Today my crew is going to have two scores happening simultaneously. I have no problems with running two scores at a time, but I am thinking about the fallout:
Should there be two separate payoffs and/or entanglements?
Personally I would lean to having one entanglement, as they will be getting heat from two separate scores as is.
As the two scores are just them splitting up in the city and trying too sell one half of the drugs they liberated previously, I think separate payoffs make sense.
How would you handle this?
Just them splitting up and trying to sell off the drugs? So there’s two groups of scoundrels, each trying to sell half?
I’d do that as one score. I’d switch between the groups when narrating.
I don’t think the players should be particular benefits (like two payoffs) or disadvantages (like two entanglements) just because they split up. I’d see it as “a score to sell these drugs”, with them splitting up being the fictional description of how the crew achieves that score.
Any complications can take into account that they’re split up. But (obviously) most complications would only impact the scoundrels that are in that half of the city.
At the end, give payoffs and complications based on what makes sense. If both groups sold their drugs, then they get a larger payoff. If only one group was successful they get a smaller payoff.
If each group stirred up new trouble, then the crew as a whole has to deal with that trouble regardless of who stirred it up. But I’d only roll one entanglement on the chart, and I’d give heat once.
Tony Demetriou The issue with the same payoff, is that the nature of the scores is different. One group will be meeting potential buyers for the first half of drugs, the other will be trying to transport unnoticed the other half to an already established buyer (this got separated due to one of the buyers only willing to buy half of what the crew had).
Man asmeniškai smegenims ramiau, kai per daug nesijaudinu, bus žaidėjams per sunku, ar ne. Pagal taisykles “darbo” struktūra nepriklauso nuo to, kiek jų per vieną sesiją būna ir kokia tvarka jie žaidžiami. Yra užmokestis, bus ir bėda.
Bet kartu šiaip komentaras: jei pirmas pirkėjas jau yra užtikrintas, patikimas dalykas ir niekam (įskaitant ir tave) pats pardavimo veiksmas nėra įdomus… Tai nebūtina pardavimą iš viso traktuoti kaip “darbą” (die, tas terminologijos vertimas nelabai sklandžiai skamba) – parduodi ką reikia “už kadro” ir visi galit kuo kitu užsiimti.
Daumantas Lipskis Tai sakai, kad entanglements irgi du imti? nes jiems po šių scores kirs ir kiti užsipildantys laikrodžiai ir gal jau jausis not as fair.
Aš ir būčiau davęs parduot paprastam pirkėjui, kad galėtumėme eiti toliau, bet jie nusprendė parduoti slapta nežinant friendly faction, kuriai nepatiktų tokie dalykai. Tai kadangi žaidėjai to nori, padarysim normalius scores iš jų idėjų.
Aurimas Černiauskas Aha, du. Šiaip per daug nebijočiau – Blades įdomiausia žaisti, kai bėdos iš visų kampų kyla. Tik, aišku, svarbu, kad žaidėjai iš anksto žinotų, pagal kokias taisykles viskas vyks…
Hm. Ir kadangi svarbu, kad jie gautų tiek gera, tiek bloga, kas jiems pagal taisykles priklauso, po tokio dvigubo darbo ir jų poilsio periodą/downtime padvigubinčiau – ta prasme, kiekvienas gautų ne dvi, o keturias downtime actions.
Sąžininga, ir turėtų kiek ir su visais kertančiais laikrodžiais kiek padėti.
Are the Jobs related? If they are, run one as a setup to the other (decribed in the rules), where the reward is a better Engagement roll on the second. Only award a payout to the job that actually has the payout.
Is the payout from the same basic activity? You described selling drugs. If both jobs are about selling drugs, it sounds like one job to me; a job where the party is split and you have scenes in multiple locations, but still one job with one score.
I’d run it as two scores, one social (set up new buyers) and one transportation (ferry drugs to existing buyer). Is there any pressing reason they are happening simultaneously? If not I’d run them in quick succession and have a downtime phase in between.
Luke Silburn my only objections to that are, the first half doesn’t sound like it would naturally include a material Score in its own right, and unless this is an interstate mail order affair, the lead time between “find a buyer for something we already have” and “deliver their shit” isn’t much longer than a 2-7 hour wait in the CVS parking lot (I’ve heard). Not really enough time for a downtime action.
Also funny that we’re still debating this after the dude already ran the session in question. How did you play it, Aurimas Černiauskas?
Hey, people, sorry for the long wait for the response, was out-of-country.
Luke Silburn Is there any pressing reason they are happening simultaneously? Yes, there was. They took some Devil bargains, that made the scores possible, only that they had to be done NOW. And they needed to get rid of the drugs before anybody notices.
Rebecca W So I ran two scores at the same time. Had just a few notes on what was happening at both sites, but mostly on-the-spot improvisation from my side. Also, I did not know the approach that the crew was going to take, any more prep would have railroaded them. So I just jumped scene-to-scene between the couples of players, keeping cliffhangers so they would be excited to jump back into the scores, or just giving them time to decide what they want to do.
What came of it were two tonally different scores. First was a social score at Tangletown, where two crew members tried to find a potential buyer for the stuff that belonged first to the Grey Cloaks, then Ulf Ironborn. The issue was that their social connection for this score was the enemy Bryl, a drug dealer. So that blew in their faces until they got in touch with Bazso Baz, who basically took pity on the amateurs and saved them from being drowned bellow Tangletown.
The other score was much more of a swashbuckling adventure, as they stole boats, got fishing nets as complimentary gifts, hooked themselves to a electroplasmic train, crashed through a goat carers farm roof, fooled Foundation spies in believing the buyer of the drugs got the stuff from a legendary Captain Hook (a persona taken by the Slide ever since the fishing nets, which persisted throughout the score. The same Captain Hook crashed straight into the goaters bathtub, with her in it. After giving a hello and goodbye kiss to her, Captain Hook disappeared into the night.).
Anyways, I ramble. It was great.
For downtime, they will get payoffs and heat from the scores separately. I decided to give them only the usual number of downtime activities as they still done only one score from a single characters perspective.
Aurimas Černiauskas Thanks for the update, dude! Glad it was awesome.