A friend of mine's put out a (negative) review of Dogs In the Vineyard here. Now that I've had a chance to play a few games and really pick the system to pieces, I broadly agree with his points, so I thought I'd link it here to see what people here thought.

Hmm...

I bought DitV.  I thought it was an interesting game.

I also think it is more or less unplayable.  The setting and style of play are both going to appeal to a very small segment of the gamer population - significantly enough for me to never even hope to play it.

The review touches on some things I found problematic with the game.  Fallout doesn't work right - taking on a new trait at 1d4 is sooo not a bad thing.  I'm sure Vince explained why he did it that way somewhere, but I can only read so many forums.

The review doesn't touch on several other things I didn't like: Buckets of dice required to play, it is nearly impossible for the dogs to fail a conflict if more than one of them are involved, and the simple fact that the whole die mechanic really interrupts any attempts at immersion in the scene (it's too meta).

I disagree with the parts of the review about the escalation system (I thought that was much more interesting and innovative than Dan did).  I also have to disagree with the overall argument - that DitV is too much like every other RPG.  I disagree - I find there to be sufficient enough differences.  I also think DitV sets out to do what it wants to do fairly well (even if that doesn't always match with my preferences).

Quote from: jgantsThe review touches on some things I found problematic with the game.  Fallout doesn't work right - taking on a new trait at 1d4 is sooo not a bad thing.  I'm sure Vince explained why he did it that way somewhere, but I can only read so many forums.

The impression I get is that D4 traits are meant to be temptations: you've got that 1D4 trait on your sheet, you know it gives you a very very slight advantage if you invoke it, but there's really no penalty for *not* bringing it into play as often as possible. The downside is, the D4 is probably going to roll a semi-useless 1 or 2 as often it gives you a more useful 3 or 4. Where it falls down, of course, is that 3s and 4s are still pretty useful, and 1s and 2s aren't always useless, and there is, like I said, never any real penalty for bringing a particular trait into play.

My beef with Dogs is that every conflict will tend to go down the same route, simply because it makes sense for characters to try to bring in their best traits and relationships and whatnot over and over again. I played in a silly "Care Bears In the Vineyard" game where my character had a bitchin' guitar and the licks to play it well, and I solved pretty much every problem I was face with by using guitar solos. Even if you design a well-rounded character, you're still going to use the traits you've assigned your D10s and D8s to much more often than your crappier traits, and you're still going to try and bring as many of your traits as possible into every conflict.

Quote from: WarthurI played in a silly "Care Bears In the Vineyard" game where my character had a bitchin' guitar and the licks to play it well, and I solved pretty much every problem I was faced with by using guitar solos.

\m/  >_<  \m/

I have a newfound respect for DitV.

Quote from: WarthurEven if you design a well-rounded character, you're still going to use the traits you've assigned your D10s and D8s to much more often than your crappier traits, and you're still going to try and bring as many of your traits as possible into every conflict.

To paraphrase the review...

Just like every other RPG.

Quote from: WarthurMy beef with Dogs is that every conflict will tend to go down the same route, simply because it makes sense for characters to try to bring in their best traits and relationships and whatnot over and over again. I played in a silly "Care Bears In the Vineyard" game where my character had a bitchin' guitar and the licks to play it well, and I solved pretty much every problem I was face with by using guitar solos. Even if you design a well-rounded character, you're still going to use the traits you've assigned your D10s and D8s to much more often than your crappier traits, and you're still going to try and bring as many of your traits as possible into every conflict.

If mrlost ever ropes me into playing DitV, I so totally am going to play a balladeer cowboy in powder blue who solves every conflict by strumming his guitar and singing songs about his horse.

Quote from: jgantsThe review doesn't touch on several other things I didn't like: Buckets of dice required to play, it is nearly impossible for the dogs to fail a conflict if more than one of them are involved, and the simple fact that the whole die mechanic really interrupts any attempts at immersion in the scene (it's too meta).

I had a fairly lengthy discussion with Vincent Baker concerning immersion on RPGnet and it sounds like he finds it very easy to context switch between thinking in character and thinking about the game as a player, so it may be a problem that he doesn't experience himself.

Quote from: John MorrowI had a fairly lengthy discussion with Vincent Baker concerning immersion on RPGnet and it sounds like he finds it very easy to context switch between thinking in character and thinking about the game as a player, so it may be a problem that he doesn't experience himself.

Well, that's just my "educated guess" anyways.  Since I haven't actually played DitV, I couldn't say if it is truly as interrupting to the immersive "flow" of things as the way I read it to be.  So it very well could not be a real problem in play.

Quote from: WarthurA friend of mine's put out a (negative) review of Dogs In the Vineyard here. Now that I've had a chance to play a few games and really pick the system to pieces, I broadly agree with his points, so I thought I'd link it here to see what people here thought.

