A couple of teasers of the new career chapter. Looking to have the full chapter and running this weekend.
Wisdom (Chosen)
When you are involved in Cramped Quarters (either directly or as a third party), up to one participant resolves a mental or emotional debility afterwards, no matter the result. You may choose yourself as the “other” subject of your own Cramped Quarters.
Compel (Telepath) (replaces “Suggestion”)
When your word compels another to perform a few brief, simple actions, Roll+Influence.
On a 10+, they obey.
On a 7-9 they obey. If they would act against their fundamental nature, they can choose to suffer mental/emotional harm instead.
Advise (Counsel) (formerly “Suggestion”, from Telepath)
When you steer someone towards a decision or desire, Roll+Influence.
On a 10+, they accept this completely, and will act on it if they can.
On a 7-9, they become conflicted and confused, no telling how they might act.
Mediate (Consul)
When you are involved in Cramped Quarters (either directly or as a third party), choose one:
• Change the roll to a 9.
• Each party gains a Data Point about one of the other participants (your choice).
About Advise. Usually in PbtA games, 7-9 is still a success, with cost. Here I don’t see it.
Great stuff!
I suppose modifications to the meaning of the rolls might sometimes be necessary for balance.
How many big fancy 13+ super-successes are there in the rules overall?
Andrea Parducci You’re correct, the “partial success” seems more of a failure state.
Perhaps something like “They listen, but are conflicted, cautious or confused. They’ll need time to think before they act.”
Not a success (they agree with you) but not a failure (they don’t act against your wishes). While it doesn’t change a decision, it can stall it for a while.
Was going to say the same thing about Advise, it applies to Compel too. Assuming the GM is the one deciding whether the target follows through or accepts mental harm, it puts them in a position where accepting the harm means nullifying the player’s success. That’s probably not good.
For both Advise and Confuse I kind of like the idea that they follow through now, but later they’ll realize they were used (and all the in-fiction potential consequences that could stem from that). That probably makes a tad more sense for Confuse than it does for Advise.
Since the upper limit of success so strong for Compel, I set the degrees of success as:
– They obey anything (shoot your ally, jump off a bridge).
– They obey reasonable/safe demands (give me your wallet, open that door, these are not the droids you are looking for), but are hurt by unreasonable ones.
– They resist the compulsion.
I’m ok with that progression; the 7-9 is still super strong and versatile.
Ah, I see. That’s a lot clearer and less binary.
I know I said that I’d have the chapter up this weekend, but I was stuck against a pretty hefty creative wall for one of the skills, and it was annoying me enough that I didn’t want to even post the chapter until I found a solution.
The skill in question is “Evocation” from the Arcane career. The current implementation is uninspiring, it basically gives you three Projectile Biomods.
Came up with a new design on the extra-long commute this morning (seriously, the train, bus, metro and even the damn escalator all had problems!)
—-
Evocation
Choose either Lightning, Flames, Frost or Energy. You may channel and manipulate that element as part of a Move or Skill, and wield it as a weapon when you Launch Assault or Open Fire.
—-
Basically, I wanted a source of energy blasts, from Cyclops’ eye beams to Palpatine’s Force Lightning. But I also wanted it to have a wider reach than just “you can shoot stuff”. We have guns for that. it should be a wider utility skill that non-combat careers might take. So I went down to the basics of elemental manipulation, and made it explicitly apply to any Move the character wants. An Arcane Industrial could weld and cut with their bare hands if they could channel fire, a Clandestine Arcane might use lightning as part of their interrogation, an Arcane Technocrat could be their own power supply.
Not related to the mechanics, however: is “Force” a good alternative for “Energy”?
Assuming you mean Kinetic Force or Gravity and such, I’ve tried to keep those separate from Arcane because of the Kinetic career, which has all the telekinesis, flight, forcefields, etc.
“Energy” in Evocation applies to incandescent reactions; Plasma and such. I know that it’s a bit muddy between Lightning, Fire and Plasma, but it’s less of a matter of science and more of art/stylistic affectation, really. Burn, Shock or Beam