by sdonohue

Fortune's Favored? by Douglas Rees (aka Vialick) is an entry in the 2018 RPG Geek 24 Hour RPGs.

Presentation
The game is presented as a 4 page PDF. There are no illustrations and the layout is simple: single column throughout with some headers and a few bulleted lists. It has adequate white space and is easy to read.

Theme
The game is really about interpreting fortunes to arrive at resolutions and create stories. There's not a strict genre for it and in fact, the players are encouraged to answer some world-building and theme questions before the start of play. All of this is meant to be done collaboratively, although there is some advice on playing with a GM.

Characters
Characters aren't really defined or limited by stats. Players create them based on answering the same series of questions they used to create the theme for the game. There's no stat blocks, just a description of who your character is and what they do.

System
The core system is something like a fortune cookie or some other source of wisdom. There are a number of recommendations from cookies, to horoscopes, quote books, or just about any other source of wisdom. There are two modes of play:

In "I am the master of my fate", players declare actions and if they aren't obviously easy, they may have to draw a fortune and interpret that to see if they succeeded or failed. In "It is my fate", one fortune is drawn for the scene and characters must act in ways which are supported by the interpretation of that fortune.


Playing the Game
Game play is very much a consensual process regardless of the system. Players create a genre and a problem, then design characters whom they think will be useful. For the most part, players narrate their own actions and results, except when it seems like failure might be interesting, then they go for the fortunes to resolve things. The game is meant to be very spontaneous and the players have to work together to create a good story.

Evaluation
I think it would be unfair to judge a game made and designed by a single person in a single day using the same standards I'd apply to a game with designers, editors, artists, and weeks, months or even years of design and playtesting, so I'm not going to do that.

This is an interesting concept. I like the idea of trying to resolve actions using tools which aren't necessarily designed to do that. It is likely to be a very creative process and will require a lot of talking amongst the players both to resolve the challenges and to create a good story. It feels like it will be more about the process than the story.

Yes, it said astronomy when it meant astrology. Of course, I checked and 22% of Americans get that wrong. It's also not really the focus of the game.

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