The review says:

"Now admittedly, I'm not reproducing the whole account, and admittedly, I'm being a little flippant in my presentation, but let's just go back to "What The Game Is Like" again: 'Blood, passion, judgement, fire. Real, gripping drama all the way around the table' is what we were promised, but the end result seems to look an awful lot like every RPG I have ever been in."

Exactly my reaction from reading actual play threads.  And it leads me to wonder exactly what sort of games people were playing before DitV.  Perhaps they really were only having 20 minutes of fun packed into 4 hours?  In fact, if anything, the examples I've read are less gripping, passionate, and intense than what I've seen in some of the games I've played in and run.

I personally don't find that the DitV dicerolling mechanic wrecks my immersion, but I can definitely see how it can wreck people who find dicerolling distracting. Rather than just rolling your dice, reporting a number, and saying whether that's over or below your skill (for example), you have to roll the dice and then pay close attention to them and the GMs' dice and peoples' bids for an extended period of time.

Quote from: John MorrowThe review says:

"Now admittedly, I'm not reproducing the whole account, and admittedly, I'm being a little flippant in my presentation, but let's just go back to "What The Game Is Like" again: 'Blood, passion, judgement, fire. Real, gripping drama all the way around the table' is what we were promised, but the end result seems to look an awful lot like every RPG I have ever been in."

Exactly my reaction from reading actual play threads.  And it leads me to wonder exactly what sort of games people were playing before DitV.  Perhaps they really were only having 20 minutes of fun packed into 4 hours?

I actually think the better point comes when he points out that one of Baker's own players reports a very different experience of Dogs than the one Baker thought he presented. Quoting the review because Dan puts this better than I can:

Quote from: Dan, in his review of DogsNotice that Tom's description of events differs considerably from D. Vincent's. D. Vincent says that Meg and Tom (the players) "Judged Brother Malachi immediately and viscerally." The way Tom describes it, however, it sounds a lot more like he and Meg had just tried to work out what the GM wanted them to do. "Your description implied she was only doing it because he was the Steward" says Tom. Nothing Tom says implies to me that he felt empowered to pass judgement on the NPCs in any way other than one sanctioned by the GM at the start of the game. Nothing implied he was doing anything at all pro-active. The players were presented with a situation by the GM, they investigated the situation the GM presented, and then they took the solution that they felt the GM was leading them towards.

I find this especially damning, because one of Baker's own actual play examples seems to be suggesting that the game really isn't as PC-empowering as it claims to be. GMs aren't allowed to explicitly pass moral judgements on players' actions in Dogs, but Dogs clearly fails to solve the problem of GMs being able to effectively suggest courses of action to players through the descriptions they give.

Quote from: WarthurI actually think the better point comes when he points out that one of Baker's own players reports a very different experience of Dogs than the one Baker thought he presented.

I'm going to toss out a thought that I've been rolling around in my head that I think captures why I don't like the whole idea of players handing conflicts to the GM to tell them what the game should be about.

When I go into New York City, I go to the train station and buy a ticket.

That I willingly went to the station, purchased the ticket, and picked the destination does not mean that I'm not still getting on a railroad.

There's a significant percentage of the Ap reports for that game that I have run across that basically amount to what i would consider "promotional ad copy". Actually, I think it's a couple of guys who just started writing like that. There's clearly a lot of promotional advocacy and evangelism going on over there*.

I do think this game has a lot of appeal if you have a certain kind of background. Like, I've never been a Christian, so I didn't really connect with the "here's where we show how judgemental christians can be!" vibe. I don't care about westerns.. or faux-moralist type sentiments I guess. But I can see how if you were some guy suddenly turning into an atheist or something in your 30-somethings's and you are suddenly overwhelmed with your own ennui or whatever this might be a very significant "roleplaying statement".





* The promotional evangelism stuff was fairly thick in 2005, but by now it's kinda turning into self-parody. A recent example I ran across had one forgie guy advocating "make a lot of extra noise at your table at a convention so that everyone else thinks you are having more fun". It's gotten ridiculous out there!

What I found interesting was mrlost's report that DitV is very adamant about the way you run it.  You can GM the thing wrong, and indeed he got a lot of shit over at (I believe) Vince's forum because he wanted to create a town on his own rather than use the town creation rules in the book.  Apparently that is a very BadWrong thing to do.

Quote from: John MorrowThe review says:

"Now admittedly, I'm not reproducing the whole account, and admittedly, I'm being a little flippant in my presentation, but let's just go back to "What The Game Is Like" again: 'Blood, passion, judgement, fire. Real, gripping drama all the way around the table' is what we were promised, but the end result seems to look an awful lot like every RPG I have ever been in."

Exactly(....more or less) what my players said when I ran the game.

Regards,
David R