Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Musings on Masks: Episode 08


EPISODE SUMMARY (New York): Wherein James Paterson needs to cope with his early days dealing with poverty in New York. Realising he hasn't enough money to buy himself a gun, he figures out a place to gamble and then spends a fair chunk of this hour trying to earn enough money to survive.

EASTER EGGS: I decided to reinforce how broke his character was by printing out some menus, learning some item prices, and keeping him busy for a few days until the hurricane happens (as he arrived early) by making him locate new sources of money and a place to stay.

I have to admit I got a sort of sick satisfaction from demanding various chunks of money from my player and having him slowly reduce his dwindling funds.

I think it also added a layer of grimy desperation.  He needs cash.  Therefore he needs cases.  It also encourages him to steal.  When he gets more cash I'll be less prone to spell out each expenditure but since his character is prone to randomly spend money I might make him roll 1d10s to determine how many dollars he wastes in a week above average living expenses.

I considered making his gambling experience a bit more lively, especially as it turns out to be illegal in New York, but decided against it.  I wanted to make this time work out ... so that next time becomes all the more climactic when gangsters chase him down.  Besides which, he'd had a bad run of it and I didn't want to break him too soon.

Oh, and as you'll doubtless figure out by listening to this, I know nothing of gambling, legal or otherwise.  I know very little about poker as well.

ALAS the fault for my Audacity problems seems to rest with Firefox.  I used Internet Explorer and it updated.  The situation should now proceed with better regularity.

No comments:

Post a Comment