Goof and Grump
A tabletop roleplaying discussion podcast about our experiences running, playing, and designing for all manner of modern and old-school games. Hosted by Alexander Tzakis and James Ekdahl, we delve our experiences at the table hoping you'll find something to bring back to yours.
Goof and Grump
One Page TTRPGs - EP. 3
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Alex and James Discuss: One Page TTRPGs
- What are one page tabletop roleplaying games and what do we think about them?
- Game design: Kinds of fun - MDA Philosophy
- What are our preferred kinds of fun?
- A game well played
- What's new is old and what's old is new again
- One Page RPG examples and proper discussion
- SWAT (Origins of Filth) a G&G one page RPG - Coming soon!
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Listening to the goofing things to get the table. Here we reflect on our experience, looking for wisdom to make us better players at the table and hope to give you something to bring back to yours.
SPEAKER_01I'm ready. I'm pumped, actually. So I'm looking forward to this discussion a little bit.
SPEAKER_00I I find the concept of the one-page RPG very interesting and also like this like shining gem just beyond my reach because I'm I'm very bad at siphoning down or or carving down a concept into something I could fit on one page. I mean that's part of the magic though, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01Like the Yeah, I don't know. I mean, something we recently discovered, and I'm just like, it's opened up a whole new this whole new avenue, right? Like I love, I love a good rule book. You and I both know this. We both got shelves full of them, right? Like it's uh it's I I even enjoy the games, like even if I know I'm never gonna play it, I'm just gonna I buy these things at the cons just to read through them and just to get the ideas, just to see what other people have done. And I feel like you get that in like bite-sized chunks, but they're like distilled down to the most important stuff only, right? In these one-page things, because everyone is having the same challenge where they're like, get it all on one page. But anyway, I like just discovered this as we were talking about it's fascinating. I'm just I'm really, you know, just eating it up.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, 100%. I'm on the same page. Like, I I have shelves and shelves of books that I may never actually play the game of, but I am always hunting for like some new mechanic, some new tidbit that just makes the game at the table more fun. Like, I'm I'm always trying to find something I'm gonna add. I'm excited to talk about this. I think we we've got a we've got a plan. First, we're gonna talk about one-page RPG jams, what what our experiences are with them. Then we're gonna talk about design philosophy and the craft of these games. And then you have cooked up uh your own one-page game. Basically, you've got like a written up from some ridiculous throwaway comment that I made, which I'm super excited to walk through.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, definitely the the idea of solo RPGs and stuff is very antithesis to what my understanding of my enjoyment of RPGs and DT RPGs is in general, right? It's like all about the communal storytelling and like the thing we're doing together and the I don't know, like the vibes. It's like a very communal activity. Uh-huh. It's an us activity, right? And so to embark on it on on my own is a a little weird. Or like the idea of it, I I always kind of like strayed away from. Um but it's fascinating. It's definitely like a part of play, like you said, is just kind of like booming and there's definitely demand for it. It's one of the things that I know I've seen from working at the booth, right? Like the number of people who come and ask, like, oh, is there a solo mode? Can't I play alone? Like, how many players do I need? There's certainly like appetite for those kinds of games. Um but you also mentioned kind of like what what's the difference between a board game and uh an RPG? And I um that's it's an interesting point, right? At what point do you consider it? Like, does it does it change and like does it matter if you're playing the solo anyway, right? Like it doesn't you're just finding a way to you know problem solve or pass the time or do do something uh entertaining for yourself that's not just you know scrolling on your phone or something for that. But definitely come back. But um yeah, I don't know. Definitely in the in the one-page space, it seems like there's a lot of solo focused content, or at least the ones that I've engaged with, are primarily for um solo content, but you can play them together.
SPEAKER_00One of the things that I I I read again since looking into researching stuff for this conversation is the uh you know, the MDA white paper, which is uh uh mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics. This is something that's mentioned in uh Delton Code Machines or ExoWit Omnis, ExoWit Press. They make the um the the make a one-page RPG book, basically. It's like a 40 some odd page book on HIO that you can download. Um and in there is reference this white paper uh from 2004, I think. But mechanics are describing the particular components of the game, you know, mechanics are the actions that you're taking. Like, like how are you actually technically having a game here? And dynamics is describing the runtime behavior of the mechanics, acting on players' input and each other's outputs over time. So it's kind of like how those mechanics uh interface with each other between the player and the game, and the you know what the designer put in place for the player to experience and and then how the player actually uses that or or ignores it, and then aesthetics um describe the desirable emotional responses that uh are invoked in the player. So when that person interacts with the game or the system, like the designer is trying to invoke some response from the player, and and how successful is that? So uh all of this kind of is in the soup between uh board games and and TTRPGs, and I think there's just a different weight and a different stuff. Um, since we're talking about it already, I feel like we might as well just uh talk about design aspects. Uh we can always come back to specific games if you have one in mind, but uh, I wanted to list through the types of fun that is in the MDA because that's like a basis for moving the discussion to like, you know, what kind of fun do you have? What kind of fun can you design for? There's eight eight types of fun in TTRPG or or in gaming uh that is suggested by the MDA. So one is sensation, gaming as a sense pleasure. Number two is fantasy, game as make-believe. Number three is narrative, game as drama. Number four is challenge, game as obstacle course. Number five is fellowship, game as social framework. Six is discovery, game as uncharted territory, seven is expression, game as self-discovery, and eight is submission, game as pastime. Uh so I I want to kick it over to you in a second here to kind of get your mix of like what you think is the most fun. I always think this is cool to like see what you think is fun and what I think is fun and where they overlap. Um, but I think for most uh TTRPGs and most games in general, like fellowship is high for me. Like the game is a social framework. I I spend a lot of time trying to pick games that I know are gonna be enjoyable for whatever group I'm trying to play with. And it's kind of games are kind of how I connect with people in general. It's it's like my preferred thing to be doing. You know, sitting around playing a game together, I feel like is is the fastest way to kind of get a grasp on like each other's personalities and and to actually like put us, uh put everybody at the table engaged into some activity that that that leads to to something. Uh usually that leads to a narrative, which leads to like just experiences and connection points around like, oh, that one time we did this or one time we did that, or you know, the meta at the table between rounds of strategy games where people get more and more salty and butthurt, and and uh you know, uh you'll have one player that uh gets a reputation for being good at something and everybody else gangs up on them, that kind of stuff. And so uh not not at all. I don't really know what you're talking about. Never heard of such a thing, huh? Well, so like I I like all of them, but those are my my my biggest two are probably fellowship, uh narrative, and then all the other ones are in there for sure. But like what's like your top two?
