to help me keep track of various things. Also, I've really gotta start using that player notes sheet more. It's a good idea that I was using in worksheets for previous phallas, but I'm terrible about actually filling it in with observations or speculation. Let me know if there are any issues or if you have any questions.
Otherwise this looks a lot like what my chicken scratchings often do aside nicely formatted/readable...
Is there some automation in the background?
When I was playing before, Phyphor wasn't in every game and some of the ones he was in he was unable to get it up and running (something about needing to log in from a particular device or something). So I kinda got in the habit of keeping track of it myself.
If you're asking about my excel file, the only thing automated are the formulas/functions in the worksheet. Pretty much everything else is updated by hand as I go. I can usually do things like the final votes sheet or updating player status pretty quickly, it's making sure I'm doing the vote records correctly that slows me down, hence why I was asking for input on stuff related to those sheets.
So I either have to get really good at drunken blind fighting, or I have to stop being so mad at myself for making dumb ill-considered choices :S
This is about where I'm at. I think I spend too much time on doing vote tallies and trying to make notes about everything and not enough time thinking about any one particular player's actions. As a result I haven't built up any kind of sense of who players are or how they play, except for the really notorious personalities like Sir Fab or kime.
Back when I first started playing, I would dive into soft networking and take stupid chances on comitting to group threads, but it paid off in a lot of little ways that got me a surprising amount of positive buzz in the Phalla Awards last year (unfortunately I didn't see any of it until just recently). However, it also tended to spell the doom of who I was playing with because we were too open, and when things weren't going according to plan in the late game I panicked and screwed everything up in a couple games while trying to figure out who the mole was.
Going forward I need to focus more on trying to learn to read the players, but that's something I always struggle with, which is part of why I'm usually content with being a low-key casual in most competitive games. I also need to get back on that horse with soft networking, but be more cagey about the extent to which I trust people, while being slower to distrust when things are going wrong.
Or I could just say to hell with all of it and play by gut. But I know I won't.
Yep.
It's the reading bit that takes time.
Why someone voted the way they did, as opposed to who they've voted for.
It's ridiculous how much more effective I was when I could spend 2-3 hours / day analysing every single communication I had received.
Just the more time you sink into trying to understand why something was sent, the closer you get to the truth.
Now's it's like: "Gut's telling me something. Don't have time to look. It's probably shit."
And then get upset later on because getting upset at myself for bad play is in my nature.
Maybe I just need a list of mafia keywords.
And then kill everyone who uses them.
Well, it's coming up to the end of February, and Arena of Phalla is still in need of heavy number tweaking. But I still want to run a game! So I will put up a game tomorrow.
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WACriminalDying Is Easy, Young ManLiving Is HarderRegistered Userregular
Things are calming down in my life, so I'm getting myself back in the Phalla-designing pipeline. At the moment, I'm constructing a Minecraft game in the legacy genre, with a persistent map, inventories, etc. across multiple games. My plan is to introduce new items and features (metals, crops, villager varieties, etc.) with each game, as well as try out different mechanics. So some games might be faction-based, some might not. There might also be some not-a-Phallas and CYOA elements. But always, a player's inventory will persist across games, allowing you guys to gradually build up villages, farms, machine sheds, and magical lairs as the game mechanics grow more complex.
Is that a game/series people would be interested in trying?
Things are calming down in my life, so I'm getting myself back in the Phalla-designing pipeline. At the moment, I'm constructing a Minecraft game in the legacy genre, with a persistent map, inventories, etc. across multiple games. My plan is to introduce new items and features (metals, crops, villager varieties, etc.) with each game, as well as try out different mechanics. So some games might be faction-based, some might not. There might also be some not-a-Phallas and CYOA elements. But always, a player's inventory will persist across games, allowing you guys to gradually build up villages, farms, machine sheds, and magical lairs as the game mechanics grow more complex.
Is that a game/series people would be interested in trying?
People are generally interested in all kinds of things. The most important thing when exploring new mechanics and other novelties is to be clear with expectations. You do not want players to feel like they were conned into playing a game that is nothing like they thought it would be.
