House of Cards GM Log

Subtle Battlefield Signals-Not!

posted by Ginger at 08:24 PM, June 30, 2003 | Filed under : Useful Player Knowledge | Comments and Followups

The repeated attempt to use inobvious battlefield signals across the crowded ballroom is pretty amusing to me because I don’t really think there is such a thing. If they’re really inobvious, nobody will see them, including the people they’re aimed at.

My feeling is that the so-called subtle signals are subtle about like the signals between the musicians onstage and the engineer mixing the show are subtle. Which is to say, they may not be obvious to people who don’t know what they’re looking for, but to anyone who has half a clue, they’re pretty blatant.

That is to say, they’re completely unsubtle to the people you’re following or trying to hide the signals from, most likely. Mundanes may miss them, but counting on the idea that quarry of the same caliber of the PCs will miss them is a bad idea.

4 Comments

Arref
Jun 30, 2003 10:40 PM

Actually I read that that some folks were still thinking in terms of "we shall come up with an explanation for all this tomorrow and I don't want to blather so as the common crowd burble will drown out my insightful warnings to friends."

Or something...

Team signals can be useful as a "clue" as to what your buddies are about to try and do. A nod, a hand circling at shoulder height, and nod and lean of the shoulder, these are the things that might say, "we are thankfully on the same page" (egad, another risque pun) better than a Trump or shout in such a roomful of action and intrigue.

If someone thought the night would seem ordinary tomorrow with the right "spin"... I'm sure that last few posts have changed their minds.

Ginger
Jul 1, 2003 12:09 PM

Oh, I agree with all that, but it really helps when you actually try to set them up in advance.

The specific analogy I'm drawing, though, is something I picked up when I started hanging around with Michael. Even though I went to a lot of gigs in the early 90s, I never really noticed the interplay between the band and the soundman until I was paying a lot of attention to the soundman. Once I did start paying attention, though, a lot of that interplay became blatant.

Now it's pretty easy for me to tell that a musician is asking for an adjustment one way or another in the monitor mix or whatever, even if it's not a band I know well. I'm sensitized to the fact that these communications are out there, and that makes me more likely to catch them and what they mean.

The analogy to trying to subtly make hand signs in the room full of 2000+ people seems pretty apt.

ChuckEye
Jul 10, 2003 1:21 AM

Indeed. Then there are the more subtle methods...
http://img2.musiciansfriend.com/dbase/pics/products/41/410606.jpg

Arref
Jul 14, 2003 11:59 AM

LOL

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