Trick Taking

[SheikhJahbooty]

Are there any RPGs that use a conflict resolution mechanic similar to trick taking in card games like Gang of Four or Bullshit?

So far I've found that John Harper was experimenting with a system like this early on for the game Danger Patrol, but then he ended up using a weird cool step die thingie that I kind of associate with John Harper because of Agon. His idea was that the person initiating a conflict plays a card and then the next person to the left can play a card but that card played determines if the person to the left can say, "Yes and", "Yes but", "No and", or "No but". So you can try to force a certain response by playing a particular card.

It would probably work pretty well, if the players has kind of small hands, like 3 to 5 cards each, and went around in a circle like that.

In case anyone is curious, I'm trying to build a GM-less superspy game that uses cards and takes place in a fictional world, something along the lines of Casino Royal meets Aeon Flux. At first I thought I could modify Capes to use cards, but when I saw John Harper talk about his early ideas for Danger Patrol I really wanted to switch to something that involves Trick Taking, since the working title of my game is Die Deuce (kind of a pun on Cho Dai 2, the Chinese trick-taking card game).

I've been fantasizing about a GM-less spy game for spy vs. spy style play for years now, so anyone who can point me to useful stuff would be greatly appreciated.

[Nicephorus]

I'm not familiar with John Harper's ideas but I think that a card mechanic would work great for a game where players are both cooperating and competing, such as spies. I'd add a neutral deck for the situation and NPCs - turn over the next card and play it as the opposition. For tough situations, turn over 2-4 and play the best one. If the neutral deck wins, everybody loses but players can play cards to add to another player's card to prevent that. (For this bit, I'm inspired by the game Republic of Rome where factions compete to control Rome but they all lose if Rome falls.)

To represent equipment, you can let each player pull choose 1-2 cards to put in their hand at the beginning of each adventure. For inherent abilities, there might be cards that they always start with at the beginning of adventures - other players will eventually pick up on what cards others always have as they get to know their counterparts. Overall ability can be represented by hand size.

Depending on the details of the mechanics, you might have past tricks won modify the value of current cards played. This reflects having the upper hand and would discourage players from hording their good cards early on for tricks that they consider unimportant.

I've been playing around a bit with a game of court intrigue that uses cards but it will be a few months before I have the time to make anything readable by others.