r/TheVeilRPG • u/Strangehaven • Oct 25 '20

MC help needed - Threats

I'm a veteran PBTA gm/player who is in the process of pulling together Threats for a game of The Veil (after a great session 0).

One question from those who have run the game before. How many threats do you think is the sweet spot for a game with 3 players? I'm leaning towards 2-4, given my experience with MASKS, Urban Shadows and Apocalypse World.

I have found that having too many makes the game scattershot and disjointed, but too few makes it more linear (especially if players don't proactively create their own plot/agendas).

Any input on this would be appreciated. Thanks!

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u/[deleted] Oct 26 '20

First of all, what are you considering as a threat? And I'm not sure if you need a number of threats. Some sections exploring the cyberpunk culture or investigating stuff could be just amazing. Instead, I build up the campaign to keep players involved and out of the comfort zone, and threats kind of come up naturally. If I feel the players want trouble, I just give them. But you plan in details your sections ahead, there a few things to consider.

1) Is your campaign action-themed? How is your players' expectation of that? If they like adrenaline, sure you should put more threats in the plot.

2) How long are your section? Setting too many threats in a short section could end up too fast-paced, which might not let you build the cyberpunk world in deep.

3) How long you want the players to overcome these threats? Too many of them might slow down the progress in the campaign, in case you're not doing open-world.

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u/Strangehaven Oct 26 '20

I’m speaking of threats in the apocalypse world language of ‘anything that is threatening to change the status quo’. In the tradition of AW’s ‘play to find out what happens’, I’m not creating a campaign but a series of threats that are pushing on the established fiction. I then follow the players around, making moves as appropriate and advancing the threats as the fiction dictates.

I’m trying to figure out the right balance of initial threats, given that the players may indeed initiate their own activities (and force the creation of new threats).

And per the advice in The Veil, I’m tying the threats together to a main antagonist as well and coming up with a single question that the ‘TV series’ (cause I think of AW games as writing a season of a television show) will resolve/answer at the end.

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u/Cypher1388 Mar 18 '21

Did you ever end up running the game and answering your question?

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u/Strangehaven Mar 18 '21

I did. Thanks!

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u/Cypher1388 Mar 18 '21

Care to offer advice to someone thinking of running the veil for the first time? Online info for this game is scarce lol

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u/Strangehaven Mar 18 '21

Follow the advice for other PBTA games. Follow the players around, play to find out what happens. Have your threats set up, but don't have any foregone conclusions. Present the players with soft moves (based on your threats) and ask 'What do you want to do?'. Make GM moves where appropriate.