Running Amber Diceless with OSR and modern techniques?

#1

The last long-term game I ran was Urban Shadows, which has a built-in timer in the form of Corruption. Games cannot continue with the same character indefinitely. Mine lasted a year before a character sacrificed herself before she could take her last Corruption and become a Threat. My players are not generally fans of partial-success systems, so I wanted to move away from PbtA.

I wanted the ease that comes with a player just describing what they do that would support long-term, character-driven play.

With my long experience with the GM-facing elements of PbtA games and more confidence in general, I was no longer as intimidated by the notion of having to decide on rulings in diceless games.

I began to look into how to run Lords of Gossamer and Shadow without any illusionist baggage or Stuff. I needed structure on my end so that I could play to find out what happens. I could use an Agenda, Principles, and Moves, sure - but the diceless approach of avoiding direct, high-risk conflicts in favor of creative problem-solving and fighting smart (and dirty) sounded more like the principles of OSR play I’ve been reading about on the Gauntlet.

Player characters are powerful, but their enemies are, too, and they’ll never “get lucky.”

In a game with attribute-resolved conflicts with no dice, how would you, as a GM, bring modern, honest techniques into the game?

(Kindly avoid the glib “By adding a different resolution system.”)

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#2

This thread caught my eye due to the sheer uniqueness of the request. Modern gaming, OSR, Amber… what?

It’s an interesting question, no doubt.

I find that, if the GM is using diceless techniques and a fairly traditional approach to the game, the game relies so much on GM decision-making that it can become “railroad-like” even when the GM isn’t consciously doing that. All the power is in your hands; over the long term you start to realize that you’re the one who has made all the major decisions and therefore chosen the direction of the story and its events.

I can think of two helpful techniques (and they may not necessarily play well together):

  1. The “Paper before Rock” principle

To enable player cleverness, and to give yourself guidance, make sure to make significant decisions before the players make theirs. This allows you to be more impartial and to be surprised more often.

This can mean thorough and careful prep - what is the space like? what’s actually wrong with the engine? how many guards are in the room? what kinds of things might sway the Baroness? - or it can mean remembering to pause play and make a decision before a significant choice happens.

The most obvious example would be something like this:

  • The PC is running down a hallway, looking for their unconscious and dying friend.
  • They come to the end of the hallway. There is a door on the left and another on the right.
  • Where is their friend? Will they choose the right door?

Here’s where you need to pause the game. For the choice of door to be meaningful and not based on your whims, you need to decide which door is the right one before the player makes their choice.

You can do this any way you want - arbitrarily, randomly, by rolling a die, by prepping it beforehand, by some principle, by imagining the layout of the castle - but you must make your significant decision before the player does (or, somehow, independently).

This is like choosing Paper before you’ve seen that the player has chosen Rock.

If you choose Paper in response to the player’s choice, their choice means nothing, and you won’t ever be surprised by an outcome.

Choosing between two doors isn’t an interesting example, but apply the same logic to more complex and interesting situations, and it becomes a powerful thing to be aware of. Giving yourself clear decision points which are made “before contact” with the players, and you enable the players to make clever decisions and to “outwit” their opposition.

  1. Sharing Narrative Authority

To prevent the game from being all on you, look for opportunities to cede authority over the fiction, the setting, its events, and so forth to the players. Let them jump and play NPCs, frame scenes, decide what’s in the chest, describe the new stranger at the ball, and so forth. Asking PbtA-style “provocative questions” is a great place to start.

This requires some experience and adjustment, as every group and every player will be different. Try things and then adjust if it didn’t feel good to the group.

In a freeform context without mechanics to create moments where you have to cede to the players, you have to choose to do so consciously, instead. Disclaim responsibility often and hand important choices (or unimportant ones! those can be full of surprises, too) to the players on a regular basis.

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#3

“Paper before” is excellent. I hadn’t thought of it in those terms, but I knew I needed to go deeper into the setting and characters in order to ensure consistency and fairness.

Thank you very much for formulating that.

