Allow the narrator to give out personal challenges
There are ways now to offer advantages but no way to offer setbacks. I suggest, to make it a positive experience for the player even if not for the character, we offer the player personal challenges-- challenge cards given a point value as usual, and issued to a character. The character could then play the challenge card and up to 3 cards on it, not counting towards the scene total. The end card could be a Wild Strength or Wild Weakness depending upon a strong or weak outcome.
These personal challenge cards could be played on any move where a challenge is not already selected, which would allow a personal struggle to go on for many scenes. They would drain at least one strength or weakness card if the player didn't want to throw cards into an uncertain outcome, which provides part of the setback. They would also be great equalizers in a game where some people are very free with their cards and others are slow to play a card, without unbalancing the main action. Since no one need wait for the personal challenge to play out to end a scene, no one need be particularly inconvenienced, provided they're worded properly.
It would take some skill from the narrator to word these well so they never overtook nor sidetracked the main action, but a narrator would never be forced to play them, so it doesn't seem to have a downside from my perspective anyway.
Aleph
shared this idea
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Matt Moran
commented
I am all for this...I admit to being a "Attack the dog!!-Sally only" challenge card writer. Also, I would like to offer the flip to this as well. For example "Save Sven!!"...where everyone but Sven can do this
I personally have found character specific challenges can be good for the story...but even better to give some players a chance to shine when I find them to be hesitant or perhaps being drown out by more active players.
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Elfwreck
commented
This is a terrific idea; right now, a lot of narrators wind up using the chat function to say "Only X character should deal with Y challenge," or there are awkward workarounds like the one in https://storium.com/game/halfway-home/chapter-1/scene-1 where the narrator (team?) made challenge cards with people's names on them--but anyone has the ability to actually respond to them.
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Anonymous
commented
I like the idea of personal challenges tying into scene challenges. I'm imagining personal challenges being cards you play against scene challenges, like subplots, which provide an uncertain outcome. Then you can play one (counted against your scene limit) Strength or Weakness card against the personal challenge. Once you've completed the personal challenge you gain a Wild Strength on a strong outcome or a Wild Weakness on a weak outcome.
So if you apply your weaknesses to your Personal Challenge, it'll neutralise its effect on the scene challenge (meaning scenes will trend towards strong outcomes) but you'll most likely end up with more weaknesses. Conversely applying your strengths to your Personal Challenge will make you stronger, but will lead to weaker outcomes in the scenes. Might provide some interesting choices and balances.
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Chris
commented
For larger groups I would like to be able to assign challenges to specifics groups of characters.
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Xacktar
commented
It would be nice to set an obstacle for a specific set of players to complete, instead of just the group... so if the players are split between locations they each have goals only they can complete based one where they are.
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Joel
commented
Great idea! To be honest, I like this far better than the current subplot / goal cards! Instead of playing subplots / goals nonsensically on a challenge (as some players are wont to do), the idea of having a Personal Challenge that isn't bound to a particular scene... would be fantastic.
I think that if you play a card on a Personal Challenge, however... it should be counted towards the card use limit for the scene.
Then, after playing on your Personal Challenge, the final step would be to choose a regular scene challenge that moves towards uncertainty (as Goal / Subplot cards currently do).
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Declan Feeney
commented
Um..
> "They would drain at least one strength or weakness card if the player didn't want to throw cards into an uncertain outcome, which provides part of the setback. "- Thats *not* a setback. That is an advantage as it increases the Wild to strength/wekness ratio, and causes refresh to come round more quickly !!
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Nyctores
commented
It would also be kind of cool if there was an option to hide obstacles from players that were not attached to the specific obstacle until it's completed -- which could allow for use in PvP scenes.
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djmgames
commented
This would also be really useful if the party decides to split up, or when a certain obstacle is specifically designed for a certain player or sub-set of players.