SPEAKER_01Okay, well, let me ask you real quick. I just want to want to make sure I got these. Uh again, can you can you rifle them off real quick? Um, just like I thought I was paying the interest, but I'm I didn't catch the the key words. I was like mostly mostly listening, because this is actually a new concept for me. Like I shouldn't read through that.
SPEAKER_00Um I'll definitely send you this document that you're ready.
SPEAKER_01After the fact, yeah, you just definitely send that to me afterwards. Um but but yeah, I'm interested.
SPEAKER_00So I'll list them off. You you tell me which two hit you like as as like your your top two. So one is sensation, sense pleasure, two is fantasy, make-believe, three is narrative, drama, four is challenge, obstacle course, five is fellowship, social framework, six is uncharted territory, it's discovery, seven is expression, self-discovery, and eight is submission, which is game as pastime. I don't really get why submission is game as pastime, but um basically having a game that you're just playing as like a traditional pastime. Do any of those kind of jump out of you?
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah, so the the two right-away that jump out of me is is challenge. First of all, you you know, I just you know, I like the games. I love I love the impossible situation. Um you know what kind of games I like, you know, the things that I that I enjoy playing, right? And so like being thrown into something that you're not supposed to win that is supposed to be challenging, that it you know, it's like very difficult, right? Um and to do that together creates moments for I don't know, something interesting to happen. And that's like really what we're looking for at at the game, someone to do something unexpected in the face of something very challenging, right? And that's like can be both puzzles and also just like the way the game is designed, right? So like I'm a little bit less on on the puzzles. Like I know we've had a couple of those in RPG sessions where there's like, yeah, there's like 14 levers and you gotta pull them in the right, you know, uh algorithmic, like they're all numbers of pi. Okay, well, yeah. Uh I'm I'm checking out on that one a little bit because it's not the kind of challenge that I'm looking for, but but more so like this idea that um you know, like in in Kingdom Death or in like some of these other things where it's like the monster that you know to be facing down, you have no business facing down, but you're gonna try anyway, and you're gonna do something crazy. Um I love that. I really enjoy challenging things, you know. If there's uh you know, in Scythe, right? Like I really enjoy the um Tokugawa shoguny, right? It's not supposed to win, they're underdogs, they're pretty universally accepted as like a bad faction. But I love it. And I like playing the traps, and I like doing that. If I can make something interesting happen, and I can make someone choose a non-optimal path to deal with something I'm doing, then I've successfully played that game.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, you see, that's that's very interesting. That's it's okay. So what I'm hearing, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, is like so challenge is real high for you, but that challenge has to fit into fit into an expected kind of like uh approach avenue, or else you're just gonna make your own fun and you're gonna make your own challenge and be like, exactly.
SPEAKER_01100%, which is why the second one for me is expression, right? The second one that like just popped out is just expression, right? Because then it's like, okay, well then um you're a paladin, and that is a choice that is like one of seven choices in the book, and yada yada. But how what what does that mean to you and what do you do with that is what I find interesting and enjoy about that, and especially with RPGs, right? That was the that was the aha moment. Um you mentioned before we're both we're both extremely lucky to play with Adam and things like he plays a priest every game, but it's not the same priest, and they have very memorable, distinct characters and all that stuff, right? It's like that's just I know that's player skill, but it's just expression, and that makes it memorable, and it makes it a great thing, right? Yeah, uh, I think in both in both cases, both of these things, both challenge and expression, really. I don't know if you've read through Name of the Wind. Um I've started Patrick. I've started it, but I have not finished it. I have the audiobook. Yeah, no worries. It drags and he's never gonna finish the book, so that's gonna rush. Autoba? Probably uh you've got another decade, right? Uh-huh. He's gonna he'll release it when Windsor Winter's gonna be. Or something like it. And Wormwood has actually produced the rules and like actually made this whole thing. Um, like a real-world version of it? They're yeah, yeah. It's actually very cool. That's a totally a sidebar. But anyway, so they're they're playing this game, but you can think of it as chess. And um he plays with this guy. Um, he's an acquaintance that they that's their main feature of their relationship is playing this game. And uh, you know, the main character, he he always loses and loses and loses, but it gets better and better and better. When he finally beats him, then he gets real high and mighty on himself and tells him, he's like, Well, now I'm now I'm an excellent player at this game. And so then he's like, Okay, we'll reset the board. And the guy beats him in like three or four moves, like several times in a row. Well fun. Yeah. And so he says, like, this was just a really like this stuck to stuck out to me because this is like very much the way that I play games. That it's like, it's not actually that interesting or fun to play a game in a way that is just formulaic and like can't be won. So that the one guy is clearly better than the other player, right? When the player's skill level is so vastly different, but he plays down to the level of opponents that it keeps it interesting, right? He'll give up, you know, almost like when you play chess with a handicap, or you like give up some key pieces at the beginning to make it harder for yourself. You give your give yourself a handicap, but yourself at a disadvantage to even the playing field, because a beautiful game, a game well played, is more satisfying than uh a game one. Yes, I I definitely feel that. So that's definitely like that's definitely where I end up, and I feel like both of these things, challenge and expression, lead into that, and that is like that is a core belief of mine, right? That a game well played is is more satisfying and more worthwhile than a game one.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I think we I think we definitely are on the same page there. I the self-discovery thing, I I think I can I can think of a lot of examples where I'm here at the table just playing this game just to see if I can figure one thing out or if I can just mess with the guy at the table that's being a bully and keep and anti-king make him, you know, that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01So I'd be the I'm definitely pop out of the woods and kind of just decide the game and you know, one turn late game.