Slugblaster (Part 2)

Teens are not made, but forged.

The first part of the critic can be found here.

5. Disassemble Engine

Games have a flow, which, when you hit, the game pretty much runs itself. It is extremely satisfying. After examining the interactions of game elements, we single out the most important - the one that sets the pace of sessions, or even campaigns. We focus on how that engine works, how it makes the game move along, and what to do to make it do what you want to do - and how to keep it running clean.

Lhuzie

I’m happy to say that Slugblaster has done the best innovation in any FitD: divorcing the action roll from clocks¹. Yes, clocks are still a part of the game, and used for complex tasks that may involve multiple steps. However, the default purpose of positioning and action roll in Slugblaster is not to fill 1-3 segments in a clock; it is to do things. This minor change/adjusted assumption does a lot to change how the game flows. Not everything needs a clock removes them web and flow of play; without them you are more likely to keep trying things, becoming more reckless an using resources unsparingly — by not getting distracted by ongoing clocks and wondering if you are not wasting/delaying everyone’s efforts on which dice pools feeding into which clock. It keeps you locked in what Slugblaster wants you to do:doing stupid yet fun things.

I cannot overstate how much this matters: by displacing clocks back to the domain of exception rather than rule, the engine of Slugblaster is now fully centered on actions. And if it wants to do things, any veteran of BitD/FitD may be how that may slow down the pace — negotiating positioning, stress management, devil bargains, etc. Well, Slugblaster has also delivered new tech on that. Pouring resources into a roll is no longer negotiating how many segments you will fill; the immediate outcome is all that matters. As such, the feedback is clear, immediate and avoids the sour taste of design feelbad — “am I messing this up for everyone?”. So, you just have to ask if you boost it, kick it or dare it. You boost it? Spend a boost, get an extra die. You kick it? Spend a kick, your action is more impactful. Do you dare it? Suffer one of three consequences to either get additional boost, kick or overcome an ongoing problem. Shout “check it!” before rolling the dice? You will get XP from this action but problems from it will be worse.

So, it gets you trying things, hooked on a mechanical feedback that leaves you more willing to get into trouble and cause problems — which is pretty good because the game runs on problems. No problems? The game halts. Almost every single roll will generate problems, and problems keep stuff going on. They are exciting things that push you to do more actions — which generate more trouble. This again, can happen because of divorcing clocks. If instead, a problem was a creation of a new bad clock/adding segments to a bad clock, the pressure would be to be smarter about your scarce resources — and you would not want to risk things your character would be bad at, be conservative, take more rolls of lower impact and risk, and overall not want to try things that may nullify the efforts of other members of the crew. Instead it is always something like, “oh you roll to break into a party and play it cool? Oh you did amazing — so cool your ex (which was there, btw) and she is coming towards you with this smirk on her face”. Keep rolling and rolling into and out of trouble — which is the engine that produces Slugblaster.

Teamwork is also streamlined. Helping someone just means sharing resources. Simple as that. Use one of your boosts for someone else: you’re done, you helped. This gets everyone very involved into someone else’s actions, which is exactly what the game wishes to reproduce.

Oh, and the Resistance roll trap/reminder-to-get-armor-instead thing omnipresent in FitD? No so omnipresent anymore, not a thing in Slugblaster. If you want to Resist something, you resist it and take campaign-consequence points for it. That’s it. No rolling, no spending a resource you need for other stuff right now and definitely need if you are eating consequences. No paying equipment/character option taxes to get armor. Say “Nope”, mark consequences for future-you and keep rollerskating.

Okay, but you are going to pay the price later, which by itself could be enough for decision paralysis. Well, see, there is where Slugblaster shows their homework². Many games run on creating drama and complications; but Slugblaster dangles over you the temptation that you can get away with it if you keep running from trouble into more trouble. The one mandatory clock — your trouble track — is non-binary. That is, all of its segments matter, rather than only the last one. You can always get away with the most outrageous of trouble — it just becomes less likely. You roll based on the empty segments in your trouble clock, and if you get a 6? Not a single consequence! This does wonders to keep the decisions organic, the action neck-breaking, the teens silly — and the problems coming their way more impactful. Because now? Now there are hopes to be dashed.

All that XP and trouble you generate? Well, come downtime after a run, you get to spend XP and trouble to introduce fiction beats, character arcs and all sort of nice stuff. That’s another masterful element of Slugblaster design. The produced gamespace of BitD is made the desired gamespace of Slugblaster: you want people doing unnecessary risky things and get into trouble. This is what crystalizes it as the desired gamespace, the desired outcome of mechanics and celebrates the fact.

Brad

Slugblaster throws out position, which reduces playing long games of “Mother May I?” exclusively to scenes about your player characters asking if it’s cool for them to go to a party!

I know to some people that seems like a minor change, but it dramatically speeds up speed and intensity of play, you no longer have players cruising trying to get the best positions possible and spending whatever resources they have to make ‘em happen, instead people roll dice and stuff happens and then the scene changes.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how cool it is to spend XP to buy scenes showing your character growing and changing as well as the mechanical changes they bring, it such a smart piece of tech that I really loved.

