For those visiting from #Gamedesign: an attempt at doing a pre-made campaign module ended up being an excuse to revisit old rules while trying to do a more concise ruleset for the module.  There’s a general intent to make things more streamlined, reduce rolls, and increase clarity.

The desire to do a WD campaign module which led to an effort to cover the rules in a tidy and succinct way, and a summary look at the game rules and what could be cut.

Thoughts & an attempt at summarizing my own impressions over the ongoing discussion over Weaverdice:

The Core System

The d6 roll with seven core attributes is the baseline system.  It’s come under fire a few times.  To cut from discord chat (with edits)…

Lune wrote (and I agree):

Just about every variation or option besides the d6 has been brought up, discussed, and kinda gone nowhere over the seven years since WD was incepted.  We’re further from consensus, not closer.

My feeling: I’d rather leave it be & get into it when the system is better conceptualized and rounded out.  In the meantime, homebrew is fine, and I’d really like to see discussion aimed more at at least ~trying~ to make what’s there work; other discussions tend to at least produce new material/raw stuff for GMs.

High Stats 

Representing extreme agility, strength, and intelligence can be tricky when the natural progression would be a high die result.  While playtesting hasn’t leaned heavily in the direction of giving powers a lot of stats, it’s nice to have the option and be able to represent things like hurling cars around.

Theorizing/My feeling:  Am leaning in the direction of having ‘superstats’ for those extreme cases.  1 is practically disabled, 2 is noticeably weak, 3 is average, 4 is strong, and 5 is the upper range of ability for a stat.  Skills and backgrounds represent the training that takes a trained 5 to olympian levels.

When we add superstats into play, we say ‘you’re strong enough that you can automatically pass those other, human-tier rolls.  The GM then sets the scope for what you’re capable of, (say, requiring a 4+ to lift a car), you refer to stats as Superbrawn or Superwits, and use those instead, for those scenarios.

Other power effects may be more hardline; Glorygirl, for example, doesn’t really fail to lift stuff.  There’s a limit to what she can lift (a little more than a cement mixer) and up to that limit, it’s effortless and easy.  There may be difficulty in knowing how to hold things (lifting a car by the wrong part can cause a part of it to tear away), but that’s something else entirely from a Brawn roll.  This could be treated as an autopass for things of a certain weight (with some Know rolls to keep the intended object intact while handling it); no roll necessary.

These things can fluctuate with connection to passenger and other effects, be a reserve that costs adrenaline, focus, or recovery (see the Effort & Exhaustion section), or turn on & off, which may in itself require tracking both standard brawn and superbrawn.

Superstats will be covered later in the character creation & powers discussion in another doc/adjacent project.

Character Creation 

One of the big hurdles, IMO, is that character creation is both one of the more compelling things WD offers and it’s something we’ve largely bridged or patched with community expectation, assumptions, and stuff that we all know is the case, but is unwritten.

Bringing new players in and having the game be something that can be given to a play group that can then create a WD game and come back with feedback requires a system where those unwritten things are spelled out, or at least a baseline is provided that makes intuitive sense and whatever else.

A WIP character creation doc with some implemented rules is here.  The intention is to offer something new-player friendly that encapsulates the writing of triggers and WD as a whole.  It would be aimed at being finished around the same time this version of WD is done.  I think the general take is that of a ‘gentler’ WD, that’s a bit more forgiving, in terms of options given.

My feeling: Big challenges to tackle in regard to that document and the suggested rules are figuring out the tail end of it, where guidelines are given for actually putting rules to powers (not fun to do, insanely complex, may need to be done as guidelines), and striking the right balance in covering everything that a GM & player needs to know, while not having it get bogged down.  A few times I’ve gone into it, I’ve scrapped the work I did because it was getting too technical and ‘in the weeds’.

Much easier & more fun to do than some other stuff, particularly the gradual expansion of classification docs.  I’m thinking more about doing a set of blueprints/flowcharts, but would want to finalize & figure out some of the trickier classifications, so it can be done in one tidy swoop, first.

Character Setup - Skills

Skills and equipment are a bear to tackle, so to speak.  They’re extensive, there’s a lot of ground to cover, and they tend to get nitpicked to death, because of how essential and important they are.  A partially complete list of skills easily dwarfs the amount of text that goes into the rest of the rulebook altogether.

Skills are one of the more contentious points of WD.  We want to represent the skillsets and development of characters.  Past action has included moving away from adding too many +1s (which scale much differently with D6s) and adding the ‘h6’ or ‘roll two dice and take the highest’.  There’s been a lot of debate over skills and what the best implementation would be, and key points include the idea that a good skill is sometimes better than a bad power, as well as skill point distribution, which is how many skill points a character gets.  The bonuses are huge and important, they unlock capabilities, and they have a way of feeling too broad and too important, and just remembering what skills do involves a lot of reference back to the sheet or rulebooks.

My feeling: From a design standpoint, there’s an issue with skills where they’re very ‘big’.  Because of how comprehensive skills are, they involve a lot of writing and case-by-case judgment.  From a design standpoint, the sheer workload of skills is a tough thing to tackle and I’d like to address this in a soft way.

Proposal, Proficiencies: There’s a few points to cover, but I think my current approach would be to emphasize proficiencies and background, as done in the Mile End system.  This would be in addition to standard skills, and work like ‘mini skills’ where you say “Can I get a bonus from my background as a computer tech?”.   Example options might be:

Standard - Picking two things in the background or character’s field of interests, get bonuses only outside of combat/conflict, and with working, crafting, and social relationships.
Youth - get less proficiencies (and maybe less stat points), but more flexibility and control over growth and progression.
Veteran - Opposite of youths, ‘locked in’, possibly with more skill points in addition to a robust set of proficiencies, but less flexibility and growth.  Needs stuff to balance with short/long games.

Proposal, Skills: My personal feeling is that a skills section should instead have some guidelines on what a player/GM designed skill would look like, in terms of boundaries and scope, and let them do that.  Some ‘core’ skills could be designed.  In general, were skills to be mapped out, I’d want them associated with a stat or multiple stats, and roughly evenly distributed.

Proposal, Skillpoint Distribution: There’s a general feeling that people want more skills, but also that skills are powerful and too many more creates a dynamic where it’s overwhelming (and because of the ongoing bookkeeping, there’s more time spent looking up the skills in the first place).

So, rearranging and adjusting, remove the cap on skills and simplify how one can pick them.  This would be only up to a point, followed by making ‘master’ skills something harder to break into (possibly requiring powers, or a lot of time).  

The skill distribution would remain similar but there’d be room for ‘learning’ skills where the player picks some stuff they’re better at than some, but still developing.  These skills can be activated by spending pips of the appropriate type.  As the character develops they can pick up more of these.  Actively practicing them (finding opportunities, spending those pips) in situations develops them into regular skills.

Character Setup - Equipment: Many of the same core issues as skills, but equipment is neglected (by myself and in discussions) due to being less exciting and interesting.  Some thoughts:

Development: Same idea as skills.

Guns: This is a case where gameplay practicalities tend to win out over lore & setting design.  I might implement a ‘red card’ rule for guns where it’s baked into how they work.

Armor: Armor, gear, equipment as terminology needs better distinction.  Base types of armor are probably out the window or turned into qualities on their own.  Encumbrance gets simplified.

Belt Items: I’d like to emphasize belt items more, as the utility belt or things you specifically keep available and in arm’s reach.  Simplifies some issues with gear, character sheets, and combat.

Gameplay - Morale: Morale is something that I personally feel works as a sensible resource, that allows players to wrestle with things like emotion control.  As it stands, Morale works by setting a cap on die results.  Initially, morale penalties have minimal effect: the initial penalty limits the results of your rolls to 6.  But as it increases, it lowers the result to 5, 4, 3, or even 2, at which point the character simply can’t function anymore or bring themselves to succeed at or focus on even basic tasks.

This tends to be a result of choices: a character may get hit with an emotion control effect that charms them: they really, really like the cape Sweet Valentine (SV), after SV’s power hits them, but they rationally know that she isn’t a friend or romantic interest.  The player retains the ability to choose not to act on their feelings, but it emotionally wrecks them: they take a hit to morale.

In another case, it may be the result of a character sacrificing a rich and comfortable life.  A murderhobo player may start to struggle as they spend weeks living under a bridge, eating trash, so they can focus on their Master minions.

Here’s the difficulty: I want to represent the inverse, to give players the incentive to surround themselves with luxury, eat good food, and get good morale.  As it stands, morale only provides a buffer.  On the other hand, having it provide a floor for rolls would be too powerful (result of 2 minimum?)

Brainstorming, some options include:

• Waiting - Wait until WD 3.0 and rules rewrite is done, then use morale as a patch to bring things more toward balance (for example, if players are still dying too often, it could be treated as bonus health or recovery.  If time to kill is too drawn out, it could be combat rerolls to help assure results).
• Morale as extra adrenaline, focus, recovery - ‘For every 1 morale over neutral you have, you start the day with one adrenaline, focus, or recovery.  Once spent it doesn’t recover until the first night’s rest.
• End of Day ‘Thriving’ bonus - Making it to the end of the day with good morale pays off dividends in the non-combat stuff (crafting, team management) and/or in recovery of injuries.

Side note: I’d like to encourage players to maintain secret identities (genre trope) and healthy relationships with PCs (also helps for story, immersion), so morale might factor in there as well.

General Thoughts: Progression 

Key principles for the tone and approach to the wormverse, I feel, are power, positioning, and problem solving.  The progression of a character and how they position themselves at the outset, adjusting as they advance, should be a key aspect of play, but I shy away from a ‘level’ system.

Starting Out, Stats: I’m leaning toward a system of two +1s and one -1, for stats, instead of the mix of one +1 and one -1.  Even when making the playtest capes, I found myself itching to take more stats to represent the characters.  

The Mile End system is one proposed way of doing stats, where the GM provides players with two or three possible statlines (For example, one of the three options could be +1 Brawn, +1 Know, and player’s choice of either -1 Dex or -1 to a random stat).  

Thoughts: I like this for a few reasons, including that it corrects some stuff where players may optimize stats or pick the best ones, instead of adapting and doing different things across different characters.  It also folds in neatly with the young character, where young characters would get only a +1 and a -1 (+1 Brawn and either -1 Dex or -1 to a random stat), with room for taking a stat of their choice later, if they can justify it.

Stats and Natural Skill: Another possible rule is making it so skill points are untethered from abilities, but growth will naturally fall into areas where the character has natural ability.  In this proposed idea, initial skill point allocation or growth could be extended, but some points would specifically have to be allocated to the areas the character has those +1s in.  A stat with a natural -1 in it would mean the character would get no growth or slow growth in that stat.

