It was made silly from the outset when one player added Juggalos to the Yes Palette, yet me being a gamer who likes him some serious drama managed to put a lot of drama into that game that we all enjoyed, and without banning silliness. Despite tentacle monsters, robot sex scandals, and a planet named Faygo, we managed to have a Imperial succession drama, a sinister immortal robot destroying the wormhole network for secret noble but tragic reasons, a space trade republic slowly going evil or decadent we didn't learn which , and questions about the rights of sentient robots and their relationship to their human creators.
It doesn't go into detail about all the possible techniques, but it does serve as an example of how silliness and seriousness can co-exist in the same game with some deliberate choices and techniques. The tone of the table is, at the end of the day, the choice of the players. The players must choose to be invested in the theme of the game and the tone of the theme.
When inviting players to play, get consensus on what kind of game they want to play. Do certain people at the table have joke-triggers? Ban them. For that matter, put "silly" on the palette's no side, or whatever term operationalizes your group's approach to funny.
Make sure everyone is cool with this and what it means. Put some serious topics on the yes side of the palette. Spell the tone of the game out here. It's incredibly powerful, because anything on the no side is auto-vetoed. Make sure that your theme has a serious context, a serious tone of exploration, and a way for people at the table to buy in. At the end of the day, if the group buys into the theme, the people won't want to contradict the feel of the game.
But this is meta. You must have the group choose to buy in, and setting the right theme provides for that. My experience with relatively unstructured, creativity-rich games like Microscope although this tendency is hardly limited to it is that people are most comfortable exhibiting their creativity in a silly way.
If you come up with a race of mole people, nobody's going to feel bad when someone else laughs at it and calls it stupid. So to that, here are a couple of story-game things that apply as equally to Microscope as Fiasco or Monsterhearts. I think it's a very, very good practice before a game starts to announce that if at any time anybody in the group decides that some element of the game makes them uncomfortable, they can ask to "draw the veil" on that thing and nobody gets to ask why.
This can be anything from rape to Ewoks, it doesn't matter. The only rule is that you can say that at any time and nobody can even ask why. Now, you can ask for clarification "Are you saying you want to draw the veil on slavery as a whole, or just the particular experiences of this character?
You might think that this would stifle creativity even more, but in fact it does just the opposite. Once people accept that they're in a comfortable environment, they'll start to take more risks. I've played with my fair share of story-gamers who complain about games getting too goofy. I like goofy, but I also really dig serious as well. And when I'm playing a game that I want to get serious in, well, I just get serious about it.
I would in general spend less time admonishing folks for not taking stuff seriously and spend more time getting deep into your own characters and themes, figuring out fiendish and devilish ways to advance the storyline keeping stuff close to the vest, as discussed in the rulebook, is a great idea! Sometimes you'll end up laughing your way through a session which, as you look back on it, was actually extremely dark. The laughter becomes "oh my god, I can't believe we just did that!
Microscope has a great mechanic about it where, before you even exactly start playing the game, you go around the table introducing things you want or don't want in the timeline. It behooves you to use this, especially if you're playing with a regular core of folks.
If you're playing a science fiction world and your friend Bob has a tendency to introduce Ewoks, ban them. Ban cuddly aliens in general. If Bob wants to then introduce a 'cuddly' insect race in retaliation, well, I could see a serious game about that, actually.
I think a big part of getting away from silly is dumping some of the more obvious cliches and being forced to play a little bit out of your zone. On the other hand, if Bob does try to bring in Ewoks, you do have that initial list to use against him as a cudgel if you have to.
Conversely, if you really want to explore some particular aspect of life through your timeline, by all means, bring it up in advance. Sometimes your ideas won't fly but sometimes someone else will hear something you want to include and think "ooh yeah, that would be awesome! The last game I played, we started out with a diplomat from a foreign land coming into a kingdom to negotiate a settlement.
Kind of out of nowhere, I remembered this scene in ancient Rome where a Roman diplomat drew a line around a king and told him to make his decision before he stepped out of that line, and I decided to bring that in to play. Folks were like "whaaaaa? Maybe you don't know history. Maybe chemistry is your thing.
Introduce some weird reaction that has some cool effect. In some ways, Microscope is your way of showing off A good half of the book talks about strategies on how to play and how to introduce others to the game. That's good design for a game like this. Read those bits and try to call them out when you can. For instance, the rule against goading other people into answers is a fantastic one in this game; in my experience, sometimes a person who is taking forever to come up with an era or a scene eventually comes up with something that makes everybody just sit there speechless for five minutes.
Keeping your ideas close to the vest is another good one, and I think is related to the first one: if you have a good idea, do not waste it on advising someone else what they want to do.
Instead, keep it to yourself and spring it the next time you can. In fact, if you find yourself doing that, point it out in-game! If folks are like "oh maaan that is awesome how did you come up with that?
There's no better way for people to understand how the game can become great than by an example like that. The big thing about story games is that they're pretty much by definition not going to go in a direction you anticipated. Let folks do what they want, roll with the punches, and see what happens.
You'd be surprised at how often a silly-seeming beginning turns into something not all that silly at all. I wanted to just add this as a quick aside: don't be too worried if the first couple scenes get silly. Microscope is a little unique in that the first couple of folks just don't have a lot to go on, usually, so they're either pulling in something from outside of the game or they're just spitballing.
