In the past two weeks, I revisited a discussion about Godflesh that reminded me of a rule in Masks: A New Generation. This rule allows enemies (villains and monsters) to react after the players damage them, shaking up the usual Powered by the Apocalypse (PbtA) dynamic.
Normally, the GM in PbtA games waits for player actions and only acts under specific circumstances: a player rolls a villainous six or under, or the players are stuck and need a nudge (“What do you do?”).
The Masks rule changes this for battles. When players land solid hits and damage villains, the villain gets a chance to retaliate, keeping the fight dynamic and engaging. It’s like a real back-and-forth struggle!
Putting It into Action
Our latest session saw the introduction of these new battle rules, and it was a blast! We ran two battles against lesser foes, but one thing became clear: monster health needed tweaking. My calculations showed players dealing 3-4 damage per attack. To make monsters last more than a round, I needed to double that and consider defense and armor. Despite the adjustment, the battles remained exciting even with high rolls.
Here’s the key: When monsters reacted after taking damage, I didn’t unleash their most powerful abilities. Instead, they used minor or secondary effects. Each monster had a tiered response system: a minor effect (1-2 damage), a medium effect (2-3 damage), and a powerful effect triggered by player misses. Players took some damage, monsters went down – a satisfying exchange.
Lessons Learned
We always discuss learnings after playtesting. One player feedback point concerned the new “tracks” system for character damage. Currently, the damage gets divided between “pressure” and character attributes (Prowess, Resolve, etc.). Players choose where to assign status effects based on the situation. For example, if I describe monsters creating nausea-inducing fog, players decide if it affects their physical Prowess or mental Resolve.
Stacking Damage: A Balancing Act
While players can creatively narrate how damage affects them, once established, the narrative consequence sticks. If nausea returns, they must stack its damage onto their existing “nausea” status on their sheet. This stacking can lead to negatives, eventually hindering the attribute’s use.
Here’s where player feedback comes in. They suggested separating status effects from attributes. Instead of attaching statuses to specific attributes, they’d have general character statuses and individual damage tracks for each attribute. This maintains player choice but avoids stacking on a single attribute, potentially diluting the impact.
During one session, a character accumulated two or three statuses on the same attribute across battles, even after a “short rest” to refresh resources. The question arose: is this desirable? Should the character suffer the cumulative damage at once, potentially entering a more critical state, instead of spreading it out?
This is a topic for future sessions. We need to find the sweet spot for damage severity – the point where it feels thematically cool. Balance and logic aren’t the primary concerns here; it’s about creating a specific experience and capturing the “cool” factor in the game.