<+DevonOracz> Greetings everyone. I’m Devon Oratz–I wrote a bunch of stuff for Shadowrun, and I also used to have my own game company, released more than 12 products over half a dozen game lines I created, got a couple ENnie nominations, but basically I’m just a dude, your standard issue gamer–and my game I hope to talk to y’all about is called Resist & Remember.
<+DevonOracz> It’s an anti-fascist RPG about punching Nazis in the face, if not literally, then figuratively. The game is going to be released in installments (I haven’t decided on a proper noun yet) which will include a built-in setting or wrapper.
<+DevonOracz> The setting of this first prototype edition is Berlin during the fall of the Weimar Republic and the rise of Nazi Germany.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> Thanks, DevonOracz! The floor is open to questions!
<~Dan> What system do you use?
<+DevonOracz> The game uses an original system but it should be one that anyone familiar with D&D 5E can immediately grasp, as it has the same core mechanic (roll d20, add bonus, compare with target number) even though it doesn’t have races, classes, backgrounds, or spells
<+DevonOracz> I can talk more about it broadly or answer specific questions about it. The latter might be better.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> Who are the PCs?
<+DevonOracz> The PCs are an odd mix of writers, artists, performers, film-makers, socialites, drunks, commies, Anarchists, and other “degenerate ne’er do-wells” attracted to the progressive cultural mecca that Weimar Berlin was in the 1920s before the Nazis happened.
<+DevonOracz> PCs are also largely but not exclusively nor mandatorily Jews, gays and lesbians, people of color, Romani, and other groups targeted by the fascist Reich.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> In what year(s) does the game take place?
<+DevonOracz> So, Resist & Remember the game/game engine is not linked to any one place/time. Resist & Remember: Weimar, this particular instance of the game, is divided into five acts. The first act takes place from September 14th 1930 and November 21st, 1932, the very last years of the Weimar Republic, and is designed to be less ‘heavy’ than the following four acts.
<+DevonOracz> Act I is largely concerned with the PCs falling in and out of love and lust, getting drunk, doing drugs, and partying. Act II is set on February 27th, 1933, the day of the Reichstag Fire.
<+DevonOracz> Act III is set during Gleichschaltung or “Nazification” as it was known on this side of the Atlantic. This was the period during which the Nazis consolidated their power, disenfranchised the Jews, built up their military, and paved the way for the Holocaust. It’s also the time period during which dozens of artists and filmmakers with leftist leanings fled
<+DevonOracz> Germany, most eventually settling in the US.
<+DevonOracz> Act IV is set on November 9th-10th 1938: Kristallnacht.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> So the game has a fixed beginning and end?
<+DevonOracz> That is correct. For people with experience with storygames, this shouldn’t be a totally foreign concept (at least I think not). For everyone else, it might be best to think of it as a game with a baked-in campaign. (done)
<~Dan> How long to you envision it taking to complete the campaign?
<~Dan> (Howdy, Crazy-Cabal!)
<+Crazy-Cabal> (Yo)
<+DevonOracz> That’s a good question, but I don’t have a particularly firm answer. It really defends on how long the GMs (important thing I forgot to mention!) want to spend on each Act. I think it could be done with an average of one Act per game session. I also think it could easily be expanded to two, three, or even four times that.
<+DevonOracz> The thing I forgot to mention is that a different player GMs each one of the Acts.
<+DevonOracz> So everyone gets to PC, and everyone gets a chance to GM.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> Ah, I see. What happens to a character’s PC while he’s GMing?
<+DevonOracz> Good question, and one I don’t address thoroughly enough in the present text. I tend to be preoccupied with marketing and promotion at this stage, but sometimes these Q&As can actually be good for the game design process itself! My default assumption is that they become NPCs during that Act, however…
<+DevonOracz> …if your PC bites it (dies) during Act II and you were scheduled to GM Act IV, you wind up GMing Act III instead since you go into it minus a PC (giving you time to make a new PC for Act IV).
<~Dan> Gotcha.
<+DevonOracz> Since I mentioned player death, I might as well lay out that PC casualty rate is designed to be 0% during Act I, 25% during Act II, completely (0-50%?) unpredictable during Act III, and 100% during Act IV.
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<~Dan> Huh. What are your thoughts on the appeal of a game in which you know your PC is going to die?
<+DevonOracz> Well, to me it’s very appealing (duh). I like the idea of playing a character who is doomed. This isn’t the first time that I’ve played around with the idea of a game where you play someone or something that is doomed. I also like the idea of heroic last stands, which are more heroic for being LAST stands.
<~Dan> Fair enough.
