Yesterday, we ran the third session of my “Burning France” Burning Wheel game. The write-up of session two can be found here. Our game is really starting to get going, and this session was more action-packed than the previous two!
The Story
Our recent fumble is a problem; the people of Avignon must be convinced of the righteousness of our deeds.
Bertrand’s Third Belief
We last left Bertrand and Benoit at the scene of a crime, where the now-murdered guard captain Matthieu had alerted the entire guardhouse with his dying cry. Benoit legged it at top speed, beating out the guards rushing out from the guardhouse with B5 Speed (+1 Fork) vs B4 Speed, rolling a magical 6s vs 3s. Meanwhile, Bertrand did his best to deceive the guards, saying he came to investigate the strange noises. Rolling B3 Falsehood (+1 Persona) versus the guards’ B4 Perception, it ends up in a tie with 3s vs 3s. Bertrand, however, relies on his good luck, and swings +1s success (Fate reroll). The guard are convinced that nothing serious is amiss.
The next morning, Bertrand and Geoffrey head to the guard house to try and sway the loyalty of the guards now that their captain is gone. (Duel of Wits).
Elisa employs the guard; we work for Elisa, so you work for us. We are certain the nobles did it, and they should be seen as the main threat.
Statement of Purpose Bertrand & Geoffrey, Body of Argument 7
Thank you for your kind donation of money; however, the guard will remain independent with regards to this murder case. Please leave us to it.
Statement of Purpose Guards, Body of Argument 4
The guards, initially trying to brush them off with a standard spiel, get turned around when they find their guests agreeing with them Obfuscate B3 Falsehood 2s vs Point B4 Persuasion 1s; not only that, Bertrand and Geoffrey manage to redirect their attention to the nobles hiding out in the forest: clearly, given that they were just about to close a deal with the captain, the nobles must surely have killed him Point B3 Falsehood (+1 Help, +1 Oratory) 4s vs Rebuttal B4 Persuasion 0s defend & 1s attack. Who can withstand such ruthless logic? The guards, thoroughly convinced of this evidence, agree to make the nobles their prime suspects.
My companions are a liability for me. I must act in their best interests, even if they disagree.
Those who resent you are dangerous, and should be scared into obedience or destroyed.
Geoffrey’s First and Third Beliefs
Meanwhile, Benoit has been spending time with Elisa to find out how he can help her. She admits to being overwhelmed by her new responsibilities, and worries that the village’s food supply will not last because crop yields have apparently been falling for a while. There are a myriad of tiny problems besetting the village: farmers not using proper techniques, others are not cooperating, others are full-on fighting. Benoit and Elisa end up spending the afternoon touring the village, making an index of all of these issues B3 Farming (+2 FoRK Trouble-wise, Foraging) 3s. He encourages Elisa to take the lead in this, seeking to empower her through his experience.
Now that everyone is equal, we should all be able to shape our lives according to our own wishes.
Benoit’s First Belief
The trio meet back up with Léonce, the woodsman B2 Circles (+1 Golden Boy reputation, +1 Named Contact) 1s vs Ob 1, who was asked to scout of the location of the nobles. He informs them that he easily found them, spotting about a dozen people and counting about three or four hired muscle among them. Rather than looking to set up a counter-revolution, they seemed instead to be struggling to make due. The trio decides to let them simmer in their misery for a week or so before showing up with food and supplies to try and sway the nobles back peacefully.
We must find the deposed nobles and their sympathizers and make sure they don’t stage a counter-revolution.
Benoit’s Third Belief
During that time, Bertrand decides to rewrite his manifesto to sway the new revolutionaries to accept new leadership (namely: his); sadly, with a B3 Write (+1 Persona, +2 Fork Rule of Law & Philosophy), 2s vs Ob4 the final product does not end up being as good as Bertrand believes it to be, and it will net him a +1Ob in future tests. Benoit has a look at the developments among the farmers, and with a graduated test B3 Farming (+1 FoRK Trouble-wise, +1 FoRK Rumor-wise) 3s he notices that it is going quite well indeed. With some hard work on his side, not just the crops but the mood in the village is also doing better, making the whole place more homely. Lastly, Geoffrey wishes to get back into his old business, and decides to advertise the intimate services offered by his husband and wife, as well as set up a rudimentary spy network through them. Sadly, as it turns out, villages are more tightly knit than cities are, and the spouses of his new customers are not happy at all that he has started up business B2 Haggling (+1 FoRK Protitute-wise, +1 FoRK Persuasion), 1s vs Ob3.
Meting out justice is what’s required, but is it not justice to be considered first among many?
Bertrand’s First Belief
With that, time enough has passed for our trio to prepare to head into the forest and finally confront the nobles.
The Session
During this session, everything really started flowing much more naturally and easily. I’m getting the sense that the players are starting to get a good grip on who their characters are and what they want to do with them, and the Beliefs are coming into play more and more. It was quite satisfying to run this session, and I was impressed that with this increased clarity, I actually had almost no prep time for this evening.
Being more on point gave us the opportunity as well to engage in a Duel of Wits, as we got into our first difference of opinion in the conflict with the guards. While it was a little involved to try running this, it was also over before I realized it. I tried to give my players a decent hint at what the guards were going to do, and I’m happy that my players picked up on exactly that. Roleplaying the interaction worked relatively nicely, and I think once we get some more familiarity with this conflict resolution system, we can use it more naturally as well.
One thing that I slipped with this session was clearly laying out the risks of failure for rolls. I think this started with me neglecting to specifically ask after and confirm Task and Intent, and therefore forgetting to set consequences. Fortunately, it didn’t cause any issues but it’s a thing I should keep an eye out on.
Overall Impression
I’m really happy with where we’re going with this game. Every session I get more ideas of where to go as the fiction now starts writing itself. I’m also getting more comfortable setting Obstacles on the fly and estimating relative difficulty for Tests. One thing that I need to work on is a bit of time management. I was well on time for most of the session but near the end I wanted to have a little vignette to skip time before the next session, which ended up costing us much more time than I figured it would have. As a result, we again couldn’t do Belief workshopping at the end of the session as we should. Well, something to focus on next time!
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