Allow this to happen. I have been blessed to live around the Seattle area, which has a vibrant story gaming community filled with people who have no problem playing Microscope seriously. This is, for many of those folks, something they've learned to do over the course of many years.
The community itself is warm and accepting, so very often newer folks will move past the awkward silly phase quickly. The thing is, you can't expect every game of Microscope to be like that from the start.
The community had to grow to get to where they are now, and you in turn will need to learn how to story-game with your friends. For now, you may not even want to worry so much about how the games are too silly or whatever, as long as everyone is having fun and getting more comfortable with each other's creativity. Constraints of Palette and Theme are your most powerful tools here.
But if the players keep wandering off on tangents then try taking a well known sensible world system and set the theme to that. You can have a lot of fun building on a world that you all know Dune, Middle Earth, Highlander and people know what is expected in that and how the characters would react. Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top. Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group.
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Active 5 months ago. Viewed 21k times. How do you make sure a Microscope game is meaningful, and not a random amalgamation of nonsense? Improve this question. Southpaw Hare 7, 3 3 gold badges 33 33 silver badges 79 79 bronze badges. AlbeyAmakiir AlbeyAmakiir 1, 1 1 gold badge 13 13 silver badges 18 18 bronze badges.
That game is actually one I managed to inject quite a bit of drama into by the end, and remembering how I did that is what inspired me to write an answer here.
Add a comment. Active Oldest Votes. Scene Questions One powerful framing tool you have is scene questions. Palette One of the more subtle things you can do is seed the palette with things that make the game "grittier" or "more realistic".
Be Boring One of the knobs you can tune is what you introduce to the game on your turn. The cure for this is being boring. Okay, not really boring, but "boring". Scene Characters When setting up a scene, it can be tempting to leave the character choices wide open, but they're an opportunity to set the tone of the scene. Scene Thoughts Scene thoughts are extremely powerful ways to shape the fiction.
The Focus The Focus is a very powerful way to set the tone of the game. The First Lens The first Lens of a round has the power to create two cards, so there is more ability to shape the round's tone.
Build on Silly Things This is more of a general directive — the specific techniques above are all useful for this.
Improve this answer. This answer is excellent. I now feel excited to play again so I can try these techniques out. Players The tone of the table is, at the end of the day, the choice of the players.
Palette Do certain people at the table have joke-triggers? Theme Make sure that your theme has a serious context, a serious tone of exploration, and a way for people at the table to buy in. Brian Ballsun-Stanton Brian Ballsun-Stanton k 20 20 gold badges silver badges bronze badges.
Especially the theme. Theme is everything when setting the tone. I've run a game that ended with a slave rebellion by intelligent sheep ninja wielding doomsday weapons Because the game had started out with simple, serious bronze age politics and exploration, and we'd hung on to that as the end approached. Pick a theme that encourages serious - Dune, not Star Wars.
Global Frequency, not Justice League. Serious themes make for serious games. Be Aware of the Veil I think it's a very, very good practice before a game starts to announce that if at any time anybody in the group decides that some element of the game makes them uncomfortable, they can ask to "draw the veil" on that thing and nobody gets to ask why.
Lead By Example I've played with my fair share of story-gamers who complain about games getting too goofy. Use the Rule System To Make Sure You Don't Go Off In Certain Directions Microscope has a great mechanic about it where, before you even exactly start playing the game, you go around the table introducing things you want or don't want in the timeline.
Let People Do Their Thing The big thing about story games is that they're pretty much by definition not going to go in a direction you anticipated. The First Scenes Are Usually The Hardest I wanted to just add this as a quick aside: don't be too worried if the first couple scenes get silly.
Practice Makes Perfect I have been blessed to live around the Seattle area, which has a vibrant story gaming community filled with people who have no problem playing Microscope seriously. Rob Rob Microscope engagingly challenges assumptions and upends long-held conventions of play while delivering a singular and satisfying evening of gaming.
And "fractal role playing" is no joke - the minute you finish, you'll want to dive back in and explore some interesting sliver of the vast history you just built.
Bypass the hype, it's a truly remarkable well-instruction'd game". Microscope is a game that takes many standard assumptions of a role-playing game and stands them on their head.
Players share the creation of an over-arching storyline, like the rise and fall of an empire, the mythic beginnings of human culture, or a bloodthirsty war between interstellar species. It's a unique storytelling engine that sweeps away blinders of limits we enforce on the medium, which, I hope, will help us better realize the full potential of this form. There is so much more we could be doing.
Microscope is a great start. Microscope excels as either a stand-alone game or a collaborative way to build a setting with your gaming group for another game entirely. You can purchase Microscope online in Print or PDF, or ask your friendly local game store to carry it. Sign-up for email updates or keep up with all the latest on the ars ludi blog. Now Available! Microscope Explorer What is Microscope?
Humanity spreads to the stars and forges a galactic civilization… Fledgling nations arise from the ruins of the empire… An ancient line of dragon-kings dies out as magic fades from the realm… These are all examples of Microscope games. Mock chronological order. Defy time and space. Build worlds and destroy them. Bypass the hype, it's a truly remarkable well-instruction'd game" —Andy Kitkowski, founder of story-games.
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