Post Four

Today I want to look at multiple trackers within a single campaign. This game will take place during the 3 month long Winter Court, a time of political maneuvering and social battles between nobles and other petty rulers when the weather prevents armies from taking the field. In this campaign the Referee has prepared 2 trackers, one each for the main plays of the game.

The first tracker is about a Noble that the party is trying to help. The second tracker is about a Noble that the party is trying to hinder. Throughout these posts I’ll be playing around with different names for game objects and labels as I find what fits best.

Name: War Debts Power: 2

Goals: Noble wants to secure a repayment from the King for expenses from the last war. Needs the funds to pay for next year's campaign. If they fail the army will be of reduced size and effect because they have to come out of pocket to finance the campaign. Weakness: The Noble is out of favor with the Court and is being required to jump through bureaucratic hoops before the King will authorize repayment. Special Abilities: The Noble can demand to be recognized before the Court and introduce people and topics. Increasing Difficulty: At the start of a session, add a Checkmark. Add a Checkmark for each week that passes. When an ally of the Noble is disfavored, add a Checkmark. Objectives: Regain the Courts favor by showing them the Nobles worth. Forge a new relationship with a more powerful Noble.

This first tracker is a slow burn. The party has weeks to accomplish their tasks without the risk of the difficulty increasing. If they manage to avoid embarrassing themselves it could stretch to months.

Here's the second tracker for the Winter Court campaign.

Name: Bishop’s Gambit

Power: 4

Goals: An Order aligned Priest wants the Court to add almost 500 new crimes to the rolls of the magistrates to provide a bureaucratic veneer to their desired inquisition. The Priest has secretly organized a campaign of terror against the Court using his underlings as sacrifices in order to convince them to agree to the expansion of power.

Weakness: The Priest cannot act openly and must obfuscate their identity and role at all costs. Their alignment with Order is actually extremely higher than most people know and the strain is threatening to break their mind.

Special Abilities: The Priest commands the absolute loyalty of Order-aligned fanatics who obey his orders without question.

Increasing Difficulty:

At the start of a session, add a Checkmark.

When an adventurer is disfavored, add a Checkmark.

When an attack happens without interruption, add a Checkmark.

Add a Checkmark for every week that passes.

Add an X for every month that passes.

When a Noble is killed during an attack, add an X.

When an adventurer advances their Order rank, add an X.

Objectives:

Prove that the Priest is the terrorist leader.

Find and clear the cultists hideout.

Calm the fearful public.

Remove the allies of the Priest from power.

This tracker has the potential to become a hydra. The party must focus their attention on multiple tasks at once all while the difficulty has a good chance of increasing.

Let’s take a look at what could happen after a few game sessions. The party has been focusing on the cult problem and knocked out 3 of the 4 objectives. Unfortunately they are not able to accomplish the fourth objective before the tracker’s Power increases. Now a Power 5 Tracker, the Referee must add a 5th objective. What to add? I think that will flow naturally from the play that has already happened. Here’s 4 possible 5th objectives based on which objectives the party has already accomplished. Number One. The party has proved the Priest is the leader, found and cleared the cultists hideout, stopped the public from rioting, but they have not removed the Priests allies from power. The increased difficulty and new threat thereby come from the Priests allies who make false accusations against the party. New objective: Clear your name of the false corruption charges. Number Two. The party has proven the Priest is the leader, found and cleared the cultists hideout, removed the allies of the Priest from power, but they have not calmed the public. The outcry of the public mob threatens to disrupt all civil order and the Court hires a mercenary company to massacre the peasants. New objective: Stop the mercenary company from attacking the town. Number Three. The party has proven the Priest is the leader, calmed the public, and removed the allies of the Priest from power but they haven’t found the cultists hideout. The cultists expand their operations and increase recruitment, magically compelling citizens to join their ranks. New objective: Undo the magical workings powering the cultists recruitment. Number Four. The party has found and cleared the cultists hideout, calmed the public, removed the Priests allies from power but has failed to convince the Court that the Priest is the terrorist leader. Cut off from all his earthly bases of power the Priest calls for supernatural assistance to wreak havoc among his foes. New objective: Defeat the supernatural creatures summoned by the Priest. When adding a new objective because of an increase in Power the task doesn’t have to be significantly more difficult than the other objectives. Most important is that it arises naturally as a result of the actions and inactions of the adventurers. In the last example the Priest is summoning terrible creatures and letting them loose on the populace. This is a last ditch effort that would only make sense if all other options had been closed off. If the party had only managed to accomplish 2 tasks instead of 3 before the Power increased, I don’t think it likely that the Priest would go this route. He’s still got one option available - whichever other task the party hasn’t completed yet in addition to failing to name the Priest the terrorist - so he’s not driven to unleash monstrosities. Yet. As I’m writing these examples I think I’m starting to get an idea of what the Referee section is going to be about. Creating these trackers really seems like it’s a different way of outlining an adventure. I don’t think I have any great insights into ‘how to be a GM’ that others haven’t said already or better. Working on these adventure outlines is interesting to me though, so I’ll keep on that.