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I think that's part of why there's people that love root and people that absolutely hate root is because it's like uh this game goes to 30 and you just obliterated any chance I had of winning because you just didn't like the thing that I did last turn. I'm like, yeah, well, that's that that's true. But I I I that's true. That's really interesting though, because I find I look for these games that create these situations where it's not a solved game and it's so far from a solved game that it's different every time you play, no matter what. And the variables, the number of things that could possibly be different in every iteration, like in ITT RPG, it's just infinite. I think that's why I've I love it. I I love it so much. It's like once once you get once I've gotten to this experience where I'm running a game and it's just basically uh improv, um improv with with rules, and and it just it has it scratches this itch that I don't think anything else does. Board games come close because uh the thing I like about the board games is that they try to create an even playing field, even the asymmetric games, they try to make it so that's an even playing field every time, so that the decisions are interesting from each faction, which I think is is good. So, like but the the the self-discovery every single time I feel like I'm discovering something. You like you mentioned like chess, like and you've played chess with me. I play with Rich, I play with my dad. I win very rarely against any of the three of you. Yeah, but I still do it, and and and I know when I'm making when I'm thinking about it and like really into it and making good moves, and I know when I'm just like throwing a move from the toilet, and and I'll throw I could throw away an entire game doing that. But like playing live chess feels so good, even if I get my butt whooped. Like I feel like I'm if I'm able to focus and like be there in the moment with the opponent, and like you're really learning something about yourself and your opponent at the same time.
SPEAKER_01There's and there's always something to be improving on or like trying with, right? It's like yeah, you have an opening and you have responses, you remember what what happened last time. I don't know. I feel like you and I are a lot more evenly matched than this other two. I just get handed handed games, left it right. I don't think I don't think I bit beat Richie but once, maybe. Um, and it was not not even supposed to happen. I think he threw it away. Ah, he's so good, man. He's all red. But um yeah, yeah, I don't know. That's all right. But I I I think that's interesting too. Another another point to make, and this is you know, dangerous heading down like a sidebar, but you mentioned how board games attempt to control this this idea of balance, right? Um, and I don't know if I shared this with you. Maybe I did or didn't, but um Ian has a costis is like you know, head of uh World of Warcraft and all this stuff. He gave he gave a a speech kind of looking back on a decade of being the head of this game. Ian it was specifically it was at a game development conference, right? And I know this is not board games, but I bring it up because um it's talking about game balance. And the the thing that he brought up, which I found really interesting, is you're aware of StarCraft 2, which has come out I don't know how many years now, maybe 20, which is just board. Are you serious? Um it's uh maybe it's 15, but it's it's a long time now. Uh the point is, they have not released a balance patch for this in years, right? It's been several years since the last design balance patch. However, it's still played competitively. And what is interesting about this, you remember this is a three-faction game, and so with no changes to balance, the win rates of the different races have continued to shift over time. Really? Meaning, meaning that basically there is not like an objective, correct balance to the game. It is the way it is, some of it is the way people play and the way they respond to what people are playing. And I know this is online and it's a different sort of thing, but I I do find it interesting, right? And I think this is one of the reasons that I love Root, and some people don't, is that I think if you played that game a thousand times, a thousand, thousand times with your same group of friends, it would continue to change and like it would be interesting. Like I could play the birds or the rats the same way every time, and people will respond, they would remember how I played them and shut it down. And I I love it. I think that is fascinating and great, right? It's like I was beat badly once by my friend who did this thing, and I will not make the mistake again. And there's some of that, you know, in a game in a game that's basically locked in, like they're not making any balance changes anymore, and yet the win rates shift dramatically. We're talking like 40 to 60 percent, like that it goes, you know, Protos suddenly are up in the meta, and you know, the Koreans are beating everybody with them because they're just responding to what everybody was playing. And so there's some element of that in in design where you just gotta like account for the human, I guess, ingenuity and response to what it is people are gonna play and how they want to play with your game and interact with it. And it's like you may design a perfectly balanced game, but it doesn't matter, right? Like it actually doesn't matter because like someone will find Find like the most optimal thing, but it's only optimal under the scenarios that assume that everyone plays one way. You shift the way that that that works, and then all of a sudden it's not optimal and everyone beats you. Like it's I it's fascinating to me. Um if I haven't shared that with you, I will, I will, I will find it and get it. It's worth your 30 minutes um to watch this guy talk about it.
SPEAKER_00A hundred percent. This this definitely this like as you're talking about it, I'm just like uh feeling it under my skin. I'm like, this is that's that thing to me is exactly what I look for in games. And like you're saying with Root, like I the reason I love playing it no matter what, and I buy every expansion, and all it does is create more and more and more options. Is that I love I love that like fucking soup, you know, that you can get where it's like you you cannot fully guess what they're gonna do. You can try to strategize, and if if you get a group together that plays the same game enough times, you're gonna start to see patterns and like things that people have preferences for, but you can't even get to that unless you've played it many, many, many times. Like we've we've played Scythe a bunch of times. I I've wanted to play like Twilight Imperium. Like, this is one of the things that one of the reasons it's one of the still most well-loved games that's out there is because it is so balanced, but there's asymmetric play in each you know species that you pick. Uh it's infinitely replayable. And I I call that depth. Like when I'm talking about a game or a TTRPG, to me, that's depth. That's like, how many different ways can you do this same activity that's divorced from the mechanics? As far as like the replayability is not because of the mechanics themselves, the replayability is because of all the dressing around the mechanics. Um, like like I love that kind of stuff. Also, while you were talking, I looked up the release date of Starcraft 2, July 27th, 2010. So I feel very old. That's 15 years.
