Character Creation: Liberté

Appropriately, it's been pouring down rain all day. On we go!

The Game: Liberté
The Publisher: GMDK
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one 

This game is kind of a heartbreaker. Here's the back cover text:

Simple, evocative, compelling. It sets up expectations for the game right away. Once you get into reading the game, though, there are a couple of red flags. One is that it uses a "modified" PbtA system. Look, all games based on PbtA are "modified," because the strength of the system, from a design perspective, is its customizability. But with that said, there are some principles that, if you change them, do kind of upset the balance. Liberté changes the target number from 7 to 8, which skews probability, but it also changes the results from miss/partial/complete to miss/perfect/excessive. It also calls moves "childities", which isn't a word, is hard to say, and doesn't tell you a thing. 

Reading through the rest of the book, the game just really failed to grab me. There are elements that grabbed me. I love the setting of the city with no adults, forever in the rain, with the monstrous sirains just outside the gate, but then the game fails to capitalize on it. There's a lot of table-created specificity, and that's cool, but I feel like this game might have benefited more from a Blades in the Dark like approach; describe the city of Liberté a little more and let the group make up details within that. 

I dunno. It's a bummer because there's a lot I like about it, but I kept thinking of how the moves (sorry, childities) would look at the table and I wasn't really feeling it. 

But hey, let's make a character and see what that does. First thing I need to do is choose an archetype. Let's see. 

You know, one thing that some PbtA games do that I really think I'd love to see in all of them is the bit where they say "play this archetype/playbook/skin if you want to X." I think that's good on a design level, too; helps you figure out what the niche for each splat is. 

Anyway, I pick...the Li'l One, how about. Ages for PCs aren't really specified, but the archetype seems to be about vulnerability and the kind of parental instinct the character triggers in others. I can get behind that. 

Normally the first step would be filling in a questionnaire about the city and the inhabitants and so forth, but that's a full-group thing so I'll skip it. First step in chargen is a name ("how they call me" - did I mention this game is translated from French?). I'll say my character is called Bubba. It's what his parents (were there ever parents?) used to call him, or anyway, it's what he says if you ask him his name. 

Next is "how they see me." I'm meant to circle however many of these I like, I guess? 

See if you can spot the problem here. Guess someone should have shelled out for sensitivity readers. 

Anyway, for Bubba I'm gonna choose small boy, disheveled, dirty, and unremarkable. He's everyone's little brother. He doesn't say much. 

Next, "what is mine." I'll pick "old plushie with a torn eye". Maybe he has the Hippo of Refuge? Nah, I'll say he's got a stuffed bear (can't beat the classics). It may once have been yellow or tan, but it's brown and dirty now. It's missing an eye and the thread on its nose is unraveling. Bubba calls it "little bear."

Let's see. I don't choose any moves childities Learnings, I just get going unnoticed and a child's heart. That lets me do stealthy things, which...why on earth isn't that standard? Especially since there are no stats, so everyone has the same chances if they use another move? Weird. Anyway, a child's heart lets me play to lose Bile, which is basically what will eventually give you Mildew and turn you into a monster (the game acts like it's a big new system, and I'm like yo, did you read Masks? Or Monsterhearts?). 

Last thing, then, is "my so-called friends." (See, that's a loaded statement. Is there any mechanical support for these relationships? Fuckin' nope.) I'm encouraged to apply these to other PCs, but y'know, just me. I'll choose someone who protects me from trouble. We'll say there's an older girl who doesn't really like Bubba, but she refuses to let him get hurt so she's stepped in to protect him or help him sometimes. Bubba doesn't know her name, he just calls her "Her."

And, what the heck, I'll take playmate who takes me on crazy adventures. Xavier is older than Bubba, and likes to tell him what to do and show him cool stuff (and sometimes scary stuff, but that makes Bubba cry and that's only funny so many times). Bubba calls him "Dayber" because "Xavier" is too hard to say. 

And that's it! I have so many grumbles with this game.