Forum

Really interested in what and how they will design a solo ruleset for the game?

Its one of the already fulfilled stretchgoals and I wonder how serious they are about creating a fully fledged solo experience? I would LOVE it, but it sounds like something that would require its own complete expansion/supplement?

Based on the multitude of solo tools developed over the years, I would expect a procedural system that could be covered in 10-15 pages and expanded by fans once the format is established. The basic elements would include something like below, note that most GMs have created similar systems themselves:

A Yes/No/Conjunction system to answer questions where you just need to define the % chance of a yes answer such as "Are the keys in the truck?"
>> 1- Yes and (something beneficial also occurs) such as "and it has a half tank of fuel"
>> 2- Yes
>> 3- Yes but (something detrimental or complicating happens) "but it has a flat tire"
>> 4- No but (something positive makes the failure less painful) "but there are four unopened bottles of water in the cab"
>> 5- No
>> 6- No and (something even worse complicates matters) "and angry rattlesnake has make it's home in the cab"

A set of genre appropriate Verb/Adjective/Noun lists for defining mission targets, encounters, etc [d66 or d100 rolls]
>> Verbs (Find, Rescue, Destroy...)
>> Adjectives (Nearby, Hostile, Functional...)
>> Nouns (Merchant, Haven, Stockpile...)

A set of genre and terrain appropriate sense lists [d66 or d100 rolls]
>> Hear (a wet cough, stealthy footsteps, diesel engine...)
>> See (discarded body armor, a crumpled corpse, firelight in the distance...)
>> Smell (woodsmoke, rotting flesh, cooking food...)
>> Feel (you catch your foot on, the weather getting cold and windy, an unusual pain in your abdomen...)

A set of genre and terrain appropriate location/encounter lists for player's hexcrawl travel [d66 or d100 rolls]
>> Forest (an abandoned campsite, a hunter's cabin, a small pond...)
>> Farmland (a tractor tire, wandering hog herd, hay bale...)
>> Coast (a small two-person boat, a fisherman, buoy with crab pots...)

A set of genre and location specific search result item lists for d66 or d100 rolls
>> On a paved road (burned out truck, a wheel and tire, large caliber shell casings...)
>> In a partially burned out farm house (a burned corpse, a sack of flour, a hidden bottle of ibuprofen...)
>> In the main square of a small town (a scattering of cinder blocks and bricks, a bicycle missing the rear tire, a book...)

There are many other procedural lists that can be devised such as encounters where you are the third party happening upon an ongoing encounter between other groups, weather, and so on. Then you just need a rough rule loop that tells you when to roll on each of the tables and guidance on how to interpret results and possibly link results into a cohesive idea. Solo play is all about poking your imagination but also constraining it so that having to adapt to unforeseen events drives the consumption of time, ammo, fuel, health and so on. Some solo styles involve reducing player agency a bit by forcing morale checks and other tests that prevent the player from making the character do exactly what they want to also add constraints. Running multiple players is also a time tested solo style to both make the game survivable beyond a single character death and to reduce the attachment the player might feel towards one character.

I look forward to seeing what the designers come up with.

But I wonder about scenes and combat.
Its easy enough to imagine a system allowing for hexcrawl and exploration on the map solo, be it with one or several characters, but only a single player.
But when combat happens and you are supposed to bring out the combat map and markers (miniatures) it pretty much becomes a tactical miniature boardgame. Which isnt as easily made for Solo play.

Will Free League be able to create a decent enough Solo experience as a simple "stretch goal"? It feels doubtful, as I said previously such an undertaking would be more in line with a fully fledged expansion on its own.

Crusader Kings the boardgame also got its solo/two-player gamemode through a stretchgoal and in that case the solo play is far from good. Perhaps someone will disagree but from the reviews and opinions ive seen, it seems most would agree that CK doesnt work well in solo play.

Now with twilight 2000 also getting its solo play through a stretch goal, what can we expect? I just hope we get something fun and working that I can mess around with inbetween sessions