I had some crazy ideas for a Fringe Phalla with either two threads or everyone's role alternating between odd days and even days but I haven't gotten much farther than that. Partnership might be useful.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
Things are calming down in my life, so I'm getting myself back in the Phalla-designing pipeline. At the moment, I'm constructing a Minecraft game in the legacy genre, with a persistent map, inventories, etc. across multiple games. My plan is to introduce new items and features (metals, crops, villager varieties, etc.) with each game, as well as try out different mechanics. So some games might be faction-based, some might not. There might also be some not-a-Phallas and CYOA elements. But always, a player's inventory will persist across games, allowing you guys to gradually build up villages, farms, machine sheds, and magical lairs as the game mechanics grow more complex.
Is that a game/series people would be interested in trying?
People are generally interested in all kinds of things. The most important thing when exploring new mechanics and other novelties is to be clear with expectations. You do not want players to feel like they were conned into playing a game that is nothing like they thought it would be.
Rats. There goes my big ideas.
Edit: I mean, it's a fair point. I had two ideas for games with a big twist, but probably never would've attempted them anyways.
Things are calming down in my life, so I'm getting myself back in the Phalla-designing pipeline. At the moment, I'm constructing a Minecraft game in the legacy genre, with a persistent map, inventories, etc. across multiple games. My plan is to introduce new items and features (metals, crops, villager varieties, etc.) with each game, as well as try out different mechanics. So some games might be faction-based, some might not. There might also be some not-a-Phallas and CYOA elements. But always, a player's inventory will persist across games, allowing you guys to gradually build up villages, farms, machine sheds, and magical lairs as the game mechanics grow more complex.
Is that a game/series people would be interested in trying?
People are generally interested in all kinds of things. The most important thing when exploring new mechanics and other novelties is to be clear with expectations. You do not want players to feel like they were conned into playing a game that is nothing like they thought it would be.
Rats. There goes my big ideas.
Edit: I mean, it's a fair point. I had two ideas for games with a big twist, but probably never would've attempted them anyways.
I think that people would be open to "Plot Twists" if they were about the story or setting, but not about the way the game functions.
People would probably enjoy a good twist, but not at the sake of them finding out that the faction game they thought they were playing is a survivor game that suddenly pits them against the people they were working with and invalidates multiple days of work. Especially if you're thinking of persistent across game effects.
If they thought they were playing to win by buddying up with 3 people and have been building their inventory/skills/whatever in that way, if you changed it mid-game, people would be unhappy that they could be at a disadvantage about something they couldn't have possibly known.
I like the idea of games affecting each other (pretty sure there have been one or two settings that have done that, not played them though), as it's nice to have some sort of carryover. At the same time, I'd want to know what my goals are from the beginning, as I shouldn't be able to make a choice in one game that makes it impossible for me to win in the next game.
Don't people generally hate the cultist role/team?
I mean, if you know some people are going be unhappy at the end, you can always just accept that for the game design you want.
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H3KnucklesBut we decide which is rightand which is an illusion.Registered Userregular
edited March 2017
Well, idea 1 was very much just a handful of ideas for a Code Geass game and not remotely developed.
it'd be faction-based, with two alliances of several different factions each, loosely affiliated by having a common goal of defeating the opposing alliance, but differing win cons beyond that. The big twist was going to be that Diethard would be a kind of survival neutral with a wincon compelling him to "go where the story is" (no idea how to actually do that mechanically), who would have the power to manipulate the daily narration. Also, whoever was playing as Lelouch would need to have a way to anonymously contact the players who were Black Knights in his capacity as Zero, creating confusion as to which Britannian was on their side. I had some other crazy ideas for characters like Mao (who can read minds, but has no control over whom, he just perpetually hears the thoughts of everyone in a wide area around him), Anya & Marianne (Marianne is dead, but her geass allowed her to project her conciousness into Anya's mind, acting as a split-personality that guided the girl into a life of being a child-prodigy mecha-pilot), & Charles (has a geass that can alter other people's memories), none of which would probably be doable, at least not in a fun way. CC & VV would also be tricky to do, what with being immortal unless a geass-user with a sufficiently developed Geass does them in, but the idea of opposed players whose special power is to give other players a randomly-selected special power seemed pretty cool.
The other idea was more tame, but basically amounted to presenting the game as a standard village/mafia set-up, except it's actually a faction game with multiple competing groups (each with distinct abilities, who'd all initially be led to think they were the only mafia based on their role pms) and only a small village with a paranoid seer (who'd see everyone as a mafia, but correctly identify which faction the real mafia are in). This was loosely inspired by Warhammer (but wouldn't have been overtly flavored that way since it'd be a dead giveaway to anyone familiar with the settings).
