The Party Dynamic (Patreon)

In the many games I've played down through the years, I've always appreciated systems that support inter-party unity, especially when they also provide space for disunity and offer a framework for its resolution. These mechanics are often subtle, providing nudges rather than making demands, but that's where they work best, providing support for playing in a shared space, but not imposing upon the players and their expression of their characters.

In WFRP, advice for handling party cohesion was historically the area of GM advice or player preference, not game mechanics. This significantly changed with WFRP 3rd edition. That game added Party Sheets, a new set of rules that shifted the focus from the individual player to the party as a whole. 

And it was a game-changer.

Why?

Well, before WFRP3, your appreciation of your character's position in the game world was viewed through the lens of your Career. Such as a Thug, for example. 

In WFRP3, that Career looked like this:

But WFRP3 went one step further. It asked: what sort of party is your character in?

To answer that question, WFRP3 had Party Sheets. 

In WFRP3, Party Sheets provided special rules to describe a party of PCs. These included a space to place shared Fortune points (rerolls), special rules describing each party type, spaces for shared special cards (so, if you had a special Tactic card because of your Career, it could be slotted into the Party Sheet so everyone in the party could use it), and trackers for Party Tension that showed what happened when things weren't going well.

So, you didn't just define your PC, you also defined your party.

That meant the game rules immediately made it clear it was a game about characters working together, not a game about characters as individuals. Further reinforcing that, the only way to decide the Party Sheet was for the players to discuss it with each other and make a shared choice, again reinforcing the group dynamic with shared interests from the outset.

This was a good thing. Cooperation was hard-baked into the game, and as we all know cooperation is a key component of WFRP when it's running well. After all, it's often the PCs alone against the world as the clock slowly ticks towards midnight.

WFRP is Britishly bleak like that.

...

So, let's take a look at how that worked. 

The obvious Party Sheet for a Thug is the Gang of Thugs. I'm sure many fellow WFRP GMs out there have had a party or two that resembles that description!

Here's WFRP3's Gang of Thugs:

So, we have a special Legbreakers rule, a slot for a Reputation and Tactic card, and shared Fortune pool, and what happens when Party Tension increases.

The rule I'm going to focus on with an example is Party Tension. It was powerful during play.

Party Tension was used in many ways. One suggested use was to tick up the tension by a point whenever the party bickered or argued needlessly. Players saw this, and (if playing as a Gang of Thugs) also saw the incoming Stress and Fatigue coming their way if 5 Tension was reached. A common (but certainly not universal) response was to resolve any ongoing dispute to avoid more Tension accruing. This, in turn, usually helped the pacing of the game as the party moved on to resolve other matters.

In short, arguments were allowed and expected. But if the GM felt it was getting in the way of the party's stated goals or the session being as fun as it could be, the bickering had a very minor repercussion: Party Tension increases. That tiny repercussion almost always led to players choosing party harmony over an argument in order to avoid being penalised at a later date.

Often, the fear of Party Tension meant it infrequently hit 5 points, and rarely hit 10. But the impact of the tension increasing was palpable. Everyone could see it. It just slowly grew worse. And that really supported the ticking clock towards midnight, the ultimate end of the world, a core theme of WFRP.

It also worked well for many different types of players. Those who loved roleplaying had a guide for how their character may be feeling ('The party is a bit tense, and so am I!'). For those more interested in just playing a game, there was a penalty to avoid ('There is no way I'm taking stress and fatigue, so let's move on!'). For new players, there was an immediate sense that the game works best when everyone works together ('Umm, that tension rising looks bad when I read the card, so maybe we should just work together.'). And, as mentioned, it supported a core theme of the game ('Aww, man, it's just getting worse and worse!'). You get the idea.

For another example, let's take a look at another Party Sheet: the Brash Young Fools.

As can be seen, with different Party Cards came different choices. For example, Brash Young Fools grow stressed more quickly than Gangs of Thugs (at 4 and 8 Tension instead of 5 and 10), but are also more likely to take chances and succeed (the Fortune Favours the Bold rule where the party always has access to fortune points), and can slot a Focus card instead of a Tactics card.

Small differences, but characterful ones.

Because the Party Sheets were chosen by the players, not the GM, they also promoted player agency, letting the players feel like they were directly shaping their destinies (and feel able to make some wise tactical decisions, if such was their preference). This led to deep player discussions about how they wanted their party to negotiate WFRP, or how they wanted the party to be perceived by outsiders (are we brash young kids? or just a gang of things?). 

Indeed, for one of my WFRP3 groups, an entire session was spent discussing the party and its goals. And for all that may sound outwardly boring, it was not. Everyone contributed, had a great time, and we ended up with a super-strong idea of what the party was doing and why. And a lot of the discussion was in-character.

Good times.

So, Party Sheets were a fun addition to WFRP3. Unsurprisingly, they were mostly very well received by those who played the game.

