Saturday, December 10, 2022

Proposal: Crouching Explorer, Hidden Exits

Withdrawn and therefore failed -SingularByte

Adminned at 12 Dec 2022 07:49:46 UTC

If “Behind the Door” was not enacted, this Proposal has no effect.

Replace this text in the rule “Mansion Map”:

All of the Rooms’ Connections are tracked in this Map.

with this text:

All of the Rooms’ Connections are tracked in this Map except for Rooms or Connections that are Secret.

Add a bullet to the end of the bulleted list in the rule “Rooms”:

* Optionally, a Secret state, which is not set by default

In the rule “Rooms” replace the text:

All of the qualities of a Room are publicly tracked, except for its Type and Malfeasance which is privately tracked by the Narrator.

with

All of the qualities of a Room are publicly tracked, except for its Type, Malfeasance, and Secret, which are privately tracked by the Narrator.

Add a subrule to the rule “Rooms” titled “Secrets” with the following text:

When adding a Room or Connection, the Narrator may set the Secret state on the Room or Connection being added. A Secret Connection must have at least one of its Exit Directions with the Secret state set.

Any Room, Connection, or Exit Direction that is Secret must only be privately tracked by the Narrator until the Secret state is removed, at which point they must be publicly tracked.

Planned Actions that interact with an Exit Direction that is Secret are treated as if the Exit Direction that is Secret does not exist in that Room.

When an Exit Direction’s Secret state is removed, the Secret states of its Connection and the Room to which it is connected are removed at the same time.

Add this bullet item at the end of the bulleted list in the rule “Explorer Actions”:

* Search

Add this text to the end of the rule “Explorer Actions”:

Searching allows the Explorer a chance to reveal Secret Exit Directions. The Narrator secretly rolls DICEN, where N is 4 minus the number of times that this Explorer has previously used Search on this Room, minimum of DICE1. On a result of 1, all Exit Directions in the Room in which the Explorer is located have their Secret state removed if set.

posted by JonathanDark at 10 Dec 2022 05:58:00 UTC Comments (10)

Comments

SingularByte: he/him

10-12-2022 11:55:02 UTC

for

Josh: he/they

10-12-2022 12:21:33 UTC

imperial I’m not sure that “roll a dice, something happens” is a mechanic that either enriches this game or supports the direction it currently seems to be heading.

Kevan: he/him

10-12-2022 13:52:26 UTC

imperial A secret passage sounds more like a type of Malfeasance, really. We probably wouldn’t want every single room to have one, they’re best used in the dark, and it makes sense for Katastrophe to know where they are.

Trapdoorspyder: he/him

10-12-2022 14:59:43 UTC

imperial

quirck: he/him

10-12-2022 15:26:15 UTC

for

JonathanDark: he/him

10-12-2022 18:57:45 UTC

I’m not planning on every single room having one. That would get old real quick, plus I want to make it a little more challenging for Explorers to decide, “Should I spend my turn searching this room or not?” rather than “I’ll search every room!”

The dice roll is to further make it risky to spend a turn searching rather than doing something else. The reward is to be in the right place at the right time finding a secret first.

If people want to replace Search and the dice roll with a Malfeasance and Katastrophe, I would be ok with that, as it creates a reasonably similar cost-benefit situation.

JonathanDark: he/him

10-12-2022 19:00:39 UTC

I should follow up to say that if someone wants to proposal that Katastrophe is the only one who knows where the Secret passages are, then remove the whole “reveal” steps.

Kevan: he/him

10-12-2022 19:15:34 UTC

“I’m not planning on every single room having one.” - whether you add secret routes will actually be up to Katastrophe, won’t it, per its ability to give you “instructions to perform [an action] in a particular way” when creating a room?

If passages aren’t going to be in every room, that in itself might be enough to make searching a room a risky waste of time. But if it needed to be a bit trickier, I’d personally rather do “right place at the right time” non-randomly (that you can only search in a room that you rested in on the previous turn, or that found passages are only revealed to the people in the room so it might be better to wait to be alone, etc), after all the dice rolling of the previous dynasty.

JonathanDark: he/him

10-12-2022 19:24:19 UTC

That’s a good point about Katastrophe, so right off the bat without any other changes, the currently-possessed Explorer will at least know about the Secret routes that they created. Given that, do you think there should be a way for Katastrophe to learn about the other Secret routes?

I also like the idea of only revealing Secret passages to those in the Room. I’m almost tempted to withdraw my own Proposal just to put up a better one. Convince me… ;-)

JonathanDark: he/him

11-12-2022 16:44:40 UTC

against Withdrawn

I convinced myself over a night’s sleep. I’ll re-propose once I have a slot open.