Thread by @rdonoghue

As expected, Quest was a quick read. I mean no sleight when I say I think the game falls short of the product. The game is not bad, but the product is truly next-level.

I can definitely see it as a first game for many a player. Less certain about a first game for a GM.

The character classes are nicely vivid. In a touch I greatly appreciate, each class (sorry, Role) has a number of ability lists. These are short, non-branching and progressive (so you need Stomcaller #1 to get #2 and so on). They are *Available*

That is, you start with 6 of these things, and the deepest lists only go 4 or 5 deep. There is no arbitrary capping to the bottom - if you want to start out with one of these maxed out? GO FOR IT.

That's delightful.

And as Levi notes, the game is awash in stage direction. Many abilities have explicit cues for what to say, and the game emphasizes your different IC & OOC "voice". There's an escape hatch, yes, but the assumption is that this game is PERFORMED.

Like, some of the abilities trigger honest to god minigames at the table. Cast a spell to learn a language - want to learn it permanently? Then you need to win a round of charades!

I am kind of not the audience for this, but that makes it no less brilliant.

Tricky, though. I mean, if I really gaze upon it, I think the game runs on a lot of handwavium, and its core economy engine seems clunky, its niche protection has some flaws, and the line between actions and Actions is weird at times.

And I dunno if any of that matters.

Is calling out that one of the abilities is broken as written a reasonable criticism or is it dwelling on something rather secondary to the point?

I'm honestly not sure.

That said, the role of dice in the game is kind of fascinating.

So, if the dice are rolled, it's a luck check, plain and simple. You roll a d20 and get an extended coin flip with Crits, Success, mixed success and failure outcomes.

Abilities might tell you what things MEAN, but the structure of the roll is always the same.

That is to say, the game boils down to "Your abilities tell you explicit things you can do, but outside those, if it's uncertain, flip a coin."

(Yes, it's more nuanced than a coin, but I'm going to stick with the comparison because it emphasizes that it's a luck check)

This is one of those rules that has the advantage of conforming to table norms like silly putty. If your table already has an intuition of what you roll for, you're set. And the table decides if 'color' has any influence on whether or not you flip.

That is, if the spy wants to pick someone's pocket, do you make her roll?

What about the fighter?

It's a question you're going to face as a GM, and the game doesn't give a lot of handles to answer it.

I chafe at this, but it also illustrates why my chafing is unimportant. I am hung up on the 'reality' of the characters, but the coin flip just drives *events*

So, there's a bit of an existential "What even is game?" question there.

However, I am actually very curious how people respond to it, because if they dig it, I will finally dig out a mechanic I thought the world would largely reject, so that's nice.

I have a hypothesis: Quest externalizes almost all of the traditionally internal elements of an RPG.

I'm not sure if this holds up or not, but what I mean is that there is almost nothing about a character - except you the player - which quest does not put on its sleeve.

So, things which you might keep track of in other games (like money or subsystems) are pushed aside in favor of, well, card friendly blocks. Even inventory is blocks.

I'm not saying that' it's bad, just wrestling with why I find it jarring.

And it might just be an incidental effect of focusing on performance. There is no part of the game where players quietly do bookkeeping while the cameras are rolling.

That *seems* like it's a good thing.

Also, for the nerds, if you want to talk about how Quest has mixed results like PBTA, I hear-by arm you with DEEP NERDERY.

It has mixed results like Talislanta.

Also - one more thing that speaks well for Quest is that I am 100% burning cycles asking myself "Ok, if I wanted a game to hit these notes, what would I do?" and that is welcome consideration.

Like, very seriously, the prospect of welding performance cues into Aspect is SUPER interesting to me.

Also, if you hear my concerns with Quest as "it's bad", I recommend the alternative explanation of "I am old, and the world is strange and confusing, and this is what dealing with that sounds like." :)