A challenge is any situation requiring multiple tasks to complete. There are different ways to resolve a challenge, depending on its nature and how the gamemaster wants to present the situation. These different options can be combined as the gamemaster sees fit, providing a toolbox for structuring a wide range of different problems for you to overcome.
A challenge consists of two or more different key tasks. These tasks are the core activities that must be completed to overcome the challenge. Once all the key tasks have been completed successfully, the challenge is complete.
At the gamemaster’s discretion, you can attempt other tasks during a challenge—these won’t directly contribute to overcoming the challenge, but they can be used to remove complications, create new traits, generate Momentum, or otherwise gain some other useful benefits.
Group Challenges
Group challenges are intended to be completed through collective effort, rather than by a single person, often because it takes place over a relatively short space of time and is too much work for one character.
In a group challenge, whenever a character attempts or assists a task, they may not assist in other tasks during the remainder of the challenge, and any other tasks they attempt during the challenge increase in Difficulty by 1. This Difficulty increase is cumulative.
Time Pressure
Adding a form of timer to a challenge, extended task, or other situation is a classic way to increase tension and make a situation more exciting. When using time pressure, it can be helpful to break down the time involved into practical units. To do this, the gamemaster determines an interval: this is a set period of time which fits the actions being taken during the challenge or extended task. Some challenges may deal with tasks that take hours or even days of work, while others may focus on shorter tasks, only lasting 15 minutes or half an hour. The gamemaster should also determine how much time is available to complete the challenge, as a number of intervals, and what happens when that time runs out.
Typically, each task attempted takes two intervals to attempt as standard, whether it succeeds or fails (two intervals means it’s easier to alter how long the task takes). You may spend 2 Momentum on a successful task to reduce this by one interval. On a failed task, you may add 2 Threat to reduce the time taken by one interval, representing cutting your losses and giving up on the failure early.
The gamemaster may use complications to make attempted tasks take longer, adding one interval per complication; for this reason, tasks under time pressure often Succeed at Cost (the task isn’t failed, it just took longer than planned). This applies to any tasks attempted during the challenge.
If different parts of the challenge can be attempted in parallel, the gamemaster can also use intervals to determine who is and who isn’t busy at any given moment. This works well as a resource and people management problem, especially if the gamemaster varies the number of intervals individual tasks take to complete.
VARIED INTERVALS
As standard, a task takes two intervals to attempt, before adjustments for Momentum spent, Threat paid, and complications suffered. However, this does not have to be the case: the gamemaster may decide that an especially complex activity may take more than two intervals to attempt.
In this case, a successful task allows the character to spend 2 Momentum per interval reduced, down to a minimum of 1, and characters cutting their losses on a failed task may reduce the time taken by 1 interval for every 2 Threat they add, down to a minimum of 1.
VARIABLE TIME LIMIT
Sometimes, a time limit represents something that will happen at a specific time, unless the characters can successfully avoid it, such as attempting to defuse a bomb before it detonates.
However, other time limits may represent something that can be delayed or avoided: perhaps the arrival of a guard, messenger, or other troublesome person. In these situations, characters may attempt tasks in order to increase the time limit.
A successful task adds one interval to the remaining time, plus an additional interval for every 2 Momentum spent. Complications may reduce this by 1 interval each, and a failure with a complication, at the gamemaster’s discretion, may mean that the remaining time is actually reduced, as the delaying tactics have the opposite effect.