Tag: Sean Hess

I’m confused about the healing rules. The full text says once you receive proper attention, erase one faint or critical every day or two, and one grievous every week. Why would critical harm heal faster than grievous?

The Basic Moves contradict all of this. They say that once you receive proper care you erase 1-2 harm every day. Which is correct?

Let’s run through a scenario. I have two characters: one takes a baseball bat to the head and ends up marking his faint and 1 grievous box (concussion). The other takes multiple bullet wounds and ends up with one critical box checked. They rush to the hospital, and get medical attention. 

What happens if they get patched up, get the bullets out, grab some ibuprofen and head out in a couple of hours?

What happens if they take it easy for a while? 

When do they get to erase harm boxes?

Do annoyances from the injuries last beyond the harm boxes? (I’m thinking when someone has broken their arm, but has rested a day gotten a cast, and feels otherwise healthy)

My group is having some trouble with debts. We’ve played Urban Shadows a couple of times, but have never done the debts well. Last night was a brand new game, and we had a hard time with them. 

In one scene, our demonologist was summoning a demon prince to subdue the other demon she had failed to bind. From put a face to a name, she had a debt with him, and they had a working relationship. She can just cash in the debt, roll persuade with +3, and go right? Does she need additional leverage? Like make another promise or threat to the demon prince? Or is the debt enough? (it seemed like it should have been enough in the fiction). I had her promise the demon a small favor as leverage, but it felt wrong. 

At the very beginning, our puppet master character cashed in a debt to get our witch to help out with his problem. Because he was cashing in a debt, he felt the need to remind the witch of the debt she owed as a veiled threat (You better help or I’ll pull the rug out from under you). The witch’s player felt like he needed to go along because of the debt rules, rather than reacting with hurt pride as his character would have, in order to follow the rule. In other words, the players felt like the debt rules got in the way of the fiction. 

And that’s the main concern of my players. It seemed like the debt rules got in the way of the fiction. Do you have any advice? Is it just inexperience?

This is also the second group where the players have complained loudly about the experience point system. They want to level up, but feel like it’s too hard or too forced. What would you say to players in this case? 

Thank you! I’m excited to get better at the game. 

I need some advice. I’m getting ready to run a game in a week with slightly different goals, can you help decide which rules to use or change?

The original idea was to run Mage: The Ascension. The game is about doing stuff in an Urban Fantasy setting, but it’s also about creative problem solving with an open-ended magic system. After considering my options, I felt like US is really close to what I want so I made an archetype for it. My group has played Urban Shadows before, but they prefer slightly more traditional rules, like Call of Cthulhu. Some of them think that US is “soft”

Normally, everyone in the group plays a Mage. There’s enough variety in the archetype for everyone to have unique skills, but I don’t currently have different intro questions. 

Also, since the party will all be in one faction, I’m worried that the faction and debt system will feel forced. I’m also not sure I want the game to be too political. 

What advice can you give me? Which rules would you change or tweak to support this? Do you think Urban Shadows as written will make for an interesting game or will I be fighting the system?

Thanks guys!