The Shapeshifter’s Duel

I recently had the privilege to take part in an in-person playtest session of The Seven-Part Pact, the upcoming game by Jay Dragon.

The Seven-Part Pact is a game for seven players, each one taking the role of a grand archwizard with phenomenal cosmic powers, sharing a sacred responsibility to hold together the fabric of reality. It exists at the intersection of RPGs, parlor LARP, and board gaming. It has no GM, instead distributing authority and responsibility between everyone. It’s simultaneously cooperative and competitive. And it is so massive in scope that no one participant could ever hope to perceive the whole.

I genuinely cannot provide a sufficient play report, and I know that’s not something most people read anyway. Instead, I’d like to share just a small slice of my experience playing it.

Setting the Stage

My expectations were high. I first read a previous draft of the game many months ago, and was immediately astonished. It seemed like one of the most incredible games I’d ever come across. So unique, so flavorful, so clever, so ambitious.

But you can’t know until you play it yourself.

My worries about social pressures were heavy. Firstly, I was asked by Jay Dragon to playtest a game with her. This isn’t merely flattering. It’s bewildering. Why me? Then consider the five other strangers who I’d never gamed with before, not knowing if we had any roleplaying chemistry at all. And of course, this is a game that deeply and unflinchingly interrogates masculinity, gender, and power. Being the only cis and heterosexual man invited into that situation, I’m sure you can understand why I was nervous. Most other allies I know are very vocally apologetic about themselves, apologetic for their privileges, apologetic for their complicity in oppression, apologetic for their unawareness, etc. To an extent that usually comes off as perhaps more annoying than comforting, right? Personally, I almost always keep those feelings to myself, believing that trust is better built in other ways.

But rest assured: they do weigh on my mind at all times.

The stress of play was intense. We were signing up for an 8 hour marathon session, at minimum. By the end, it totaled closer to 12 hours (with the last hour or so just debriefing the experience). In addition to the 64-page core rulebook (read in full) and the 210-page Grimoire of wizardly spells (skim at your own peril), every player also has a 40-60 page personal rulebook (read in full). During the game proper, every Wizard is simultaneously playing a zoomed-out epic-level RPG, and is playing their own personal board game on the side, and is doing their part to collaboratively referee for everyone else in the group, sharing GMing responsibilities collectively.

If this game sounds daunting, it is.

Everyone playing had truly amazing moments throughout the game. I’ll share one of mine, where my expectations, my worries, and the stress of play all nearly devoured me.

The Warlock and The Sage

There is a spell in the Grimoire for performing a Transformation Chase, sometimes called “the Oldest Game.” You may be familiar with it. It’s a duel of wits, where each competitor takes turns shapeshifting (perhaps literally, perhaps metaphorically), trying to best their opponent’s form with something appropriately superior.

I first must say: this game has one of the most ingenious spellcasting rulesets of all time. Every last spell cast is memorable and strange and important. Each spell is expertly crafted to be potent, yet flexible. So many variables figure into each one, making your ability to control the effects of magic a never-ending challenge of your intellect and skill.

But when I was reading the Grimoire before the game, and I came across the Shapeshifter’s Duel, I immediately dreaded it like no other spell in the book. It is the one spell I thought to myself, “gee, I better avoid this one at all costs.”

Yet, of course, right when I was going to strike them dead with my blade, Jay’s Wizard instead cast this spell, challenging me to a Duel that I could not afford to refuse.

Why’d it have to be me, instead of any of the other five players present? Why did it have to be against the Sage, a Wizard uniquely advantaged at this specific spell? And why oh why did it have to be against Jay Dragon, the creator of the game?

Unlike the other spells, there’s almost nothing abstracted away into mechanics and character skill when you resolve the Shapeshifter’s Duel. You literally just have to play an actual Transformation Chase.

I want to be as clear as possible about this: the Oldest Game is the ultimate test of both intellect and creativity, the purest distillation of challenge-based improv. My expectations of the experience this game could deliver never seemed more out of reach than at that moment. My worries about the “social performance” of this game were worse than I could have anticipated, having the spotlight cast directly on me and Jay fucking Dragon together in a duel of wits, with everyone else a captive and explicitly judgmental audience. And the stress of play was more intense for me in those few minutes than in nearly any other session of gaming I can recall, with so much at stake for our characters and practically no mechanical scaffolding to lean on.

Like, I am not an improv guy. I avoid exercising that muscle at all costs. I don’t even like speaking in character when I roleplay. I spent the last couple weeks before this session reading and taking notes to prepare for the game. Seven-Part Pact otherwise provides so much support for my schemer-centric playstyle that I felt safe engaging with the game only in ways I find comfortable.

But that feeling of safety was violently taken away, for just a few minutes when everything was on the line.

A Thing of Beauty

I lost the Shapeshifter’s Duel. My final transformation was rejected by the other players. Forgive me for not remembering the exact phrasing, but I’ll do my best. The Sage had taken the form of “the drive to dream of better possibilities, of fantasies unattainable.” I had tried to counter with “the harsh realities of duty.” Some of our audience judged my form to be weaker, others judged it to be equal. But no one judged it to be definitively stronger, which is all that matters.

I can’t say how well I performed at this spell which gave me so much dread. You’ll have to ask the other players if they thought I held my own against Jay. If I proved myself at least somewhat intelligent and creative when put on the spot. I don’t know the average number of transformations you can expect to see in your bog standard, everyday Shapeshifter’s Duel. Maybe I embarrassed myself during one of the few moments I actually had to step up and act like a goddamn wizard.

But more importantly, the entire thing felt very true to both our characters. Over the course of the game, I found that one of the most important themes for my Wizard’s story was “defeat.” And it’s pretty clear to me that the game wouldn’t have been nearly as satisfying for me or anyone else if I had prevailed.

Everyone playing had truly amazing moments throughout the game. That little duel was a footnote in the session, overall. But for me, personally, it was a gaming experience I don’t think I’ll ever forget.

-Dwiz