Other Considerations: NPC statlines get tricky, where there’s a lot of contention over whether capes should (lorewise) be that much better than mundane people, for stats.  There’s no great options for this, except for accounting for defense scores and a lack of practical skills when looking at civilians.

Milestones (our level up system) are something of an issue, where many GMs don’t use them or are very conservative with them.  When they do come up, they aren’t meaningful, with a lot of inconsistent or minor options for growth.

Oftentimes they can be ignored or seen as unimportant.

My feeling: A ‘better’ system might be one that encourages tiny points of growth after most sessions or in every downtime.  The benefit of tying it to downtime is that downtime already falls into the times when someone can rest, plan, and make micro-adjustments to what they’re doing.  The tiny points of growth could include: ‘learning’ skills (see skills, above), followers, maybe stuff tied to disposition, proficiencies, and bonus downtime or bonus effectiveness for downtime actions.

Possibilities for arrangement & options then include:

• Milestones as bigger steps.  May continue current trends, but are simpler.
• Milestones get scrapped, and instead there’s slightly better options for growth that require three of the lesser options be taken first.
• The tiny points of growth are a list of, say, 16 options with some repeated entries.  Players who do (for example) 10 of the 16 then run into a character moment, where the milestone they set is either something they’ve progressed in or handled, or neglected.  This may be played through in-character, where they have to come to grips with success or failure, with the GM setting difficulty and circumstances according to the player’s progress in-story.  It may also be something where the nature of the campaign doesn’t allow for that moment to happen, in which case it may be an auto-pass or fail.  If neglected or failed, the character suffers a setback in their lives, related to the goal.  If they succeed they pass the threshold and rise in tier as a cape, with reset room for personal growth (taking the 10 of 16 again, with a new milestone).
  

Milestones themselves (if applicable) would and should be bonuses that are both big and consistent, requiring those points of growth, and marking big ‘checkpoints’ in campaigns and games.

Rough example of mini-progression options:

Once an option is taken, it’s off the list until you get to 10 and hit your ‘make or break’ point in your milestones.

1. Start ‘learning’ a skill.  It can’t be a skill you have a natural -1 in.  Tapping into that skill requires spending a pip.  Athletics skills require adrenaline, Wits skills require focus, and Guts skills require Recovery pips.  This makes the skill available for a short time.  After [Know-7] uses in this manner, gain that skill point permanently.
2. Start ‘learning’ a skill.  It has to be one you have a natural +1 in.  See above for details on using skills you’re learning.
3. Gain your choice of noncombat follower or fan who will help you in the background, respective to your disposition.  They start work after 1d6 days, unless your morale is good or better, in which case they start immediately.
4. Gain a random noncombat follower or fan who will help you in the background, respective to your disposition.  If you maintain a secret identity and good civilian life relationships, you can choose the type; you heard about them through word of mouth.
5. Raise your maximum (combat available) underling count by 1.  Named or capable followers may take up more than one slot.
6. Raise your maximum (combat available) underling count by 1.  Named or capable followers may take up more than one slot. [Duplicate, padding, allowing it to be taken twice]
7. Gain reputation up to your maximum.  The next two times you pick off this list, if your morale is ‘good’ or better, gain one rep.
8. Gain media attention.  Amounts to more rep, while temporarily hampering the reputation use and availability of opposition.  Can springboard into other options.
9. Gain $500.  Each time you pick off this list, if you’ve maintained a secret identity and healthy civilian life relationships, gain half the amount of the last time ($250, 125, 75…).
10. Gain $500.  Each time you pick off this list, if you’ve maintained a secret identity and healthy familial relationships, gain half the amount of the last time ($250, 125, 75…). [Duplicate, padding, allowing it to be taken twice]
11. Gain a belt slot.  This is a slot for items, tools, or other weapons that you bring with you into combat.  Examples include grenades, ammunition clips, a knife in a holster, a medkit, or a fire axe that takes up two belt slots because it’s large.
12. Boost morale.  If your secret identity and civilian relationships are intact, your morale baseline rises for [Social] encounters.  Over time, morale tends to settle at the baseline.
13. Recover.  Heal fully, and then one long-term injury or issue (such as another parahuman power) gets halved in severity.
14. You gain a free Downtime slot, usable once.  If you’ve maintained a secret identity and good civilian life relationships, this slot remains open (roll each time it’s used).  Each time it’s used after the first, however, it hurts relationships, raises suspicion, or lowers your morale.
15. You gain a free Downtime slot, usable twice.  
16. You gain a pip in Adrenaline, Focus, or Recovery.  It is available only in the first encounters after resting; exhaustion occurs as if it didn’t exist.  [Can take other conditional forms; on future lists, may have option to turn this into a regular pip above the normal cap]

Example Milestones:

Expand Power - Roll on the power bonus/augment list for the classification.  Can include secondary powers, skill points, and general power expressions.  If you have a good relationship with your passenger, having avoided guns, experimented with the power, and fostered healthy conflict, roll up to (GM discretion) three times and pick one.

Life Perk - Gain a broad character benefit, rolling on the Life Perk list.  If you have a secret identity and maintained good familial relationships, roll an additional time.  If you have morale of ‘good’ or better, roll an additional time.  Pick from the 1-3 rolled options.

Power Perk - Gain a broad power benefit, rolling on the Power perk list.  If you have morale of ‘good’ or better, roll an additional time.  If If you have a good relationship with your passenger, having avoided guns, experimented with the power, and fostered healthy conflict, roll an additional time.  Pick from the 1-3 rolled options.

What’s going on? - Superheroes and supervillains started appearing in 1984, after the initial sighting of Scion, the first hero.  Some of the first people to come into contact with Scion got powers, and around that time, people all over the world started to manifest abilities.  Now, in the year 2010, ‘cape’ is slang for parahumans, these powered people.  They appear in the media, have independent capes, teams or multiple teams in every major city and many minor ones, and are taking a hand in world events.  People root for their local heroes in the same way they do for local sports teams, kids on playgrounds debate whether Scion or Eidolon would win in a fight, and people will show their friends photos they snapped of local capes downtown.  For most people, that’s the only meaningful impact capes have on their lives.

If someone is particularly interested in capes, or if they take parahuman studies in University, they might start looking into the question of where powers come from.  The short explanation that is fed to most people is that their best theory is that people who have a very good day or a very bad day can manifest powers.  Really, it’s just the bad days, and the ‘good day’ thing is PR.

You have something terrible happen to you, you have a ‘trigger event’ where you momentarily black out, see some flickering images, promptly forget what you saw, and come back to reality to find you have powers.  Powers often take ironic slants that keep people in whatever mindset they were in when they triggered, or forever remind the cape of the traumatic incident, even in vague ways.

Because powers often come from traumatic events with lasting impacts on the person, there are a lot (Hundreds of thousands) of unhappy, desperate people who can do things like breathe plasma or lifting cars, many of them with PTSD, poor coping mechanisms, and complicated relationships with their powers.

The PRT - The Parahuman Response Team began as something akin to SWAT for dealing with capes, but became an institution.  The PRT is a human-led government organization that in turn manages the Protectorate, the leading hero team, and the Wards, which is the same thing for under-18 government heroes.  Well equipped, serious, and determined, the best a villain can hope is that they aren’t the PRT’s biggest focus, or that they have sufficient firepower.

The Unwritten Rules - It takes a lot for society to simply accept heroes and villains as a part of the fabric of everyday life.  Part of this acceptance is due to an ongoing, long-running PR campaign that even the villains participate in.  The primary goal of the unwritten rules is to keep the hero-villain dynamic stable.  Breaches in the unwritten rules include crossing lines such as sexual assault, wanton murder, interfering in key points of civilian life such as elections, making heroes and villains appear to be too dangerous, or taking advantage of truces to target rivals.  Perhaps the trickiest point for many people new to the Wormverse to get a grip on is that use of a gun often constitutes a breach - even when lethal lasers and fire blasts are slung around, even the act of brandishing a gun is seen as a sign that one is willing to kill, and using one is clear evidence of premeditated murder on a cape’s part.  Once the rules are sufficiently breached, the broader cape community tends to handle the offender. 

Dispositions - One’s disposition refers to the role one takes in the local dynamic.  Roles include the self-explanatory hero and villain, the resource-driven mercenary, the ‘sponsored’ cape who serves a greater organization, the ideology-driven believer, the ultra-violent, and the reputation-shirking ‘F-lister’.

Classification - the PRT started using terminology to quickly refer to the broad classifications of powers, to quickly alert one another or fall back on blanket strategies, and this terminology seeped into the mainstream (primarily the use of ‘Tinker’ and ‘Tinkertech’ to refer to superpower-derived inventions)

• Mover - Capes who can cross distances with exceptional ease.  Often flying or teleportation.
• Shaker - Those with area of effect capabilities, often affecting broad areas of the battlefield
• Brute - Capes with enhanced durability or protection.  May also have improved offensive ability.
• Breaker - On/off change into an altered (often ghostly, eerie, inhuman) state to use their abilities.
• Master - Have an ability to control others/influence actions of others.  Mind control, minions, etc.
• Tinker - Ability to invent tech only they can really use.  Have varied approaches & specialties.
• Blaster - Ranged attack powers.  Beams, fireballs, artillery.
• Thinker - Enhanced cognition, perception, access to information others don’t have.
• Striker - Melee-range or touch-based powers.
• Changer - Mutate, transform.  Use their abilities to change their state or shape.
• Trump - Have powers that nullify/steal/alter/modify/tap into other powers.
• Stranger - Powers for infiltration, deception.  Invisibility, illusion.  Often overlap with others above.

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As a game master (referred to as the GM from here on out), you are an arbitrator, narrator, guide, and you play the role of every character that isn’t one of the players.  Keep in mind that what is outlined here and in rulebooks is only a guide, and improvisation makes for a better play experience.  One of the best things about pen and paper gaming is that unlike a video game, there are no invisible walls, no actions one cannot take (within the bounds of the character’s capability), or dialogue options you think of but can’t take.  The balancing act as GM is in accommodating player desires while keeping the story going.

Remember that you are not the adversary.  The world is harsh, and it is dark, but your role is to usher the players through it, while telling a collaborative story with them.

A good approach is to try to strive for terms like, “Yes, and…” and “No, but…”.  When working to guide a collaborative storytelling effort, a hard ‘no’ is really discouraging to the players.  Try to say yes where possible, improvising the end results.  Even if it means bending one’s own creative vision for the game, or a novice GM treading into uncomfortable territory that isn’t covered by this guide, it is better to have a game that goes against a single person’s vision or that goes awkwardly if that compromise incorporates the whole play group.

