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A jam submission

Gut HunchView project page

TTRPG about Detectives with strong gut feelings
Submitted by Lucy <3 — 1 day, 10 hours before the deadline
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Gut Hunch's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Does the game seem fun to play?#94.4294.429
Did it make good use of the Havoc Engine?#144.1434.143
Overall#213.9053.905
Did it build on the Havoc Engine and add interesting stuff?#393.1433.143

Ranked from 14 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

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Comments

Submitted

Exactly what it says on the tin in a really fun way, I love the way you've mashed these ideas together.  This is a really solid, ready to play setup.

I really like the art throughout and especially loved the unifying neon lighting you did on the character sheets.

One thing I'd love to see in a future edition would be a map since you've already gone to the trouble of detailing out the locations anyway!

Submitted(+1)

The game looks like a lot of fun. For such a short text, especially with the art and the layout, it's amazing how much you've packed into the game. 

If I have a complaint it's that the whole thing is a bit non-specific. The game would benefit from either a single statement or something like prompts and random tables to specify what's going on exactly. I get the overall vibe of what's happening, but it feels like as a GM, I'd want at least pointers that give me something specific. I feel like there's a risk of getting overwhelmed by having too much openness here. Something like a d6 table for clues at each location, or a dossier with a couple of options would be good.

Submitted

What you've managed to convey in 20 pages is really good. 

The characters are so good. I especially love the creativity in their abilities (Sharing is Caring, Transmutation, Smoke Trail, Golf Caddy, Fingerguns, and Foresight are all such good additions to the characters). 

I like the structure of the adventure. I agree with the comment below about rewriting some objective descriptions. I do wish there were maybe some more optional or side objectives (like stealing the UFO in Act 2 & Saving the Alien in Act 2), but that's something that can be thrown in on the fly by a GM. I'd maybe try to build them, so they're available during any scene in an act and maybe even repeatable, that way they feel reflective of a Detective processing disparate clues learned in different spots, rather than specifically and exclusively tied to a single location. 

  • Act 1 side objectives could expand on the "build a profile" and "what do the police know" objectives in Act 1 with more details. Example below:
    • (Repeating Objective) Build a list of people who had frequent interractions with the victim. 3 successes. Roll 1d6 or pick one each time this objective is completed. Maximum of 3-5 potential suspects
      • 1-2 players learn that just the other day at the grocery store, the local librarian publicly berated the victim for overdue library books (pushes players to the library potentially)
      • 3-4 players learn the name of a red herring. A coworker or someone from the victim's personal life who held a public grudge against them (limit 2 times) 
      • 5-6 players learn the names of a stooge who visited or called the victim's home in the days before their death. The interactions were short and tense. (These were stooges from the cult who were threatening the victim) (limit 2 times) If the players get this reward at least once, they recognize the stooge at the cult meeting in Act 3. 
  • Act 2 side objectives could revolve around vetting alibies from red herrings and narrowing down connections between the cult members that the party has identified so far
    • (Repeating Objective) Vet an Alibi (5 successes)
      • One red herring says they were at the UFO trinket shop at the time of the murder and the owner could validate it. 
      • One red herring says they took their family to the Roswell Museum on the night of the murder. They lost their ticket stubs, but they had willcall tickets and the people at the counter should still have their name on a list somewhere
      • One red herring says they were out to eat celebrating an anniversary at the extra terrestrial diner and the waitress who always serves them was working that night and should be able to confirm they were there
      • One person who is involved with the cult but didn't commit the murder says they were up at the old radio tower after they got a call to fix something. They're sending the party up to get trapped. 
  • Act 3 side objectives could revolve around taking out cult leaders permanently to stop the evil once and for all. The town hall and police station are key targets, but they've learned the names of lots of stooges who need to be dealt with
    • (Repeating Objective) Deal with a Cult Stooge (5 successes)

I do think that maybe the cops/men in black are slightly overused as the adversaries. I'd like to see a little more variety here, especially in ways that a gumshoe can deal with without direct violence. Some ideas:

  • Victim's home already mentions nosey neighbors. Maybe rather than active cops at the scene when they get there. It's a nosey neighbor who will call the cops if they don't leave immediately. Maybe that's a side objective.
  • I love the idea that the town librarian is in the cult and actively tries to misdirect the players during their search of the town records. She'll send them down the wrong path unless they deal with her. 
  • The mortician is not just going to let the party look at the body while they're in the morgue. Someone needs to get rid of him. 
  • Tourists who keep getting in the way of the party at the trinket shop, diner and museum while they're trying to look around and interrogate leads
  • Cult members seem like a pretty clear choice. It seems heavily implied that most of the cops are in the cult, which is great, but I also think there should be other cult members just acting as nuisances. This is also a great place to source side objectives. 

