Fria Ligans forum

So I am playing my first run of solo rules, and so far I'm loving it. the Oracle is engaging, helpful, and provides really good story direction suggestions.

But I just made my first investigation roll and got a clue.

I must be missing something, because I have no idea where I'm supposed to link the clues you get from INVESTIGATION rolls and translate them to the entries on the 3 Vaesen tables with LEARNING rolls.

Is it just narrative? or am I missing where investigation clues lead to the learning table outcomes?

I don't mind it being narrative. maybe I am finding false clues for those that don't really match, and I have to suss out which are the ones that "matter".... but then how do I know which ones matter without memorizing the Vaesen Table 1?

So I thought I'd reach out for help. so....help please?

It is narrative yes. The idea is that you use the text you got in the clue and try to fit that with the vaesen tables.

The example 3 say that he got clue 43

A worn-out piece of clothing covered in blood stains

The person in the example got two successes with his Learning roll and he used one to link the clue to

Burglary or Theft

with the comment that any of the vaesen listed under this clue (myling, nisse, or spertus) could be behind a burglary. He also say that this doesn't explain the bloodstained clothes though.

Luckily he got two successes with his Learning roll so he can link another vaesen clue to his original clue. This is from example 4:

Livestock have gone missing or died.

I think that's part of where I'm confused, table 1 seems to be organized for you to "find" the clues and then be surprised by the vaesen as the mystery unravels, but it feels almost impossible to go through it without pre-planning what your vaesen is ahead of time. I feel like this would have been better presented as a branching tree or pairing similar clues together for clue 1, i.e. all "people are not themselves" are paired together in Clue 1. it seems impossible to narratively determine which clue form table 1 goes with a clue from the original d66 table without knowing what the options are ahead of time.

I believe there is good information here, and I've enjoyed the vaesen oracle so far, but this, especially for being the crux of an investigation, feels weirdly laid out.

I have never used Vaesen's solo rules. Although I'm no expert in this, but I thought the examples was very good showing what the idea of the game is. Solo rules for mystery games are very difficult. This set of rules gives a balance of mechanical game play and narrative game play. I plan to test them myself.

the examples are good about showing what they are doing in their thought process, but they aren't good for showing how to actually use the tools provided. it's like saying "in this example, i used this electric drill to build a birdhouse" but not having any instructions on the design of the birdhouse or the use of the electric drill.

i do get that it is difficult to write solo rules for a mystery, and I think most of the Solo rules are done really well. which is why i'm confused as to why the method and use of the actual clues for the mystery are either poorly laid out or obtuse in their use.

I don't mind there needing to be a narrative reason for the link between the initial clues and the vaesen clues. but the layout of the tables, especially table 1, doesn't give a workable flow for figuring out the mystery and makes it difficult to figure out what the intent of the tables are beyond "these are the three clues for this vaesen", "these are the vaesen that are associated with the Misdeed", and "This is where they hang out", just not really how to use them for a solo mystery.