I have never run or played a funnel, but...

A topic by maxcan7 created Jun 24, 2021 Views: 199 Replies: 2

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I've had an idea for a My Hero Academia-inspired superhero funnel for a long time, and this jam has me thinking about this for the first time in a long time. I was especially inspired by the initial tournament to get into UA.

Granted, it will almost inevitably be very different than a typical funnel anyway because it's a very different genre and context. Like for instance, I'm tentatively going to use an original, rules-light, FKR-ish system, and PCs aren't just at risk of incapacitation, but also disqualification if they fall below a certain number of points or for violating certain rules of the tournament. I'm hoping the tournament structure and building the system around that will make it easier to manage, but without a frame of reference for running or playing funnels, I could be making things more difficult for myself by doing that.

So that all being said, as someone who has never run or played a funnel before, what are some unique concerns or subtle complications of running and designing funnel games?

I know that there's a lot about game design that I've internalized to the point that I have a decent intuitive sense for how to design adventures and run games and how mechanics affect play, but I do feel a little out of my element with the idea of a funnel. I'm especially concerned with how to account for the added burden on players to keep track of multiple characters, let alone for how to design challenges with that idea in mind. I'm concerned not just for the questions I know to ask, but also all the ones I wouldn't even think to ask until I'm in the moment and realize I didn't consider something.

I've read DCC and I've read some other things related to funnels, will probably need to go back and reread them more critically, and maybe it'll be fairly clear once I do that, but just wondering about GOTCHAs (like in a software engineering sense), and stuff like that.

SageDaMageHost2 years ago(+1)

My personal answer (and something I personally believe most DCC funnels do NOT do well) is that you should especially consider the IMPACT the funnel will have on surviving characters. A funnel is an amazing time to give the players crazy mutations, powers, or even just hooks to other things you want to come up later, after the funnel. Due to the fragility and unattached attitude players will have, you can get away with really warping a character into something interesting. For example, I ran a funnel of my own creation for a group of players. One of the characters touched a pedestal with their bare hand, which jammed a long rod of alien metal into their arm, which allowed them to use their arm as a weapon but also allowed aliens to control it (think Magneto controlling Wolverine's metal bones but just the arm).

To your secondary question, "I'm especially concerned with how to account for the added burden on players to keep track of multiple characters", I think that there are two things to keep in mind:

(1): Traditional roleplaying will normally be heavily mitigated. I've seen this go one of two ways. Either the players each choose one character at a time to put to the forefront for roleplaying, or they just don't really talk in-character. This is generally expected for most traditional funnels. A funnel is very "meta", and strategic thinking is encouraged, often involving some metagaming, especially since (A) the players can't really get into character with three characters at once and (B) the players might not even get the chance to fully get into character due a character's unfortunate demise

(2): Players often (at least effectively) play as one character with two hirelings at their personal control and disposal. So, when thinking about the burden a player may have, they'll often come up with some solution by themselves or as a group to mitigate the issue. Mechanics might be an issue, but if you're running something rules-light, it normally isn't an issue. When designing a funnel, at least the one's I've seen (I haven't designed one yet), traditional OSR problems usually do the trick, although you are expected and encouraged to make the stakes a LOT higher, or the problem a lot harder to solve, at least without some collateral damage.

Hopefully all that helps! Let me know if you have any additional questions!

maxcan72 years ago

1. The idea of mutations and whacky stuff is something that would really appeal to me for a funnel for a more fantasy-oriented game, but I'm not sure how well it would work for this idea. That being said, in general I like the idea that the Funnel should in some way be a monumental experience for the "survivors", so I'll think about that. In MHA, it works so well because we get the completion of the first narrative arc for Midoriya, but within the context of a TTRPG, and a first session, and a funnel where players have multiple characters and don't know who will come out of it successfully, there isn't necessarily as much of the baked-in weightiness.

2. This is a really good point that I hadn't considered, that it should be expected to be a low-roleplay, more tactical experience, given the number of characters they have to juggle and the high uncertainty of what they'll end up with. This doesn't necessarily change anything I had planned on so far, but it does change how I think about designing for a Funnel, thank you! While there definitely will be this tactical element, I think I might also borrow some of the collaborative storytelling elements of from Anyone Can Wear the Mask, if not literally, at least in spirit. Even if I don't use any mechanics from that game necessarily, it demonstrated to me how to go about playing an RPG where you aren't really roleplaying as much as doing collaborative worldbuilding and storytelling, and I think that approach could be useful for a Funnel for the reasons you state, and especially in this case since I want there to be certain superhero narrative elements that might otherwise not come through.

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Funnel Jam

I have never run or played a funnel, but...