I also think there's a bit of heavy lifting on the GM/Players part in terms of identifying and naming interesting characters to act as the Victim, Suspect, Red Herrings, Witnesses, etc. I think it's good you left that vague, but I do sort of wish it was addressed in the text at the beginning to let a GM know that they should try to have a list of names handy. In the same vein, I do sort of wish there was a very simple map with the objective locations and maybe some others thrown in to allow for players to come up with creative solutions. 

It feels like progressing through the adventure can go one of two ways. With a very invested group and a good GM, the players do a lot of the leading (as Havoc Engine recommends) and they start identifying locations they want to go to. The GM then is maybe dropping hints/breadcrumbs to the locations the objectives take place at or just picking up objectives from the text and dropping them into the places the players actually choose to go. With maybe a less invested group or an inexperienced GM, I worry that maybe the GM just runs through the areas like a checklist and the narrative doesn't really string together between them very well. I think that's what the side objectives that I have above could help with. Give the players freedom to roam and plot hooks to pull them back to where the story is taking place. 

Sorry for the novel. I really like this submission!

Developer(+1)

Thank you so much for all the good and detailed feedback!! I plan on making a revised more polished version soon so this will be very useful for that :))

Submitted(+1)

AS others have said this is tightly written, gives a ton of flavor in such a small package and you really need to leave some layout chops for the rest of us dang it!

Nothing I’d call a real issue but one thing that I noticed is it is hard to see the last use highlight on the items and when printed I know that the EtR character sheets that look so good in the book are hard to use in game with the marked areas and loot slots feeling a bit too dark. I think some B&W alt sheets would be super useful as a separate resource.

Submitted(+1)

Absolutely love the media you pull as references for this game and those inspirations really show. Before I was more than a page or two in I thought, "This feels like Disco Elysium," and I mean that as a compliment.

The game makes good use of straightforward Havoc Engine mechanics and evocative art.

Ed gave some good feedback below. The only additional feedback I'd have is that I'm not sure how many locations you expect players to play through in each act. Is it one each? More than one in some? I know that you say they should move as they get enough clues, but also think some guidance on how to determine what enough is could benefit players and GMs.

Really, though, I love this game's theme and think you executed really well on it!

Submitted(+1)

This looks cool as hell. Tight theming and premise, straightforward Havoc Engine mechanics, and fantastic art.

Submitted(+1)

I love the artwork. It transports the vision of the characters. This vision seems somewhat distinct from the media touchstones you mention. There is great creative potential here! Please continue building this.

Some more work is needed to make this fully playable, with a lot of things implied in the context of the jam but not really in the document.

Given the title, it surprises me that Gut Hunch is a Stat that varies by characters. Narratively, all seem to have a different kind of intuition, but mechanically only some really shine.

I am not sure the equipment list is a good idea (I see players hoarding the “good” stuff).

Submitted(+2)

The characters and their abilities are so much fun and thematically rich, really nice work.

The "Finger guns" ability is something special. 

Submitted (1 edit)

Gut Hunch is a supernatural detective game where you must solve a murder in the town of Roswell while evading cops and Men in Black.

I love the layout and art in this game, it's evocative and suits the theme. The use of inspiration mechanics to gain Shivers, this game’s spendable resources, and the descriptions of abilities are on point.

The game gives 4 PreGen characters, but I would've loved to have a narrative reason why these 4 very different individuals work as PIs together. Maybe they're a crime-fighting family?

The promise of exploring the town, solving a murder, and then escaping the forces at work trying to cover it up is very fun. I would've loved to have a more detailed approach to what each location can offer and why players would want/need to visit these locations. 

For example : Public Library - Objective: 5 - What happened in the town’s past. Any cults?

could read :  Public Library - Objective: 5 - You discover hints of an active cult  in Roswell's past.

Explicit motivations to visit objectives and rewards will definitely make the GMs work a lot easier. Same goes for who the murderer is, the list of suspects, some red herrings, etc.

This is the tough part of writing or creating a murder mystery, and I would personally get a game in this genre only if it explicitly thought out of the cool plots and twists for me in advance.

I also love the equipment and ability description that bring a lot of flavour (the laptop that gives extra dice, if you guess, terrible passwords, for example).

Thank you for this submission!

Ed from JoyJoi Games

Developer(+1)

Thank you for the kind words and very useful feedback!! :))