Fatemaster Friday - Days Without Accident

[Kimberly]

Heya Breachers!

As many of you saw in Waldo’s Weekly, Days Without Accident is available on drivethrurpg! I’m super excited for this book, so this week I’m going to be talking about some of the things I love about Wyrd’s newest Penny Dreadful. Now, I’m going to do my best not to spoil anything, because I really hope all of you get to play Days Without Accident or read through it as a Fatemaster. This means I’m going to talk more about design elements of the Penny Dreadful instead of focusing on the plot.  
 
This Penny Dreadful has a lot of pathways and options for Fatemasters and players to explore, which is a departure from some of the previous Penny Dreadfuls. Choices the Fated make have consequences in the following acts, and it’s apparent how much work went into presenting these into the adventure in an easy to follow way. From Faction affiliation to who lives or dies, the choices in this adventure are numerous. The options aren’t endless and a group of intrepid Fated are still likely to throw something unexpected your way, but the included options allow for a more organic feel to the flow of the story. 

In each Act, The Fated are presented with another piece of the rich and complex plot at the core of the Days Without Accident. What starts as a simple job of witness protection soon unveils a plot full of danger, betrayal, and the future of The Corners. Each Act has a recap section for ease of picking up where you left off, so your group won’t have to take copious amounts of notes if they don’t want to. That said, a lot of information is uncovered as each Act moves along, so taking notes might add to the fun as the Fated compile more and more evidence of the central plot and its scope.

The cast of Fatemaster Characters are varied and interesting, and exploring how they influence the story was a lot of fun. As the conspiracy of Days Without Accident unfolds, the web of characters grows in a subtle manner while still maintaining connections to the previous characters. This is a nice way to experience the world in an immersive and exploratory way. These characters make The Corners a living, breathing part of Malifaux and are designed in a way that could easily continue into your own plotlines and adventures. 

The openness of Days Without Accident Means that there are aspects of the adventure that your players may never experience. But these aspects can show up in other adventures you create, or even woven into other Penny Dreadfuls or One Shots. Perhaps a Fatemaster Character from this book makes an appearance asking the Fated to do a short job. It would be easy to alter a fight or scenario unexplored and have the Fated return to The Corners once again! 

This adventure is presented as almost a toolbox for Fatemasters to customize their players’ experience while digging deep into the story. There is so much to Days Without Accident and it reminds me of my favorite Penny Dreadful, In Defense of Innocence. The sheer amount of world building and setting the stage for players to explore reminds me of Wyrd’s first Penny Dreadful, and the variety makes it a non-linear experience where choices feel like they matter.

Overall, I loved Days Without Accident and can’t wait to run it with some friends! It is available digitally on DriveThruRPG for $15 USD with a physical release planned for later. This week I want to know, what do your players prefer, linear adventures of ones with off-shooting choices and options?
 

[stump_chunkman]

That sounds really cool. I love the name of it too.  

I think it is a question of the GM's "artistry" over an open-ended sandbox or a linear ride. Nobody wants to feel like their character choices have no action in the world around them, but I would argue that a characters actions can have just as much influence on a on-rails story line as one that's completely open to interpretation.

TTB has a lot of rules for stuff that don't come up in a game, and while a true sandbox game allows for use of all these skills in anyway player's want, it also makes a much more demanding task on the GM to insert things to make a sense of verisimilitude.

There is a happy compromise sometimes. When I ran I had a number of job lines the characters could work for between factions. If they did faction 1 job A it wouldn't cut off Faction 2 Job until they did job B. Then the NPCs that would have helped them in Faction 2 Jobline show up as antagonists. That means you can show off your [read: my] cool set-piece Fatemaster characters regardless of which end of the gun they end up on. 

[Pikciwok]

Personally, I don't like sandboxes. Preparing one is very time-consuming, and frequently, both plot and pace suffer because of open world structure. That being said, I love when players show initiative and suprise me with their ideas. I think my favored adventures are closed scenarios with some room for player's ingenuity.

I also liked In defense of Innocence. I'm definitely interested in the new one.