JJBA OCT #8 R1M30 Jojolity Deliberations

Judge MarioAddict -

The Jojolity this time around was to “show what life means to you” - a very open-ended question, one with no clear right answer, giving everyone a lot of freedom to define life however they chose. How did this affect the strategies? Let’s find out!

Starting with the players, I want to be clear right away: the concept was *excellent*. Tearing down the ideology of not just Frederick, but of every single boss throughout Round 1 was a great idea, one that could easily slot into the characters’ views on what life is and what life means. I’ve seen the seeds of this idea growing throughout Round 1, and watching that process and the excitement behind it was an absolute joy to behold.

My issues are not in concept, but rather execution.

Reading through the player strategy, it seems that generally, their take on what life means is “being free, being yourself, and not being what others want you to be”. This is good, though I struggled to see how it fed into the mechanics - my best understanding is that fighting Frederick in the water is meant to represent this, a play on going against Frederick’s definition of the water as purely his domain, but… well, let’s be honest, this match was always gonna end with the players fighting in the water. The players even acknowledge as such. There are definitely some creative plays, like forcing water into Frederick’s lungs (LOVED that), but outside of one or two fun moments, the plays didn’t feel particularly integral to me.

Further, I feel that the players’ definition of life ended up being somewhat in conflict with the “tearing down ideologies” approach. It certainly tears down *Frederick’s* ideology, but the other two’s feel a bit disconnected from the main point - I’m not really sure how Julian’s view of evil being inherent ties in to the idea of ‘freedom’ and ‘being yourself’, and I feel similarly on De Selby’s. And again, I want to be clear - this is not a flaw in *concept*. Conceptually, this could have worked *really* well. I merely feel that in execution, the two concepts weren’t tied together as much as they could have been, which is a shame - we easily could have had an 8 or higher on our hands if they were.

Instead, I look to the definitions on the rubric; “6 is a decent Jojolity with something holding it back from being better. Maybe some flubs on the conception or execution, but it is a good product overall.” A good concept with some flubs on the execution is almost exactly where I feel this lands - thus, I give you a **6**.

Moving to Frederick, we have a much clearer statement of how Frederick views life - he sees life as being the power to do, exert power, and fulfil one’s purpose. Frederick proclaims that his purpose is as a lifeguard, and that his element and domain is of the water. In turn, we see a strategy filled with moves and techniques befitting a lifeguard, jetting around the water, grappling, keeping himself safe as he “saves” these two poor helpless souls. It’s all pretty well done!

That said, I can’t help but feel that here too we see a somewhat lackluster integrality at play. This can be a bit hard to judge for a boss character, as they only get one shot to play with their kit, but I’m not entirely convinced that Frederick would have played things any differently under a different Jojolity. We were always gonna see Frederick play around the water, we were always gonna see Frederick do “Lifeguard” things - I would have liked to see Frederick’s view of ‘elements’ and ‘fulfilling purpose’ play in more unexpected ways, or in ways that meaningfully change Frederick’s approach. As-is, it’s fine, and definitely captures Frederick’s character, but I can’t help but feel like there was more that could be done here.

What *is* here is solid, that’s for sure. It’s robust, and creative enough to make me smile. And again looking to the rubric definitions, a **7** reads that “nothing particularly unexpected or exceedingly creative is done, but plays are robust and implemented in an entertaining manner.” - a description that fits my feelings pretty well.

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Judge RocketLlama -

When both teams in a match have the same jojolity they have a chance to not only say something about their character in both narrative and mechanics and act as a contrast to their opponent. Both teams take good advantage of this dynamic, but in noticeably different ways.

Beginning with a focus on the player team I think that your narrative sections are the strongest in the match. The writing is well done and highlights how the strange contrast between Agnes and Grendel enable both of them to show what they believe what life is while having a meaningful impact on the other. The framing is incredible and creative and highlights a fun dynamic that I don't think we would have seen without this boss match! If this was the only category for jojolity we would see very high scores.

However in the meat of your mechanics your jojolity often feels absent. Your narrative is sometimes felt, but there are large gaps where I had to stretch to see if the way tech was implemented reinforced the themes and ideas you set up in your narratives. Especially in the case of Grendel it is hard for me to call out moments outside of the end of the match where it feels like the jojolity in this match meaningfully impacted how you went about defeating your opponent. Agnes escapes this, with an especially impressive showing at the end of the strategy, but with many other sections lacking robust integration it is difficult to give too much credit.