Of course, as a mechanic, it was super gamey, and some of the special rules didn't fit individual parties. Further, many parties didn't really fit any of the cookie-cutter party archetypes offered, and no accommodation was made to counteract this (for example, by offering a set of Party Sheet Generation rules). And the rules were somewhat negative in their approach, penalising 'bad play' with the tension meter rather than supporting 'good play' with a different mechanic. But there was nevertheless a great idea being offered here, and it worked well for many groups. 

And it certainly worked well enough for my WFRP3 games. Most of the time, at least. I got enough play from WFRP3 that I started redesigning it to match my needs, and we always used the Party Sheets. I'd reached the point where I was making updated versions of Careers, Talents, and more. I also built new Character sheets that slotted in better with the many cards that were added to the game during its lifecycle.

As you all likely know by now, I don't do things by half for my games.

So, as I'm sure you can see by now, I liked WFRP3's Party Sheet rules quite a bit, even though I could see several flaws in their implementation.

Indeed, I liked them enough that I wanted to incorporate an updated and streamlined version for WFRP4 when I was drafting the initial design documents for that game (the documents where I stated the core goals for each section of the book and how I planned to resolve them).

However, I was told that I could not use any mechanics from WFRP3. 

Only WFRP1 and maybe 2 as inspiration for WFRP4. 

And that was that.

Now, I love WFRP1 and WFRP2, so that wasn't an issue. But, I also loved many of the mechanics in WFRP3. So, that was a bit of an issue.

But, not my call to make. There were to be no Party Generation rules in WFRP4.

However, even though direct references to WFRP3 were right out, I still felt it was important to have a small space where the rules focused players on the party as a whole, and discussed how that party interacted with the game world and with each other, rather than solely focussing on the individual.

So, I added Party Ambitions. To do that I repurposed the personal Ambitions rules I'd already built for the Character Generation chapter and extended them to the party as a whole.

In short, this was a very simple rule: the party has a short and long-term goal. If a goal is met, all party members gain an XP boost.

Neat, and it wasn't a big ask for word count, so it was easy to add.

Further, I requested a tweak to the Character Sheet so that it included a Party section for those ambitions, and it also recorded a party name and its members.

These were all tiny changes, but they made a pretty big difference to how players interacted with the game.

During playtests, there was an immediate difference. Players started to discuss the party as a cohesive unit, not just discuss their individual PCs. They were discussing what they thought their party as a whole was trying to do? How did their party goals marry with the personal ambitions of the individual PCs? What were the long-term goals of the party and how did this influence its decisions? And did the party have an actual name? Was it a mercenary band? Or the retinue of an important noble? Or wayfaring youths seeking adventure?

So many questions. None of them were difficult to answer. And all super characterful. Many new stories were added to the narrative before play even began by the inclusion of a tiny new rule, and players were excited by it. After all, if you succeed in your party goals, you gain a small XP bonus. So, best come up with some fun ones.

Positive reinforcement for completing shared goals.

Nice.

Much like WFRP3 asked you what sort of party your character was in, WFRP4 now did the same, albeit in a different way.

And worked well in practice, so I was happy with the rule.

With all that said, we now turn to the ridiculously colourful rainbow image I opened this blog post with.

Seriously, WTF is that? And how does it relate to the rest of this blog post?

Well, last week, we were all somewhat dejected because rain had seen off glueing our new table together, and we needed the huge table in place before we could start filming. (More about the table in a future, in-progress post, because it's now finished!)

Given we'd already played many sessions to get to know our characters, it was decided that it was worth firming up all the in-character opinions of each other PC. I.e., we were going to examine the party's internal dynamics.

To do that, we fell back on the old relationship grids from Vampire: the Masquerade's Chicago by Night.

If you've not seen those, here's an example from the 1st edition:

I'd used versions of these extensively in older Vampire chronicles I'd run, and found them a useful summary for mapping character relationships with each other. So, we decided to build one for our six PCs.

The players described their characters' opinions of each PC in turn, and, after discussing it out with the group, came up with a single-word summary for what they currently thought of each PC.

And that ended up with the aforementioned colour-tastic grid.

And, yes, each of our PCs has an associated colour. We decided that pretty early. Each is also marked with a simple device as well. In turn...

Luitpold - Yellow - Comets
Alamennowyth - Green - Arhain, Rune of Shadows
Birdie - Blue - Rats
Gerhardt - Purple - Stag
Elric - Red - Key of Secrets
Yume - Orange - Fox

Slap a splatty rainbow heart in the middle, and we were good to go!

The conversation concerning each PC's opinions was informed by the previous party ambitions and how they had (or had not) been achieved. It was good to see those mechanics influencing the grid we built.

Looking over it, I think the end result provides a fascinating, easily accessed insight to each of the character's opinions of each other. I'm very much looking forward to doing this again in three months' time or so to see how the opinions have changed after they've dealt with the horrors of Enemy in Shadows and Death on the Reik.

Something to look forward to!

Also, yes, I could have gone grim and dark for the graphic we created here - made it all WFRP. But I decided not to as it was an out-of-time thing for us, and it was nice to create something a bit brighter for a change.

And then we reach the conclusion. After making the grid, I realised that WFRP4 is still lacking a Party Generation system, and that it wouldn't be too hard to implement.

Anyone think it's worthwhile?