Bond Questions
Sorry, there are clearly going to be more of these posts from me, as I try to figure things out. I’ll try to group them up.
* What is the “BONDS TO BE RESOLVED” space for on the character sheet? I can’t find any reference to “resolving” bonds in the rulebook (Conditions, yes, but not Bonds). Is this just where you put points you haven’t assigned yet?
* On that topic, I’m a little unclear on how Bonds work at character creation. I’m looking at Page 117 and Page 118. The terms “Bond” and “Bond Points” seem to be used here in an inconsistent fashion sometimes interchangeably, and the term “Bond Score” is thrown in for good measure.
I’m going to take a stab at interpretation…
– Bonds are relationships described by a sentence.
– Each Bond has a Bond Score, an integer value representing its current strength. Whenever a Move says roll +Bond or the rules refer to increasing or decreasing a Bond, that is referring to the Bond Score.
– Bond Points are a currency you spend on increasing the Bond Score of Bonds. You can also spend a Bond Point to create a new Bond with a Bond Score of 1.
– The Bond Threshold is BOTH the maximum number of Bonds (regardless of Bond Score) you can have at any one time AND the number of Bond Points you can spend at character creation on your initial Bonds.
– At character creation, you MUST spend at least one Bond Point to have a positive Bond Score in a Bond with: the City, Law Enforcement, each other player character. You can spend the remainder to increase those Bond’s Bond Scores or you can create new Bonds with NPCs.
– During play, when you Burn a Bond, that means you decrease its Bond Score by 1.
Do I have that right?
Follow-up question: Is it possible to erase a bond completely? I don’t mean reduce its score to zero, I mean take it off your sheet. This would seem to be an important consideration if I am right and your Bond Threshold is the maximum number of Bonds you can have regardless of their score.
Follow-up question 2: Must Bond Points be spent immediately when they are earned (either at creation or during play)? Or can they be saved up?
For the first question:
https://plus.google.com/+DanieleDiRubbo/posts/ijHRvdEsS4q
Hans Messersmith You got everything right, except that at character creation the only thing you MUST put at least one Bond Point in each PC (which you start out with free by default). Any of the remaining Bonds you got from how easy it is for you to blend/fit in/be a normal person you can distribute however you like, whether it be other PCs, NPCs you make up, Law Enforcement, or the City.
Everything else is good. You can erase a Bond completely, definitely. As Bonds go into the negatives a player might choose to just cut that person out of their life (the EIC of course, will definitely want to keep that in their pocket for later), or even a person who they have a positive Bond with might die (or so they think) so they choose to cross them off.
And you are right, the Bond Threshold is your max number of positive Bond Points you can have at any one time (how those points are distributed is up to the players, and will reflect the fiction).
Bond Points don’t have to be spent immediately – if a player doesn’t know what they want to do with them I usually just let them get some play time in before they decide who is important to them and such. If they have ideas though I like to see them distributed as the EIC so I know what’s important to them and can come up with some machinations perhaps, or can help them out with resolving Bonds when that needs to happen but they aren’t sure what to do. I’m always, always for just getting into play and filling stuff in as you go if the player doesn’t have solid ideas yet, that includes Bonds, filling in the Powers Summary and Profile. It’s always way more fun to figure that stuff out in play rather than hold everybody up at the table.
And yeah, Bonds to be Resolved on the sheet is for players to keep track of any Bonds they have Burned, but have yet to resolve (since they can do that whenever, and sometimes it can take a bit to come up with something cool and punchy).
Thanks!
Three more points of clarification…
When a Bond goes negative, it no longer counts against the Threshold, right? That is you don’t get credit for negative bonds.
Assuming the answer to the above is “yes”, then there is technically no limit to the number of bonds, just a limit on the number of positive bonds, right?
If the Bond Threshold is the maximum sum of positive Bond Scores, I’m assuming that can’t be short circuited by “Fit In”, right? You would need to Burn a Bond first, so that you have space of at least 1 under your threshold, right?
Yes, Yes, and Yes. Only a limit on the number of positive bonds, and nothing can put you over your Bond Threshold (though it can be increased through advancement).
Now I have some follow-up questions:
a. Since we said that you automatically get a Bond with the City and Law Enforcement, but you have not to spend any of your Bond points to have a +1 or higher Bond score with that Bonds, my question is: can you leave those Bonds with an initial score of 0?
b. Can you write a new Bond with anyone, let’s say with a friend of the hero, and leave it with a Bond score of 0?
c. When you have to roll +Bonds, can you roll the move if you have not a Bond with that person/entity on your hero sheet? Let’s say I want to roll to serve and protect my uncle Simone, but I have not a Bond with him; can I still roll?
d. You have to roll +Bonds for a move, but you just decided (before rolling) to burn a Bond point with that person. Do you roll the original Bond score or the new Bond score, modified by the burning of the Bond point?
Thanks for the great customer service, Kyle Simons!
Daniele Di Rubbo
a. Yes, in fact I almost always tell them to leave it at zero since they’re starting as new heroes, those larger relationships I generally leave to develop throughout the campaign.
b. Yes, you can also write in negative Bonds if you want.
c. Yes, you can, but you wouldn’t add anything to roll since it’s 0 (and as the EIC I’d get you to write in the Bond on your sheet too probably).
d. Roll the original one, as it was before Burning the Bond, then lower it. It probably won’t affect the outcome regardless, but it is possible.
Thanks for the answers. 😉