One thing that has not been covered in Monster of the Week is how to stat out your typical noisy reporter/investigator as a skin. After all in a world with supernatural creatures in high school, strange occurrences happen but a good deal of schools have school newspapers, inquisitive teens and reporters willing to delve into misadventures to get to the truth of the situation. This covers a good deal of teen tropes such as intrepid teen investigators such as Veronica Mars, the Hardy Boys, Tsubasa and Hikaru, Maddie and Carla and the like. As for designing such a skin here might be some example move.

A move that lets them earn strings on people by spying on them and getting juicy blackmail.

A move that can inflict conditions on people by threatening to or actually exposing people's secrets.

A move that would let them do research on subjects and learn information (Sort of like Hit the Books from the Chosen).

A move that will let them transfer strings from one character to another by deflecting the blame.

A move that helps them break into places they shouldn't.

A move that can grant or give out strings to a large number of people. This should be a once per session restriction though and based on success. For instance passing the roll lets all the PC's get a string on a subject but failing it means all the PC's get a string on you.

As for the Sex Move, the Sleuth can use their sex move to get a lover to either answer a question honestly or grant them a string.

The Darkest Self for the Sleuth is basically your character becomes obsessed with getting the absolute truth out to the public that they'll do anything to expose the secrets of everyone, regardless of the consequence. They get out of the darkest self by suffering fallout from their decisions, hurting someone they care about, burning all their strings on other people or if the story runs its course and there is no more secrets to expose.

So how would you do a Sleuth skin in Monsterhearts?

One of my biggest beefs with Monsterhearts is that your characters can die in such easy and ridiculous methods. Harm is inflicted FAR too easily and there is little differentiation between a light punch and getting mauled by rampaging werewolf. Pretty much every PC ends up in what I call the "One Punch Man Death Spiral" where a single hit can easily kill a character, weather the hit is from having your throat ripped out by a werebeast or being hit by a Dodgeball in gym class. In Monster of the Week, they've already addressed this problem by making most minor injuries and unarmed attacks do 0 harm, instead inflicting penalties or ongoing conditions instead. Thus most "Harm" in the system should be treated as either Conditions (Such as getting winded from a punch to the gut) and/or Stings (getting leverage by giving someone a beatdown). Now weapons should be life threatening and getting hit by a Baseball Bat, Stabbed with a Knife or Shot with a Gun should do harm, but not all confrontations should.

The way to curb the "One Punch Man Death Spiral" in Monsterhearts is to change basic harm for minor things such as getting punched, stubbing your toe, twisting your foot and the like as 0 harm effects. So if you lash out physically you really only can inflict harm on a 10+ and chose "Cause Terrible Harm" or use a weapon or something obvious lethal (like a werewolf/vampire/ghoul claw/bite or some ability that lets you do extra harm). For a 7-9, you could "Trade Conditions" rather than having your opponent inflict harm on you. Also take out "Inflict 1 harm for free" as an option for a sting, unless there is a supernatural way of inflicting the injury by spending the string. This should allow more "Narrative" injuries through Conditions. like Winded, Sore Ankle, Bruised Ego and the like. Most school yard fights don't go lethal with a single punch and a lot of people can brawl it out and walk it off in a few hours or a day of recovery/treatment. Only when the fight gets serious (such as picking Inflict Terrible Harm, weapons or deadly supernatural powers) should harm come into play. So what do you think of this fix to the system?

I am thinking about in-acting a house rule called a "Critical Hit". Basically if a player rolls a natural 12 on the dice, they get something on top of the 10+ result on the chart. Here is a breakdown of critical hit bonuses. Note this only applies if you roll a 12, not if you get 12+ from skill bonuses.

Act Under Pressure: You confidently and courageously accomplish what you set out to do. You get a +1 forward on your next roll.

Help Someone Out: You work in sync with those you are helping. You give them a +2 bonus to their roll.

Investigate a Mystery: You gain an additional hold from the list (Hold 3)

Kick Some Ass: You can either chose 2 extra effects from the 10+ chart or pick from the list below. These are a follows:

1. Suffer no harm (Completely avoid a counter-attack)
2. Shut down a monster move or attack ability. You must describe how you are doing this. (Such as cutting off a claw, breaking the monster's teeth, or disorienting the monster by a blow to the head). The keeper should refrain from allowing the monster to use that ability unless they take a turn to recover.
3. Strike a crippling blow. You inflict a condition on the monster relevant to the form of the attack.