<+DevonOracz> I think in the case of this particular game it’s a fairly important feature. While I’d like to describe the game as having a tonal range that covers all the possible ground from Schindler’s List to Cabaret to Inglorious Basterds and try to support all of those playstyles, the default assumption is that we cannot change history.
<+DevonOracz> We cannot change the Holocaust. It has already happened. All we can do is remember–never forget–and to resist fascism in all its forms in the future.
<+DevonOracz> Considering that, the kind of fatalism inherent to a game where you know your character is going to die at the end felt totally appropriate.
<~Dan> You describe this as a story game, but it sounds like you use conventional mechanics. What was your thinking there?
<+DevonOracz> Firstly, I prefer conventional mechanics (the mechanics are not entirely conventional, but I honestly do not know enough about storygames to say whether the breaks from convention are storygame inspired or not).
<+DevonOracz> Secondly, I think that designing Resist & Remember so that anyone who knows how to play D&D 5E can immediately pick up and play the game will help this reach the broadest possible audience.
<+DevonOracz> Although I will still need a lot of help on that front. : )
<+DevonOracz> (done)
<+DevonOracz> This seems like a fairly decent place to discuss how the game differs from D&D 5E, unless you had a different followup question in mind.
<~Dan> Oh, that’s fine. I was just going to share an observation.
<~Dan> Specifically, that in my experience, storygames tend to have a 3rd-person POV.
<~Dan> Which is neither here nor there, really. Just seems like a potential selling point for your game.
<+DevonOracz> I’ve seen both kinds of games played both ways, sometimes by the same player in the same session, heck, sometimes I will in the same session go from “she says xyz” to “I do xyz” although the latter is my default.
<+DevonOracz> I guess I’ve never thought of POV as being a function of game design–I totally see how it could be!–but I’ve always thought of it as more of a matter of play style.
<~Dan> Oh, certainly, but many storygames involve the players having influence over outcomes, not just attempts.
<~Dan> To explain:
<~Dan> A storygame player might roll to force a door open. Depending upon how the roll goes, the player might get to describe what’s on the other side of the door once it’s opened (as opposed to the GM doing so).
<~Dan> That’s what I mean by “3rd person”. It’s more like telling the story of your character rather than experiencing a setting through the PC’s eyes. If that makes sense.
<+DevonOracz> *nod*
<+DevonOracz> completely
<~Dan> I only bring this up because I could see that approach being used for this game, which is why I find it interested that you stuck with the 1st person POV.
<~Dan> *interesting
<+DevonOracz> Personally, I have a great deal of difficulty enjoying playing RPGs where I can directly influence the outcome of an action, i.e. through any kind of narrative currency. I like influencing outcomes through my character’s in-game traits, i.e. I’m going to get that door open (or not) because I built a ridiculously beefy character,
<+DevonOracz> (or didn’t), not because I spend a Fate point (or don’t).
<~Dan> I guess I fall somewhere in the middle… I vastly prefer the 1st person POV but enjoy little narrative nudges like Fate/Drama/Hero Points.
<&Karn> It one of the reasons my superhero game puts “meta” controls in characters hands not players (I mean admittedly its a hair fine distinction) but acting as the character would in that genre, gives them the oomph.
<+DevonOracz> I remember the first time I actually encountered the ability to directly influence narrative outcomes and how completely out of the experience it pulled me. I was playing Shadowrun using FATE, and I had this in-hindsight surreal moment where the GM was trying to figure out what move or action I was going for by shooting an NPC in the kneecap…
<+DevonOracz> …and I had this long, surreal argument with the GM, either because I didn’t get it, or didn’t want to get it, but in any case I remember repeatedly being like: “no, no, I just shoot him in the kneecap. YOU TELL ME what happens!”
<&Karn> That I get.
<~Dan> Heh. I know what you mean. I prefer there to be minor bonuses to actions or to soak damage, but I don’t want to be able to actually say what happens.
<+DevonOracz> One of the things that Resist & Remember does to share control and ownership of the narrative is splitting up GMing duties among the entire group.
<~Dan> But, to loop this back to Resist and Remember, it would seem to be a challenge to get the expected outcome using “standard” gaming methodology.
<&Karn> That can be cool. Or go horrible depending on the play group.
<+DevonOracz> Dan, can you unpack that a bit or give me an example? I think I know a mechanic in the game that speaks to exactly what you’re talking about, but I’m not 100% sure.
<~Dan> Specifically, how do you *guarantee* that everyone dies? Do you just pit them against hopeless odds?
<+DevonOracz> Ah.
