investigation

[misuba]

I've been thinking about Cthulhu gaming and looking over the awesome supplement The Armitage Files for Trail of Cthulhu, and meanwhile, my GF has been watching as much X-Files as she can get on Netflix Instant in the next room over. SO I'm thinking about investigation-based hacks.

I have a few moves written, sort of - nothing you might not guess as far as the sorts of things investigators do (analyse evidence, search, interrogate someone, question someone peaceably, race to get there in time, chase someone/something). What I'm getting stuck on, though, is what you get out of them. Specifically, I'm resistant to the thought that the GM is going to be doling out clues that have been prepped... but making up the clues and doling them out isn't a lot better. And having players take the lead by getting their own clues leads to pacing problems that could threaten the feel of all sorts of games, especially Cthulhu ones. Do I just need to get over myself?

Any thoughts, and any moves I'm missing, are welcome.

[Simon C]

Jared Sorensen said an interesting thing about investigation games.

He said that the normal approach to investigation rules is like:

"When you search a place high and low for clues, roll +observent"

or

"When you analyse a substance, roll +science"

and so on.

He said it would be interesting to make a game where the rules are like:

"When you have an unanswered question about something, and you try to find an answer, roll +investigate:

10+ The MC gives you a detailed answer to that question, in the form of clues and analysis of those clues.
7-9 The MC gives you a clue that suggests the answer to that question
On a miss, the question cannot be answered with available evidence."

Not sure that's the right format for AW though. It's more broad and genaral than a move really should be, I think. It might be better to have specific questions you can ask, like Read a Person and Read a Sitch:

When you examine a crime scene, roll +observant.
10+ hold 3
7-9: hold 1

Spend a hold while looking for clues to ask one of the following questions:
What is out of place here?
What is not what it looks like?
What happened here, exactly?
What should I be on the lookout for?

Or something.

That's more police procedural than Cthulhu, though.

[John Harper]

Someone (Simon, wasn't it you?) wrote an awesome post around here about managing mysteries as Fronts. Now I gave to go find it.

Here it is: http://apocalypse-world.com/forums/index.php?topic=417.msg3908;topicseen#msg3908

I'll also say: harm tracks can be used for many things besides harm.