So I’m having a great time with masks as a GM narrative wise but I’m having a hard time using it mechanically for combat and social interactions.
Both me and my players are starting to feel like it’s getting stale mechanically and I’m kind of at a loss on how to freshen it up. We’ve been playing for several months now and the group is good in the stories fun but all our combat seem to go the same way. The challenge is setup player 1:assesses the situation. player 2: directly engages the threat. Player 3: directly engages a threat or defense’s one of the other players. players 1or2: use Playbook move. Player4:finishes it by unleashing powers,directly engaging a threat, or rolling defend to save civilians. sometimes someone might Pierce The Mask but that’s rare. that turns into our whole combat usually.
They usually don’t fail any of they’re rolls and by usually I mean 95% of the time. The only time they take a powerful blow is when they choose not to resist the blow from the bad guy but then they always succeed at taking a powerful blow so it doesn’t affect the players at all. They also always succeed when it comes to resisting influence when they choose to. Story-wise I’ll say bad guy does X and they’ll just stop them mechanically which means they stop them narratively. In the end my villains conditions get filled up fast.
granted there a lot of really good story elements that players deal with outside the combat but it just feels like there is no mechanical challenge in the game.
Is anyone else having this problem?
Do players just usually fail more of there rolls so people don’t have this problem?
Should I focus less on mechanical conflict and more on narrative conflict in battle?
Do I create my own mechanical moves and interact more mechanically even though the players succeed?
most of my villain moves tend to be narrative. villain one gets punched in the nose so they throw rocks at civilians, put a hero in danger or ratchet up the verbal aggression towards the hero. is that right or should I be creating moves that I’m going to roll for that can hurt the players mechanically?
sorry if this post seems rambling but I just thought I would see what people’s thoughts were and what their experiences were and whether or not I could get some pointers on what I might be doing wrong.
Give your players more to do than just fight. There is a lot of GM Moves other than take a powerful blow. They Bull rolled a 7-9 on his Engage a Threat. Great! he knocked the Villain into a bus which leaves he bus teetering on the edge of the bridge. (Put Innocence in Danger) Something that the heroes have to deal with immediately whose resolution isn’t “stop the villain” Make them worry about collateral damage. Where and when the fights take place matters to. Put the fights where the environment can be used for the PC and the Villains this will help freshen up the fighting.
Also up the villain count. You have a party of heroes. Well bring in more than one villain to contend with. While the Transformed is going toe to toe with Titas-the-Tank the Nova has to deal with Killer Canary.
I hope this helps. You are probably do a lot of this already thought.
I guess the first part to address is your mention of them not failing 95% of the time. Are you saying they’re rolling 10 or higher that often? Seems extremely anomalous.
Keep in mind that rolls do not define a binary success/failure mechanic. They represent the opportunity for complications. The way the dice are set up, the players should be getting 7-9 results most of the time, and that’s when you as the GM gets to embellish.
For instance, suppose your powerhouse character is preventing a chunk of building from squashing innocent bystanders below. You have the player roll Unleash Your Powers, and the result comes up 7-9.
A possible resolution is to say the character stops the main chunk, but that smaller pieces have broken off and continue falling. This sets up the chance for another character to act.
Bottom line, one of the Principles of the game is to complicate the PC’s lives. The best way to keep combat and conflict from getting stale is to live up to that Principle.
You told us about the player moves in these situations. What kind of GM moves are you using? What moves are you choosing when the villains mark conditions?
Have you given them situations where violence isn’t the best answer?
Also remember that to stop someone mechanically you must be able to do it narratively. Spider-Man can’t Directly Engage Sandman by punching him and Jimmy Olsen can’t cold-cock Doomsday—they don’t even get to roll.
I have the villain respond mostly in narrative. the only real mechanics I use is take a powerful blow or Tell someone how the world works.
Should I be creating mechanically moves for the villan that force mechanical interactions? Right now the the villain moves are mostly narrative.
If I create my own villain moves do I roll, just say it happens, or have the players roll and shoes on a villain consequence move chart like any other move?
Just checking: are you remembering that the villain gets to make a move every single time they take a condition?
“Create three or so villain moves, things
the villain does, both in and out of fights.
Make them descriptive and interesting,
active and direct.”