<+DevonOracz> In short, yes. I want to do another gloss pass over the rules and add two mechanics I think are missing right now. One is to have each PC select an ‘anchor’ (which could be just plain stubborness) that keeps them from leaving Germany. The other is to give players the option of some narrative control of their character’s last moments, IF they want that.
<+DevonOracz> “Hopeless Odds” is baked into the game in general, though, in the form of the Hate Die.
<+DevonOracz> I assume you’re familiar with how Bardic Inspiration works in the current edition of D&D?
<~Dan> Vaguely.
<+DevonOracz> so basically, when a bard is barding you up, you get to roll a d4, or a d6, or a d8, or whatever depending on their bard level, and add it to an attack roll or saving throw or ability check after you roll it.
<~Dan> Ah, right.
<+DevonOracz> The Hate Die is the opposite of Bardic Inspiration. It’s a die (the die type depends on the Act, increasing in accordance with, as the name would represent, the level of rampant bigotry, hatred, and intolerance in Berlin) that gets rolled by the GM and subtracted from virtually every action you take.
<+DevonOracz> Now, throughout most of the game this doesn’t translate to you failing individual actions any more often than you would in D&D, in part simply because you get bigger bonuses to more things.
<+DevonOracz> But during Act IV, that’s a d12 coming out of every roll you make, which is very significant and which should convey the sense of hopelessness and overwhelming odds mentioned before.
<~Dan> (Howdy, BPIJonathan!)
<+BPIJonathan> (Hi dan. Sorry I was late)
<~Dan> (No worries!)
<+DevonOracz> +1 to that no worries : )
<+DevonOracz> In D&D 5E you roll (or pay, if doing point buy) for six abilities, choose a Race, a Background, and a Class, which grant you a handful of different proficiencies with a list of around 12 skills and 6 or so different kinds of tools, as well as your proficiency with weapons and armor.
<+BPIJonathan> I’m sure this is been asked, but why is the Weimar Republic?
<+DevonOracz> I assume you mean why is the game set during the Weimar Republic?
<+BPIJonathan> Yes, as a historian of the era I find that to be an interesting and exciting choice
<+DevonOracz> The Weimar Republic is a period in history that I find incredibly fascinating and just found more and more fascinating the more I read about it. The idea that a society so bohemian, liberal, and progressive could snap like a rubberband into Nazism is very scary.
<+BPIJonathan> I’ve been here for two minutes, and you already have me sold. You have Dan to thank for that
<~Dan> 😀
<~Dan> DevonOracz: Do you have a character sheet that we can see?
<+DevonOracz> If you look at the Weimar as a cultural arena, it’s one that included men and women that were more or less openly gay, “the new woman” (women that were more sexually liberated and independent), leftist political radicals, and a fair amount of straight-up debauchery. It was a post-monarchy society fixated upon the future.
<+DevonOracz> Dan: I wish I was that organized lol, but the game is actually simple enough that I might conceivably be able to whip one up in between questions here, it just won’t be as pretty as the one I publish.
<+DevonOracz> BPIJonathan: Dan is the man.
<~Dan> Oh, I’m not worried about that. I just find that a character sheet helps with system discussion.
<+DevonOracz> Actually, now that the S word (sold) has been used, before anyone leaves who’s been at least half paying attention to anything I’ve been setting, for the first month this game is out, 50% of sales will go to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. After that, 20% of sales will go to the USHMM in perpetuity.
<~Dan> DevonOracz: Jonathan sends his apologies. He’s having network issues. I set up a group with you two on FB as per his request.
<&Karn> That’s cool.
<~Dan> Have you contacted the museum about this?
<+DevonOracz> I haven’t yet.
<~Dan> I’m sure they’d have some interesting resources to share with you.
<+DevonOracz> ah, those I’ve already taken advantage over the course of developing the game
<+DevonOracz> they were an excellent resource
<+DevonOracz> there are a lot of very, very sad stories about artists, performers, and filmmakers that we have never heard of because they were murdered during the Holocaust. a few of those I learned about for the first time from USHMM’s website
<+DevonOracz> One reason I haven’t contacted them is I am not sure how substantial my donation will be because I have not taken my stab at crowdfunding this yet, so I’m not sure if it’s a large enough amount that I might want to talk about it in terms of a partnership with them, i.e. perhaps them helping promote the game.
<&Karn> The common focus of small release materials these days seems to be “Zine”
<+DevonOracz> But if it’s going to be more like “well uh, here’s $121.74 guys” I’d feel silly mentioning it in that context.
<+DevonOracz> Yes, initially, I thought that this game was going to be something I could publish in a not un-zine like format, Karn.