SPEAKER_0115 years, right? From Starcraft 2. Okay, that's what it was for. Yeah. All right, so now 20. We're not there yet, but you want to you want to cry a little bit, look up the uh release date of Lion King see what that's all about.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I used to I used to listen to that uh the the the audio, the the soundtrack on repeat on CD, because I'm old.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh June 15th, 1994. Holy cow. Awful. Thank you.
SPEAKER_01Back when times are good. That was before the Bulls had really won a bunch of championships. They were the dynasty. They were, they were becoming the dynasty.
SPEAKER_00They hadn't repeated the three-peat yet. But but yeah, so like even though it's not a board game or or or a TTRPG, like the I feel like the game design aspect definitely fits right into what we're talking about.
SPEAKER_01It does. Um, and because they I don't know, they're kind of inseparable in my mind because I know you know not everyone who loves board games loves video games, not you know, not vice versa, but there is a significant overlap in the two, right? And like that a lot of those things are they influence one another, right? Like if you go back, and I didn't realize this at the time when we were, you know, a bunch of idiot kids and playing EverQuest. Uh if you look at the spell books, like I I went back last winter and kind of mess around and it was free to play on on Steam and got on there. Look at do do yourself a favor and go look at the spell books for the stuff that they have. And so what's really interesting to me about this is the spell books for the classes are straight out of the SRD, like the D. Are they? Like they're just they're just straight out of it, you know, like stuff, you know, dancing lights, uh conjure fire, conjure food, like all this stuff that you get at these levels. The the very first original like iteration of this game, it was just D, but online.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01And it's cr it's crazy to me, and like that that's what the original name was. Like, you know, it if it diverged very far from that. But like you can I guess my point is that they're like kind of inseparable, is like the thing that kicks off this catalyst of all of this online gaming and you know, to become the broad appeal that it is today started as a bunch of dudes who love DD, just were like, what if we put it on the computer? Right? Like, what if we could take our weekly RPG game and make it a nightly grind, you know, you know Carners Castle or whatever, right? Like that was the thing that they did, and they did it. And that's really cool to me to go back and experience that, right? Like those spell books, those classes are straight out of DD.
SPEAKER_00There it this brings me back to like the discussion on like OSR and discovering old stuff that's then revamped and like brought into the modern day. Like, as uh anyone will know that I talk to, I love Shadow Dark because it's basically like the original old school game kind of uh brought up to like for modern day players, right? There's it's this is a very interesting uh concept linking it back to EverQuest also being from like older DD, is like how many things do you like look back on that you really enjoy? And it just ended up being some some version of a thing that was really awesome back in the day. And then like they they made it, they made it accessible in another way, and then over time it gets like it diverges and becomes something that isn't as good, and then comes back to that original thing. Like I love one of the things that I love about reading OSR materials is like I have this vision of the game in my head that I've I've never still yet successfully played. Uh, I we've mentioned before that like you, me, and Rich, we did like a three three group uh shared map D game during high COVID times. And it didn't it didn't work for 5e because 5e is not set up for it. It's too narrative driven, too specific to these to the people at that table. But I have this vision of wanting to play a version of DD in a hex exploration that's a little bit more like uh like like a interchangeable groups that are like Westmarch's style that are exploring and discovering a hex map as well as developing a story, a narrative through the play of the game. And I I'm always working on something in that direction, but like I have yet to really make that work. But I think the OSR style of game, if you look up the ODD rules, the like zero DD, the original stuff that like use chain mail as like the rules for fighting and the rules for having group battles, like that was the game that existed then that I have like this want to play that I didn't even know existed before I found that. And it it's very interesting to like look back and be like, oh, this is what people were doing in the 70s. At least this is how it's described. I don't, you know, I can't say for sure, but I think a lot of people were doing doing that game. It was like a simulation war gamey uh multifaceted uh experience that got drilled down into like small groups going into dungeons under castles. And the context that's missing when you do only the the dungeon crawling under in under cat under castles in like a DD 4E or whatever, like the context that is missing there can be injected back in by looking back. And the context that become that that makes your character not just the paladin that's here stomping domes and doing lay on hands, but is someone that has a reason for being where they are, has uh a hometown, has like projects going on, has like a castle that they're building. Like it it just makes for this infinitely more uh interesting tapestry of stuff that's going on.
SPEAKER_01One one point of Leon Anne's if you're playing optimally, Alex, because that's how Divinity works. You're like just enough to get you back up, but I have 64 of these bad boys. I just I only give you one. But but first of all, let me respond a little bit by by disagreeing and saying that uh I don't feel like that game was not a success. That that you know, Westmarch's style thing that we tried to run. I think it was challenging in the sense that there were the same, everyone started in the same town. And uh, you know, if I could do it again, I'd probably have each of the GMs start in a different town. Uh, and they'd have control of the NPCs and stuff in that area, and once, you know, the adventures went far enough into another place, it'd hand them off to another GM or something. So I think that was the the real challenge was the inconsistency between the same NPC. So two tables had a very different, you know, experience of the same core town, you know, like mayor or priest, and it was just like, okay, well, uh it's not necessarily a problem unless one player wants to drop in and drop out, which was the original design. Right. So then that's like you create some continuity problems. But I think if you have people who are in charge of certain areas or certain things or aspects of the game, it works. Um could do it again. But I don't know. I mean, I think it was it was generally successful and definitely like uh memorable to me uh as a uh a great campaign metal.
SPEAKER_00When I say unsuccessful, I just mean reaching this pinnacle vision that I have for the game that will probably never be reached. But was the game super awesome and enjoyable for what it was? Absolutely. I still play, I'm still playing a weekly 5e game in the group that you ran for that five years ago. Yeah, you know, like and those are those guys. I I was trying to get them to play DD for probably two years before you ran them. And now they're like they've seen the light and they they fucking love it.