Beyond that, I think that more could have been done to make your jojolity feel more cohesive. You set up definitions of what life means to each individual character, and it feels like there is an inkling of reaching synthesis that never quite comes to fruition in the mechanics of the strategy. While it does get resolved in the post match narrative, it is precedent to weigh what is in the meat of the strategy heavier, and I end up feeling like the most satisfying moments of your jojolity lay outside of the most important moments of the match.

All said, I think that what we have here is excellent creativity with some serious flubs in robustness and integrality. However while weaker on those fronts I still see and acknowledge the effort here, and found your efforts satisfying for the most part. Integrating a jojolity like this into mechanics is tough, and with the efforts I see here the only direction I can see you going is up! In this match your efforts were solidly good, and it feels like a solid 6/10 is fair.

Moving on to Fredrick I have similarly positive things to say. I also think that your narrative sections do some incredible setup! It has been a minute since we have seen a heel be as jojo  villain-ish as Fredrick is in his match. The combination of confidence, danger, and self derangement is intoxicating in a way, and breaches the narrative into the core of the strategy itself.

Integration here is wonderfully done! The way that Fredrick recontextualizes inherently violent acts as “saving” his opponents is genuinely chilling. Everything from how he moves through the water to how he grapples onto his opponents is a bastardization of what my gut tells me a lifeguard should be. He unjustly declares that certain people have “life” and others do not in a way that benefits him while being strikingly similar to talking points from some of the worst might-makes-right motherfuckers I have heard from. It culminates into something that feels like it is building to the ultimate condemnation, where Fredrick defines what life is by stamping out what he clearly considers excluded from it.

And then the final execution is a little bit flubbed. My comment on your finisher being a bit limp hurts the punch of your jojolity here a bit. It makes it feel a bit like a powerful bit of prose with a misspelled last word. And while that keeps you out of the upper echelons I still feel that a high 7/10 feels more than fair here. Congrats to the boss on a masterclass in in-mechanics integration and a solid effort overall!

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Judge AtomicPeace -

Fortunate Sons:


Your jojolity starts off strong with your opening statement, granting good narrative insight into Frederick’s point of view and how that colors his actions as a character and throughout the match in particular. I thought you did a particularly good job at continually adding to this narrative throughout the strategy, it felt like we were getting a little bit more of the details of Frederick’s worldview in each section, and overall it felt nicely executed.

The core of the meaning of life to Frederick seems to be that everyone is dealt their lot in life and they should act within those bounds. The dead should stay dead. Monsters should act as monsters and nothing more. And lifeguards get the privilege of jurisdiction over life. As such, Agnes and Grendel are an affront to this, and should be his stepping stones.

I felt this was well communicated through the actions throughout the strat as well, much of the plays justified through Frederick’s approach to the situation as a lifeguard, including his methodology for his more reactive, single-target approach.

I thought the execution was overall solid, if a bit straightforward. I think there could’ve been a bit more to juice it up throughout the strategy beyond the opening statements of the sections, but I did think what was there delivered on his philosophy well, and for that I think it gets a 7/10.

La Isla Leviatán:

I was interested to see what was done here, as both of these characters have pretty unique experiences in life and are bound to have interesting outlooks as a result, and I wasn’t disappointed. I felt that as a whole, the player’s strategy engaged with the jojolity in an interesting way, not just in their demonstration of their own outlooks on life, but in their refutation of Frederick’s.

Grendel sees himself as a monster, plays up his role as a monster, and also encourages Agnes to do as such. Of course, there’s more depth to that feeling, and Agnes challenges it as such throughout the strat. Grendel similarly challenges Agnes’ view of itself as lacking humanity. I found the push and pull here compelling; they are not necessarily always unified in their outlook, but play off each other to demonstrate their own quite well, and help each other’s introspection because of it.

Frederick’s mastery within the water, and his view that all people should be in their place in life and should not fight that, is challenged well by the player’s bold plays within the water. While I do think to a degree this isn’t much different than how the match would’ve played out otherwise, I think the way that the players handle combat within the water, using it to their whim with their mobility, fighting Frederick using his own style, hunting him down with some pretty brutal offense, did sufficiently feel like the mechanics meaningfully met the narrative they were trying to tell.

I do feel like to a degree, the points with elegance I mentioned in the quality section apply here as well. While I feel like portions of it were weaved well into the strat itself, much of the narrative also felt weighted towards the end of the strategy, which felt like it slightly dragged down the cohesion of an otherwise solid demonstration of the character’s beliefs. I do feel like this is a case where less would have been more, even if the narrative itself is compelling.

Overall, I think this gets a high 7/10. I liked the elements that were there and felt like they tackled the premise of the jojolity in an interesting way, but could have done with some more fine tuning to improve narrative cohesion and to help integrality and punch it up to its full potential.