The shopkeeper from Back East? His wife isn’t really his wife. He’s the procurer and she’s the available woman. Their marriage is a front.
Your brother’s son, your nephew, is fourteen years old. He’s been stealing money from his father, your brother, and taking it to visit this woman.
Your brother is in a bitter rage, humiliated by his son’s thievery and grieving his son’s lost innocence. He’s going to shoot her.
What do you do?
If you read my AP report on Buckets 2010, you’ll have noticed me all but gushing about Hamish Cameron’s game of Dogs in the Vineyard.
To be brief: Dogs is a game about God’s Watchdogs, who travel from town to town in pre-Civil War Utah, keeping the peace and teaching doctrine to the faithful. They’re answerable only to themselves, and they have the authority to do pretty much anything they like. If they decide that they need to threaten an old woman so she’ll tell them gossip about the town, no one has the right to tell them otherwise. If they decide that the best course of action is to shoot down the Steward of the town in broad daylight, they technically have the right.
The game itself is designed to be episodic – the Dogs will arrive in town, be greeted by its people (who are generally happy to see them), unearth its sins and plots, solve them in whichever way they see fit, and move on. A particularly big town may take a couple of sessions, but in general you want to keep moving.
Birch Hill was an example of a small town. Brother Levi, the town’s Steward (a combination of religious leader and mayor) had forbidden his son, Brother Elias (everyone is “Brother” or “Sister” someone) from marrying Sister Miriam, as Levi had heard rumours about her purity. There was something of a rift in the town because of this – Elias and Miriam were both morose, and Sister Miriam’s father, Brother Adam, was angry at Levi. The only one who was still happy was one Sister Tabitha, who had eyes for Elias and had started the rumours in the first place. To add to the confusion, Brother Adam’s cows had taken sick, and no one knew what was wrong with them.
When the Dogs rode in, however, everyone was acting happy, with Elias and Miriam out of sight. Brother Levi asked the Dogs to come to a dinner that evening, and it was there that things started happening. Sister Talitha (played by Rachel H-O’C) cornered Brother Elias and started asking awkward questions. Within minutes he was storming out of the Village Hall. Brother David (played by Matthew H) saw Sister Miriam leave soon after, and decided to follow her (along with Sister Talitha). She lead him to a barn on her property, where she met up with Brother Elias again. Deciding that the couple should not be allowed in such a place unchaperoned, the two announced themselves. Moments later, Miriam emerged, telling them she was checking on the farm’s horses.
The two took her inside, but when Brother Adam saw the shadow of Elias slipping out the back of the barn, he intercepted the boy. Separately, David and Talitha worked the story out of the two villagers – even though they had been forbidden from marrying, they had been meeting up after dark, and had slept together.
In the meantime, Sister Lavinia (played by Rose) had cornered Brother Levi at the Village Hall, and was asking him some hard questions. It took some time, but he finally caved to her, and she got him to agree to give Elias and Miriam a second chance.
The next morning, the Dogs convened on Brother Adam’s farm. They’re interested as to why the cattle were sick – Brother Deocles (played by Alan D) suggested that perhaps it was someone jealous of Elias and Miriam’s romance. Brother Levi turned up shortly thereafter with some feed for the cattle, and Deocles used the opportunity to berate him about his past actions. Levi tried to reason, but Deocles was a hard man to reason with. Levi finally gave up, and was coerced into offering his resignation to the village.
Only one order of business remained for the party – Levi had asked them previously to open a new wing for the Village Hall, and the ceremony would be that night. During the afternoon, Deocles started hunting down whoever had started the rumours about Miriam. Eventually he was lead to Sister Tabitha. Tabitha was no match for his fire-and-brimstone sermon and was soon reduced to tears, especially when he let her know that Elias and Miriam were permitted to marry again.
That evening, the Dogs opened the extension to the Hall. Following that, Levi publicly blessed the marriage of Elias and Miriam, and offered his resignation. Deocles doled out the Dogs’ punishment for Elias and Miriam – for while they were in love, they had slept together out of wedlock, which is still considered sinful. The two would go on a religious pilgrimage for six months before their marriage, to prove their worth.
The next morning, the Dogs left for Bridal Falls. Just before they left, Brother Adam arrived in town from his farm. Apparently the sickness was abating from his cows – they were eating again, although only time would tell if their health improved. He suggested that it could have been the feedstock that Levi had given him. Deocles, however, opined that the cows may simply have been suffering from the sickness of sin that the village was under.
Dogs is a very interesting game to GM. It’s structured (quite deliberately) differently from your average dungeon crawl. There is no set sequence of events – instead, the GM is instructed to make a village rife with dissent, grudges, pride and sin, and ensure every member of the village wants something from the Dogs. Then, when the Dogs arrive, it’s time to throw villagers at them and see whose side they’ll take.
Nor is the GM supposed to hide the sins of the town. After all, if the Dogs wander into town, ask everyone if there’s anything wrong, and everyone says that it’s all fine, they’ll just keep going. Dogs isn’t supposed to be about rolling to find clues – instead it’s about moral choices, tense conversations, and deadly gunfights. Similar to the GUMSHOE system, the players are encouraged to uncover the clues (or even the entire crime) quickly, and debate what to do after they know the facts.
Overall, Dogs in the Vineyard isn’t your average, everyday RPG. It’s immersive, it challenges you, and (when GMed well) it should ask you hard questions about your characters and their relationships. I’m looking forward to GMing it again at some point – now I have a village under my belt, I’m interested in letting the sin run deeper, the complications become more twisted.
And, of course, giving the players choices where no answer is right, and they have to choose which path to take.
Interested in posting your actual play online? Email the webmaster and request an account!
