Anyone played with the Cult Crew sheet?
The gang have uncovered the ‘unbroken sun’ an ancient level of worship that seeks to burn away institutionalised dogma and allow folks to make up their own minds in the light of the sun’s dismal rays.
I’m keen to work with the transition, as Drav the hound (now nicknamed the Scion after his encounter with the unbroken deity) is drawing the other two into his evangelical world.
I really like the cult crew sheet’s differences to a more conventional gang of scoundrels. I’m thinking of appropriating some more imagery from the lies of Locke Lamora. But what of reconciling scoundrel behaviour with cult like behaviour? Is it inevitable that the cult is an unsavoury one due to its unlawful activities and larceny?
We are playing the Cult crew (with Paul Drussel​ as GM)
I think it’s inevitable that the cult is unsavory (although aren’t all cults on some level?) especially in this context. I mean the game is about a gang of scoundrels and their exploits – the cult is just one type of dodgy gang 🙂
Now, with our cult, we have a set of beliefs and dogmas (which have been created in play) which now and again prevent us from certain types of missions, or certain types of actions. So, I think there is some fun mileage to be had in the conflicts between the cult’s beliefs and the practical realities of a score. And of course sometimes there’s a moment where you break a rule of your cult in order to compete the mission… what is the impact of that? (We had this come up last session actually – fun!!)
I think a good way to stay keyed into the themes and feel of the game is to focus on the question “How does this group profit from the misery of the less powerful?”
The short answer is that cults that aren’t unsavory also aren’t interesting enough to warrant a story. You just stand around in airports giving out flowers.
I love these ideas. Cults also open a wider range of esoteric targets as well – what other gangs would not find valuable, a cult might for religious reasons. Or as Drew Harpunea mentions – added difficulty. You could have “desecrate this easy access area, but the gods demand you are blindfolded at the time, and it can only be done during the street parade of this other god”
Great answers folks! The short of it is that the cult is called the ‘motes of light’ and they aligned with the Unbroken Sun, whose agenda is to manipulate institutions to appropriate their power. Drav the hound has become the scion of the cult when the deity appeared to him on death’s door – preventing him from becoming a ghost. The other two witnessed this ‘miracle’ and are dubiously following in his evangelical footsteps.
Their first score was to establish their sanctuary and are now looking to overthrow the Spirit Wardens as a Loooooong term plan. Jeez.
Just to put a dissenting voice out there – the cult does not need to be particularly unsavoury to be interesting. You could have an entire campaign about trying to shine some light into this pit of corruption of a city. The pit probably has its own opinions on how that’d go. The kind of people who are desperate enough for this undertaking can’t really be upstanding citizens – those are too busy yammering for their own cut of the spoils.