If you feel overwhelmed or aimless at any point, as if things are too sidetracked, feel free to communicate that with the group or call for a short recess while you get your thoughts in order.  The guide can still be helpful - if the guide says a character shows up as the characters retire for the night, to provide information for them to think about and discuss, you might decide to have that character show up now, helping to steer things back on track and provide some focus.  Their later appearance could be changed to them simply being available for follow-up questions later.

If ‘no’ must be said, try to play off of it.  This is the “No, but…” side of things.  This is where the GM can say No: “As you approach the building’s edge you see how far it is to the ground and realize you wouldn’t survive the landing, or you wouldn’t make it without broken legs, but there’s a fire ladder to the side.”

Ability checks

When a player wants to do something with a chance of failure, the GM will ask that player to roll a d6 and add or subtract a number based on their statistics.  With their statlines, the sample characters each have two stats that get +1s and one stat with a -1.  They would roll a d6, aim for a 2+ or 3+ (trivial to easy task), 4+, 5+, or 6+ (middling, hard, impossible).

When in doubt, default to requiring a 4+ to succeed.

For reference (also on the reference cards), statistics are:

Statistics are a 3 by default, and for every point above or below that baseline, characters get a +1 or -1 to the roll.  

Ex: Ramjet wants to leap over a gap.  Leaping is full-body movement and draws on Athletics.  With a 4 in Athletics, he gets a +1 to the roll.  The GM judges the difficulty a 4+, Ramjet leaps and gets a 5, and clears the gap.

Social Rolls, Negotiation

In an ideal case, the GM will urge players to roll Social first, and the players will tailor their dialogue to the roll (their player sheets have some suggestions on how).  If this doesn’t happen, or if the negotiation comes up spontaneously, just have them roll after and adjust the other party’s response.

Negotiation 

When difficulty rolls are made for conversation, players can get a bonus or penalty between +3 and -3, based on the other party’s relationship with the negotiating cape.  If they’re close allies (the group that hired the players, peripheral teammates) then it’s likely to be a +2.  If they’re on opposing sides or there’s bad blood, it may be a -2.  Then apply another +2 or -2 depending on what’s being given to or asked of the other party.  Offering a big incentive?  +2.  Demanding a sacrifice?  -2.  Examples:

• Close allies (+2) are offered a bit of the cash to go toward the mutual cause (+2).  Total +4
• Someone wary of the player group (-1) is offered a deal that’s clearly in their favor (+2).  Total +1
• The players try to recruit someone tentatively interested in joining (+1) but can’t pay them for a while (-2).  Total -1

If multiple players are involved, they should roll Social as they jump into the conversation, with some dialogue or adjustment each time.  If their input is catastrophic (needing a 4+ and getting a 2) then penalize future rolls.  If not, just hold steady.  Player A rolls, makes an offer, and it goes poorly, the GM says the guy feels a bit insulted (penalizing all future player’s rolls).  Player B can then make their offer, and increase what they’re promising, or make the attempt with reduced chances.

Being generous or going above and beyond may lead to others feeling like they need to balance the scales, offering additional help, information, or adjusting their standing.  If players are negotiating, shooting for that 4+ while trying to broker the sale of a truck full of drugs, and they ask for way less than is needed just to get the stuff off their hands, the dealer is going to be more inclined to work with them in the future (standing shifts from neutral to ‘good’ +1 to social rolls).  Otherwise, or if standing is already ‘great’, they might get a bit of rep, exclusive to that individual or group, covered in Progression, below.

Player Characters, Notable, and Generic Individuals

While the player controls their individual character and the GM controls many (termed NPCs), we run the risk of getting bogged down in gameplay rules and minutiae for the various NPCs who simply don’t warrant that attention.  With this in mind:

Player characters (PCs) are varied, complex, with full character sheets and a breadth of mechanics and options, including options for ‘downtime’, reputation, the ability to expend effort, skills, and backgrounds.

Notable individuals are recurring or important NPCs.  The loose line we draw here is that the notable individuals are those with names.  Those individuals who get introduced to the narrative as opposition or help and are involved enough to need a name to refer to them can get skills, more detailed stats, and the ability to expend effort.  This makes them a little harder to bring down in combat, and a little more unique.  The GM is encouraged to handwave (that is, to estimate or shortcut to the results of) reputation, downtime, and backgrounds.  There’s no need to treat the notable individual as a PC and work out what they’re crafting or who they’re recruiting night by night.  Powered individuals are almost always notable, barring the extreme crisis scenarios where 20 capes are on the battlefield.

Generic individuals may be henchmen, cops, attack dogs, or robots.  If they’re liable to be referred to as ‘SWAT team member 1’ or ‘attack dog 3’ then they’re generic.  We give them a statline, some generic equipment, and maybe a special rule or simplified skill that all NPCs of their generic type have.  Because they’re simple, there’s no need to check how tired they are, or continually look things up.  If they suffer wounds equal to their Guts stat (damage and wounds are covered later) they drop unconscious.

Bystanders are those individuals who are there in the middle of a situation, with zero combat expertise.  Bystanders are generic, but also have very low defensive stats, and are very easy to hit.  They may still sometimes act, but tend to do so last, and as groups.  They don’t even have stat blocks - if they’re hit, they go down and we pretty much ignore them thereafter.  A player’s family could potentially be bystanders in a situation, depending.  Once an individual has seen some scary situations they can be upgraded to basic ‘generic’ NPCs, depending.

Skills and Backgrounds

Skills represent training and natural capability in specific areas, and impart both familiarity in that field and options when taking actions in that area.  The familiarity is typically the first thing one gets when progressing in a field, and is represented with extra dice on rolls they’d already be making, with the player taking the best result (sometimes referred to as an ‘Xh6’ for ‘highest of X six sided die):

While options are somewhat skill dependent in terms of what they do, but may offer additional actions, speed things up, or simplify things:

Skills are divided into the entry skills (Ex. Aim, above), a pool of bonuses and options, and an Expert capstone skill for further familiarity that requires a solid base of skills from the pool and field experience.

Players start with one different skill per attribute they have a native (not counting powers) +1 in, and that skill must be of that attribute’s type; a +1 to Wits means it must be a Wits skill.  They can then pick up an additional skill as they see fit, and then two training rolls, put towards one skill (see below).  More skills can be learned through further training, and a player may have a total equal to 2x their Knowledge.  (These numbers change for young and veteran characters).

Training Skills 

Training is an option during downtime (covered later); one of the things a character can devote their time and efforts to between activities.  Using a block of time to train in a skill allows the character to start learning a new skill or to make a roll for one they are learning, applying attribute bonuses/penalties from knowledge and the skill’s relevant attribute, saving the result.  Individuals who’ve used the base skill in a combat encounter (ex. making attack rolls in melee that benefit from Brawl, for example) may also roll after combat, but must choose one skill and only roll once.  If the total Knowledge rolls for a skill total 12, the individual learns that skill.  Until they do, they have it as a skill they’re learning, and can spend Focus to temporarily access it, gaining it until the encounter ends.

Backgrounds 

Backgrounds are the character’s field of interests and knowledge base.  They represent the work they do, the families they grew up in, and applicable hobbies.  They are a basis for character knowledge, and potentially taking during a mission, and can impact passive income or provide minor bonuses and options.  These are not game changers, and are primarily flavor and characterization.

Characters typically pick two background traits.  They treat these fields as familiar, are considered well grounded in all common applications of that field, and can get some tips from the GM when applying it.  This familiarity means that they roll an extra die and take the best result for knowledge and any application of the background trait in unhurried situations where they aren’t at immediate risk of being harmed.

Backgrounds may also or instead grant bonuses or minor boosts; niche backgrounds may grant reputation or morale if the player finds a narrative-appropriate justification to use them.  Backgrounds can be lost if a character loses their secret identity; they reflect the knowledge and practices that are maintained in day to day life.  This will be covered in a later section.

Example Backgrounds:

Data Entry - It’s not fancy, but you’re organized and you know how to find something on a computer.

I Know French - Niche.  Can speak French and gets a bit of a boost when talking to French speakers.

Long Term Care - A bit of medical knowhow, and the ability to help people recover faster.

Effort and Exhaustion

Every notable individual has certain reserves to draw from that allow them to push themselves a little harder.  

Effort gets broken down into physical strain (Stamina), attention and mental effort (Focus) and one’s ability to keep pushing forward through hardship (Recovery).  They are linked to Athletics, Wits, and Guts, respectively.  Individuals get a number of dots in a category for every stat point they have in the linked stat.  (3 Athletics = 3 maximum dots of Stamina.  4 Guts = 4 maximum dots of Recovery).

Powers, perks, and character progression may change the individual’s capacity; as they develop or grow they may gain more maximum stamina, for example.

Effort may be expended (dots utilized) to get a bit of a boost in a critical moment, or to avoid immediate harm.  Dots may also be drained by circumstance or afflictions. Common & key ways to spend include...

Spent effort is restored at the end of an encounter.  An individual can take a Rest action in combat to recover one dot to any category, in addition to any other benefits of resting, and spending a full turn doing nothing but resting recovered either one dot to all three categories, or two dots to one category, in addition to any benefits like healing or stopping ongoing status effects.

Rules of Thumb - The GM or play group may wish to use the effort system to represent power mechanics or other effects.  Care should be taken to mind the fact that the effort system is in many ways a player’s lifeline.  Focus and recovery especially; focus is the player’s ability to defend themselves, and recovery is their ability to stay in a fight.  Balance any improvisation with this system against the fact that the player will be spending resources they could spend otherwise, and the system should ideally involve regular choices.

Where improvising or leaning heavily into this system is useful is in keeping things from getting out of control.  If the GM’s response to something is “Yes, that would be cool, but I worry that letting you do this would make it a thing that happens all the time” then it can be made into something that draws on a relevant type of effort.  Examples include:

• The play group really wants to make a player a speedster, someone who moves twice (or more!) as fast as others, and they want to do this by giving them extra turns in combat.  This can get overbearing, however, so the power could mean spending adrenaline with every action they take this way.  It’s hard to move that fast.
• Taking actions outside of the regular turn order or shuffling the turn order can be a massive headache to keep track of, so we curb it a little with a rule of thumb that says if someone’s mucking about with turns and action order, it takes focus.
• Player wants to do something cool, but GM doesn’t want it to be a regular thing?  Expend effort.

Exhaustion - Exhaustion occurs over the course of successive engagements.  At the end of any encounter or situation where effort was expended or dots were lost, if there are at least five minutes without immediate crisis or rolls needed, players recover all spent dots of effort except one of their choice, which becomes exhausted.  This essentially lowers the maximum number of dots in that category by one until their next full night of sleep.

