Enforced Chaos

Burning Empires Firefight
1

I’m running an Invasion phase campaign right now. We do at least two Firefights a session. In fact, both myself and the players are delighting in turning down Duel of Wits and then saying, “Open fire.”

Tonight, we got into a massive 4 v 4 fight to capture a city. One volley in, the players are reciting their actions and robotically giving helping dice. It sucked.

So I looked up at them from my scripts and said, “Look, you either add chaos to this battle with descriptions and narration or I’ll start applying disadvantages to your actions as is my right as GM.”

Suddenly, the table came to life with rich descriptions and the battle was much more fun.

For those who don’t have the game yet, “chaos” is one of the rules of Firefight. You must color your actions. The penalty isn’t specifically discussed in the FF chapter, but applying disadvantage is the job of the GM. It was nice to see the threat of disadvantage serve to light a fire and get the players to actually play the freaking game.

-Luke

2

It’s easy to fall into the boardgame aspect of Firefight and forget the color aspect. Such a disadvantage is fine medicine.

3

i like this idea as a general rule - for duel of wits and firefight.

lazy play is boring for all.

4

Hello

So, does it work the other way ?
Can players hit GM with “you’re not chaotic enough” stick ?
Any other method for bringing chaos to game table (something besides shooting players with paintball :wink: ) ?

5

No, the players may not. The GM’s roll is to provide adversity. The players’ role is to drive the story forward by overcoming that adversity.

-L