A move like they listed : Summon Robotic Minions.. sounds like it would spice things up.
You wouldn’t roll for these things they just happen.
Also note the PCs don’t have to FAIL in order for you to do a GM move. You can do them any time you think it would make the game more interesting. Also they happen any time the Villain takes a condition
I do create villain moves. What happens is thw player roll and succeeds. The villain marks a condition so they in the story release nanites or illusions that threaten civilians, buildings’ or just generally make things more complicated. But when I do this players just interact with these complications mechanically and succeed.
If the players succeed 95% of the time, either they’re cheating or they’re only doing things that their characters are good at: The one with plus 3 danger is attacking while the one with a plus 3 Savior is doing the saving.
You might want to put them into situations where they’re forced to do things they’re not good at. Really push them.
As one of the players in the game, he’s only mildly exaggerating. The rolls in this game are ridiculous. We were probably 5-6 games in before anybody managed an advance. Even throwing 0 or -1 labels, 10+ results are not nearly as uncommon as they ought to be.
To piggy back Harry Connolly Go after those +3 stats. Have the villains/adults really hammer those stats down with their influence, or go the opposite way and force conditions by forcing them to raise them more. By now they may have a few locked in, and they do still don’t forget to showcase the downside of that stat. +3 Danger means they are wrecking a lot of things.
Push their labels around. If they are amazing at danger, take it down a notch with using influence. Their labels should not remain static and be in flux. It’s one of the games strengths and a fantastic tool for the gm.
Yeah in the last couple of games I’ve had better luck at moving their labels around if I tell them something there character believes or something the characters won’t necessarily fight against. Whenever they resist influence they really do succeed most of the time. So ends up being characters ignoring npcs
I’ve had more luck with players changing other players labels and making it complicated for each other then doing it my self.
Michael Beard yeah I am slightly exaggerating.
Jeff Johnston Thank you for pointing out that I should have enemies that some times the heroes can’t just directly engage a threat to. I didn’t think of that.
Thanks guys for interacting with the post and helping out. The advice was pretty useful and I hope that in my game this Saturday it will help.
Another way you can implement what Harry Connolly mentioned above is to have moves trigger dangers affecting the other players (I really need to read Masks soon!). Use those dangers to push players out of their comfort zone. Also, add some nuance to those dangers to spread around the rolls a bit. Have a bus teetering on the edge and have someone on the bus freaking out and have the hero try to calm them down.
Masks is really about young heroes and how they are molded somewhat by the perceptions of people around them. Have them get molded into something that isn’t ideal for an action scene that is coming up. Then, in true comic book form, after they fail they gather up their strength and come back for round two where they whup up on the baddies.
One other option is to split up the party, that way unless everyone has the same labels they won’t have the same niche protection as when they’re fighting as a group. This could be especially good if each group is sent into a situation that they’re bad at dealing with.
The Unwrittenart here’s something to remember when you’re influencing—there’s the “too much of a good thing” rule. If you shift something past +3 the character takes a condition instead.
So say One Punch Kid has Danger +3. Don’t tell him he’s no good in a fight. Tell him he’s reckless and dangerous and he’s going to get someone killed (+Danger/-Savior).
Now to reject your influence he has to actually reject your influence. You can’t use the mechanics if you don’t do it in the narrative. If OPK really thinks he’s a dangerous badass then he’s accepting what you say, not rejecting it.
So lets say he rolls a 10. He’s got to choose two of those options, so he’s going to be either switching his labels—and it’s got to make sense narratively—or acting to disprove you (which is definitely not Directly Engaging)
Couple other things to remember:
The reject influence roll is just a straight roll with no bonuses (making it spectacularly unlikely that they’re always rolling 10+. Maybe get a pair of casino dice?)
NPCs can also just pass out conditions or -2 penalties if they’re willing to take advantage of the influence they have over someone. If the villain isn’t meant to last for longer than a fight, start throwing that move around.
(And don’t forget the various -2 penalties conditions inflict.)
Also take a powerful blow is 2d6+conds, so how are people not rolling a 7 on average?
Adam Goldberg no they’ve been rolling extremely low when it comes to take a powerful blow. I believe maybe two or three times thay actually rolled over in and have to face the choose from the consequence list.
Andrew Cady totally stealing Titas the Tank and Killer Canary.