Sharing narrative authority is a tough one. It’s something I love to do in most games, but my players are not as big fans most of the time, so this one is to be more traditional.

Framing scenes, though? Absolutely. Absolutely a thousand times.

Especially because it can be worked in seamlessly. If they want to go talk to an NPC, ask them the situation they would prefer she be in. Generally it’s as they wish; sometimes it’ll be inverted.

The OSR element I’m thinking of most in this situation is having lots of tables for the worlds, the Stair, and traveling in general that I can be silently rolling on my end to keep the situation from being predictable.

I posted this thread precisely because I don’t want to run it in the traditional “just trust me” manner. I want to have my tools ready.

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#4

@edige23 ran Amber on The Gauntlet last month (info and videos here: Amber Diceless: Gauntlet TGIT) and might have thoughts…

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#5

I didn’t have a great experience with it. I talked about that on the most recent Gauntlet Podcast episode: Gauntlet Podcast: Nahual, Lighthearted, Amber

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#6

Thank you. I’ll give that a listen!

#7

@edige23 I’ve listened, and I think you were fair in your assessment of Amber.

The relative lack of guidance about how to play the game as anything but a contest for the crown and its associated intrigues is lamentable.

The sheer amount of empty space that leaves gives me a sense that proper GM structures can fix the game.

If you don’t run an attribute auction; if you establish a strong starting point for the game and a history that they help create beforehand; if you allow players to frame scenes; if every player creates a custom homeworld they have a stake in protecting; if the GM uses random tables to shift the locus of power outside of his own head; then maybe the great parts about encouraging creative problem-solving in the face of superior enemies can shine through.

Are there any other ifs that you didn’t cover in the podcast that you would add to my list of ways to redeem the game?

Thank you for the help you have already provided.

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#8

It’s a shame I didn’t come across this thread before commenting on the podcast thread. I won’t repeat myself completely, that post more comprehensively addresses the comments from the podcast, but will address the issue raised by @AbacusMensch here.

Throne wars are only one game structure described in the game, and they’re only intended to be one-off or short run ‘event’ games. The rulebook makes that very clear. They are introduced as a way to experiment and shake down the system, but “are almost the exact opposite of the usual Amber role-playing experience”.

The ‘Opening the Abyss’ Campaign outline is an example of a kick-off for a collaborative campaign, which is how most or all ongoing campaigns work. The attribute auction and competitive framing is mostly just scene setting in practice. All the examples in the combat chapter are about PCs fighting NPCs and creatures. PvP isn’t actually much of a thing in any of the campaigns I’ve played in and the book doesn’t actually treat with it much. Amber has a reputation as the game with throne wars, but that’s not at all the standard approach the actual book promotes and is written to support.

Edit: I’m currently nearing the end of part 1 on YouTube, I’ll comment again once through, but it will take a while.

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#9

I’d like to address the question posed in the thread directly, which I didn’t do in my last post.

A lot of PBTA and related games focus in-the-moment play. Zero or low prep. Play to find out. I am absolutely with that in terras of having the players choices be consequential and genuinely following where the play at the table leads rather than leading it to a predetermined place.

Here comes the but - some games are based on extensive prep. What is a conspiracy game without a conspiracy? Amber is often very much about battling dastardly plots to seize the throne of Amber, or Chaos or both. So who is conspiring with whom? How are they executing their plot? How are they trying. To manipulate the PCs and others towards their goals?

So sometimes that mysterious stranger at the ball might be fair game for the players to help weave into the narrative in a collaborative way. Or maybe she’s here as part of a plot to assassinate Caine, and the GM sticking with that is just being true to their prep.

Now the Amber series wasn’t all plotted out by Zelazny in advance. The twists are turns in the plot were actually woven in by him as he went along. There are a few points where there are inconsistencies or ambiguities as a result. However were not all master talesmiths like Roger. So the challenge is how to present a convincing and coherent challenge to the players, while ensuring that their actions are consequential and going where play at the table leads.