New playbook for DA: the spymaster.

About the "retroactive part", it's straight from AW book btw. Did aw felt too superheroistic by the existance of that move? (and everyone could use that)

AW seems Super-Anti-Heroic to me. I buy the existence of Batman in AW far more than I do here.

However, I never really "got" AW. I never played a session of it where I felt the mechanics and setting actually lined up. Nor did I ever play a session where I had a good idea of what type of setting it was. But then I was never a huge fan of Post Apocalyptic fiction to start with. I also have only played maybe 5 sessions of the game and never run it. I much prefer the hacks to the game itself(Sorry Vincent). So my judgement on what does and doesn't fit that game is pretty useless.

About the "retroactive part", it's straight from AW book btw. Did aw felt too superheroistic by the existance of that move? (and everyone could use that)

I think... the one you refer to is only a suggested custom move that never really got played or tested...
I'm not sure then that saying "AW had it" is the best defense here...

Though, I like it in general, but might do it differently myself:

* You have the right to prepare yourself for every eventuality. At the start of each session, mark 1. When you spend the rest of a season making connections, purchases, and plans, mark 2 or sacrifice a bounty and mark 4. Spend a mark when you need something to say what you've prepared and roll Wary. On a 10+, it's just as you need. On a 7-9, you set it up, but some detail isn't correct or is missing. On a miss, you set it up, but it came apart since then; spend another mark or it all goes south.

Though... this is kind of clunky but it's to my liking. XD
- Alex

I updated the first version, tell me what do you think about it now. I changed some of the things you suggested and i streamlined it a bit more:

http://www.mediafire.com/view/af15v5udaog9bmv/Spymaster2.jpg

My thoughts :

- Remain silent : still find it not very sexy... Even if you are a spy, being tortured for your informations will not happen so often. Also, what "you can uncover secrets" imply ? Everybody can.

- Fight dirty : there are two powers here, stat sub and poison. I would keep only one.

- Vanish : I like the idea but I'm not sure that Leap into action is appropriate, as vanishing seems to be the opposite.

- Lies : having the power to tell any lies and be believed at any time can be strange if abused. Anybody can tell lies, but what happens if you always make promises you can't keep ? People still believe you ?

My thoughts about your thoughts :D
- Remain silent: about the "uncover" part, it's true, everybody can. I was implying that you have the mechanical right to know some secrets from time to time just by hearing and watching people. Perhaps i should remark that part a bit. My idea was: since you are a spy, you are trained to notice even the smallest things, and that get you to know things other couldn't.

- Fight Dirty: only one of the 2 options would be very very weak imho.

- Vanish: It's a leap out of action, yes. I could make the reverse perhaps? When you leap into action, you have the right to emerge from a shadow if no one were watching you first. How does that sound? Mechanically it's better, but narratively it's the opposite: you use it to take people by surprise instead of using as a get out of the jail card.

- Lies: you'll roll badly sooner or later, and then will they believe you anything you already said in the past? You have to mix lies and truths, and spreading false rumors and be believed it's pretty fun imho. Telling lies is different from falsely promising something. Should i change it to "spread false rumors"? My intention isn't that you can get what you want using a promise you won't keep, the intention was "you can insert some rumors or talk behind the back of someone inside a conversation and the person who hears it will believe those lies and act accordingly".

The dirty fighting was hard to understand, partially because the poison move was below it and I hadn't read it yet. SO I'd say put Poison first and also try to make it clearer.

I miss the new sneaking move, but I suppose this fits better

I much prefer the way vanish is written.

I would have liked poison to have less powerful straight killing effects and more narrative effects. You may not want to kill the person you poison, just make them unable to speak or fight the next day. Also, I don't like the instant kill nature of it.

Well the poison it's the exact same of the Wicker-Wise one. So vincent, take that! :D

I too think vanish it's fine as it is. For example, with 3 options you can:
- Easily cover the distance betweem you and the holy grail
- You seize hold of the grail
- You vanish into shadows, while saying out luck "suckers!"

I rewrote dirty fighting again:
"When you join single combat, and you wield a blade you have the right to fight dirty: you roll Wary instead of
Strong and your weapon is poisoned: the first time you harm your opponent, he loses 1 position if he picked that
combat option."

and about the lies:
When win someone over you can choose to roll Bold instead of Good. If you do it, you have the right to spread
false rumors and be believed.

Huh. Well, apparently I don't like the way Vincent did poison either.

As for dirty fighting, I just thought of something that I think fits better. When you join single combat you have the right to see where your opponent spends. It seems to go with the theme of spying/gaining information better.

Cool, very cool. I approve!

- Maybe a master of spies (like Varys) and a master spy himself (like Garrett) are too much different characters to fit into a single playbook : see the War-Captain and the War-Champion for example. I would focus on the master of spies, remove the roguish rights (vanish, fight...) and replace them with narrative rights.

I definitely agree with this. James Bond and M, Jaqen H'gar and Varys, the Angels and Charlie - agents have a different skill set from handlers. A Spymaster is more like the Maestro D', sitting at the center of a web and reaching out through other people. I'm not even sure what a superspy of the age would look like. In the Renaissance, the spy game was mostly courtiers. That's not as much of a thing in the Dark Ages. I don't think there's really a dedicated thief/rogue/agent in this setting. Just other playbooks with hidden loyalties.