This is going to be a weird thing to say because it should seem obvious.
I really like running the game I made.
The Streets of Avalon is a lot of fun and while it’s not perfect I’m starting to think one of the best features of the game is Downtime. I wrote about it in an earlier post here but I just need to talk about it some more after the most recent session I played.
The TL:DR of Downtime is players get 25 effort to put into various activities of their choice and creation to accomplish things. I, ask the GM, get to set the parameters and final costs of those activities which can further the games ongoing narrative, give them trainings they don’t have, and even create businesses, assets, and whatever else the players can think up. These downtimes happen between scenarios so it’s kind of like a player turn to decide how what happens next to their characters. But when downtime is spent we create scenes around that spend.
Long Term Projects
One of the things Spanky, our prostitute light magic user, wanted to do from very early on was create their own brothel. They spent the majority of their downtime and the cash they’ve earned to make this happen. 13 Sessions into the campaign, in the middle of our 5th downtime, the Succuin Manor opened. This provides some pretty substantial benefits to the character, especially where making money is concerned, and money comes and goes in this game pretty rapidly. So long term projects are possible.
Create Fiction
The other thing I have built into downtime is on your first and second spend the GM and PC set a scene together and we play out or montage a moment that highlights the effort the character is spending. Often, these downtime periods are 1-2 months long in game time. They can be extended or shortened but that’s what has felt right so far to keep with the narrative of upkeep in a city and having to pay rent and cover costs and what not. That’s a real thing in this game. Don’t worry. It’s pretty easy to put together and keep track of. These scenes turn downtime from a resource expenditure into something that creates a story and has often been jumping off points for us into other stories we want to tell. That’s what I want for people playing this game.
Keep them Involved
I also use a few other techniques to keep the other players involved. When I have to invent a new NPC or Location for a scene I ask each other player to provide a trait about the NPC or location going around the table. Takes some of the creative load off me and lets me play with some ideas I would never think to put together myself. When it involves a scene that has several established NPCs I’ll just let other players play them in the scene. But I don’t try and involve everyone every time. Just when it makes sense.
Build off the Scenes
If you still have effort left after the first two spends we just gloss over our further spends. We could drill down into them but it makes folks think about those first two spends and how it can showcase their characters’ evolving story on the Streets of Avalon. As the GM I’m often asking questions and improvising off the scenes we’re crafting in those moments. It makes it feel like they’re living their lives. To go along with that I was inspired by something in one of the downtime sequences where Bitsy, our orphanage running fighter, was working as a bodyguard for a young noble named Marcy Danforth who was being introduced to society. Marcy is 17 and is enamored with the idea of being an adventurous sort like Bitsy who she knew because Marcy had been reading penny dreadful dime store stories about The Clockwork Detectives. Bitsy was a bit taken aback by the level of detail in the stories.
I had zero plans for this to be a thing in the game. It just happened. Bitsy found out Marcy bought them from a print shop called Cappies in the Clocktower neighborhood where the PCs live. The PCs went to Cappies and found out that Cappie had published nine of these short dimestore novellas and that the PCs young ward Tommy Donavan, who Spanky had adopted and has been a part of the campaign since session 0, had set up the deal, told the stories of the Clockwork Detective, which they came up with their name right there, and had been collecting 10% on every sale since. Which is well over four thousand copies. Cappie even had some hard cover collections made up for the PCs for Tommy to give them. The PCs were very proud of their young ward, except for Bitsy who was quite annoyed, but came around eventually. They left Tommy one of the books and then Tommy came clean giving them a chunk of the cash he’d made off the deal. Tommy’s 13 by the way.
Use Downtime to Live in Avalon
That whole set of story beats came out of the ongoing narrative of Tommy being a part of things, and then me being inspired by one of the players choices. There were other things that happened, including a short little sequence where the Succuin Manor opened and we had several scenes in there. It was important to me to make sure I highlighted the opening of the Succuin Manor because it was something a player had spent a lot of time and effort on both mechanically and in play. It also allowed me to introduce the hook to the next scenario, which was from Missus Light, the mage who taught Spanky magic. She came and asked him for a favor and of course he was going to say yes. The Succuin Manor was only possible because of Missus Light so she was the perfect hook to use. When I publish the scenario it will be more generic so that a GM can use any NPC that’s close to a PC to hook them into the scenario. But that kind of design is for another day. For now, downtime is one of my favorite parts of the game because it’s one of the things that makes it feel like the characters live in this world. Makes the players feel like they’re really a part of it at the table.