In a series of battles or scenes that play out over the course of a day, or in a prolonged fight against a city-wide threat, this can accumulate; they get tired, focus slips, or they lose the grit needed to keep fighting.  They’ll have one total exhausted dot at the end of their first encounter, two total dots exhausted at the end of their second, three at the end of their third, etc.  Players can choose what gets exhausted.

Reputation

Rep or reputation is given for successes, going the extra mile, or kicking a lot of ass.  They are a solid way to reward players who come up with inventive ideas, strategies, or power interactions (first time only), and default to giving rep if stuck on what reward to give PCs.  If playing at the table, a pad of post-its can be useful - write the source of reputation and note if it’s exclusive to a group:

And then stick it in between the player(s) in question and the play area so they know they have it.  

Consider this rep like a card that the players can play in conversation.  If they use one bit of rep, they get to roll an additional die for the social roll, taking the best result.  The costs increase for further rolls: to get +2 die they need three rep.  To get +3 die they need six.  They only ever keep one die result.  In the event the players fail a roll and negotiations look like they’d end, players could use rep to make another try.  “Back off, Asshole.  You don’t want to fight us.” /Players roll a ⚀, players cite rep, handing card to GM/ “Remember what happened to Steeltoe?” /Players roll a ⚃/.

Rep is usually spent when played, but rep exclusive to a person or group lets the player roll Social if relevant.  On a 4+ they keep it, but make a mark on the post-it: future attempts to keep it will be harder (6+ difficulty).  If the rep doesn’t matter to an individual it gets rejected: “Who cares?  Let’s stay on topic.”

If players accumulate a lot of rep, that’s good & fine, but at the day’s end, reputation that is in excess of the character’s maximum (their social score + their number of milestones) is discarded.  This may coincide with gaining followers, money, or other small benefits.  Players may choose what to discard.

Reputation may also be provided by other sources.  A really stylish costume, as the most frequent example, can get people to listen up and pay more attention, provide more respect, and draw them in.  Other costumes or perks like being very trustworthy can make it easier to use rep without it being spent.  More on this in the equipment section.

Negative Rep  -  If players cross a line (hurting civilians for kicks), or betray people, they might accumulate general negative rep.  This can sit on/in front of the GM screen or take the form of red/orange post-its.  Cite these (without spending them!) to apply a -1 at an inconvenient time, like a negotiation with the mayor.

The most common source of negative reputation is the use of guns.  A lot of the hero-villain dynamic has a slight charade to it.  This was very intentionally cultivated by some of the early powers on the scene and has carried forward.  For various in-setting reasons, people want to keep capes around, and an environment with a lot of bullets flying around isn’t conducive to this.  As a result, the ‘scene’ has unwritten rules about gun use, and a cape who is pulling the trigger with any regularity is going to earn a bad rep.  In game, we represent this with a rule that hands out negative rep every time the cape uses a gun to shoot at someone.  If they hide it or do the shooting in secret and leave no witnesses, then the rep will either be hidden or it’ll crop up when the death(s) are investigated by authorities and authorities develop their hypotheses.

There are special cases where use of a gun (or other actions) may be justified, but we still hand out the reputation regardless.  It’s up to the cape to argue it was okay to use it when they get called out on it.  If they can, they can likely get away with using it in future, same-case examples.  Using it against a cape that’s impervious to harm because that cape is in a special transformation, forcing an end to the foe’s transformation?  That’s fine, but one will have to argue the case, and it is possible to lose that argument.

Negative rep tends to stick around like a bad penny.  It’s rarely spent, but may instead wane or fade slowly as the cape grows and events are left in the past.  GMs may choose to get rid of it if they’ve used it 3-6 times and they feel the crime has been ‘paid for’, or when putting a general penalty into play, like a pissed off vigilante with a vegeance, who’ll refuse all negotiation.

Otherwise, negative rep may ‘stack’, with three or so instances combining into something more severe; a permanent escalation in how the cape is dealt with.  At the lowest level, all their enemies will get a pass if they want to use guns back.  Authorities may start refusing all cooperation, ‘seats at the table’ when negotiating cape politics with local villains may be closed off (lest the bad rep rub off) and at the most extreme case, ‘kill orders’ are instituted: free for all, government-funded hits on the offending cape.

Morale

Morale is a reflection of a character’s mental wellness and is bolstered by self care.  It takes the form of a sliding scale ranging from ‘Excellent’ to ‘Dismal’.  Some powers and forms of attack may directly impact it, representing boosts or devastating hits to the psyche and mood.  Having low morale impacts one’s performance and sets a strict cap on die results.  In the worst case scenario, dice results (after modifiers are added from stats) will be capped at a certain number.  High morale can be considered a buffer against these consequences, or it can be spent; lowering morale by one step to change a die result.

Examples:

Tankspanker has great morale, sitting at the ‘4’ mark.  He’s tasked with making a leap across a rooftop, fails, and decides he doesn’t want to live with those consequences, so he draws on morale: he takes care of himself, he’s focused, his head’s in the game, and instead takes an automatic 4, at the cost of knocking his morale down a step.  He might do the same later, for something easy, like making sure he doesn’t lose reputation he wants to keep up, or he may hold that slight morale bump in reserve…

Dandelion is having a bad run-in with a sadness inducing Master and she’s struggling; her die results are capped at 6… which doesn’t really affect her, except to serve as a warning of what’s to come.  As the fight carries on and her morale takes another hit, to ‘5’, it starts to affect how she performs.  She’s just not able to hit as fast, hard, or react at her best.  Her opponent rolls a 6 and she can’t match that.  

Morale doesn’t tend to move much when powers aren’t involved and when it does change, we err on the side of giving choices.  If a character gets hit by a charm effect, falling in love with a foe, we don’t want to force their hand too much, so we give the player a choice: do you act in accordance with the effect and play along, or do you take a hit to morale (two steps for first instance, one step for every one thereafter?).  You’re literally breaking your own heart by defying them and this takes a while to shake off.

Morale has a set starting point for a character, determined by their living situation.  Someone living in various degrees of luxury may sit naturally at the 3, 4, or even 5 point for morale.  Someone living in misery, someone homeless, or someone being kept prisoner may dwell one, two, or even three steps below normal.  Further rules to come in progression and assets.  This determines where morale sits at the start of the day.  

When the day ends, the character’s current morale impacts recovery.  If morale is low, then for each instance of exhausted effort and injury, roll a d6 for each.  If the result matches or exceeds the number listed (for example, 1 step below normal is ‘6’), the effort or injury isn’t recovered that night.  

If morale is high, roll a number of dice equal to the listed number (for example, if morale is two steps above neutral, roll four die).  If any turn up ‘6’, gain an extra time slot for downtime, for use in rest and recovery, socializing, mustering up the effort for bookkeeping or information gathering, etc.  Only one time slot is gained in a given night, using positive morale.

After downtime is resolved, morale changes to the ‘day start’ value.  Players are thus incentivized to keep morale up, where possible, and to ensure their living accommodations, food, and relationships are all doing well.

Some drugs may affect morale or rules around morale, but have their own consequences.  Some are a straight positive boost to morale when taken, but increase in price over time as tolerance builds, and lower the effective starting point.  Others may change the rules, making it easier to get that extra time slot, at a cost of health (stimulants), or numb the effects of low morale while simultaneously making morale harder for enemies to budge.  They may have other benefits or drawbacks.  More on this at a later point.

GMs may wish to use morale as a small positive bonus or incentive.  Hitting relationship goals with a love interest, getting revenge, or getting promotions can be passive rewards where gold or reputation don’t necessarily apply.  This ‘success high’ should fade over time or after being spent.

Battles are organized into individual turns where they take and resolve their actions, and ‘rounds’ where everyone who can (skipping the incapacitated) has taken their turn.  Example round:

Starting Combat

When the GM decides combat or another time-intensive encounter is appropriate, the GM can use Tactics scores to determine who gets the edge in setting up on the battlefield and if one side surprises the other, if appropriate.  Each individual’s tactics score is their Social and Knowledge added together, with +1 for every Social or Knowledge skill known.  More on this in a later section.

In short, very intelligent or strategically minded individuals may thus not be the fastest to run when the starting gun goes off, but they can buy an edge by shaping how the battle starts with tactics, and even maneuver for surprise rounds where enemies don’t get to act, or having better positioning, surrounding foes.  

Speed is tallied up the same way, using Athletics and Dexterity added together and +1 from each associated skill.  When combat starts, players and notable enemies roll 1d6 and add it to their speed, and non-notable individuals and bystanders simply add 3 to their speed.  Break ties by comparing notability (notable foes > players > non-notable > bystanders), morale, and reputation in that order.  Individuals take their turns in descending order of speed scores.

Focus (⯁) can be spent for a 1d3 to either tactics or speed, to ‘buy’ an edge, break ties, and can be matched/beaten by foes, at GM discretion.  Making this effort exhausts individuals as normal.

Actions

Players often make two actions a turn.  Some common actions that could be taken on a turn include:

• Attacking - Using a fist, weapon, or offensive power to hit someone, something, or an area.
• Moving - Moving happens in bursts, from point A to point B, and can include jumps or brief bits of climbing with certain rolls.
• Skills - Some skills unlock options in combat, like taking a few seconds to try to intimidate an enemy into surrendering early.  (Other skills may expedite actions, like climbing.)
• Power - Use of a power, whether it’s firing a laser beam or transforming.
• Belt Items - Use something like a flashbang or drawing a weapon that’s kept on one’s ‘belt’.
• Wait - Ready & delay an action until a condition is met.  Spends focus.
• Rest - Pausing for a second in combat to press a hand to a wound or catch one’s breath.

The specifics on these typical actions and skills will be detailed further on.  A standard turn could include charging in and attacking, for example, or drawing a knife and stabbing with it.  This list is not exhaustive and other things can appear on it.  Further, some actions get benefits from being doubled-down on.  Ex. Sprinting as a double move.  See below.

After a round of individual turns concludes, we go back to the beginning of the order and loop, with the unconscious and dying doing nothing except perhaps rolling to get back up, and we repeat this process until the combat comes to an end.  Players control their characters and decide on their actions, while GMs control the enemy NPCs and any nonplayer allies.

Full actions (abbreviated) or full-turn actions are often the above actions (attacking, moving, resting) but extended out to take an individual’s full turn.  A full move is much the same as taking two standard moves, but gets a bonus.  A full attack may have more to it than two individual weapon swings, depending on the weapon.  The assumption of a full action is that one’s entire focus is going toward something.

The individual entries and explanations for the actions one can take will have some notes on the full-action variants of those actions.

Quick actions may be made without counting against the two actions a turn.  Speaking, grabbing something in arm’s reach are common quick actions.  If trying to or anything that could be done while (as examples) running at a sprint or walking forward while shooting a pistol can be considered quick.  These should be kept to one a turn at most, and to things that don’t require rolls.  To make a more complex quick action or a series of quick actions, the GM may wish to implement a Dexterity check (rolling and aiming for a 3+ or 4+).  