<+DevonOracz> But it kept growing and growing and growing to the point where it was clear it really wanted to be a big honking book.
<+DevonOracz> right now it’s standing at 46, 680 words. this is something that at one point I imagined I was going to write over the course of a weekend.
<+DevonOracz> <- delusional sometimes
<~Dan> What takes up most of the page count??
<~Dan> -?
<+DevonOracz> historical research for the most part
<+DevonOracz> but I’ve also got some very crunchy and tactical melee combat rules
<+DevonOracz> I watched a fair amount of footage of street fighting between political partisans IRL
<+DevonOracz> you know, Black Lives Matter vs. Cops, Antifa vs. Trump Supporters, and so on
<~Dan> Can you give some examples of these rules?
<+DevonOracz> absolutely
<+DevonOracz> first off
<+DevonOracz> (Link: https://www.patreon.com/file?h=28655375&i=4206814)https://www.patreon.com/file?h=28655375&i=4206814
<+DevonOracz> that should be a link to a character sheet I started making when you asked “do you have a character sheet that we can see?” like five minutes ago lol
<+DevonOracz> <- extremely professional
<~Dan> LOL
<+DevonOracz> Does that give a better basis for discussing the system?
<~Dan> It does indeed.
<~Dan> Although… I have to confess that my silly brain wants to read the Hurl skill as the ability to vomit successfully.
<+DevonOracz> lol
<~Dan> So do the PCs not have attributes? Just skills?
<+DevonOracz> so basically, skills include attributes and skills.
<+DevonOracz> I’m not sure what they’ll be called in the end, but for right now we’re calling them skills.
* ~Dan nods
<~Dan> What is the ability scale?
<+DevonOracz> Although strictly speaking, some of them clearly aren’t (Bravery, Toughness, a few others).
<+DevonOracz> so, going into Act I:
<+DevonOracz> To make your character choose two Skills to be +5 Skills, then choose four more Skills to be +3 Skills, then choose six more Skills to be +2 Skills. Every character starts with Weimar as an additional Skill at +2, but you may upgrade Weimar to +5 or +3 by using one of those picks on it
<~Dan> I follow you so far.
<+DevonOracz> So, an Act I Peter Lorre (yes, that Peter Lorre, he’s one of the built in setting NPCs) has Skills: Performance +5, Fast Talk +5, Carouse +3, Dodge +3, Running +3, Skullduggery +3, Awareness +2, Bravery +2, Intimidation +2, Rhetoric +2, Weimar +2.
<+DevonOracz> During the Act I-Act II intermission: Each PC should select five different skills—they could be any of the skills taken during character creation, or skills that weren’t chosen during character creation—and add +3 to their total bonus for each one.
<+DevonOracz> Act II-Act III intermission: each PC should select four different skills—they could be any skill the character already has a bonus in, or any skill the character has no bonus in—and add +2 to their total bonus for each one.
<+DevonOracz> Act III-Act IV Intermission: each PC should select five different skills—they could be any skill the character already has a bonus in, or any skill the character has no bonus in—and add +4 to their total bonus for each one.
<~Dan> By the way, to replacement characters get built with the same bonuses that go with the Act in which they’re starting?
<+DevonOracz> yes
<~Dan> Gotcha.
<~Dan> So how does combat work?
<+DevonOracz> An Act III-IV Leni Riefenstahl (another real historical personage included in the game as an NPC) would look like this: Awareness +4, Artistry +12, Bravery +5, Carousing +3, Dodge +6, Fast Talk +8, Performance +6, Rhetoric +4, Running +5, Seduction +6, Tinker +3.
<+DevonOracz> Okay, COMBAT.
<+DevonOracz> So I’ll try to be fairly broad and general.
* ~Dan nods
<+DevonOracz> The first thing is that the game mechanically acknowledges that combat is…I forget, am I allowed to swear here? let me go with “freaking”…actually being in combat is freaking TERRIFYING.
<+DevonOracz> so if you want to light a molotov cocktail you mixed up, that’s a Bravery roll because lighting an IED in your hands is SCARY
<~Dan> (Swearing is frowned upon here, yes. 🙂 )
<+DevonOracz> if you want to peek out from cover and return fire after being shot at, that’s a Bravery roll because again, being shot at with a gun is TERRIFYING
<~Dan> That makes sense.
<+DevonOracz> Melee combat in particular is cool because I think that it deals with weapon-reach in a way that is more accurate and realistic than any RPG I know of, while still being even more playable than 5E, which was a benchmark I kept in mind throughout development.
<~Dan> Although… it would seem that with the Hate die in effect, characters would become more cowardly than less as they grow more experienced with combat.
