Hi all!
I’m planning on writing an Arc for my Crooked character’s player using his former heats. I plan to focus on the idea that he(the crooked) disrupted what was on the surface level human trafficking, but was in fact more like vampire takeout. The gang in charge of the human trafficking will come for revenge against the crooked, and essentially let their former clients have at him. I’m planning on a very ‘From Dusk til Dawn’ vibe for it.
The problem I’m running into: I’m not sure how the countdown would work. Countdown’s are meant for if the hunters never appeared, but I’m confused as this is a personal character arc. How do you approach character based arcs?
Also, and this feels like a silly question but how should one approach a personal character arc in regards to All the players? I know it’s to help add some depth to the character in question (i’m also trying to get the player for the crooked to be more engaged), but should I be on the lookout for accidentally excluding the other players?
Sorry this is so long!
I think of the countdown for arcs being a little more like traditional fronts from Apocalypse World or Dungeon World. The events are taking place more in the background and then finally start coming to a head. It’s still the same general concept, and you want to think about how things will play out if no one intervenes or works to stop the plan.
In terms of approaching arcs and making it fun and fair for the other Hunters, I like having multiple arc countdowns going on simultaneously in the background, and switching between them from session to session, kind of like a B or C plot in a TV series. Your “season” might only have one Big Bad, but you can still advance other characters arcs here and there. The other thing is just to make sure that it’ll be fun for the other players. Give them something to invest in or find a way to tie in their own stories.
You can also look at it as the enemy plan… It might well include actions against the hunters.
The thing to avoid is assuming that any of the events will turn out a certain way… You might have “kidnap attempt on hunter” in there, but don’t make the next one “the rest of the hunters find the captured hunter in the enemy hideout” because that presumes the previous one plays out a particular way.