SPEAKER_01You know, like yeah, I'm a little jealous. I then continued on and I kind of kind of fizzled out. I got got very busy at work and couldn't couldn't put in the time to keep running it, but I'm so pleased, you know.
SPEAKER_00I have this like ultimate vision for a game and like watching the critical role people set up season four with a West Marches style thing that's like it's got the critical role spin on it, so like everything's super lore heavy, and they got Brendan Lee Mulligan running it, so it's like beautiful vignettes, and like everything's just so well orchestrated, it's like absolutely impossible to like to copy, which I don't even want to copy it, but but but it makes me be like, oh my god, all I want is just like I want no day job. This is all I'm doing is like creating these awesome experiences and then making my friends play through them and then like seeing what happens. Like I it's absolute wet dream.
SPEAKER_01It's hard not to get excited about it, even so. But I mean, I think you know, steering us back to you know what we're talking about here. I think that is part of what that is part of what I have been kind of voraciously devouring some of these like one-page things is is about though, right? Is like this kind of discovery or this hype or like you get something where it's like distilled down to the core essence or an idea of a game, and it's all in like it's all there and it's digestible, and so you can kind of like turn turn through it. It's really hard not to have somebody's interpretation of that and get excited or be like, okay, well let's start rolling some dice.
SPEAKER_02You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01Like to you go through you go through the the design, you kind of like get to what this person was going for, right? I think um there's probably like uh three things that you really need. Um like these these well thought out one-pagers, right? Like they have a strong core concept, right? Yeah, they have simple, kind of intuitive mechanics that it's like, okay, well, I can read this a little bit and I understand it. They're like very information dense, right? Like they say a lot with very few words because they kind of have to. And then like the architecture of kind of how they lay out the information is like easily digestible and like a quick reference, right? You got like two two sides of a sheet of paper to kind of like get it done. Yep. And so like if they have those three things, it's really hard not to feel like excited and be like, let's let's start.
SPEAKER_00They seem to pick uh one or one to three types of fun that they're trying to hit, uh, that they're trying to target, and then they'll they'll there's usually like two to three mechanics, and then they'll do something that I see written in like good dungeon design uh books, is they put some kind of time they put some kind of time constraint. So I think this is something that you've talked about before. It's like how do you constrain it and and the constraint focuses it, right? So so one example that I have here is exclusion zone botanist from from uh skeleton code machine, exoit press. Uh basically the whole game is you're you're just drawing like leaves or foliage from going to this very corrupted zone that can't take any tech. Uh so it starts out by providing you with here's the types of leaves that exist, here's the types of stems, and then like you can roll to see which ones you're supposed to draw. But the whole point of the game is like uh you're gonna be drawing stuff that you see in the exclusion zone. This is this is a special place you have to go as far as you can without just being corrupted and turned into part of the forest. So right away it's got a strong concept. You go in and you get out, and if you don't get out, you die. Uh, and then your goal, strong goal, you your goal is to draw something cool, to draw something fun that you find in the exclusion zone. So the player's imagination comes into place, play where they're like, I may be told what kind of leaf or or thing it has on it, but I'm gonna be sketching this plant life in this corrupted, futuristic, uh, apocalyptic zone. And it could be whatever, whatever you want, but like you've got a solid foundation. Uh, and then it gives you like a twist, right? So there's unusual features, there's a 2d6 list of possible features. All of that stuff that I just listed is on like one third of one side of this threefold pamphlet. Uh, and then it gives you like a small map and what happened and a small time frame, like you basically have a maximum of six six steps. And then, you know, how do you roll for whether you find something new or not? And then and then if that fails, how do you roll for how corrupted you get? And then so that's that's that's up to mechanics number two. Number number three is like the corruption itself. The third mechanic is like you you can how you actually die. Basically, there's a checkbox, and anytime that you have to check off something on this list, you can get up to six, and once you get six, you just die. Uh, so I don't I don't know how how well justice I did it there, but but basically, in in a three-fold double-sided pamphlet, you have your goal, you have uh the complete expanse of what you might be doing, both on you know, on the paper and off the paper, yeah. Which I think is something that one-page RPGs do a lot of is they'll they'll suggest a lot of things that happen off the paper. Whereas, you know, a big big rule book is going to explicitly explain every single little thing. You just don't have the room for that here. And then one thing that's like super always included in these that are good is what do you need to actually play this game? So this is like you need a couple D6, you need a notebook, sketchbook that you can draw and pen, pen, pencil, and then that's it. And and I something I really like about these kinds of games, and and when I think about trying to make one is like if you can if you have a couple resources for the player, whether they're like printable, whether they're just like uh something that like comes off of the pamphlet or or is an insert, uh like you you can really up the experience for for for for the player and you can really push them in a direction.
SPEAKER_01I guess the best versions of these one pagers, right? You can kind of explain the game in one sentence.
SPEAKER_00Yes, but I agree with you, but also I'd like to segue this into SWAT. So I want you to give the one the one sentence pitch for SWAT, and then I want to walk through SWAT.
SPEAKER_01Uh okay. I mean, I can like give I can give you the breakdown, probably a little bit of like background on this is like necessary or like why this even came up. Um because you had actually written a an article on your Substack about this where it was like you were responding actually to something that I shared you. This is like show like the kind of reactionary nature, like our like our scattered brains, a circular loop, right? Where like I sent you something about this guy who was, you know, he thought he was writing a hit piece on like uh you know, our RPGs too dark or whatever.
