Question to players that have 5-6+ games up their sleeves.
Question to players that have 5-6+ games up their sleeves.
Do you still use cheatsheet or have you mostly internalized the moves by now?
I find that, at least to me, DW moves are easy to remember (then again, I don't remember if I remembered them all that well after only a couple of games) but for Ironsworn I feel like I'd need to keep the cheatsheet around for Ironsworn even after dozens of sessions.
It's not really that the moves are hard to remember but I think they are more "mechanical" than say DW. They affect more stats (Momentum, Initiative, Supply, Spirit, Health, Progress Track, Conditions). Maybe also the way they have bigger "chunk" of text in each move?
That said, using the cheatsheet is easy, the moves themselves are generally easy to understand and well written and easy to use at the table. It's just that I feel shackled to that sheet as I feel I can't remember the exact triggers or effects of a move.
Do you still use cheatsheet or have you mostly internalized the moves by now?
I find that, at least to me, DW moves are easy to remember (then again, I don't remember if I remembered them all that well after only a couple of games) but for Ironsworn I feel like I'd need to keep the cheatsheet around for Ironsworn even after dozens of sessions.
It's not really that the moves are hard to remember but I think they are more "mechanical" than say DW. They affect more stats (Momentum, Initiative, Supply, Spirit, Health, Progress Track, Conditions). Maybe also the way they have bigger "chunk" of text in each move?
That said, using the cheatsheet is easy, the moves themselves are generally easy to understand and well written and easy to use at the table. It's just that I feel shackled to that sheet as I feel I can't remember the exact triggers or effects of a move.
Oops, posted that in Play Reports. Should be in Discussion.
ReplyDeleteNo shame in using reference material no matter how experienced you are in a game. We only have so much mental energy to expend everyday.
ReplyDeletePat Perkins It's not a question of shame or not. It's about fluidity. I find a game runs much more naturally when you don't need to reference to rules during play (or as little as possible).
ReplyDeleteHeck, I wrote the damn thing and I still reference moves during play, so I can't disagree with you.
ReplyDeleteMy experience has been that common moves (Face Danger, Secure an Advantage, Gather Information, Strike, Clash, Undertake a Journey, the key portions of Endure Harm and Endure Stress, maybe 1 or 2 others) tend to internalized after 3-4 sessions, while others get referenced. Ideally the stuff you do 80% of the time gets internalized, and the other 20% requires looking up the move.
I do agree that there's more mechanical stuff happening, and some moves have embedded oracles which require reference (though not every time! -- Pay the Price is usually just making the obvious bad thing happen). For folks who like a game that "gets out of the way", Ironsworn might be a bit frustrating, but I do think it gets much better with play.
For myself, I have a bit of an unreasonable anxiety over internalizing rules systems, and fret about forgotten rules and mistakes made. I do like the fact that there's not much outside of the moves to remember or reference, and I don't feel that the looking as the moves interrupts the flow since they lead you towards weaving together mechanics and fiction.
My other hope is that the relevant lightness of mechanics outside of the PCs (NPCs for example), help contribute to an overall fast experience.
One thing you might consider having at your table is just a 1-page cheat sheet with the move triggers and maybe some relevant crib notes. This would make reference a bit leaner, and perhaps serve as a tool to help you internalize them faster.
Would love to hear opinions from others.
Yeah I agree that the shuffling around in the 5-6 pages of moves sheets (+ another 4-5 pages of oracle moves) is probably not the helping this feeling. Maxime Lacoste is working on a cleaner two sided move sheet. We'll see next game how it helps.
ReplyDeleteThere's also this, which seriously collapses things down and is nifty if your eyes are better than mine. The moves are in there on 2 pages.
ReplyDeletedrive.google.com - Ironsworn Reference - 7 sheets - 14 pages (not the full game but complete reference).pdf
They better be. They cost me 3500$. But I think they botched the job. I still can't shoot lasers from my eyes. Or did I misunderstood the operation? lol
ReplyDeleteThis has been my biggest hurdle, too, but I made a deck of move cards which I plan to share once I have reformatted to highlight the stakes a bit more, and I also use this on my phone (don't bother on a desktop): https://elstiko.github.io/ironsworn
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, because of the interplay between your momentum and statuseseses, it's harder to internalise than just hit/partial/miss in DW. I'm not cranky about it, just trying to speed it up and I just don't want to be a GM all the time.
ReplyDeleteMatt Horam very nice! Is there some way of making the selections from the top menu easier (fat fingers and all on a phone)? I wouldn't mind if it required a drop down menu
ReplyDeleteDwayne Summerfield Yeah, that's on my list for sure. Stay tuned!
ReplyDelete