<+DevonOracz> well, it depends how many of those bonuses they decide to put in Bravery
<+DevonOracz> a PC could go into Kristallnacht with Bravery +14
<+DevonOracz> which is enough to give them a +2 even if the Hate Die rolls max
<~Dan> True.
<~Dan> By the way, does degree of success matter?
<+DevonOracz> As for melee combat, basically, if you have a lead pipe and someone else has, say, a Kar 98 rifle with a bayonet attached, that reach difference is substantial. It isn’t “nothing” which like D&D 5E treats it, nor is it a few extra points or dice for the fighter with the longer weapon (like Shadowrun and The Singularity System 😉 ) treat it.
<+DevonOracz> I’m going to include a shortish excerpt from the game text. There is a single instance of profanity there, so I apologize.
<~Dan> Understood.
<+DevonOracz> it describes one of the moves available in combat
<+DevonOracz> “Get Inside To ‘get inside’ or ‘get inside on’ someone with a longer weapon means to neutralize their weapon’s reach, turning it from an advantage they have to a disadvantage you impose by carefully slipping yourself inside the arc of their thrust or swing…
<+DevonOracz> Note that getting inside is fucking terrifying and requires a successful Bravery check (TN 10 + target’target’s Scrap) to even attempt. If you succeed, then the target gets to make a free attack against you. If you are still alive after that attack hits or misses, then you can roll to hit the target’s Defense, ignoring the target’s Reach bonus…
<+DevonOracz> If you hit, you do no damage, this turn, but you are now inside the target’s defenses. The target loses his Reach bonus to Defense. Additionally, the target receives a penalty equal to his weapon’s full Reach category to all attacks he makes against against you until he manages to disengage (see below).”
<+DevonOracz> Basically, if someone is thrusting a flagpole with a swastika at you, it takes some doing to position yourself so you can hit them with brass knuckles, but if you manage it, they have very little chance of actually hitting you with that flagpole.
* ~Dan nods
<~Dan> This sounds like a pretty robust (if gritty) little system. Have you thought about using it for anything else?
<+DevonOracz> future Resist & Remember games, primarily, which will all involve street fighting and rioting
* ~Dan nods
<~Dan> You could always use it for a licensed “The Warriors” game, too!
<+DevonOracz> like, I don’t think it’s a appropriate for everything, like I think it’s perfectly fine that in D&D if you’re a fifth level fighter with a shortsword, you don’t need to go through any extra steps or suffer any disadvantage to hit an enemy that has a halberd, because D&D is a high-magic medieval power fantasy.
<+DevonOracz> a lot of the future riots I want to do are actually not that far from The Warriors
<~Dan> Cool.
<+DevonOracz> and the socio-economic circumstances that created the film The Warriors (“…come out and playeeeyayy”, sorry, couldn’t resist).
<~Dan> Don’t worry. I was thinking it myself. 😀
<~Dan> (IIRC, that was improv on the actor’s part.)
<~Dan> So in the time remaining, is there anything we haven’t covered that you’d like to bring up?
<+DevonOracz> sure
<+DevonOracz> A LOT of page count is also taken up by detailed descriptions of places and of persons (historical or fictional: you’ll find stats for both Bertolt Brecht and Sally Bowles in the game) in Berlin you’re likely to visit or interact with.
<+DevonOracz> As for the combat, I think it’s a cool system, and if it’s been done before, I haven’t seen it, and it’s largely based on, like I said, observation (from the safe distance of Youtube for the most part) of real streetfighting.
* ~Dan nods
<+DevonOracz> On a lighter note, there is something very funny to me about political partisans literally hitting each other with Confederate flags or Black Lives Matter signs.
<~Dan> Heh. 🙂
<+DevonOracz> There is just something so stupidly literally about it that it is amazing, it is like literally thumping someone with a bible (or the Communist Manifesto).
<+DevonOracz> But black humor was definitely necessary for me to complete this project. I don’t know the details but I understand that I have at least one relative that was actually murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
<+DevonOracz> So while this would sound cooler of I was Arnold Schwarzenegger and not a game designer, “this time it’s personal”
<~Dan> Cool. 🙂
<~Dan> Thanks very much for joining us, DevonOracz!
<+DevonOracz> Thank you for having me, Dan.
<~Dan> As usual, if any of you have enjoyed this Q&A and would like to treat me to a coffee or two, you can do so at (Link: https://www.ko-fi.com/gmshoe)https://www.ko-fi.com/gmshoe 🙂
<~Dan> Now, if you’ll give me just a minute, I’ll get the log posted and link you!