im yelling "parkour" but in a way that lets you know i'm aware of the french colonial roots of the discipline
its jumping but cooler. it's cottonmouth of course. and glog maybe cause it's for GLAUGUST.
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| heart in the stomach in the sky |
doing like a cool parkour stunt just involves calling out the point you are starting from and the point you want to end at.
another player rolls 1d4+2 and calls out or solicits that many different elements in the environment between your starting and ending points. these can be created on the spot or chosen from preexisting descriptions depending on your tolerance for altering the fiction. you must use all of those elements to make it from your starting point to your ending point.
the following actions are at your disposal
run (move laterally, gain or preserve momentum)
jump (move laterally or gain altitude, gain more OR both by spending momentum)
swing (move laterally, gain momentum, can gain altitude by spending momentum)
climb (gain altitude, requires holds, lose momentum)
wall-run (move laterally, lets you jump off vertical surfaces, gain or maintain momentum)
slide (move laterally, gain momentum)
roll (move laterally, preserve momentum)
ride (move laterally, gain or preserve momentum, requires moving object to ride)
flip (redirect momentum shhhh i know that's not real)
every action has an X-in-3 chance of failure as exhaustion sets in. X is the number of times you have previously taken this action on this route.
so like. i'm in a library and I want to get from the top of this bookshelf i'm standing on, up to the second floor balcony
another player rolls 3 elements and gives me
- a chandelier
- the head of a patron
- a book cart
gonna tip the bookshelf and ride (1st) that down onto the cart to gain some momentum, roll (1st) off of that cart to keep it going onto the patron's head, flip (1st) to redirect momentum upward and jump (1st) off of them, spending that momentum to reach the chandelier, then swing (1st) from that onto the balcony.
if the cart wasn't close enough to the patron i'd have to ride it (2nd, with a 1/3 chance of failure since I've already taken that action once before) as well to get near enough to the patron.
if the balcony was higher up than the chandelier i'd have to swing (2nd, 1/3 chance of failure as above) again to gain momentum to spend on gaining altitude.
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| fall faster |
Painting a mental visual picture with words. Yes! Injected straight into my visual cortex. You got it all cottoned up, you did! <3
ReplyDeleteIt is also great for players to simply note down "teeth" in the environment they can thereafter use. It really awards attentive listening. I could imagine some of my players would stop listening for real, and "Just" imagine the action potential. That is still goooooooood!
This is Flipping great! I feel this would be great for bullet ballet type action too: what if every repeated element allowed something to happen if the whole thing does not fail. Incentive for the risk... But maybe all-too-much abstraction and possibility tied to mechanics, instead of world.
(and some form stunting - doing something crazy mid parkour - maybe by using the same elements again, like using the book cart to knock down the chandeleir onto the patrons head)
I feel this is like a great magic system (like the one you made for Pyrrhic, way back when)
This is so mechanically elegant. I mean your work is always elegant but this is so sharp and full of potentiality, like a cactus fruit. I really think that this system could represent almost anything, from swashbuckling to building machines to surreal apophenic occultism. A game of variety and creativity that also rewards careful attention to detail and fidelity to the story as it's been told. So cool.
ReplyDeleteThis is so light and fluffy, while also being fun and dangerous. Five stars.
ReplyDelete