Review of Dream Factory 2e

Full disclosure: I was contacted by the author and given the PDF of the game for reading and reviewing. I haven’t had the opportunity to playtest it, but contacted him back about some of my observations, and he said his experience with his group confirm that. So, take that with as much salt as you feel like is warranted. I promise to be as objective as I possibly could.

The game in Dream Factory can be neatly summed up as narrativist; using conflict resolution and stakes; with strong GMing control; with player-defined traits ; and with a dicepool d6-based Roll-and-Keep system that’s unified for all conflicts-and I mean all, including ones where your PC isn’t present! The last part is a nice touch, IMO. Yes, it’s meta-gaming, but it makes for good stories to have your inspiring example helping your NPC friend, doesn’t it?

At least, it would be a bonus to me, and I suspect it would be to many narrativist players I know.

So, back to the game elements… I’d be the first to say that it’s an unusual combination, for sure (especially the stakes and strong GM control – of course, I might be betraying my own relative inexperience with the wide range of indie games out there, but that’s how it felt).

However, there’s nothing unusual about the elements in themselves. Assemble your dicepool, deciding which traits to risk, they become spent if you win (but not if you lose), and must be re-freshed by losing a conflict later. This, in itself, creates a win-lose-win-lose-win-win-win-THE (HAPPY) END rhythm, which is something we haven’t seen in other games. However, it’s well-executed, in my opinion, and is a goal worth reaching.

So, how do we reach the win-win-win part, if the rules are such that losing makes you stronger?

Well, you can be lucky, but that needs real luck... or you can get it by spending Karma. It’s a meta-resource you spend for…basically, extra dice*, but it might also be whatever you manage to talk the GM into (Negotiation is part of the game rules – explicitly). Or you can declare an event happens. Or you can use it to acquire a magic artifact, or something (effects are also negotiated, though there are rules for that, too). The most common source for Karma is as a session reward for embracing the 2 Lynchpins (see later) and your PC's personal quandary (that's the main source of conflict for the character, or at least the one you've chosen to be mechanically relevant).

And with that, we reach the REAL strength of the game. Well, what is the real strength of the game in my opinion, but my opinion is all I can give you in this review.

It Integrates The Elements Of Social Contract In The Rules.

And then they tie back with the rest of the system. That, in itself, helps resolve something like half the issues people have when coming from a different group with a different social contract.

So, how do you do that?

Well, in Dream Factory, you do that by creating a character sheet for the game first, which is almost as detailed as the character sheets (or rather, the character sheets are almost as sparse as the game sheet).

What is the theme? What elements you want included to achieve that theme (called Lynchpins)? What is it you agree would be unacceptable given the genre (these are called Safeties)?

Yes, there are Safeties and I want to delve some more on them. Not only do you have group Safeties – each character can also define what is unacceptable to them. Stuff like never losing a conflict obviously doesn’t work, but never suffering a setback you can’t recover from? Check, and that includes no crippling PCs, barring quite good medical care. Never being able to cause the death or suffering of innocents? Check, it is possible, Superman doesn’t accidentally kill muggers**. Never harming kittens? Well, why not, Safeties are player-defined anyway!

This also means someone that insists characters can only die in a major, dramatic way can play in my group – they just put that as a Safety!

Two important elements that are worth mentioning are:

First you only use the full conflict resolution for pivotal moments in the story. If you can negotiate how it goes, or there are no doubt about the outcome, there’s no need for dice, either. Granted, I remember this being even in Unknown armies, and probably earlier – but I can also attest way too many people neglect it. It’s worth stressing it more, which is what Dream Factory 2e does. What do you do when you don't need to roll? Well, you just roleplay it. The book assumes that's what you would be doing most of the time anyway.

Second, you can negotiate with the GM, and the GM can negotiate with you. This often takes the form of bribing, but keep in mind – you can make a counter-offer, or refuse an offer. “I have plans for this villain for a couple more sessions. How about you not removing his mask yet? I’d give you 1 Karma for it.”

“I wanted to know who’s behind the mask, but for 3 (or 5) Karma, I can live with it being a secret for a little longer.”

“That’s too much Karma”.

“I remove the mask. Who’s the guy?”

Granted, that’s an example of unsuccessful negotiation, and I just made it up. Examples of successful negotiations are in the book, though. So I felt like this one might be of an unsuccessful one. And yes, if negotiation fails, the player gets whatever they've earned, good or bad.

One element some people might like, and others would hate: there are different ways to get Karma, and one of them is caring about the game outside of the session, like keeping a diary of the events, or painting a scene from the session, or whatever. Personally, I appreciate such elements, but I fully realize people might dislike them.

So, that’s Dream Factory in a nutshell. It ain’t got a setting, much like FATE Core. You can use it for most settings. The examples in the book are three students in a ninja academy fighting to preserve balance, defeat an evil ninja clan, and deal with the ultimate scourge of teenage protagonists: dates. I’m pretty sure it can handle My Little Pony as well, and the author attests that with skillful use of Lynchpins, it’s able to handle horror as well.

So, I guess it’s more or less “Savage Worlds/GURPS for literature majors and movies fans”, to model the description on how Heroquest 2 tends to be described.

GMing advice and player advice.

These two should be read together. Really. They give sound advice, but don’t consider reading only one of them. If anything, reading only one of them can give you the wrong impression. The text in the basic rules definitely stresses the strong GM role. These rules delineate no less clearly what restrictions are put on the GM’s power, and what could be expected from players.

All in all, I’d advise to treat this advice it’s an important part of the game’s rules.

And now, what are you waiting for? Go ahead and make a Game Sheet! At least if you like narrative systems, that is.

*If it reminds you of FATE: you’re right. Or at least, it reminded me of FATE as well.

However, the author revealed not being familiar with it himself! It seems to be a case of convergent evolution in game design, based on narrative threads and trying to fix the elements in PDQ games. Namely, he believed they start to fail when the GM is calling for too many checks, as your resources become exhausted.

It’s possible, I guess. To me, origins simply don’t matter all that much.

**I realize that it might have happened in a comic I’ve never heard of, as I’m not familiar with the genre. That’s why I stressed “accidentally”, someone wanted it to happen – just like you might want your character to fail for character development. Actually, that might preclude the need for rolling, in Dream Factory.

And either way, Superman doesn’t kill muggers nearly as often as a physics-simulating system would suggest people would be dying when punched by a being that can lift hundreds of tons. People die even when punched by an ordinary human, Superman’s murder rate should be beyond 90%, but it’s not like that in the comics.

And that’s (part of) what Safeties are for.