3 tactics

a mechanic
by lenny
Game made for #RefractionTTRPGJam.

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prize
So you and your partner each want something and those things
that you want are incompatible. Alright. Define that thing that
you want as your prize and your partner will do the same thing,
in the form of an I want statement, like I want to grab the pearls
unnoticed or I want to stop Jacques from entering.

By the end of the conflict, only one person will have their prize.
tactics
Next, consider your tactics. You should have three. If you
don’t know what your tactics are, they’re as follows:

Your Body lets you do things physically, like running, lifting, or

enduring pain.

Your Mind lets you do things mentally, both in terms of intelli-

gence and social acuity.

Your Soul lets you do things spiritually, through sheer force of

willpower (or magic).

Your tactics might be different, like maybe Guns, Sorcery, and

Money Laundering, or something, but there’s always three of
them.

Each person should also have a card for each tactic. This can
just be an index card or whatever.
tension
You also have some amount of tension to spend. If you want,
you can keep track of some total tension you get to spend
across a game, replenishing it as you go. But otherwise you
can do it like this:

Both sides roll 6 six-sided dice. Then everybody takes turns

(starting with the instigator of the conflict) allocating one die
to one tactic, and briefly explaining what their character does
relating to that tactic - usually, the smaller the number, the less
significant the act.

Maybe you roll 1 1 2 3 4 4 and your partner rolls 2 3 3 3 4 5. You

go first because your character, Belle, is the one trying to line
up the shot against Mark. So you say, “Belle’s just letting her
muscle memory take control,” and toss a 4 into Body. Mark’s
player says, “The hairs on the back of my neck stand up; my
sixth sense tells me something’s not right.” She puts a 2 into
Soul.

You also have to always have a tactic card face down in front
of you. You can change it at any time, but you always have to
have one. Your opponent can’t know what it is.
breaking the tension
You trade blows like this for a while until someone decides to
break the tension. Instead of adding a die to a tactic, they’ll
roll it. You don’t have to say “I’m breaking the tension” - just
toss the die on the table and now everyone has to deal with it.

When you break the tension, both players immediately flip over
their tactic card. This is the tactic their character’s committed
to, that they’re using to lunge for the prize. The die rolled to
break the tension gets added to whichever tactic was on your
card. Same goes for your partner.

Whoever got the highest number in a tactic gets a success,

and the person with more successes wins their prize. Break
ties by having all parties roll a die; highest rolled wins.