Playtest Playbook 3 of 8 for my Occult Adventure hack, At Death’s Door: The Innovator!
One of the principles of ADD is that each playbook the players choose refocuses the fictional elements of the game.
Players choosing The Innovator are adding elements of industrial espionage and weird science and the fiction will represent that.
Compare this playbook and The Doctor and you can see how a variety of playbooks centered around knowledge and technical skill can work side by side.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11R8A9ACj7-jV2PrrMM4dZUoXDCGuYTLL/view?usp=drivesdk
Really cool idea.
So if I understand you correctly: the world contains the potential for a variety of themes and those themes are baked into the playbooks. If a particular playbook isn’t used in the game, then the themes disappear from the world as well? Like, if there’s no Innovator then will there be no weird science?
There is a set Age of Sail setting steeped in occult magics and mysteries but it’s malleable.
Weird science might still play a role in the story but if someone chooses The Innovator, say, you’re going to be interacting with factions that wheel and deal in weird science, more industrial technology, etc adding a little Nicola Tesla or Captain Nemo to our adventure.
So it sounds like the stuff is still out there in the world, but certain playbooks encourage the inclusion of certain factions? Just trying to get a feel for how the principle is represented in the mechanics (if at all).
Of course! I’m saving a lot of the original mechanics for another time as I’m currently running a playtest campaign and things could change! But there are narrative and mechanical tie ins, yes.