“I move forward, swinging my pipe to keep them at bay, while swiping the money and the drugs from the table.”

“That’s two grabs.  Roll Dex.”

[roll happens: a rolled 2]

You got a 2, that’s a fail.  You get the money but you knock the drugs under the table.”

Lengthy actions are so time consuming they take up both actions for the turn, or even extend into the next turn(s).  Often these things can be group efforts.  Lifting up the end of a car, or kneeling by someone and giving medical care.  When they involve difficulty checks, lengthy actions will have a total number that rolls must add up to, such as a 10 to stop a teammate from hemorrhaging or a 12 to hack a security system.  

For these lengthy actions, rolls are made, bonuses added or subtracted, and all contribute to the total, with multiple people potentially adding to this, in some situations.  If attacked or interrupted midway through this, they can attempt a Knowledge check (Difficulty 3+ for minor interruptions, 4-6 for something like being shoved or wounded) to concentrate and stay on track.  On a failed knowledge check, they stop and can’t resume the action on their next turn, and only if the interrupting factor is dealt with.

These checks are sometimes called lengthy checks, long checks, or lengthy rolls.  The principles of lengthy actions are applied to some non-combat procedures, like crafting.

Out of Turn actions or opportunity actions happen when it’s not one’s own turn, typically as a result of using the Wait action to try to interrupt someone, or from someone making themselves vulnerable, such as trying to run by you while you’re in a position to swing a baseball bat at them.  Detailed later, it’s important to note these actions require Focus(⯁); if you can’t expend the focus, you’re not alert enough to take opportunity of the opponent’s mistakes.

Movement

Grappling and Associated Options

Wait to Act

Leverage Reputation

Resting

There are three types of equipment: held items (sometimes called weapons), belt items, and costume.

Held items occupy the hands, and come with their own sub-ruleset, including a damage type, any special rules or keywords that dictate how they’re used (such as ‘heavy’ or ‘fragile’), and their functionality, which can include attack types: a knife slashes quickly, a machete has a wide swing.

Characters have two hands and can carry two small items or one large one.

Belt items are those limited items that the character keeps in easy reach.  These include the weapons that are sheathed and not yet drawn, smoke grenades, tools, spare ammunition.  Essentially, anything they carry with them that they don’t want to spend time digging in their bag for.  Characters have belt item slots equal to their Dexterity, by default.  Any more items than that, and we assume there’s just not enough pockets and they stop being as quick to access, draw, or dig in a pocket for.

Costume is the character’s overall outfit.  Instead of having overly specific locations to allocate costume to, the character has a 3x3 grid to start and picks the features they want.  These are bought individually and combined.  At the most basic level, a character could pull on a hockey mask and goggles, or a dyed army jacket with an excess of chains and a symbol sewn into the back.  This wouldn’t look fantastic and might have some slight drawbacks, but it serves.  With some time and skill (or by paying the right person) costume can be updated so elements flow together and drawbacks are lessened.

Especially heavy held items and costume elements have an encumbrance cost.  Characters have a total encumbrance equal to their brawn.  Exceeding this imposes a -1 to Ath, -1 to Dex, and a further -5’ to total movement.  Note that things like carrying or lifting a person can be two added encumbrance, in addition to their encumbrance (their armor is heavy for you) so having a spare amount can help.

Belt space and costume can be extended as the character grows and picks up milestones.  They’ve worn their costume and carried stuff for long enough that they’ve figured out the adjustments, or the spaces they can stow a knife or wallet.

More general inventory is either carried (a toolbox) or worn as a costume feature (a bag/backpack).

Costume:

Costume pieces are organized into three rough tiers of quality, but some pieces may be tier-restricted.  Higher tier costumes may increase maximum possible reputation, be easier to use, or do away with drawbacks.  Low tier pieces may have drawbacks.  The pieces include…

Armor - Armor as a costume quality grants +1 armor, which acts as an additional wound slot, taking one hit.  Further, conventional damage done to armor doesn’t have any consequence.  (Less conventional damage like powers may).  Repairing wounded armor has the same rules as repairing other broken gear, but at a set cost of $20 per roll.  [Long DC of 12; each roll takes 20 min & money for materials]

Reinforcement - Protects costume pieces from being destroyed (does not prevent wounding, however).

Belts & Pouches - Grants additional belt item slots & inventory.  Items are dropped if the belt is damaged.

Supply - Specific to use with particular powers, that need a particular resource, such as hydrokinetics needing water to manipulate.  The standard option suggests a reasonably durable, refillable, easy to wear/carry container, but particulars (encumbrance, scaling, low or high tier options) are up to the GM.

Icon - Grants reputation on a per-day basis.  If damaged, the existing reputation isn’t lost, but it’ll need to be repaired before it supplies its benefit.  Reputation preserved to day’s end may contribute to gaining followers and fans.

Affiliation - Grants reputation specific to a key group or organization, such as a specific gang or followers of a certain ideology.  May hamper interactions with those of opposed belief systems.

As a character progresses across multiple days, downtimes, and events, they’ll progress in terms of ability, competence, and the resources at their disposal.  However, the work of most capes isn’t one that sees them regularly collecting huge amounts of ‘loot’ or procedural upgrades.  In reality, many of the rewards are ones that are hard to put a hard label on.  This raises the question of how to measure a cape’s progress and track their evolution.

Milestones are the primary benchmark for progress in Weaverdice.  These are character goals that the player negotiates with the GM early on and throughout the character’s life as a cape.  Clearing these goals in one’s own personal narrative are the big breakthroughs, the character turning points, the moments of growth.  Players will have 3 or so, but it’s fine to have longer-term goals lined up too.

Outage is a player’s cape, an eco-terrorist who triggered after heavy metals from nearby industry caused debilitating health issues and mental problems in his small rural hometown.  The player wraps up the character concept by saying he’s taking the fight to the city with his lightning tether mover power.  Working with the GM, the player suggests some key goals.  
⬥ Finding a way to care for his mother (a victim of the heavy metal poisoning, dying)

⬥ Hurt AMPerand (responsible for the poisoning) on a level that gets statewide attention at least.

⬥ Destroying AMPerand and ensuring the board’s careers are over one way or another.

The GM decides that that last one is more or less his ultimate goal, and it’s something the GM says is better saved for later.  As Outage completes milestones, he’ll replace them with new ones, and that’s a good one to drop in further down the line.  The player instead decides…

⬥ Sway 4 capes, 2 close personal acquaintances, or a mix thereof to the (violent) eco-terrorist cause.

Getting a certain number of lesser rewards (covered below) and clearing the goal will raise the bar for the cape, with more reputation, recruitment, money, attention, and room to grow in terms of skills.  These points of personal growth that come with milestones can coincide with epiphanies on new power uses.

More on milestones below, after a digression on general rewards...

Rewards

Finishing a mission should see players rewarded, with some minor growth, earnings, or other assets.  Because ‘loot’ isn’t the be-all and end-all of Weaverdice, we focus on some other things.  These progression rewards are awarded regardless of whether a mission is successful or not, while the acquisition of general, non-progression rewards largely depends on victories.  Players need at least four of these progression boxes checked off to take a milestone (Options can be taken once; duplicate options twice):

 Once a milestone is achieved, the list is finished, refreshed and options may be taken again.  

General rewards don’t count toward the milestones, and are some of the things a GM may reward a player with that may count as or contribute to progression of a sort without truly breaking the curve.  Can be money (Rewards scale up exponentially as one takes on bigger objectives):

Can also include abstract gains for scenarios where other rewards wouldn’t do:

Pacing Rewards & Milestones:  

The overall intent is that players will have a loose 4-5 encounters before they hit one milestone, rinse & repeat.  If players are achieving milestones at a rate of one per 1-2 sessions, the milestones may be too easy; adjust accordingly.  If they get one on session three because they’re attentive and focused on the task, they could be given a ‘success high’ of a bonus to base morale, rep, or followers until they’ve progressed enough to take the whole package of progression rewards & milestones.  If they’re taking too long, then GMs can replace other rewards with...

...to catch them up with other players.

Catching up should be fairly organic.  Our example cape Outage has the goals of taking down AMPersand, finding a way to care for mom, or recruiting believers.  This milestone help could be someone passing on information about a care home that needs $20,000 to admit mom, a tip that there are some potential recruits in an environmental club on the university campus, or a news article saying AMPersand is holding an event tomorrow.

Note that if the players are taking too long to hit their milestones because other story is in the way, they shouldn’t be penalized.  It’s fine to put things off, and in the case of city-wide events or major story elements, these things can be treated as their own milestones.  Surviving an Endbringer or successfully fending off the Elite could be a milestone for every player that survives the week; the rewards may just come late and as a cluster- a ton of new fans, supporters, resources, cash rewards, and willing recruits.

Choosing Milestones (Player)

Milestones should mix up character roleplaying & personality, referencing the trigger event, interacting with the world.  The goal is to encourage motivated and rich characters.  To suggest some...

• Revenge - Taking out an individual or group that is well protected, stronger, or otherwise hard to access, related to trigger event or backstory.
• I Want Answers - The character wants & needs a critical piece of information that must be bought or bartered for.  Can include finding someone missing or uncovering a clue about why their trigger event happened.  Often a big revelation & lead-in to other milestones.  
• Set Something Up - Start an organization, business, or movement.  May require money or certain hurdles to be cleared/removed.
• A Relationship - Finding love or repairing bridges with someone they hurt.  Often a good way to inject some raw character work into the margins of a campaign.  Shouldn’t be made too easy - some introspection, development, compromise, and time could be required.
• A Position - The character wants to achieve a political, business, or some other position.  Could include a position in a family, involving some family politics to get an inheritance.

Players should work with GMs to find something that strikes a good balance.

Scaling Milestones (GMs)

Try to make a loose estimate about what might take 4-5 sessions to do; defeating one person (or delivering a serious blow to a company) could require time spent gathering information, figuring out an angle of attack, and then actually making it happen - that’s 2-3 sessions.  Mixed in with other events, that’s a fine short character arc to lead into some serious character growth from a gameplay standpoint.

GMs should pay some mind to the planned story and work with players to find something that gives the characters to be themselves while also engaging with that planned story.  In cases of very short campaigns (in the order of 1-3 sessions), the GM and player could decide on something that ties the character to the event and set it as a kind of bonus goal to meet.  Otherwise, if the player has a life flaw or drawback that requires them to ‘play along’ (like a hero that’s prone to falling in love with villains) then roleplaying that flaw to a point that is interesting and effective could be a milestone, or even a ‘bonus’ milestone that rewards the player for having the flaw.

