FreeMarket Actual Play Session 1
Transhumanism has been an interest of mine for quite some time, so I was pretty excited to get a chance to run through Luke Crane and Jared Sorenson’s FreeMarket. This session covers a the basic themes and focus of the game, and character creation.
Relevant Links
- FreeMarket Home Page
- Rapture – Bioshock
- LaGrange Point
- Clade
- MCP
- Friend Computer
- Ad Hocracy
- Alvin Toffler
- Diamond Age
- Cosplay
- Adopt a Highway
- Stephen Colbert
- Anonymous
- Cyberdeck
- All Your Base Are Belong To Us
- Singularity
- Furries
- Malcom Gladwell – Blink
- Mt. Dew WhiteOut
- Kusanagi
- Mera
- Lebowski
- Draper
- Hal Jordan
- Rutger Hauer
- Gesture Clusters
- Kinesics
- ARG’s
- Cybermen
- Improv Everywhere
- HAL
- DARPA
- Sneakers
- The Wolf
- Voight-Kampff
- Panther Moderns – Neuromancer
Crunchy Bits!
- Intro Music “Inner Universe” from the Ghost In the Shell: Stand Alone Complex OST
- Outro Music “Future Soon” by Jonathan Coulton.
Podcast: |
Tags: Ad Hocracy, All Your Base Are Belong To Us, Alvin Toffler, Anonymous, ARG's, Bioshock, Blade Runner, Blink, Clade, Cosplay, Cyberdeck, Cybermen, DARPA, Diamond Age, Draper, FreeMarket, Friend Computer, Furries, Gesture Clusters, Gleaming the Cube, HAL, Hal Jordan, Improv Everywhere, Jared Sorensen, Kinesics, Kusanagi, LaGrange Point, Lebowki, Luke Crane, Malcom Gladwell, MCP, Mera, Neuromancer, Panther Moderns, Rapture, Rutger Hauer, Singularity, Sneakers, Space Hippies, Stephen Colbert, The Wolf, Voight-Kampff
It’s kinda cool hearing other peoples’ take on FreeMarket. I played a session with my BE group a couple of weeks ago, and it was a lot of fun – they wound up building Thunderdome in a park. Definitely looking forward to playing more of this in the near future.
Regarding the character and MRCZ creation order, I think that the decision to create the characters first was very much deliberate. It really gives the characters room to grow and change. It also gives you some built-in conflict, because you’re going to wind up with gaps between the characters’ capabilities, and the Needs of the MRCZ. If you create the MRCZ first, you run the risk of reducing the impact of the MRCZ’s Needs by optimizing the characters’ Experiences and Genelines to fit the MRCZ’s goals. Does that make sense?
Shaun,
Exactly! People on FreeMarket form these groups. Which means that you, me and that guy decide to do X and it’s possible that I’m not any good at X, you just like having me around (while that guy might be a douche bag but have valuable skills).
It’s possible (and desirable!) to change the MRCZ if it’s not working out or if you acquire new experiences that steer the MRCZ in a new direction. The whole point is to keep things fluid and adaptable to the needs of the individual (rather than have the individuals conform to the demands of the group). Keep Free!
I haven’t listened yet, but did they really drift the game right out of the gate?
Kevin, was this on purpose or accidental?
Well, we all wanted to play Android Furries, so we made it work for us.
I kid, I kid.
This is my fault. I made mention that later in the character creation process we will be making a group that all the users will belong to. That sparked a conversation as to whether or not it’s useful to have that information beforehand or not. Everyone chimed in on the side of “having a coherent group concept beforehand is useful” and I went with it to a small degree.
We did a quick-and-dirty MRCZ concept, just a one-sentence idea about what kind of MRCZ it’ll be, then dove back into character creation. We still did the MRCZ Tags, Needs, and full Description in step 7.
Every time I’ve done character creation so far, this has been a sticking point. People get annoyed that they suddenly have to shoehorn their concept into a group that might not make any sense for them. Since this was the third time it’d been an issue, I guess I just didn’t fight it as hard as I should have.
I plan on reading Jared’s comment first thing next session, explaining the reasoning for the order. If there’s anything else you’d like to add or say, lemme know. Also, I plan on bringing it up in the interview, so you can really chew us out if you’d like.
Kevin
Well, it doesn’t sound like you were too far off the mark. If they were annoyed, then you were doing something right!
I listened. Very charming how you all assume you know better! You’re so cute!
Oh, just Frownie us and get it over with!
Frownied!
Nah, just kidding! While it’s possible it may have been better to do it the “propper” way, I really enjoyed listening to this. It’s the first time I’d heard your podcast, and I’ve found in the past that AP recordings are either really boring and annoying for me, or they’re really cool. So far it looks like you guys might fall into the “cool” side. I’m going to listen to your APs of Poison’d now (another game I have but haven’t had the opportunity to play)
You got sapience and sentience backwards!
Sentience is self-awareness – it’s a MYTH that animals aren’t sentient, they are, they know they are individuals and all that.
Sapience is ‘higher intelligence’, hence ‘Homo Sapiens Sapiens’