Got a nifty little custom move for when your players get into big trouble.
Here’s the backstory. My husband (Alexi Sargeant) GMs our (now year-long) Masks campaign. We agreed I’d run a one-shot for the final session of the year where all our players could try on new playbooks and characters by being NPCs and putting together a b-team.
I told them I’d just come up with a problem that the usual team wouldn’t be a good fit to solve, but what Alexi and I agreed is that the preceding session would end with the main team captured by our A.E.G.I.S. equivalent. He got a shot to take us down in the session, for everyone who escaped, I had this move as mop-up.
My goal in writing the custom move was to give players a real reward for escaping the first time, it’s just that their reward is getting the shape the circumstances of their capture. They get to pick how they want to go down and what complications that might set up for the future.
When you get captured, roll +Conditions to tell us how it all goes down:
On a 10+ it gets ugly, choose one:
• They took you down in a public place, and blackened your name. What did they claim about you? What person or persons did you lose influence over?
• You lost control of your powers trying to escape. Who did you hurt and why do you feel so guilty?
• Choose two from 7-9
On a 7-9, somewhere or someone you thought was safe wasn’t, what happened? Choose one:
• You are ambushed somewhere you thought was secret or safe. What happened?
• Your captors threatened someone you cared about if you didn’t turn yourself in. Who did they threaten? Why did you have to give in?
• Your captors had something prepped specifically to neutralize your powers. What happened? Mark an appropriate condition.
On a 6-, you’re still captured, but you conducted yourself with honor and you managed to learn an important piece of information that you relayed to Kevin before they got you.
• Choose a question from pierce the mask/assess the situation for Leah to answer. And tell us something badass you did as they took you down.
Excellent leading questions!
Thanks, Aaron Feild! In writing custom moves, I’ve been drawing a lot of inspiration from Dread by Epidiah, where character creation is all done through GM-written leading questions.
dreadthegame.wordpress.com – About Dread the Game
To build up the backstory for our b-team, I’m giving them all a bonus backstory question based on what we already know about them as NPCs. e.g. for our Bull:
“Where were going the last time you snuck away from [your current protector’s] shelter, and what happened when he caught you?”
And for those wondering, Kevin is the team’s man-in-chair support staffer, the Beacon’s best friend who is getting bumped up to Beaconing himself in the b-team session.
Wonderful.