I few questions came up when i was trying to sleep last night.
If a players sets the Goal: “Try to draw a map of the path between X and Y”, where X and Y is cities or villages.
How would one deal with that, do you let them Roll a Cartographer in the GM’s turn or do you wait till Players Turn and make them spend a check to see if they where successfully drawing the map?
If players during the GM’s turn encounter some hurt mice ( Which is really just an narroation of the GM and not an obstacle ) and one of the players break in and asks if he could try to use a Healing roll on them. Should i allow it?
Lastly, If durring an Players Turn they may spend checks on doing or “testing” the things they want to do.
If someone wants to make his/her way to Port Sumac, while the others wants to collect information att the current place.
How would you go about this? Should you split them up?
Like one wants to find the Bandits hide out and confront them while the others wants to rest att the Inn or Smith some new Weponry.
In this case my question is how you deal with players decisions that means spliting up with the group.
Have you played any of the demo scenarios yet? It seems like these are big issues before you play, but once you get rolling, everything fits together quite naturally.
For example, players rarely want to split up, but if they do, you just let them. You make a test to resolve their journey (and, in the players’ turn, they spend a check).
And goals that take characters on strange errands beg the question “which is more important, your duty or your personal goals?” That’s a good question to answer in play.
First of Luke, thank you for being so patience with me and with my dumb questions.
Though as time goes by more of them will come.
But i must give you credit for being so devoted.
Yes and no, i ran an very very very short unprepaired session once. And now I’m very paranoid about my “REAL” attempt.
It’s just that i wanted to get some imput by more experienced Mouse Guard GM’s. But i guess you are right I’m worring to much.
Hmm, well i guess In the above situations i would allow a test in the GM’s turn( I can allow a test if the player makes the surgestion, much like in the mission “The Grain Peddler” when they players may ask to search the area. ).
My worries is to bring them back together and that they may drift apart. But i guess that is easily solved with some narriation, right?
Failing the players reconvening on their own, or narrating them getting back together as color for what happened in between sessions, you can have them assigned to a mission together by their superiors. They are, after all, members of the Mouse Guard.
I’m planning on running a long mission/scenario over one long session*
I’m not really sure whan a Session is. But my will consist of several GM’s Turns and Player Turns.
ADDED:
Okey so i finally stumbled upon my last problem( for now ).
It’s about the GM and Players Turns.
The GM’s Turn is preatty easy to solve since the GM are allowed by the rules to allow character tests.
Example: Osric stubles upon some hurt mice’s that tells them that the where ambushed by bandits.
Naturally the story would continue with the GM saying they need to make a test to find the Bandits.
But the players can surgest that they want to make a healing test before they continue to the next obstacle and this is okey by the rules.
However my problems lies in the transitions and limits in the Players turn.
If lets say Osric haves 1 Check or “Free Test”. He decides to sneak into an house.
Once he passed the test he asks if he can search the house which he is not allowed because that demands more checks.
A new GM phase is invoked with Osric in the middle of an house and the rest of the patrol back in the Village.
It feels unatural that the Player just sneaks in and then leaves because hes out of checks.
I guess one way to handle this is by telling the player “You can sneak into the house but without more checks you wont be able to advance the scene”.
Then the pitfal comes if he have collected a lot of checks whilst his team members only has the free test he can’t spend them all on himself but ends up sharing them and this cannot advance anyways.
Hm, Scout i would say, since it has with sneaking and spoting to do.
EDIT:
THAT situation maybe wasn’t the optimal, what if Osric want to look for a mouse lost in the wilderness.
He spends a check to Pathfinder( or Scout ), he finds the mouse hurt but that is it. He is not allowed to heal her.
It’s rather annoying that the Players Can’t do Complex Tests ( Like Pathfinder 3, Scout 3, Healer 3 ) without spending 3 Checks.
Though I’m sure that the Players Turn checks are ment to make small straitforward stuff like:
“I want to buy a new Sword” - Resource Test
“I want to ask around to see if any have heard anything about the missing mices” - Circle Test
Trust me Siff, once your players get in the hang of really pushing to get checks and using them for whatever large subplots they want in the players turn, this “problem” will disappear. A group I ran a mini campaign for a few months back didn’t understand checks the first session, gunned for a few more for the second, and by the time we reached the finale the were doing whole “missions” in the players turn just to accomplish the things they wanted to.
Checks, and earning them, really drive Mouse Guard play a lot.
Look at it from another perspective. Players often know what they want to accomplish in the PT. Thus they know they have to earn checks in the GT. The system encourages them to take risks.
And, the source material for this game supports cliff hanger endings! You patrolmouse comes staggering out of the wilderness, bitten and torn, carrying the lost mouse on his shoulders. He collapse. She’s clearly injured. End of the issue! What happens? You’ll have to tune in next time!
But more than likely what happens in the game is that our hero staggers out of the wilderness having rescued his love and…his patrolmates help him tend to her injuries.
Simple stuff can happen in the PT, but the stuff you’re talking about is way more exciting – you’re supposed to have little adventures in the PT and they’re supposed to cost you.