As noted above, milestones may be sidelined by important events, and that’s fine, but an even better case is to anticipate that city-wide event and as it opens, ask players what they want to achieve in the midst of it all.  If they succeed and go the extra mile in roleplaying, the GM could allow them to get the big ‘level up’ before the final scene.

Games driven more by a tight narrative (esp. one shared by a group of players) may wish to lean entirely on that other system, passively rewarding players for remaining true to characters instead of carefully tracking the big goals; much like the endbringer or elite example events, GMs could make the call on rewarding players just before the final scene of that narrative.  This has the added benefit of keeping players at roughly the same point of progression.

In the event that the Milestone was estimated to be more difficult than it was, you may wish to throw in a ‘yes, but…’ twist, to take it from something that takes two sessions to one that takes three, or four.  In the event that it gets resolved somehow in session one, it’s fair to tell the player, ‘these are meant to be more difficult’ and give a small reward (such as a morale boost or reputation), while rewriting or addressing milestones after the session.

Gaining the Milestone

On completing the milestone and picking up the four progression rewards, the character will refresh that list and then select one of the following.  Players cannot select the same option two milestones in a row.

Followers

Followers are one reward players may earn as a form of progression.  Followers are background resources and supporting figures in the cape’s periphery.  They may be the members of a villainous gang who don’t carry guns or join a fight but instead handle the accounts and buying/selling of drugs, they can be informants, and they can be fans, among other things.

The mechanics of followers are fairly consistent across those followers.  The Journalist here is one example of a follower one could earn as a reward for an action so high profile that getting reputation alone isn’t sufficient:

Each follower has a passive benefit and also offers the opportunity to reach out to them and do some other things as a bonus.  Tapping a journalist means losing the passive benefit for the rest of the downtime phase, and all of the next one; calling in a favor or turning the follower to one’s own ends.  

In this case, even a violent cape could stand out enough that they attract the shock jocks and more bloodthirsty media, and use that media attention to passively perpetuate their intimidating reputation.  Or, if the heat was getting to be too much, they could soften the edges and downplay the downsides of having a nasty reputation by tapping the journalist, calling in and offering some quotes for the headlines.

Note that we abstract the followers to some extent.  Each one doesn’t need a name and having three journalists attached to the character doesn’t mean only three individuals are following them.  But for all intents and purposes, if the cape wanted an interview to get their side of a story out there, there are roughly three people or stations or organizations they could contact.  A ‘Journalist’ follower could be a simple abstraction of overall attention from the news media.

When getting a new follower of a type, it’s a roll requiring a result in excess of the number of that follower one already has.  If a character has three journalists and meets the criteria noted (high profile actions), then they can roll Social and they would need a 4+.  Players can benefit passively from up to six followers of a type, but may have more as a surplus to tap or in case followers are lost.

Followers aren’t generally easy to lose, however.  If the player has more followers than they can maintain, they can tap one for its benefit and then lose it, as part of their downtime phase.  Otherwise, it’s up to the GM’s discretion.  Negative reputation may make it hard to hold onto specific kinds of follower (and that negative rep may be spent as the follower departs), and either languishing due to illness or injury (for plot points), or moving to new cities (as a kind of reset) can cause followers to drop away.

Players are initially capped at a number of followers equal to 2x their Social, plus three per milestone, though general progression rewards can give a headstart on this.  They could come in any combination.  A player could have six Journalists or two journalists, a fan, a supplier, a trainer, and an informant.

In addition, groups have their own shared followers, with a cap equal to the number of notable people within the gang.  For a player gang, this would be equal to the number of players to start.  This cap can be expanded with properties, investment, and the advancement of the collective group.  Sponsoring organizations (see Sponsored capes, in Dispositions) may offer a lot of followers and be already very developed, but more inflexible for the player to adjust.  If one person in the group taps a follower, however, everyone loses the benefit they offer.  Benefits are restricted to organization relevant things.  Managing reputation by and for the organization, for example.

(Another example)

Barring circumstances where a play session ends with a cliffhanger, ‘Downtime’ happens at the end of a short to moderate session.  Marathon-length play sessions may use downtime as a way to put things on pause while food is obtained, bathroom breaks taken, or phone calls made.  Here, we corral many of the rules and activities of a player character that wouldn’t necessarily be fun to work through in the course of a session.  This is the wrap-up, the research, the patching up of wounds and the recruitment of new rank and file soldiers, stuff done in the cape’s free time.  This section details some example actions...

Which players can then use to fill a variable number of time slots (typically 3; can be less if mid-session) determined by the GM, to be handled between sessions.

It should be stressed that these are only guidelines.  These sorts of activities can happen and be roleplayed in the course of a play session, and a GM might use or borrow from these example activities.  A new player recruiting their very first minion, however rank and file that minion might be, can be an occasion worthy of showing ‘on screen’.  These activities can also be a springboard for the start of a new session.  Does surveillance lead to a situation where the cape has to decide whether to jump into the fray to help an innocent?

Conversely, there may be a need or desire to invent new downtime actions or ad-hoc some of the downtime rules to cover a unique situation.  A player who is running as a politician in their civilian life might have a lot more optional bases to cover that a simple ‘focus on work’ would be too broad for, in which case the GM could list off some activities or obligations the player has to make time for, like campaigning, meeting key people, and scheduled events.  

Ad-hoc rules might be used for a scenario where the GM has five players all as members of one team, who all get hospitalized after a fight with a new villain in town.  The session happens just before Christmas, and the group can’t meet for a few weeks, so the GM handles it as a long run of downtime as the weeks pass, the team recovers, and the new villain seizes territory, with daily exchanges by email.  The GM might offer a few time slots a day, with many options simply crossed off: they’re too injured to do surveillance or go meet potential henchmen, for example.  As they take ‘rest & heal’ actions they might open up these crossed-off options, and finally reach the point where they’re ready to stage their comeback.  Do what works for your campaign.

Key things to keep in mind: Downtime is loosely tied into progression and character power.  Characters may earn money, status, gather information, get back in fighting shape sooner, or gain another sort of edge through these activities.  When inventing new actions, they should offer something, lest the cape fall behind for taking the unconventional path.  Similarly, if these activities are being done regularly in play sessions, GMs may wish to balance accordingly, reducing the effect or amount of Downtime slots… especially if different players are leaning on this to different amounts.

Downtime exists as a balance vs. some powers (primarily Tinkers); tinkers will have to weigh time spent researching/building tech vs. other options.  Their friends/foes may use the same time to grow/prepare.

Set up or refine the details of a major mission/event.  Missions may be GM initiated, but when they aren’t, the first ‘plan a mission’ option can be the organization and declaration of an upcoming mission, serving to tell the GM “This is the big thing that we want to do in an upcoming session”.   It is possible to set a plan of “Let’s rob a bank tomorrow”, and leave it at that; the mission would then goes on at the set date.  Without subsequent planning, however, it’s liable to be a disaster.

Each subsequent planning session allows players to refine the details.  Details vary depending on the job, but a bank robbery could have security (number & type of defending forces), reinforcement (time before police/capes arrive, who arrives), reward (value of the take), access (number of locked vs. open doors/vaults) and traffic (difficulty of getaway) as details.

For an assassination, variables could include security, reinforcement (see above paragraph), location (where the target will be at the time of the mission), readiness (state of the target: tired, low morale, power partially depleted?), and stealthiness (how easy is it to get in & get away undetected?)

Each detail gets a range of possible values/results.  Each ‘Plan a Mission’ action, GMs roll a result for [Knowledge] details the player nominates, and the player chooses between the last decided (or default) result and that one, then locks it in.  Example:

Detail (Security): Either [4 rent-a-cops] or [1 protectorate, 4 police officers.]  Choose one.

If details aren’t refined or decided by players, GMs should roll twice and take the worst result, or possibly introduce more complications.  Intel, followers, and trained underlings can contribute or be prerequisites.

Use of this option can also allow mission-relevant skill rolls (including hacking security, command, initial tactics or initial stealth rolls) to be made in advance and ‘brought’ to the mission or sent in with underlings (carrying a thumb drive, etc).  One such roll can be made in advance per mission planning action, taking the place of one of the knowledge-based slots normally spent on refining details.

  Cape Business

  The nitty-gritty organizational points of being a hero, villain, mercenary, or cape of some

  other stripe.  Even drug dealers need to decide how many kilos to order.  Covers getting

  jobs, managing the team/gang, and making sure things are running smoothly.

Particulars may differ depending on the disposition of the player (hero, villain, mercenary, etc) and where they are positioned in their careers.  At the outset, allows them to put out feelers for any opportunities to grow their organization.  GMs with a very freeform GMing style may offer up missions (or ‘quests’) with relevant rewards in the way of followers, assets, and resources.  Those with a story in mind may choose to de-emphasize this focus and give less in the way of assets, immediately- a mercenary starter pack, for example, as the cape makes it clear they’re starting out and some fellow mercenaries sign on.  If the player is already defined as a cape of a particular disposition then this is where that business is handled.  More on this in subsequent pages & sections.

Once players are at an early to midway point in their progression as a cape, they may have a number of followers, underlings, assets, and buildings, in addition to various jobs or projects that are too ongoing to be called a mission or covered under ‘Plan a Mission’.  Up to three people or things can be checked in with across a single ‘Cape Business’ downtime session.  Checking in allows the GM to roll and make skill checks behind the scenes.  In this way, being an attentive manager may highlight anyone acting suspicious, things that are about to fail or fall through, and identify those members of a gang who are rubbing up against others in the wrong way.  Knowing the boss is checking in can help forestall these things or slow them down for a time.

In essence, this is the option for ‘I want to get started as a Villain/Mercenary/Believer/Hero/Whatever’, for managing the offscreen things specific to those dispositions, and when an organization grows to a point where it is hard for the GM to keep tabs on it, they may start necessitating (or punishing a lack of) check ins and time devoted to managing it (or to manage the NPC lieutenants tasked with managing it).

‘Punishments’ in this case should take the form of problems that need creative solutions or attention; splinter groups, underlings worsening relationships with other factions, enemies getting intel, or drama.

Crafting is an option available to everyone, but not everyone is going to be a capable craftsman.  This category has several sub-options, and interacts with the Craft skill and Assets, the base, workshop upgrades, and followers who may be able to help with the task of putting a costume together.

Baseline, each period of downtime spent allows the character to take [Dexterity] actions within this skill.  They could roll for a craft three times, or they could craft, costume, and repair, in any combination they desire.  

Each task is a lengthy DC, and there is a baseline limitation on how much time or how many rolls may be spent on something before the end result is decided.  The craft skill helps a great deal with getting more consistent results, with subskills within craft helping to cut down on material costs, make more room for the process, and specialize in harder to craft specifics.