SPEAKER_00Um yes, do RPGs have a grimdark problem.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they have a grimdark problem, right? There's a lot to talk about. That's probably a whole other episode. So let's not dive into that. But as part of that, as part of that response, you had said, like, one of the points you maintained was that the theme doesn't mean anything. It's about the players at the table, and that you can make an RPG about living life as a fly. And at the same time that you made that post, that I was also kind of um, I had just discovered these one-pager things with this other guy who's super active on um Substack, the whiskey, blood, and dust gentleman, the publisher there. I forget, I forget his name off the top of my head, but he he did for this game jam this like post-apocalyptic kind of Mad Max, uh, it's called Drug Pilgrim of the Apocalypse. I had just played through it as part of something that I was doing, like researching and thinking. I loved it. It was really like my my experience of it. And so that in conjunction with your like offhand statement about living life is a fly, I decided. Um I would do just that to kind of exercise my you know uh muscles a little bit or like stretch, stretch myself because also, you know, we love complexity. Um you and I kind of get carried away on on different things, and the challenge of constraining yourself to a single page is is really uh I don't know, it's a very appealing thing. So uh SWAT is the game that I came up with for that. This is basically my swing at a one-page thing, which you know we'll be putting it out in the real world at some point here. But the if I can sum it up, you know, if I give you the one-sentence pitch, it's really simple. So uh you are a house fly, and your like lifespan is 24 hours. So your whole goal in this game is to find a mate and seed the future in some exquisite piece of rotting matter, and then go out and then go out in a blaze of glory. I love so like the you know, the full pitch that I have written here is basically just that, right? It's like, you know, you are a common housefly hatched from a scoring maggot, you know, you have 24 hours to live and fulfill your biological imperative. I know, by the way, and this is a discussion point, something that I do want to talk about here, that a real housefly does not live for 24 hours. Um, that's a Mayfly thing. Um, but it felt thematically appropriate here in this game because it creates this kind of absurdity and this like frankly thing, like a real housefly will live for like 30 days or maybe a little less, you know, 20 to 30 days, depending on male or female and biological stuff and all that. But like, you know, I'm not Elizabeth Hargrave. Uh I can't, I don't think at this point I have enough, you know, scientific knowledge to make it fun, and like a you know, international hit about like birds. Like I can't, I can't do it, right? So I'm I just just feels like it fits, and I just went with it.
SPEAKER_00So, firstly, like I think I was thinking of Mayflies when I said it, and also I think you just have to keep it as like a normal housefly, and you should explicitly state it as such, just to get people in the comments to be like, you know, houseflies don't actually live only 24 hours. But that's not the point, like you just said, like the it's the time constraint, and you gotta go out in a blaze of glory b after you seed the future. So I still think it's it's it's real real friggin' strong. Uh goal and and like theme. Like it's just it's just on point. So like I'm I really want to hear how how do you support the theme with the mechanics?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, sure. So yeah, just to to follow up, but I think it's true though, right? Like the ones that are really memorable. Or like the one pages that I do, they they embrace a kind of specific absurdity or like weirdness. And I just tried to follow in those steps of this. So the the way this works, this game, or that I have, is that basically it's 24 hours, which plays out over 12 turns. The whole point, like what you're trying to do is score these like legacy points, and things that you do while playing will get you points, you know, on each of your 12 turns. And if you manage to go out in a blaze of glory, uh it'll double your score, your legacy points. Uh if you get a 10 plus, so this is kind of like a bonus thing. So if you score 10 or more legacy points, uh you may choose for the next playthrough that your legendary offspring, you begin with the mutations of your parent, right? And so you get immediately this kind of like stacking thing. So you see, I suggested some here. So let's let's begin with like creating a fly, right? So this one pretty directly comes from I like the way that the um drug pilgrims from the whiskey blood and dust guy did it, where you give you a set of points and you just kind of distribute them, right? And so like it's gonna be like a d8 role for most things, and so uh your modifier for that role is whatever stat it is. I give you three kind of stats, you know? You have wings, guts, and buzz. So I just kind of give you the I give you kind of like the ideas about these. And this is one of those things that I actually really like about one-pagers is that um they're not super specific and they don't try to be. They're just trying to give you like enough to sit down and play and kind of like GM for yourself. So under these things, I have I have wings, you know. This is stuff for like agility, speed, flight. It makes sense. You know, guts is like resilience, your appetite, like whether or not you can stomach. There's like a roll table down here for like sacred feasts and stuff, which is like it's crazy. We'll get to it. We'll get to it. But uh, you know, and then like buzz is like your senses, like social skill finding things and all that. I think I I missed one here, but the wings is also like mating, right? You're like your ability to like attract a mate.
SPEAKER_00Because it's one of your pretty wings will get you will get it to you.
SPEAKER_01That's right. That's right.
SPEAKER_00I love it. And I love the little Laura injection with like uh the you know, the flies could have some personality if they're they're having a glorious feast upon a disgusting uh soon-to-be maggot-ridden piece of meat.
SPEAKER_01That's the whole that's the whole point, right? It's like you do something a little bit disgusting. Like I kind of gross myself out a little bit, like writing some of these things. But like I think that's the that's kind of the point. It's gotta be like absurd, it's gotta be weird, and it'll be memorable. Love it. This is gross. I love it. I want to keep going. Um, so you create your fly by distributing points, right? You get three points. You can also, I kind of like this thing from like you know, old school RPGs and stuff, like uh gaming ones where you can like remove from stats and put them in. So I basically said like as you distribute your points, you can have a maximum of plus two and a minimum of minus one, right? So if you're like, I'm not gonna, you know, I'm not gonna get hit by anything. So um I don't need any guts, so minus one guts, you know. And then like I'm gonna put it all on wings to be the most spectacular fly. You can do that. Uh and I don't care. Like, do it. Um that makes sense, I think, to let people kind of do what it is. So then you get into this own like specific flavoring of these things, and this is the mutations and why like kind of the legacy stuff matters, is that you get to pick one or create your own, and they should all have like a pro and a con. So like an idea would be like plus one twings um or minus one to seeding success, right? Because you're gonna have to roll later to see whether or not you can do it. So really good at attracting mates, not so good at laying the eggs, right? Um, so it's kind of like a pro and con that goes with it. And the way I wanted these to work is that they stack. And so, like if you had an iridescent wings parent, you could then take iridescent wings again, and it's plus two minus two. Uh stacking, right? So, like the idea would be that you could play like several flies trying to hunt you know, for like that perfect fly to use as a parent for like future playthroughs and stuff like that, which I I don't know, I find gross and kind of fun. I just like the idea of it.
