Paranoia (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Tangents)

[crash2455]

I think I've run into a major problem as a GM. 

A problem I noticed most predominantly when I was running Paranoia a few nights ago.  I told the players that part of the point of Paranoia was to turn in your friends as traitors, so as to earn favor with the computer.  I discouraged them from doing this act randomly by telling them they needed evidence.  Unfortunately, this had the reverse effect I wanted:  Anytime anybody said something, the accusation of Treason flew up then and there.  After a while, some players sort of started ignoring the plot and just went back and forth with the treason stuff (even with the occasional execution), and we only made it half-way through before we ran out of time.

Now, in Paranoia, this is probably to be expected (though I think it's supposed to be somewhat expedited).  However, shit like this has started happening in my games recently (sans treason).  I'm all for RP, but I want to move the story along and keep the other players involved as well.  Have you guys run into this?  Do you have any methods (box of pain aside) to deal with it?

[Tadanori Oyama]

If it's one person going the assusing than shut their ass down. If it's everybody than talk to the group about what you want from the game.

[clockworkjoe]

No, that's how you play Paranoia.

OR ARE YOU SAYING ALPHA COMPUTER IS WRONG?

[Flawless P]

Tangents are by far the biggest thing bogging down my games, they are always funny, but sometimes they are very misplaced. One of my friends will randomly pull out his phone and fire up music from youtube on it. Which is not so bad in combat, but when we are trying to talk and he turns it up to hear it over everyone else it is pretty annoying.

Last night our DM finally told him to shut that shit off. Which he did even if he was grumbling about it. It's gotten so bad that I told all my friends the next time I DM I am requiring people to raise their hands because there are 7 damn people and I don't want to talk over all of them.

[crash2455]

If it's one person going the assusing than shut their ass down. If it's everybody than talk to the group about what you want from the game.

It jumps around.  I have talked with my players about it before.  I've shut down a game because 2 of the 4 players had clearly lost interest.  Their request was shorter games (2-3 hours tops).  I think I'm running into trouble because the group wants different things.  2 of the players are modestly interested in the game, but I think are there mostly to hang out (especially since one player decided to start bringing his girlfriend).  1 is a hardcore powergamer and rules lawyer (which is part of why I wanted to run Paranoia), and the other one is fairly interested in the game.

No, that's how you play Paranoia.

OR ARE YOU SAYING ALPHA COMPUTER IS WRONG?

No, I would never fault the knowledge of my friend the Computer.

[Tadanori Oyama]

If it's one person going the assusing than shut their ass down. If it's everybody than talk to the group about what you want from the game.

(especially since one player decided to start bringing his girlfriend).

Unless she's got dice in her hands, destroy this traitor gamer for bringing outsiders among the choosen.

[crash2455]

Unless she's got dice in her hands, destroy this traitor gamer for bringing outsiders among the choosen.

I would consider it if he weren't sort of the linchpin in my group.  If I lose him, I lose his friend (the other modestly interested player) and his brother (the somewhat dedicated player).  I'm also sort of keep hoping that she'll grab some dice and play along, but she's staying out under the guise of "homework."

[Charlie72]

You know, both time I've played Paranoia, neither was really blam happy. Sure, there was some blaming, but there was also deaths do to (somewhat) subtle backstabery and, ofcouse, comedic high jinks.

[crash2455]

You know, both time I've played Paranoia, neither was really blam happy. Sure, there was some blaming, but there was also deaths do to (somewhat) subtle backstabery and, ofcouse, comedic high jinks.

Aye.  I was hoping my players would play a little closer to straight and collect some evidence on each other before going to the accusations.  The Paranoia rulebook does say that you should start by playing Zap, then moving to Classic.  I was just sorta hoping they'd start in the Classic mentality (one of them did, but the rest were sorta slap-happy).

[Dogfish]

Did you ever tell them that false accusations are treason? If you want to go a step further tell them that executions without evidence submitted to computer are treason.

That's what I did when I ran the game and it worked out well. I also didn't have much of a central plot but just many different scenarios that can be sewn together into a fun game.

If you were intent on running a long-running Paranoia game you should of given them multiple tastes first.

[crash2455]

It was just a one-shot game.  I'll have to keep that in mind next time I run, though.  I do recall thinking that, but it was only for misuse of weapons.