Edit: Forgot "cult" and "cultist" have a specific meaning in mafia game terms. Fixed idea 2's description.
Well, idea 1 was very much just a handful of ideas for a Code Geass game and not remotely developed.
it'd be faction-based, with two alliances of several different factions each, loosely affiliated by having a common goal of defeating the opposing alliance, but differing win cons beyond that. The big twist was going to be that Diethard would be a kind of survival neutral with a wincon compelling him to "go where the story is" (no idea how to actually do that mechanically), who would have the power to manipulate the daily narration. Also, whoever was playing as Lelouch would need to have a way to anonymously contact the players who were Black Knights in his capacity as Zero, creating confusion as to which Britannian was on their side. I had some other crazy ideas for characters like Mao (who can read minds, but has no control over whom, he just perpetually hears the thoughts of everyone in a wide area around him), Anya & Marianne (Marianne is dead, but her geass allowed her to project her conciousness into Anya's mind, acting as a split-personality that guided the girl into a life of being a child-prodigy mecha-pilot), & Charles (has a geass that can alter other people's memories), none of which would probably be doable, at least not in a fun way. CC & VV would also be tricky to do, what with being immortal unless a geass-user with a sufficiently developed Geass does them in, but the idea of opposed players whose special power is to give other players a randomly-selected special power seemed pretty cool.
The other idea was more tame, but basically amounted to presenting the game as a standard village/mafia set-up, except it's actually a faction game with multiple competing groups (each with distinct abilities, who'd all initially be led to think they were the only mafia based on their role pms) and only a small village with a paranoid seer (who'd see everyone as a mafia, but correctly identify which faction the real mafia are in). This was loosely inspired by Warhammer (but wouldn't have been overtly flavored that way since it'd be a dead giveaway to anyone familiar with the settings).
Edit: Forgot "cult" and "cultist" have a specific meaning in mafia game terms. Fixed idea 2's description.
lol I did exactly this
I did it because I was curious if mafia are generally less or more talkative and wanted to see what would happen if everyone thought they were mafia
BaidolI will hold him offEscape while you canRegistered Userregular
edited March 2017
Expectations! While it might damp down the "oh shit" factor, telling people that things may get crazy at some point at least tells people that, yeah, you might be signing up for a glorious train wreck. In that case, most people will say "Well, shit, I'm getting the fuck on anyway."
H3KnucklesBut we decide which is rightand which is an illusion.Registered Userregular
edited March 2017
I'd like to say, I do have an idea for a faction-battle style Bloodborne game I might want to try and do for next Halloween. I'd probably need someone to write the narration. Although, I knew a guy on the Game Grumps subreddit who's a huge nut for the lore, maybe I should see if he'd be interested in writing for it... Well, if a regular here is interested, let me know and we'll see when it gets to be that time of year.
Expectations! While it might damp down the "oh shit" factor, telling people that things may get crazy at some point at least tells people that, yeah, you might be signing up for a glorious train wreck. In that case, most people will say "Well, shit, I'm getting the fuck on anyway."
Yeah, that is a lesson better not learned through experience so all new hosts should commit the above post to memory
Expectations! While it might damp down the "oh shit" factor, telling people that things may get crazy at some point at least tells people that, yeah, you might be signing up for a glorious train wreck. In that case, most people will say "Well, shit, I'm getting the fuck on anyway."
Yeah, that is a lesson better not learned through experience so all new hosts should commit the above post to memory
Just pull it enough that that kind of thing is already assumed
Posts
You make my dreams come true.
Critical Failures - Havenhold Campaign • August St. Cloud (Human Ranger)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pxvdxrjj12llyqo/2017 Q1 phalla netherball game 2 - Copy.xls?dl=0
This was another thing.
My spreadsheet was only used once by me.
I was more frustrated by the lack of time I had to put into everything than anything else.
So I either have to get really good at drunken blind fighting, or I have to stop being so mad at myself for making dumb ill-considered choices :S
Otherwise this looks a lot like what my chicken scratchings often do aside nicely formatted/readable...
Is there some automation in the background?
When I was playing before, Phyphor wasn't in every game and some of the ones he was in he was unable to get it up and running (something about needing to log in from a particular device or something). So I kinda got in the habit of keeping track of it myself.
If you're asking about my excel file, the only thing automated are the formulas/functions in the worksheet. Pretty much everything else is updated by hand as I go. I can usually do things like the final votes sheet or updating player status pretty quickly, it's making sure I'm doing the vote records correctly that slows me down, hence why I was asking for input on stuff related to those sheets.