Crafting Equipment:  Create something.  Baseline, creating something low tier or basic will have a lengthy DC, and will require appropriate materials equal to 1/Xth the item’s market value.  Each craft attempt allows one roll, which each benefit individually from related skills, and doesn’t get any direct bonus to the results from stats.  However, crafts allow a total number of rolls equal to [Knowledge].  If a player has three knowledge and has made three craft attempts in total, rolling three dice, the attempt is done, and is a success or a failure depending on whether the die results add up to the DC or not.  If a higher tier item is attempted and the result isn’t sufficient, but is sufficient for a lower tier, then it can default down to the lower tier result.  The extra cost remains spent.

Crafting Other Things (GM Guide):  The rules for crafting anything is essentially the same, and the number of things one could potentially make are unlimited, and include computer programming, sorting out an underground room as a team base, or cooking a batch of chili for the team.

Because the possibilities are so diverse, there are some guidelines instead of any firm DCs to make:

• Work of throwaway value or things that could be improvised should use the low tier DC and rules noted above: lengthy DC of 10, costs equal to 1/4th the item’s price.  If your average joe could put it together with stuff from the basement and a few glances at the internet, or if it’s of a par equal to the very cheapest things on offer out there, it’s low tier.  Low tier craftings rarely grant bonuses and typically are there only to serve a basic need: a bat with nails in it for a thug underling, mediocre food, molotov cocktails, or a tidied up room with a whiteboard located in the basement.
  
• If it’s in line with what could be purchased from a business or typical worker, then it is of your standard tier.  Standard craftings may offer small bonuses or perks equivalent to what followers or other equipment provide.  A base could have a hidden entrance, the chili might allow those dining to roll for a morale up (one time, then it’s eaten, GM could also rule this has diminishing returns), and this could be the tier where one finds their first, most basic computer programs, common drugs; something simple and one-note that could be done in a workday.
  
• High tier things are professionally made and specifically made for a particular person or case, or things invented.  The highest end things of quality.  Tailor made clothing or designer drugs.  Bonuses are double and durations are extended by an order of magnitude.

Other variables & suggestions include...

• If it’s mechanical, add 5 to the DC.
• If it’s beyond the average person’s capacity to learn in an afternoon (clockmaking, drugs) add 5-10 to the DC.
• Drudge work and things that can be iterated or worked on endlessly (programs, math problems, construction) may have 2x+ the knowledge cap, with raised DC, taking a lot of time.
• Resource costs and required equipment are variable.
• Sometimes there may be consequences for failure, or hidden rolls.  Bombs can blow up while being put together if the DC isn’t met, and drugs could have a bad batch that poisons the city.

Additional Factors

The baseline difficulty of making high tier equipment and miscellaneous things is too high for the average person to ever succeed; even meeting the bar of making mediocre things can be difficult for the average individual and can be a waste of a busy cape’s time.  There are ways to improve the chances, however.

The baseline Craft skill allows the player to roll two dice and keep the best result when crafting.  A player with 3 Dexterity could do three craft checks in one block of downtime dedicated to crafting, and with 3 Knowledge they would get three tries to roll the target number:

The Craft skill lets them make the most of those attempts, keeping the best of two rolls in each set, for a total of 5+3+2 = 10 in this case.

When another player devotes time, they can add their own roll to the pool of dice available to pick from.  Crafting can be heavily collaborative, with two players using the craft option and pooling their dice together at each step, or it can be a helping hand.  Someone who is hanging out at the workshop or headquarters (doing the recuperation or ‘hanging out’ option, for example) can add one roll to one craft attempt while they’re around.  Henchmen or staff who do this will be tied up and don’t do anything while being helpers.  Finally, followers can offer their own bonuses.  The Craftsman may be tapped to offer a single 4 at any stage (or left alone to make his own stuff), replacing a bad roll.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, having the right tools for the job can help.  A dedicated workshop with tables, machining equipment and things can help in any number of ways.  Machining equipment costing an upfront $1000 may be expensive, but could raise the cap for the number of tries to [Knowledge +1] when crafting armor or metal weapons: a whole other dice roll whenever crafting!  Other tools offer a +1 to the total result, save money, or allow for more rolls in a block of downtime.

Skillset, Craft: 

Those with a Craft skillset are capable of putting things together and putting things back together.  While anyone can hack together a costume or half decent weapon for when they’re out in costume, Craft helps to improve quality, cut down on costs, speeds up repair, and allows the dedicated craftsman to become very good at making specific things.  Out in the field, Craft isn’t often directly useful, but the practical skills help with hacking into that security panel, jury rigging a lever for some rubble, or hotwiring a car.

When a Recruitment call is put out, the person devoting the downtime will indicate their preferences and then roll a number of separate dice equal to their Social score.  By default, for each 4+, they get one prospective candidate.

However, setting different standards or looking for specific things can affect the results.  A (very) non-exhaustive list of possibilities for Capes & non-cape combatants can include...

These numbers will reflect the GM’s instincts on what is high demand, higher power, and/or more bookkeeping heavy or more difficult to generate.  Tinkers, breakers, and trumps are likely to be harder to dig up, while common types are easier.

Setting a goal doesn’t mean every applicant will meet the desired bar.  There is a 20% chance that an applicant won’t have the desired qualifier.  Doubling the penalty (-3 becomes -6) removes this chance.

There are two more factors to account for; for capes, a -1 penalty applied for every cape already on the team, including any cape that is handling the hiring.  Second, prospective individuals won’t tend to be more advanced than the individual leading the recruitment.

Primarily, this means that hirelings won’t have more milestones, skills, or reputation than the person doing the recruitment.  It’s possible that a group may designate a secretary or an underling with better social abilities to handle things, but in such cases, some measure of command or leadership skill may be required to effectively communicate that the offer is coming from the cape in charge and not the gregarious gangster being asked to handle the hiring.

Reputation, milestones, skills, and assets may be used to mitigate the various penalties:

Reputation can be tapped to grant an additional recruitment opportunity (rolling an additional die), or to grant a bonus to all die rolls made.  One reputation must be tapped for a +1, two for a subsequent +1, and three for a further +1, for 6 in total to get a +3.  Tapped reputation has a 50% chance of being lost after the fact.  Reputation tapped for additional recruitment can’t be used to grant a bonus and vice versa.  At GM discretion, reputation may be limited to specific tasks or roles (villainous rep to recruit villains, for example).

Milestones both raise the quality of people who are willing to work under the character in question, and each obtained milestone level can be used for a recruitment effort in the same way rep can, but doesn’t disappear.  Milestones tapped for either an additional recruitment opportunity or contribute to reputation for better bonuses and specificity.

Skills and Assets provide their own bonuses or impact things, specific to that skill or asset.

There are exceptions to the above and the GM may insert relevant characters who fit the story or who make logical sense to include.  Further, just because an option wasn’t sought after, doesn’t mean it couldn’t turn up on its own.  Searching specifically for tinkers imposes a fairly steep penalty, but a search for any cape could turn up a tinker, potentially, with a 1 in 12 or 1 in 24 chance, depending on how the GM weights things.  They should inform players of the weightings.

Handling of Prospective Candidates 

Each prospective Candidate will be generated, loosely drawn up, or ‘rolled’ as the case may be, and then limited information will be provided to the player.  Recruits should match what is being searched for, with a 20% chance of deviating from the particulars if the search wasn’t strict (with associated penalties).

Example 

Once the applicants are drawn up, a number of questions can be asked equal to the recruiter’s Social score, and intel can be used if appropriate (to be covered later).  Questions may be split up between candidates or focused on one.

If the recruiter likes a candidate, they can make an offer, which may include an upfront amount, a percentage of takes and/or wages, or other deals.  The candidate may respond, at GM discretion, with their own offers or demands.  This is more common if the candidate’s disposition or personality clashes with the group as a whole.  Knowing Troglodyte is flawed means a lower offer can be made to hire them, but Troglodyte is violent in addition to being a mercenary.  He accepts the low offer, conditional on the fact that Felinous doesn’t stop him from ‘handling’ anyone who gets in their way.  He doesn’t want the team getting cold feet or demanding to keep witnesses alive because they don’t have the cojones.  If this deal is violated, his morale may dip or he may even leave, depending.

If this negotiation drags on or the player wants to make a lower offer, they can leave it up to a social roll, as described in the Social Rolls & Negotiation part of the handbook.  On a failure they may be disgruntled with a penalty to future social rolls or higher demands the next time they are approached.

Non-cape gang members are liable to be simpler to hire.  Individuals who are brought up for consideration but not recruited may crop up again and again.  Casting a wider net with the search skips this but imposes a penalty and means that recruits may take time to arrive from wherever they are.

Intelligence Gathering     -    Surveil / Research / Utilize Intel

  The various means of collecting, gathering, and utilizing information

  on a person, place, group, or thing.

These three downtime actions abstract the process of finding and using the small details and putting in the effort to get information.  Used in downtime, they can produce leads that can later be followed in actual sessions, or take the information from the sessions and codify them.  Surveil involves discreetly observing a person, place, group, or thing, often moving and sneaking around, while Research tends to happen in one’s headquarters, a slower but steady study of information online and tracking down of details.  These represent different approaches; Surveillance can eventually turn up the sorts of details that one might get with research, and vice versa, it just takes time and effort to get there.  We can represent a given target with a grid such as this one:

These grids may be 3x3 or even 2x2 (keeping only pertinent headings), and are approached from the top left (for surveillance), or bottom right (research), with players having the option of spending intel to unlock a space or rolling to try to beat the target number, each unlock opening neighboring spaces.

Surveillance requires finding a target first, with a long DC and a sometimes unknown target number - across multiple sessions, the player can roll Athletics and Wits (alternating) until they reach the target number.  However, this number may drastically change depending on the target’s notoriety or lack thereof, their activity level, whether they’ve taken steps to hide details, secret identities, etc.

The player is trying to find a vigilante that’s been killing capes in rural towns, known only as Crossbones.  The GM sets their target number at 20, then says that because the target is only out once a week, they’re adding 35 (5x7) to the DC.  The target is taking moderate steps to hide themselves and obfuscate their patterns, so they add another 10.  But the target is also semi-famous and people are talking about ‘Crossbones’, so they reduce the target number by 15.  The DC is set at 50.

The hunt to find someone by searching the city can be an arduous one - at 50, with three rolls per Downtime and average rolls, (assuming average stats and no skills), that’s 4-5 full downtimes dedicated to the task.  However, having information on the target works to reduce the target DC, and intel, depending on their tier, serve as a reliable way of reducing the DC, if they’re relevant to the target.

