Burning Empires - Grab Bag of Awesome

So I have finally had the chance to sit down and begin perusing my copy of Burning Empires, Luke Crane's game of sci-fi war and intrigue. And I am completely and utterly blown away. The interaction between the macro- and micro-level mechanics is amazing in its ability to present a compelling tale of planet-wide conflict with huge stakes and thrilling parries and reversals that still features your individual characters and makes them central to the fate of their world. Wow, just wow.

So while I wait for some outside playtesters to report back to me regarding The Committee, I've taken The Big House out of mothballs and begun considering its further development. And I now think that Burning Empires will be a major inspiration for the game, in particular the World Burner and Infection mechanics.

Cooperative setting creation at the beginning of play is a feature of The Committee and I want a similar process to be in The Big House, establishing the details of the prison in which the characters find themselves and the social dynamics and relationships that surround them. I know that creating a relationship map will be a huge part of that, but now adding a burner-esque series of choices that have broad mechanical implications for the rest of play seems to fit well. After all, the security level, the amount of guard corruption, the extent of rehabilitation programs, etc. should have a profound impact on what life in different prisons is like. So taking those details and making them matter in a mechanical way beyond mere color will create intensity and allow each instance of play in a different prison to be custom-tailored to what a given group wants.

I also have been trying to find a way to feature the large-scale conflicts between various prison gangs and factions while still focusing on the player's characters, no matter how small scale they may currently be, and the Infection mechanics are a great example of the kind of thing I'm looking to achieve. Since The Big House is structured in a completely different way, I'm sure my eventual mechanics will be something vastly different, but seeing such a well-done example of what I've been trying to do is very inspirational.

So thanks Luke, Thor, Dro, and crew for inspiring the rest of us with your awesome innovations. I'll bet I'm not the only one reading Burning Empires and jumping up and down with the utter coolness I'm finding both for future actual play and my own designs.