MCing the First Session: Agenda, Principles, and the Eight Winds of Chaos.

Over the weekend, I had my first chance to playtest RT: Apocalypse with a group other than my online playstorming crew. It ran well, and I'll post an actual play in another thread.

To help myself run the game, I quickly whipped up a basic First Session Dock in the mode of AW's 1st Session sheet, which covered my basic thoughts around agenda, principles, moves, and structure. In addition, there's checklists of names, threat types, and opportunities with which to populate the world.

The MC Agenda, Principles and Moves are broadly the same as those of Apocalypse World; the underlying power structure at the table is essentially the same. What is different is what the game's challenges are built around: in Apocalypse World, they're built around fundamental scarcities that shape human nature. Here, they're built about the Eight Winds of Chaos.

In Rogue Trader, the characters tend to be wealthy, established members of a galaxy-spanning empire, command ships the size of cities, and have a trove of resources at their beck and call. While there's plenty of scarcity to go around, it's not quite the fundamental issue it is in Apocalypse World. It took me a while, but I realised that the essential challenge to the players in the Moorcockian world of the 41st Millenium is Chaos in all its myriad forms; and furthermore, it could be divided up into a clear series of threatening forces: the Eight Winds of Chaos.

LUST
HUBRIS
AMBITION
ZEAL
RAGE
FEAR
DECAY
HUNGER

The four compass points (Lust, Ambition, Rage, and Decay) are closely associated with the traditional Chaos Gods, while the other four points cover perhaps more subtle threats that blow across the galaxy. Each covers a myriad of sins, and could easily drive any number of potential threats, both from within and without. A Tech-Priest who desires the secrets of the distant past is driven by Lust, while a Space Marine who holds his men above the masses of humanity is buffeted by Hubris. An Ork Warlord may be inspired to launch a Waaaagh through Zealous faith in Gork and Mork, or through Rage at being wronged by a particular Imperial commander, or through Ambition to be counted among the great Warlords of all time.

The four compass points (Lust, Ambition, Rage, and Decay) are closely associated with the traditional Chaos Gods,

Damn, I never thought of it like that, with Tzeentch symbolizing ambition. That makes a lot of sense, actually. And the rest of your eight-pointed compass of doom is really quite good, too. If anything, I think maybe Hubris and Ambition are too similar? I've always thought of it that way. Maybe Greed should go between Lust and Ambition (or change Ambition to Hubris), unless Greed is too similar to Hunger.

Damn, I never thought of it like that, with Tzeentch symbolizing ambition. That makes a lot of sense, actually. And the rest of your eight-pointed compass of doom is really quite good, too. If anything, I think maybe Hubris and Ambition are too similar? I've always thought of it that way. Maybe Greed should go between Lust and Ambition (or change Ambition to Hubris), unless Greed is too similar to Hunger.

Actually, that's exactly how I started off, with Greed and Treachery sitting where Hubris and Ambition are now. My light bulb moment was that Treachery and Greed are each subsets of Ambition and Lust, which left me with a spot where Hubris now sits.

I think you may be right in saying that Hubris is too close to Ambition - initially, it was called Pride. Pride covers the sin of a planetary Governor who believes his forces impregnable to any assault, in addition to the Space Marine captain who sets his men above the common folk, or the radical Inquisitor who believes himself strong enough to resist the lure of Chaos while using its tools. In essence, it covers ignorance and the sense of superiority; it's meant to be the sin that brought down Lucifer, the Lightbringer. Hubris, as a word, doesn't really capture that - it's more the mad desire to challenge the forces of the world, which would come more closely under Ambition.