FORUM

Continuing my updates via forum post, here's #6! This time it's about chases. Chases in SK are fast and, appropriately, constantly changing. The scenery that is rushing by plays a large part in how the chase goes. Chase rules work for racing, too, by the way. In fact, the adventure we're running at Gen Con features a race at the Rose Downs.

To run a chase in SK, you first determine initial positions. There are six range increments: 1-5 and Long. The initial positions are determined by roleplay, either through positioning in combat, group narrative, or some other method.

Each round, the GM describes the environment the chase has entered and the base difficulty or target number of the area (this is often just the Doom of the kingdom, but easy or hard chase areas can increase or decrease it by one or two). The person in the lead of the chase might also have a choice as to what environment to enter as well: the road forks and he could take his horse galloping through a wedding party in a churchyard or through a tunnel meant for foot traffic under the river bridge. Each presents its own challenges and opportunities.

After the GM or the chase leader has described the new territory, the parties in the chase choose an action. There are six basic actions: run, sprint, under control, attack, defend, or environmental trick. There's a handy chart to keep things straight, but you probably won't need it. Run gives you no bonuses; sprint gives you a bonus if you succeed at a higher Chase target number than normal; under control lowers your chase target number but provides commensurately lower bonuses; attack and defend are obvious (and don't gain as much ground as Run); and environmental tricks are the wild cards.

Once everyone has determined his action, the actions are resolved. The results of the actions can increase or decrease the die size used to make the Chase roll at the end of the round. In other words, if Gerald's arrow slices through the fleeing burglar's thigh, the burglar is going to have a much harder time making his chase roll this round.

After the actions are resolved, everyone makes the chase roll for the round. The chase roll determines how much ground you gain. Everyone is sorted into a new order using the 1-5 and Long range increments. Then the next round starts, probably in a new environment with new tricks available. GMs and players are encouraged to exploit the environment as much as possible.

Chases are also very narrative because of the die you use to make your chase roll. You can use any characteristic or skill that you want, as long as you can narrate it logically. If you want to roll Reason for your chase, then you describe how your character spies a dock gantry with a pulley system and uses its counterweight to lift himself and zip through the air, dangling from the gantry, safely into the sails of the galleon at the next docks. These narrative descriptions are a lot of fun. They can get a bit out of hand if you have players that try to stretch the boundaries, though, so Quickness is the recommended characteristic for chases. Each other characteristic or skill is only to be used once per chase unless extraordinary circumstances arise or the character has been trained specifically for chases (through talents or class abilities). After all, what are the odds of finding a perfect gantry set up with just the right pulley system twice in one dock chase?

All right, that's it for now. Chases are a lot of fun, and in scripted games they really make things move. Between combat and chase scenes on the "action" side and social and investigation scenes on the "intrigue" side, scripted games have a ton of variety. Until next time!