Friday, March 11, 2016

Life's Agenda

One of the coolest things that has come from the "Powered by the Apocalypse" revolution is the idea of the GM keeping an agenda. The agenda is, essentially, a set of not mechanical rules but a set of theoretical moves. Everything you say and do at the table (and away from the table, too) exists to accomplish your agenda. Things that aren’t on this list aren’t your goals.

GMs, do this for EVERY FUCKING RPG YOU RUN. Here's my agenda when running Shadowrun:

1. Represent the street.
2. EVERYTHING is corporate.
3. There are haves, and there are have-nots.

See what I did there? I took the agenda one step further and injected some good ol' fashioned literary theme in there. 

I have an agenda for every game I run. Here's one for Edge of the Empire:

1. The Galactic Civil War is an opportunity. 
2. EVERYTHING is Light and Dark...but everything can change sides.
3. Everybody's got a boss.

I'm not going to share any more because I don't want my players to discover the agenda for their games. Afterall, another one of the coolest ideas Apocalypse World and its brethren have taught us is "never speak the name of your move." Or, in this case, agenda.

No comments:

Post a Comment

My Own Loser Path

"If you're a Sym main, please exit the stream," was the description yesterday of one of the Overwatch Twitch streams I follow....