RPGaDay2020 Prompt 27 – Favour
Prompt: Favour
Though many adventures start with doing someone a favor, this particular spelling of the word directed my mind to another definition of the word- favour given by a patron or organization. When running a game, I like for my cities to be alive, and not revolve around the PCs. But I also want the PCs to be embroiled in the operations and invested in the outcome. It's hard to have a good balance between a patron railroading the PCs actions and being entangled with them of their own volition. I was able to get partway there with the city creation rules in Fate- first in The Dresden Files RPG, and then with Fate Core as it had it baked in. The organizations had their own Aspects that the PCs could find out about and tag for effect, helping to build the narrative around them. But this still gave little mechanical benefit when the organizations were not directly involved. I recently did a playtest for Swords of the Serpentine by Pelgrane Press, and the final piece of the puzzle slotted itself into places- the PCs have ratings with the different organizations- both positive and negative- to indicate their involvement. These ratings are fluid- as the PCs have positive or negative interactions with the groups, their ratings increase and decrease, and with an increased rating comes an increased presence, increased support, and increased obligation. This allowed for the PCs interactions to have an impact on how they maneuvered in the city, and made the city seem more alive in play. I just need to find out some way to represent the dealings that the organizations have with each other in a more dynamic manner without having to manually work these angles or randomly generate them.