mrph | RPG Spoddery - Amber weirdness

Well, another week gone and another Monday night spent running Amber. The system weirdness is starting to show, but not at all in the way that I'd imagined.

I'm having to play fair. I'm not used to this, and it's going to make GMing interesting. I was expecting problems with the dicelessness, with rules-lawyers and Pattern, with the shakier aspects of the XP system.

But no, the first big shock is one that affects me, and the way that the GM has to behave. I'm can't justify cheating any more.

That's not cheating in an evil, nasty, anti-player sense, you understand. But I'm used to running with minimal stats for my NPCs, glossing over the numbers until I need them, then allocating whatever they need to fulfil their role in the story. In Deadlands crowd scenes, where goons have been perhaps a little too competent, I've backpedalled and decided that the late arrivals aren't quite as good as the first few who attacked our heroes.

More importantly, I do much the same with major NPCs. I don't want my darling villains killed too easily, and I don't want them slaughtering all the heroes, either. So if only three of the characters make it to the final confrontation, the villain might get discreetly weakened. Conversely, if they bring a stolen panzer tank and 300 mercenaries along, the villain's sleeve may suddenly be full of tricks. Dramatic necessity takes precedence. And the occasional "fuzzy" dice roll doesn't do any harm, either. :)

Now, back to Amber. It has an attribute ladder for stat rankings above 0 ("Amber rank" - stats below 0, "Chaos" and "Human" rank, are too low to really be of consequence...). All of the player characters are on it, as are all of the NPCs.

So if, for example, my NPC Malachi is stronger than drivenapart's character Xavier, then that's how it stands. Even if the two have never met - as long as he's clashed with another character, he'll be part of the mental pecking order the players are building up, and I can't change him without explanation. I can't play as fast-and-loose with such things as I used to.

Which means if PCs, or NPCs, get backed into corners, someone is likely to die - or, at least, to get seriously maimed. Hmm. This has implications.

RPG Spoddery - Amber weirdness

Harsh but fair.