SPEAKER_00It's it's very um what's what's the what's the word I'm looking for? It's like those video games where like you just keep dying and like but you keep absorbing new experience every time. Totally, right?
SPEAKER_01Like the you know, the bullet heaven or some of those ones like Hades and stuff where it's like the point is to go and fail, but you will get stronger each time you fail, and then eventually you come up with something that's like, okay, well now I can't not succeed, right? I just ought to succeed because I'm so good at this thing. Um that's the idea. You're gonna have to have like a little bit of luck to get through and you know get your plus ten on it, but like I think it'll happen, right? You roll roll a D8 enough, you're gonna hit the eight and get critical success. So we've created our fly. We kind of have our right our core stats and our mutations. So we get to like the the actual gameplay. And this is the other thing that you know, one of the three things that I said they have to have is like um kind of uh core mechanics that are like simple and intuitive. And that's really what this comes down to, right? So the like the world and the way you interact with it, it's it's all action and resolution. Uh there's gonna be a map on the back side of it, which is basically just boils down to four locations. The way I'm picturing it is kind of like four uh four hexes where two of them don't touch, right? There's two kind of in between each other, or two right next to each other and then one on each side, but you can't get to the far sides right and left without going through one of the others. So you have like just basically like a kitchen, kitchen, living room, bathroom, and backyard, but um and your whole goal, right, is to to move. So you choose each turn to act or rest, essentially. Right. Um excuse me. So you choose each turn to act or rest, and you must rest eventually because each turn that you don't, you take a fatigue, and if you reach four fatigue, you die. Which is what you'll see these things happening here, right? Like you just run out of gas and then you get caught by something. Uh you know, the fly gets gassed, it gets swatted. Uh so that happens. So so the first thing in here is like the resolution table, right? So you're rolling your D8 and you've got you know, like the various degrees of success. I kind of like that concept where there's like critical failures and critical successes. Um basically, you know, resolving any action, you can choose whatever it is you're doing, right? Like I kind of leave it open. Like I give you some suggestions here where basically, like, okay, like if you want to do a mating action, right? It's only possible if you're not where you started, so you can't be in the same location. You have to have moved once, right? You gotta go to another location. Okay. And different from where you plan to seat. So if you're trying to lay, if you're trying to lay your eggs in the kitchen, don't mate in the kitchen, right?
SPEAKER_00So it's like kind of you don't don't bang where you work.
SPEAKER_01Exactly, right? Just know what's going on. Uh so so anyway, but the thing is like it just means like you you're gonna have to move. So you're gonna have to take some fatigue. You can't just like play this entire game acting in one one, yeah. You gotta plan out a couple moves, for sure. Yeah. So so basically, like suggested actions, right? I probably should reorder these in the way I have them. But like the first thing is you're gonna probably gonna want to do is like locate your rot. Uh, so you it would be like a buzz roll, right? So you go, can I locate some rotting matter? If you look at the very bottom of it, there's like the third column. I might make this the middle column because it's probably the most like flavorful and like fun. But it's uh these are the roll tables for some of these things.
SPEAKER_00Like sacred rots.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so these are these are your uh places where you can lay stuff, right? And so you can, you know, we can see this, but describing for anyone who's listening along, right? Multiple columns, right? So it's just a D6 table, but multiple columns in the row. And so you'll have something that's like the rot type, which you know is you know, garbage slurry, right? And then where is it at? It's on the living room couch, which is absurdly disgusting, but but sure, but sure there it is. So you know you need to go to the living room to get to the garbage slurry, and then there's a third column here, which is like how many points is it worth? So I leave this kind of open for interpretation, right? And I but you could roll like three specifies, get get a different one or I would roll 3d6 to do this, right? And that's exactly that's exactly what I want to I'm trying to imply here, is like roll it, see what you get, because like you may not like it, right? Let's let's say that the the garbage slayer on the living room couch is only worth one legacy point, right? So it's it's only one legacy point.
SPEAKER_00But that's so cool. I I love that it like adds lore to the location just instantaneously. And uh you're seeding the map at the same time.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Exactly. And I feel like I didn't I didn't necessarily want to have it be like so fixed, and like probably need to make some of these areas like more generic because like even some of the things that I have here, right? So it's like so what if you get like the the toilet bowl rim, but it's in the the kitchen trash or something like that. It doesn't make sense, right? It's like okay, but it's in the kitchen, but it's a toilet bowl.
SPEAKER_00I think the kitchen counter might be worse than the kitchen trash, but yeah. Sure, sure. Why is this toilet rim on the kitchen counter?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and it's one of those things that I'm like, I don't know if it matters. I don't know if it needs to make sense. I know it's just like gross. I don't know if it does. It's still it's too much. You might be in a horror house. You might be in like fly heaven. Exactly. Who am I to say, right? Like I think that's the thing that one of these one like these one pages do really well. So like I'm not trying to explain myself, like um it doesn't have to make sense. I don't need like deep lore on this. It's just mechanically what I'm doing is I'm using my turn to locate rot, and I am hoping that I get like a plus four or a plus five legacy roll. Because if I do that, yeah, because if I do that and then I hit my blaze of glory, which is how I end the game, uh I am going to be able to pass on my mutation and then start again, you know, with a better, stronger fly, right? The next next time I play. And that's the whole point is to like live fast, die awfully, and like have spawn something gross, like even more worse than you are.