The near lack of clocks and swap over to simple consequence is not only a fantastic change, but it reinforces the players role as teens who don’t need a ton of time to do things, but do suffer fierce consequences for ‘em.

6. Essentials For Session One

So, you got this game; you are going to play it, but you don’t have the time to read everything. Or even worse, you have read it and now it is all jumbled together. Here we break down the things that you absolutely want to get right and/or hit during your first session, so you get the feeling for what makes this game stand out from similar art.

Lhuzie

You really don’t need much to read, so it is quite easy to keep the pre-game prep to a minimum. Just read the 16 pages of rules (pg.12-28), with special attention to how action rolls work and how to improve your odds. (pg. 18)

The First run setup is the perfect one-shot with no prep (pg. 139). Run a tone discussion as included in (pg. 140), have players create a crew of characters together — making clear that the playbooks are less archetypes and more types of personality of skater. Then do something like opening in media res while chasing a prize in an alien world — the Golden Jungle served me quite well for this (pg. 96). Keep them rolling to beat obstacles, and then build upon the problems created. That will be a representative slice of Slugblaster.

I would be not be doing due diligence if I disregarded Turbo-X, a rule set for one-shot Slugblaster; it is a nice addition and pretty convenient, but honestly, the core book does a great job by itself. Kick off with either; it does not require significantly different pre-reading/cognitive load.

Brad

Read the rules, if you are overly familiar with FiTD there is a sidebar in the back that explains how Slugblaster is different and I would read that. Make sure to familiarize yourself with the various gadgets and gizmos. You are now ready.

7. Playing The Game Wrong

Games are played wrong. Rules will be misunderstood, interactions will be confused, the importance of certain tech disregarded; etc. This is good, and it is good to acknowledge for: you cannot have the designer at your table, and even if they were, they would be just another player - and entitled to play it wrong. After identifying stress points of the game, things that don’t connect that well, we think of the things that are more likely to be (or have been) “played wrong”. What happens when you forget a line on page 273 clearly saying this is impossible?

Lhuzie

Honestly?

This game has no need for clocks, at all. Even for complex actions, they don’t add much; to the point where you can question if you are getting The GM section expands the uses for clocks, and does it overrepresentation there, it may nudge their implementation in a certain way. As such, the biggest stress point I found playing Slugblaster was how easy it was to bring clocks back in when we would have been better served keeping them away.

Other than that… make sure everyone understands their attitudes and that different personalities lean different ways?

Brad

Don’t use clocks, make sure everyone is comfortable and understanding of the tone, otherwise I don’t really know.

8. What to Steal

Experiencing good art is the most important step in making good art. We look back at the things that worked and did not work about this game, see what we learned for design work, interesting tech and just a general overview of things that we will take from this game and bring into others. Or more honestly: since many of us may not play this game and we have it in our library, this way we can get some use out of it.

Lhuzie

Slugblaster is the first FitD game that I can call heterodox³. As such, I believe it can be the thing that makes the design of many FitD designers click for them. It excels at taking an engine, removing all the parts that would do nothing for their game and doing much more with less. It is my hope we now start to see more and more heterodox FitD games.

It is a fun game, and one can appreciate losing itself in that mindset. It is also a very focused game, and how a game can be quite honest with what it is and fully comit to the bit. It knows it is a game for around ten sessions, it knows what it can and cannot do, so every design decision is to deliver that at a steady pace. I keep saying that the best version of a game is often 33-66% shorter, but due to all reward incentives and ways games are produced, that is not the case. Well, Slugblaster is a game that is 33% shorter. The game has been made as elegant as possible, to produce Slugblaster as efficiently as possible. Then, a lot of things may be hooked into it — but even if you don’t use them in play, you still have Slugblaster. All the rest of the game is additive, and in turn, designed as efficiently as possible: modding your signature items, acquiring or crafting gear, developing the crew’s fame and legacy, sponsors, factions, different worlds to slugblast through, etc.

And please, more non-binary clocks! One would think the awesomeness of Ironsworn would make those more popular, but Slugblaster shows just how easy they are to implement in FitD!

And in the end, it is a lesson in how to use every part of Forged in the Dark on its design. Slugblaster does not fight Blades in The Dark; it takes every part of it, and by this total embrace of it, was also confident to trim and overhaul what it needed.

Brad

Slugblaster is beautiful! A fantastically designed game that is just long enough, just sharp enough, and just meaty enough to really sink your teeth into. What cannot be understated is how refreshing it is to see a FiTD game continue to iterate on a design that so many accept as the conclusion rather than a work in progress.

I think it’s worth revisiting what we said in section one, almost no game has you play teens and yet Slugblaster wears its authenticity on its sleeve and deck and really? What more can you ask for.

1. And thus, we go full circle back to Cthulhu Dark.

2. Or it would, if the slugs from dimension X had not eaten it.

3. Also, as the big heterodox designs advocate, it catapults it to the best FitD game design I ever experienced.