Reflecting this morning on my first session of tremulus, it suddenly occurs to me that there’s nothing in the rulebook about creating custom moves. Now, of course, I’m familiar with this powerful and fun tool from other PbtA games, so I can and will use it (my main villain needs something more than an Extra tag).
It seems like the Let the Dice Decide Keeper Move (roll+luck) stands in for it to an extent, though that’s ostensibly for matters of seemingly little import.
Well, my experience does not tell me so.
I’ve had to use ‘Let the dice decide’ Action in two instances and one was nearly a life or death sentence.
However, I agree that ‘Let the Dice Decide’ partly replace custom moves in that it fills the gap where other Actions don’t work.
I’m interested in hearing more details about the times you used the move.
In Call of Cthulhu, the Luck roll can be used for determining random outcomes from the innocuous to the dire, so I’m familiar with using that similar mechanic in wide range of circumstances.
But tremulus isn’t skill-based in the same way; the moves that players have access to are both more robust and constrained at the same time. So the Let the Dice Decide move might be a way to shore up the gap, though I’d like to simply use fiction in a lot of circumstances rather than bring in the dice–it’s something I’d like to balance.
I’m interested in hearing about a campaign run with tremulus. Our experiences with tremulus deem it more suitable for oneshots.
Lauri Maijala , what about it makes it more suitable for one-shots than long-term play? The current game I am running is a one-shot in place of our regularly scheduled game (the GM couldn’t make it), but I’m curious about how it works otherwise.
We have played it only a couple of times. Granted we started out with a oneshot in mind but the technic of Trust and the lack of clear advancement system point towards that direction. Now I’m not saying it wouldn’t work as a campaign, I’m merely thinking that it is better suited for shorter games.