Information, when provided instead, can be compared to intel and provide a reduction of that intel’s tier.

Searching for Crossbones, the player talks to the the family of one of the dead, who share what the PRT told them.  That Crossbones moves on after every few kills, and that the family should be safe.  He or she will likely have moved on to a neighboring town.  The PRT is not currently putting a lot of emphasis on the case.

The GM rates this as the sort of information a tier 2 intel would offer if spent, and reduces the target DC from 50 to 25.  In addition, information gathering tends to award intel in general, so the player gets tier one violence intel (for the former) and tier one sponsored intel (for the latter).  

They expect to hunt for another lead in their next session, so they hold onto both.

Research concerns itself with different issues, working in a near-identical way with a long DC, increases and reductions, but is focused instead on first finding the thread.  It’s possible to have a target with a known identity but unknown location, such as a missing person or Crossbones, above.  The inverse is true: if someone is doing strategic arson, finding the thread on things online means trying to figure out if they have a name, identity, a pattern that started in other cities, etc.  Reaching the tail end of the long DC for research means you’ve found the likely starting point of that individual’s activities.  If there’s more to be found, it may be turned up with the grid, above.

If the target is found but the thread isn’t, or vice versa, Surveillance or Research will be locked out, respectively.  For something like a missing person, the intel grid might well be the attempt to track down details about their location in the first place, with surveillance just not being possible.

From there, once the target or the thread is found, the grid is provided by the GM, with dimensions matching the scale of the target - a 2x2 for something like a parking lot or security guard, a 3x3 for a very minor cape, notable non-cape individual, or standard location, and a 4x4 for a cape of note or company with armed security.  The target is given a disposition or combination of dispositions, with locations often having a generalized ‘city’ disposition in addition to the disposition most representative of the use of the space, and these are distributed across the grid.  Targets may have intel specific to them (generally for a 3x3 or bigger), which acts as a wild card and can be used as any intel required for that target.

Surveillance can start from the top left, while Research can start from the bottom right.  Once something is uncovered, it allows access to orthogonally adjacent (up down, left, right) spaces:

Information gathering on a person will tend to be very structured.  There are categories outlined, with Surveillance tending to favor the most recent movements and contacts, and observable details, while research focuses on minutiae and background.  The suggested labels are…

• Movements - Most recent movements, visited locations, activities in general.
• Capabilities - Powers, equipment, manpower, strengths, weaknesses.
• Status - Injuries, activity level, confidence, reputation.
• Relationships - Contacts, network, how things stand with other factions.
• Patterns - Observable patterns, habits, tendencies, tells.
• Secrets - Past deeds, addictions, hidden motivations or affiliations.
• History - As movements, but starting from origins and going forward, past cities, identities
• Data - Online presence, minor details, articles, relationships to media.

Each space unlocked will confer a tidbit of information, sometimes useless, sometimes critical.  Finishing a given row or column will confer a mechanical bonus.  Against an enemy, knowing their movements and/or history confers a bonus to all information gathering rolls against them, knowing their patterns can mean being able to plan so they show up late or at their most tired/ unprepared.  For a location it assists mission planning.  For a missing person, it can help with finding them and eliminating possibilities.

When investigating a person, the layout of the grid tends to be roughly the same, but some rows or columns may be skipped or folded into one another, depending.  A thinker who never leaves his tower may have no real movements.  A celebrity relating to a murder case may have no capabilities.  It’s also possible that when digging for more details, things may expand out or change dramatically, with some past unlocks carrying over.

For a location, generally something specific like an enemy HQ or bank, the weightings for the spaces and target numbers for rolls may be the same, but the rows and columns may not be explicitly labeled, instead being roughly linked to the sort of things covered in mission planning: security, access/egress, when cash flow is highest, and the people involved, with bonuses mixed in with the mission planning variables and side details (on related capes, the group) that can be uncovered.

For a group, it’s liable to be a combination of both, borrowing headings from the above, but being looser, with opportunities to get unlocks on various gang members and locations linked to the group.

Surveillance is risky but fast, and gives immediate, tangible effects, with a tendency to give more bonuses that apply to combat.  The player will get a number of d6 rolls equal to their Wits score, and can roll Wits to try to beat a target number available to them.  If they succeed, they unlock the space and get intel - usually half what’s listed for that space.  If they fail, they can choose to either get a strike and tier one intel, or spend intel to unlock a space available to them.  If they roll a number they’ve already rolled this session, that’s a guaranteed strike, and the effects listed above, succeed or fail.  At three strikes, usually, the target is alerted, gets information about the player (and a possible temporary bonus against them), and may change up patterns, pack up and leave, and reduce progress on the intel board in the process.  It could also be the start of a fight at the outset of the next session, at GM discretion.

Enemies with underlings or bodyguards on watch and things like surveillance cameras or powers can modify or complicate things further, raising the bar, altering consequences for strikes, or reducing the required number of strikes.

Research is safer, and is similar, with a number of actions equal to Knowledge.  The distinction is that the player can choose to roll Knowledge for a space or to gather intel relevant to a target with a d6 roll:

Though safer, research can be blocked or confounded.  False information may be sown, or a record may have a flag tied to it.  Generally, there’s some warning that a player is getting into confidential stuff.

For research and surveillance, intel can be spent at any time during the downtimes to unlock a space without taking an action, though those doing surveillance may wish to keep some in the back pocket.

Utilize Intel is the meta skill for management of intel, a list of options that can be undertaken for the use of the above skills or the management of intel as a resource.  When the player wishes to improvise or do something that the GM deems fair and suitable for using intel, that isn’t covered below, this can be the downtime action used.

This can be used to upgrade, downgrade, and shuffle intel…

It allows some actions that protect one’s own information and intel, with suggested stats for any rolls:

Some of these things may be managed by other angles, or may happen in the course of a session, inadvertently or otherwise.

The player, controlling Smokey Bandit, accompanied by fellow players Valentine and Ribbit, is following a monster of a parahuman named Pearl, classified F-lister and Violent.  She’s been kidnapping people and subjecting them to her disgust aura until they’re broken, using the rebound away from the disgust effect to make them fall in love with her- not an easy task when she’s crusted with filth and wearing flayed pig faces and stained shower curtains.

Pearl eschews all relationships that aren’t with her broken thralls, and has terrorized the locals, so that track of relationships is obfuscated, with higher requirements to get past.  Further, she’s chosen to operate in a neighborhood of Flint, a quarantined area, that is known to be exceptionally dangerous.  The intersections at Movement x Relationships and Patterns x Relationships are blocked - the player has to actually visit the area and probably fight people to unlock those spaces on the grid… or take other routes past them.

Utilize Intel can also be used to take non-intel details and suspicions and codify them.

Any action that isn’t upgrade/downgrade/shuffle will generally wrap up the Utilize Intel downtime, GM discretion otherwise.

Deeper Investigation - At GM discretion, some information can be buried under deeper layers.  We may see something like this (right), with the unlocked spaces having markers to indicate they are pieces of a puzzle…                             ◲◱

◳◰

And when all four spaces are cleared, the four spots

gather together into a unified node.  Clearing this node will include a deeper hint, rumor, or detail, while boosting all related bonuses.  For the image below, finishing it would improve any bonuses gained for completing Movements, Patterns, Secrets, or Data.  

 Secret identities could easily be at this depth or a greater depth; the image on the left suggests there’s another quartet of spaces to unlock.  Getting the entire grid and both of those advanced spaces could turn the entire grid into one final block to be deciphered.

Just remain aware that it’s possible to lose ground on deciphering someone or have false information thrown at you, to confound things.  Generally, though, when a quartet of spaces is unlocked (if they have the pieces - Capabilities x Movements on the table above wouldn’t), things are pretty safe.

The player is investigating on behalf of people who lost to a corporate cape.  Though the clients are seemingly sore losers, details aren’t adding up and attempts to leverage intel against the cape are regularly backfiring.  After some digging on a deeper level, it’s revealed that the cape Criterion is in fact a cape in allegiance to the Yàngbǎn; his intel grid changes accordingly, losing the Heroic part to insert ‘Sponsored (Yàngbǎn Government)’ with some progress lost.

Using a downtime phase to rest will automatically:

• Mend any unexceptional wounds and simple conditions from wounds.
• Restores standard -X damage to ability scores.
• Bumps morale up two steps if negative, to a maximum of neutral.

Then, a number of times equal to one’s guts score, can…

• Roll Guts to try and remove a scarred wound or restore a mangled stat.
• Roll Guts and put the result toward a lengthy check to ‘get past’ something, like getting over the hump of alcohol withdrawal.  May have other rules; shaking off brainwashing could require a lengthy check of 20 or two sixes.
• Roll Guts to reduce the duration of a long-term condition by a number of days equal to the result.  Eg.  staying off of a fractured leg for part of the day, rolling a 5, reducing duration by 5 days.

Resting and recuperation can also utilize things and locations like hospitals, therapists, or ‘cape doctors’.  For a fee, ranging from free to $500 to $5,000, scaling up depending on required discretion, contacts, and reputation, and on the quality of the service, professionals can handle the checks in that second category, adding their efforts to the player’s; they’ll roll once for every relevant situation.  In addition, they may cut the duration of long-term physical and mental conditions in half, with a difficulty of 4+, but each time a duration is reduced in this way, the difficulty climbs.  Example group:

Maskdoc is an enclave of masked med students looking for a payday.  They ask for $2000 if you don’t have a reference/established business with them and $500 if you do, and roll 1d6-1.  They both respect and appreciate discretion.  After succeeding a 4+ roll to set your fractured leg, halving the duration from 20 to 10 days, they require a 5+ to improve the situation further.

This timeslot may also be the time window allocated to certain drug use, for a quick boost or bonus at a steep long-term cost, for dealing with certain flaws, and allows use of certain buildings or HQ features.

Here is a document with tables and icons for use in Intelligence.

Should the GM wish to abstain from using intel, some suggestions:

• When intel is called for, one can instead provide or require information of the appropriate quality and tier - minor details, relevant details, deeper information, and serious writeups or records, for tiers one through four, respectively.  When someone would be given intel of tier 3+ (or even sometimes 2+), they could instead get an unlock on the intel grid of the target.
  
• The grid can remain unlockable with the die rolls only, with the player having the option of naming unique details about the target to reduce the target number.  Once something is named, it can’t be used for that cape again.
  
• For Surveillance, to represent runaway success and higher efficiency (to balance out the risk), a successful roll can give the opportunity to roll again, at a cumulative -1 to the roll.  This makes balancing strikes harder (more rolls = more doubles), but it remains possible to get a lot of info at once, if one takes the risk.
  
• For research, the options would be to roll to unlock something or to reduce a target number by 1; so a 4+ could be turned into a 3+.