Random thought/idea of the day:
Borrowing from Monsterhearts somewhat.
What if, instead of unlocking the higher tier advancements for your character when you reach 5 advancements, you unlock them for the rest of the protagonists too and for the remainder of the campaign?
Thoughts? Concerns? Do you like it?
City Moves! This is where I’d put stuff like “lead a faerie court.”
A good name for it.
Speakign about that, why do only Spectre and Wolf get to join/lead a group on the first advances?
Monsterhearts also has these Rules because the ammount of advances and Story you can get out of 1 playbook is shorter. The storyarcs are more condensed. If that is the same in US you should adopt that, otherwise it doesn’t add much.
However, also note the “End of Season” rules for Mnsterhearts. Once Season Advancement are on the table you only get 1 more session to play. Do you see the same being a good idea for US?
We wanted the Wolf and Spectre to get the option earlier, so we added it.
This idea doesn’t change longevity of play at all, just means everyone at the table gets to that tier at the same time. So if I’m an advance or two behind you I can still get excited about your advancement progression getting to that point. 🙂
Yeah, make the city a shared character. Every X character advancement you can take a city move that does group related stuff
You mean Faction?
I would not make them City-wide advancements, it would be more interesting to have it be a Faction Based advancement so you can see the raise of a Faction’s influence mechanically… though honestly the Fae leading a Court is a little odd anyway when they have a Monarch that is not defined well mechanically , though I am assuming it will be fleshed out in the book (and I am hopeful it will be like the Agency in the Turncoat playbook).
Faction could work as well. I agree with Dave Bozarth the rise and falls of factional power within the city would be neat to watch.
Dave Bozarth, the group names are just there to be evocative per archetype. Any grouping of Fae could be viewed as a Court in one form or another. We had Svartálfar take this advance when his brothers and their wives arrived in the city to lend him a hand with the Æsir that were plaguing the city. 😀
I don’t think the suggestion is a problem, but then I’m also not sure it matters very much. As someone who joined an Apocalypse World game that was already in progress I never coveted the higher tier moves. Consider what is there: Some stat boosts (that already exist in the lower tier), removing corruption, replacing your character or archetype, removing scars, advancing moves, leading groups. Almost all of those are really things that only matter after your own character has had a certain amount of growth. The only real exceptions are having a group and advancing moves, but neither seem important to be available early.
So basically I think that even if you unlock the second tier simultaneously for all players the ones who are “behind” are likely to still pull from the core list precisely because it has all of the stuff that is core to the concept.
I like the ideas of having the City as a character/playbook and also having the Factions as characters/playbooks.
Andrew Medeiros I think this my be a difference in expectations on what “Court” means. I view what you are describing as a Troop of Fae, but Courts are divided along Seasonal/Elemental and attitude towards humanity.
Rory MacLeod The only issue with Factions as playbooks that I see is that they encompass so many diverse groups (many of which may not work together), but if the “Faction” playbook idea was written more as a clique / politico group / coven / whatever that would be interesting
I like the idea, though I might be concerned that it would lead every play-group’s city to follow similar lines, unless there were enough different choices, or the advances were really open-ended.
Maybe even have the city advances or faction advances be questions rather than statements: Who opens a door better-left sealed? Why are the Wild up in arms?
Since I play much longer campaigns with a larger teir of advancements …. I do not like.
The good thing is that if you have a new player, they have larger amount of possibilities and are not “pigeon holed”
Tommy Rayburn As someone who joined an Apocalypse World game late, I’m not convinced that there is much risk of feeling “pigeon holed.” None of the second tier of abilities really seem like the sort of thing you need to rush for. I wouldn’t WANT to take them before rounding out stuff from the first tier since “I get a cool new move” is almost always more fun than “my stat goes up” or “I get rid of a corruption/scar.”
Cool new moves really are the best part of advancing. 😀