Edit to add:
This is about where I'm at. I think I spend too much time on doing vote tallies and trying to make notes about everything and not enough time thinking about any one particular player's actions. As a result I haven't built up any kind of sense of who players are or how they play, except for the really notorious personalities like Sir Fab or kime.
Back when I first started playing, I would dive into soft networking and take stupid chances on comitting to group threads, but it paid off in a lot of little ways that got me a surprising amount of positive buzz in the Phalla Awards last year (unfortunately I didn't see any of it until just recently). However, it also tended to spell the doom of who I was playing with because we were too open, and when things weren't going according to plan in the late game I panicked and screwed everything up in a couple games while trying to figure out who the mole was.
Going forward I need to focus more on trying to learn to read the players, but that's something I always struggle with, which is part of why I'm usually content with being a low-key casual in most competitive games. I also need to get back on that horse with soft networking, but be more cagey about the extent to which I trust people, while being slower to distrust when things are going wrong.
Or I could just say to hell with all of it and play by gut. But I know I won't.
It's the reading bit that takes time.
Why someone voted the way they did, as opposed to who they've voted for.
It's ridiculous how much more effective I was when I could spend 2-3 hours / day analysing every single communication I had received.
Just the more time you sink into trying to understand why something was sent, the closer you get to the truth.
Now's it's like: "Gut's telling me something. Don't have time to look. It's probably shit."
And then get upset later on because getting upset at myself for bad play is in my nature.
Maybe I just need a list of mafia keywords.
And then kill everyone who uses them.
Yes, even in a pure faction vs faction game
Hey!
At least he said that Sir Fab wasn't a ref this game.
Same minute Sir Fab said the same thing too!
Ah ha ha
Ha
I could build my phalla analytical engine into Nethack! (the post-apocalyptic Javascript code-sandox hacking game)
There are no humes.
Everyone is a robot.
It's post-apocalyptic in that manner :P
I disagree!
Is that a game/series people would be interested in trying?
When's the next Poke-Phalla @Grunt's Ghosts :bzz:
People are generally interested in all kinds of things. The most important thing when exploring new mechanics and other novelties is to be clear with expectations. You do not want players to feel like they were conned into playing a game that is nothing like they thought it would be.
Rats. There goes my big ideas.
Edit: I mean, it's a fair point. I had two ideas for games with a big twist, but probably never would've attempted them anyways.
Maybe in like... 5 years once the kid is in school.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
Completely true. The 1 year old is easier to take care of than the 4 year old.
I think that people would be open to "Plot Twists" if they were about the story or setting, but not about the way the game functions.
People would probably enjoy a good twist, but not at the sake of them finding out that the faction game they thought they were playing is a survivor game that suddenly pits them against the people they were working with and invalidates multiple days of work. Especially if you're thinking of persistent across game effects.
If they thought they were playing to win by buddying up with 3 people and have been building their inventory/skills/whatever in that way, if you changed it mid-game, people would be unhappy that they could be at a disadvantage about something they couldn't have possibly known.
I like the idea of games affecting each other (pretty sure there have been one or two settings that have done that, not played them though), as it's nice to have some sort of carryover. At the same time, I'd want to know what my goals are from the beginning, as I shouldn't be able to make a choice in one game that makes it impossible for me to win in the next game.
I mean, if you know some people are going be unhappy at the end, you can always just accept that for the game design you want.
The other idea was more tame, but basically amounted to presenting the game as a standard village/mafia set-up, except it's actually a faction game with multiple competing groups (each with distinct abilities, who'd all initially be led to think they were the only mafia based on their role pms) and only a small village with a paranoid seer (who'd see everyone as a mafia, but correctly identify which faction the real mafia are in). This was loosely inspired by Warhammer (but wouldn't have been overtly flavored that way since it'd be a dead giveaway to anyone familiar with the settings).
Edit: Forgot "cult" and "cultist" have a specific meaning in mafia game terms. Fixed idea 2's description.
lol I did exactly this
I did it because I was curious if mafia are generally less or more talkative and wanted to see what would happen if everyone thought they were mafia
People were not happy at the end of that game
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/175532/mini-phalla-mafia-village-the-informed-minority-aka-mafia-and-inantp-wins/p1
Yeah, that is a lesson better not learned through experience so all new hosts should commit the above post to memory
Just pull it enough that that kind of thing is already assumed