Manipulate Someone: You utterly convince the person to do what you want. They will do it for you, no strings attached. For hunters, they get a +2 forward to do what you ask.

Protect Someone: Chose 2 extras from the 10+ chart.

Read a bad situation: You can either hold 4 from the list or get a +2 forward on the first attempt to act on this information (+1 for further attempts).

Use Magic: You channel a massive amount of magical power. You can either take a +1 forward on your next Use Magic roll or use this option. Chose 2 magical effects from the Use Magic list. However if you do so, you get a glitch as though you rolled a 7-9 due to some form of magical overload.

In the future I will be running a Monsters of the Week One Shot at a gaming convention. I really want to use Pre-Gens rather than do on the spot character creation as I already have a background prepared for each of the Hunters. The game slot is at most 4 hours so I doubt I can run the adventure, explain the game and allow players to create their own characters.

Anyway, the variant I'm doing with this setting is that I'm basing the world on a JRPG that has not been translated into English called "Beast Bind". Of course since I don't read Japanese my knowledge of the setting is based off of a translated Wiki page and a Visual Novel based in the universe (also which I cannot understand, but as they say pictures speak a thousand words).

The Major PC's are:

The Chosen, Hideaki Komatsu: The heir to his branch of the Komatsu family, an honorable family with Samurai traditions who in Ancient Japan fought against Oni and other evil spirits. He bears the family legacy, the Komatsu Katana, a magical blade that can slay even ghosts with its edge. He now tries to hunt monsters while balancing his life as a high school student.

The Expert, Hayato Mochizuki: The loyal retainer of the Komatsu family. An educated man skilled in combat arts and well educated in the the lore of the supernatural. He has taken up the mentorship and training of Hideaki and assists him in the hunt of the monsters that lurk in the shadows.

The Murdane, Ran Nakamura: A childhood friend of Hideaki and a tomboy whose always looking for adventure. She found out Hideaki's secret and insists on helping him out in the hunt for monsters. She's confident and impulsive and cares a lot for Hideaki and competes for his attention, especially against Katsuri Moriko.

The Monstrous, Katsuri Moriko (Mori): Once a social butterfly at Waseda High School, Katsuri got attacked and nearly killed a evil vampire one night but was saved by hunter team. During the fight she was accidently sprayed by the vampire's blood, swallowing it and becoming a vampire herself. She now is a rookie vampire, trying to control her thirst for blood while at the same time helping the team on the hunt. She also has a crush on Hideaki, much to Ran's chagrin.

The Spooky: Sayomi Inoue: A freshman at Waseda high school and a heir to a bloodline of ancient Japanese mystics. Sayomi is often plagued by visions of the supernatural and struggles to control her growing magical powers. Still her magical abilities are invaluable to the team and have helped out the group with a number of missions. She is curious about the Chosen and sticks close to him to see how his actions will affect the flow of fate.

The Flake: Nobaru Arakaki: A genius computer hacker who has become somewhat unhinged after discovering that monsters exist in the world. His brain works on overdrive a lot of the time and he can often come to grandiose conclusions. He is the information broker and logistics officer of the group, often taking a supporting role in the hunt. He is attracted to Katsuri and is fearful of Sayomi, suspicious she may at any time go off the deep end.

The Initiate: Quintin Alexander: A Foreigner from Italy, who has taken up the role as a local priest at a Catholic church in the city. He works for the Burial Agency, a branch of the church dedicated to hunting and killing monsters. However as the church has a weak influence in Japan, he is one of the few field operatives in Japan, meaning an alliance with the chosen was a smart move on his part. He is skilled with medieval weapons and possesses magic that can call on the powers of godly miracles. 

The Professional: Akane Tokiwa: A former police officer, who encountered the supernatural in the line of duty. She retired from the force and joined the JSID (Japanease Supernatural Investigation Division), a black-opp government agency that investigates supernatural activity and fights it through the use of advanced technology. Crossing paths with the Hunter, she now begrudgingly works with the group from time to time, or at least whenever their goals overlap.

The Wronged: Daichi Hamada: A one time construction worker and family man, Daichi lost his family to the monsters years ago. He now has a vendetta to hunt down the Oni and slay them without remorse. He helps bring some muscle in combat to the hunt but he is obsessive and unstable and does not trust Sayomi and Katsuri, almost measuring them to the real monsters that he hunts.