Due to a Teachers' Conference, the club will not meet for its usual open gaming session on Friday, so I can file my report early. As you can tell from the title, our friendly little game club was turned into a house of lies; we played The Resistance.
For those of you unfamiliar with the game, The Resistance is known as a "hidden role" game, where groups of five or more players represent factions in a futuristic dystopia. The Resistance (usually considered the heroes) is trying to "stick it to the man" so to speak, while two of the players are really government spies (usually considered the villains). The job of the spies is to pretend to be loyal members of the Resistance and hopefully blame other players for their dirty work, thwarting the plans of the Resistance by intentionally failing missions.
If you have the time, check out this link. Wil Wheaton's Youtube show Table Top demonstrated the game, and captured some of the great moments you get to experience with the right group of people. It's a great game that has few components, is easy to learn, and has tremendous re-playability. There are several different strategies one can use, and the game-play is entirely verbal. If you're going to win, you will need some serious acting chops of the best kind; you have to be able to lie and manipulate an entire table of players.
In order to describe the game session, and preserve the anonymity of my students, I'm going to refer to particular students with just a letter. The players included:
Yours Truly
Ms. L: The other teacher who guides and co-chairs the game club.
B: Grade 12 male, and the only club veteran in today's session.
S: Grade 9 female.
C: Grade 9 female, originally from Chile. The fact English is not her first language comes up in the game.
Ms. W: Another teacher who stopped by to watch, but was pulled in to the game.
M: I'm not sure what grade she's in. She was a brand new member who was recruited in the most interesting fashion.
We had four solid game sessions. In the first game, S completely fooled me into thinking she was loyal. On a two player mission she kept herself off the team, which to me looked like a virtuous choice. I was perfectly played and she thoroughly enjoyed the big reveal at the end. At the start of the second game, Ms. W stopped buy to watch, but we quickly recruited her and brought her into a six player game. The Resistance easily won this game when the two spies were on the first mission (a two player mission), and one of them tanked the operation. This brought instant suspicion to the pair who were essentially pariahs for the rest of that round.
After game two, B left, admitting he just wanted to win one session. He was pulled home by the apparently undeniable allure of Fallout 4. This was where I was a little heartbroken. Although I'm a fan of video games, the social aspect of table top gaming is what I consider the major draw and advantage over digital gaming. A video game could never replace the mechanics of lying and bluffing a table full of players into believing you're on their side.
Down to five players, I decided to throw a wrinkle into the game; I added a pair of cards and a small deck from the expansion Hidden Agenda. Hidden Agenda adds some interesting variations to the original game. The new rule set we played used two additional cards: Defectors, one Resistance and one Spy. These two cards replace standard versions from the base game. After the second round, a small deck of cards is added. At the start of each round, loyalty cards are flipped to see if the two Defectors switch allegiances, the Defector loyalist becomes a pro-government spy, the Defector spy jumping to The Resistance. The game came down to the last round as both the loyalist Defector and spy Defector were on the same team. It tanked, and was a win for the spies.
At this point, Ms. W had to leave. With only four players remaining, it looked like we were going to have to switch games, as The Resistance must have five players minimum. I went to the washroom, quickly trying to figure out how long it would take to teach the group Blokus. Upon my return, I was pleasantly surprised that Ms.L had gone to the commons and done some recruiting. Our new player, M, is a student I've never seen before. She seemed a little nervous, quickly thrown into a game out of aggressive (but friendly) recruiting. I think she just took pity on us by helping us round out the group of five. After quickly explaining the rules, she picked up on the ideas right away, and proved to be a solid player. Afterwards she mentioned that she might return for future game sessions, which was encouraging.
It was also during this game that language barrier became a small issue, but also reinforced the value of games as a teaching tool. The Resistance requires players to bluff, lie, and be quite persuasive. C, who is a very intelligent and shrewd player (she was the one who cleaned house in Small World), was feeling a touch frustrated. C's ability to speak English became a small hurdle for her as she wanted to eloquently get her argument across to the table. Luckily, Ms.L speaks Spanish, so she was able to translate C's persuasive points to the rest of the group.
At that point I realized that for EAL (English as an Additional Language) students, a game club is a smart destination. Like I said earlier, C is a clever and very strategic player, no matter if we're playing Elder Sign, Smash Up, or The Resistance. Her only (temporary) weakness is her struggles with English, and the game club gives her a fun destination for her to develop her English skills in a non threatening setting. It's an interesting bi-product of this strange journey I started just over a year ago.
Game 4 ended with a win for the spies, and featured some of my best work as a manipulative liar. M was shocked and impressed.
Next week will be a full week of class and my usual gaming sessions. I think it might be time to bust out some Camel Up!
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