SPEAKER_00I I love it. What so like I don't see a list of blazes of glory. So like, is is the blaze of glory a purely narrative mechanical thing? Or is there some insane suggestions?
SPEAKER_01So yeah, so basically, like uh so we did the locate, then you're gonna have to mate, right? So then that's another location that you do that. And then once you do those two things, so you have to basically you in order to in order to do the blaze of glory, right? So like here, if you look at that that section there, so the the for the blaze of glory. So let me just read you what I wrote because I actually worked a lot on making this clear. So after completing mate and seed the future, you may attempt a blaze of glory. This doubles your legacy points. Two paths for the blaze of glory. So I basically you've completed your two main objectives for this game, right? Like you you made it at least once and you seed it. You can only seed once. Uh so we've completed our objectives, we can now end the game. So let's say that we're on like turn eight, you have 11 turns, right? So what we're looking for is to do any action and to roll a critical success on a roll of eight or higher, and remember you can add your attribute rolls to this, so if you have like really high buzz or wings or guts, it doesn't matter, you're gonna choose an action that does that, and you want an eight plus, you may choose to end the game in a blaze of glory. Uh if you reach turn twelve, you automatically get to blaze of glory, but you still have to roll like success. So basically it's like a two-two-roll system, right? So you have to roll the eight, and you have to roll success for blaze of glory. Uh, there isn't a table for that because I want players to kind of come up with it, but I do give you some suggestions. So I have some here where you see like the types underneath. So like the lover, you die in an act of mating. Yes. Uh I didn't I didn't know this. I didn't know this. One of the ways that like flies actually do this is like bump into each other uh when they mate, basically.
SPEAKER_00So can they actually die from it?
SPEAKER_01Like mid-air? I don't know, but it sounds cool. Like you're crashing into another fly midair. Like what if I don't know, you know.
SPEAKER_00No, no, no. I I love I love the thematic uh option first. I was just curious if that was research-based. It's just the thematic option.
SPEAKER_01No, no, it's just a thematic option, right? So that's you know, we've got these other ones here, you know, you got the martyr, you know, die defending your sacred rot.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Uh the annoyance, you know, like mechanically, right? All this does is it doubles your points.
SPEAKER_00Cool. So it doesn't matter. If you successfully do this, so you can fail. Like you die, but not in a way that is uh talked about by your progeny or whatever.
SPEAKER_01Correct. Got it. Cool. And you can still and you can still reach 10 points, right? Uh without the blaze of glory. It's just like kind of a guaranteed sort of thing. So if you end the game on a basically like if you end the game, you know the the kind of the hell divers thing where it's like if you end the game while the ship is, you know, the door is closing and you jump in and everything like okay, great. Like this was it's still successful, even though half your team is dead, it's fine. Totally.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Uh that's all this is. So like that's literally that's that's it. That's the game. Um, I like I like it. Okay, like yeah, it's just like uh first of all, I want to play at least once, and then second of all, like, why do I want to keep playing? It's like to create this like legacy thing, right? Where I get some like super mutated fly. Now I think with the way that I've written this, like the mutation stacking and all this stuff, you could really extrapolate this and like take this to an extreme where it's like, okay, well, I've created this fly that has like plus six iridescent wings and um just auto-succeeds on everything. But like because I put that the con on that of like minus one to seeding success, like it can't actually reproduce. So then it auto-failed, like you can't actually complete the game then. So like you know, there's some constraints on it. Like the I think the maximums, right? It's never gonna get like level 20 D D levels, right? You probably won't succeed that many times or play that many times, but like I don't think it matters. Like, I just don't I just don't think the balance matters that much. You can do however you want it, right?
SPEAKER_00If if you had a player like play through and play like six flies through like uh uh a family tree, I feel like that's that's success. Like, you know, a couple of things. Totally right.
SPEAKER_01Like I I would be over the moon if somebody played it twice. You know, I'd be like, I'm so pumped, dude.
SPEAKER_00Uh I think it's fucking cool. Like, you should we should definitely give this uh you know the treatment and put it out there for real under the you know as a goof and grump release. It's super cool. I love it. I want to see it in action. I want to play it. I want to try it. I want to see like we should we should try it as a co-op game too, just to see what happens.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean like I definitely could see you doing co-op where basically you're in the in the same space, right? You just start in different locations and see what happens. And you're probably like even like if we're in the same space and we can't both do like a mating role or like one of us can only succeed, right? Like, that's that's true. I was very specific. I was very specific in this to not give uh gender to the fly. Oh, there you go. You could choose, you could choose however you want. Um, you know, I was kind of leaving it open-ended. I might have put like a I was considering putting like an appendix out for anyone who wanted to like engage in some kind of like long-term legacy play where like the the flies could uh you you choose two parents, uh two consenting flies from from the originate, you know, your you're you basically be creating a every time you play, you create like a stable of potential parents, right? And you like kind of record their locations, and then like you could choose two from your completed plays to seed the next play, right? Very cool. That would be kind of kind of a fun thing.
SPEAKER_00Here's another thought like from this kind of exercise, though, is like this because you know, like we we tend to get this like maximalist like direction that we'll take something because we just can add, we can see how we can add features and add-ons and and mechanics. But something like this is is really one of the really cool aspects about it is that this could be like the a mini-game of another game, or it could be something that you could make another another type of small one-page or or bigger RPG that is like taking this silly concept of like the flies with their mutations, and you could put it into another setting. Like it's not just silly, a silly fly game. What if you're like, okay, well, we're actually going to like simulate mutations amongst a uh, you know, uh a colony or something.
SPEAKER_01Like, yeah, we'll we'll just we'll make a whole game, you know, buzzboard or something.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Swift here. Really cool, dude. I I love this, and I can see that like, you know, I can feel that you really put some stuff into this. It's cool. I can't wait to see what it looks like. This has been Alexander Zakis and James Echtel of the Goof and Grip Podcast. Find more from us at Goof and Grip Podcast? Thank you for listening.
