Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, Part 4
If you want to read along with me, you can get the demo copy for free on A.N.I.M.'s official site or head over to their Patreon to get a copy of the latest playtest draft for $5. I'm reading the most recent playtest draft and there are significant differences from the demo copy, just as a heads up.
Day 4! (Its totally day four! I've never missed a day in my life, you can't prove anything!) This time, we'll be going over Pages 60-94, all the way up through "Traits."
We start off going over Composure, a common 'type' of system in many games with horror elements. Right off the bat, I strongly appreciate that it's not called 'sanity' or something like that. That's a very loaded term, and composure is a much better name in my opinion. Anyone can freak out and lose their cool, especially in a tense situation. Composure is essentially a mechanic that lays out how much pressure an investigator can take before they crack. Composure rolls are called for anytime something frightening or unnerving is encountered by an investigator, with the possibility of losing up to three Composure per roll (but most often 1). Everyone has seven Composure to start, and Base Modifiers on rolls are limited by current Composure (e.g. With a Composure of 2, no roll can have a Base Modifier of higher than +2). One might think having the same starting Composure score would make every player lose it at a similar rate, but this is untrue thanks to legitimately one of the coolest takes on fear mechanics I've seen in a game like this: Tiers of Fear.
Tiers of Fear is a system which outlines common fears on a character sheet, and it varies from person to person. While many horror games will ask what your character's deepest fear or phobias are, Tiers of Fear requires a deeper examination of the things that make a character frightened. There are seven tiers, ranging from -3 (Horrifying, this tier will be deeply traumatic and upsetting to the investigator) to +3 (Ridiculous, a silly thing for the investigator to be frightened of). There will be a more thorough breakdown on Tiers of Fear later, and specifically what fears must be placed on the sheet. I'm not sure if it would make sense for the formatting of the game, but I almost wish that section was placed here so I could discuss it in more depth now. The gist is that one investigator might be used to violence but have a phobia of snakes, whereas another finds snakes cute but would be deeply frightened of violence, and these investigators would see their Composure dropping at different rates even if they encountered all of the same things.
One last note on ToF - If two frightening situations arise at the same time, the Composure roll modifiers are added together (e.g. -2 + -1 = -3). However, if the situations both have a positive modifer, then that calls for two separate Composure rolls. From a mechanical perspective, I'm unclear on why this is - why not just have compounding situations apply a -1 to the worst modifier for each compounding source of stress? That's always going to be the worst case result anyway, since modifiers to this roll can't get worse than -3 (That is, you can't have a -2 and -2 add up to make a -4. Unless that is actually a possible outcome…?).
There are a couple other scenarios that cause Composure damage. Combat always calls for a roll, but only after the situation has resolved (presumably due to adrenaline kicking in). Composure rolls are also made whenever an investigator takes damage. There's also flat composure damage from failing to attend to basic needs, like not eating or not getting enough sleep. Finally, there are a few ways to regain composure - attending to basic needs or being the beneficiary of a Comfort roll from another investigator (more on that when we get to skills). Optionally, investigators may also regain composure from making major headway in an investigation, at the Narrator's discretion. Lastly, there is an optional rule for the erratic behavior caused by Composure falling to zero - a 1d6 roll is called for to determine how the investigator cracks. This is a useful tool and I'm glad its there(particularly for players unaccustomed to this type of game), as an aid in portraying unstable behavior.
There's a very fun optional rule next - the Jumpscare. When the investigator is surprised by something that may or may not be a scary creature or threat, they may Jump or Not Jump. If the investigator jumps, they make a flat +0 composure roll immediately, but get a +2 on their next roll to deal with the threat. If they don't jump, there's no inherent composure roll but there is a -2 penalty to their next roll. Mechanically, this is basically a gamble - jumping tends to be more advantageous if there really is a monster or threat there, whereas not jumping is better if there isn't. Of course, good roleplay and how an investigator actually would react is what should be informing this decision.
Skills are up next. Skill lists are a pretty standard thing in TTRPGs, of course. One thing to note is that just about any skill could conceivably be used for Investigation rolls, which is really cool! There's three categories of skills in Eureka: Interpersonal, Knowledge, and Physical. In very broad terms (skills in Eureka are very flexible), Interpersonal skills are used for interacting with NPCs, Knowledge skills are used for, well, knowing things, and Physical skills are used for interacting with the world. I won't be going through all the skills, but I will go over some highlights.
Comfort is used to calm someone agitated, especially in a tense or dangerous situation, but can also be used to restore Composure to fellow investigators. Paperwork is a pretty neat skill that lets a character read quickly and pick out important information from a text - its more handy than you might think! The Senses skill covers detection, but usually only in edge cases where no other skill makes sense, and an investigator will generally not need to roll Senses to see something - Senses applies mostly to the other four senses. There's also a selection of optional skills with more specific applications, which is always nice to have.
A huge highlight to "The Redacted Skill." This skill is completely blacked out in the Skills section, and is meant to be unknown to the new players. As stated in the book, "The type of player who would put points into an unknown, mysterious skill is just the type of person who would have high marks in this skill." I really love this element of mystery, an intriguing tidbit that puts something tantalizingly secret right on the character sheet. More on this skill waaaaay later, towards the end of the book.
There's a brief section on "when to roll skill checks" and I'm really thrilled that this guidance is here. I find that learning when to call for rolls (i.e. impartial arbitration to the narrative) is a hugely important skill for GMs to have, probably in the top five most important skills a new GM can develop. Having this philosophy of play here to outline exactly when Eureka wants rolls to be made is a very welcome addition.
