Help with regaining reputation

[Taran]

After the last game I GM'd I ran into a mechanical issue that I need help fixing..

Background:

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One of the PC's is the daughter of a wealthy Merchant (1600's british colony).  Over the last week or so an enemy of the family's company set things up so that the reputation of the company would be tarnished.  There was a catalyst event in the last adventure that triggered all the carefully laid plans and rumours are spreading like wild-fire about the company's poor(unlawful) business habbits. This coincided with the Great Fire in London(by pure chance) which destroyed the many of the companies holdings in London.   The character desperately needs to turn things around to save her family from bankrupcy and destitution!

I basically said that the company has a "tainted reputation"  An Epic+8 aspect hanging over its head.

My plan was an extended test(contacts, resources etc..whatever appropriate), each roll takes "a few weeks" until there are enough shifts to undo the aspect.

Immediately, the player asked, "what can I do now!  How can I reduce the time?  I have piles of FP's to spend!"

Part of the reason for this happening is a compel on the characters trouble and to get them out of the city to explore the world and repair the company's reputation.

I'd originally offered him and aspect to be laid for every "mission" he completed for the company.  he could then tag that for a +2 when he does each roll of the extended test.

But he wants to do stuff now.  Stimy the rumours before they get out of the city etc...  But the whole challenge is designed to take a long time.

How can I play this out?  What kind of actions can the player do.  I don't want to railroad him and I want to give him free choice.  He's specifically going to be changing an aspect to represent the new "responsibility" his character has taken on.

Another idea was to set it up as a mini-game.

Like work spaces.  The quality of your workspace dictates the highest roll you can acheive.  In that sense, the "quality" of the company dictates the highest amount of shifts the player can get.  He can perform tasks to increase the quality of the company. 

Any ideas?

[Haru]

You could set up each of the companies as characters for themselves, and have them do a social conflict with several weeks per exchange. The characters (and antagonists, for that matter) can use that time to create aspects to help in the big conflict, if they like.

After that, all usual conflict rules apply.

[Mr. Death]

Make the things the player wants to do into challenges--they want to quash a rumor, well, determine a difficulty or make it a social conflict. They want to make good press, same thing.

[Dr.FunLove]

Hey Taran - interesting setup you have going on there!

So if part of the plan is to get him out of the city, why not have the character begin salvaging the reputation as the player is asking and then have some circumstance occur that forces him to get out of the city? Assaination attempt...sex scandal...or the aid he seeks being elsewhere. The player still gets what they want (tangible progress) and you get the character where they need to be.

[Theonlyspiral]

I would put the burden on the player to explain how he wants to stymie these rumors and rebuild the fortune in the short term. I would then just let the chips fall where they may. Run some missions for him in the short term but maybe limit the amount of shifts they generate to encourage him to leave. My preference is to have action generated by the party however.

[Wordmaker]

You could also explain to the player, OOC, that you've planned for this to be an obstacle to be overcome over a series of adventures rather than something that he can apply a quick fix for.

[Mrmdubois]

Or give him quick fixes that like most quick fixes are bad ideas in the long run.  Cook the books, false advertising, insider trading, money laundering and shady tax shelters, etc.

[Taran]

Or give him quick fixes that like most quick fixes are bad ideas in the long run.  Cook the books, false advertising, insider trading, money laundering and shady tax shelters, etc.

Ooh, nice.

Make the things the player wants to do into challenges--they want to quash a rumor, well, determine a difficulty or make it a social conflict. They want to make good press, same thing.

You could set up each of the companies as characters for themselves, and have them do a social conflict with several weeks per exchange. The characters (and antagonists, for that matter) can use that time to create aspects to help in the big conflict, if they like.

After that, all usual conflict rules apply.

So this is essentially what I was going for.  The player does actual adventures that help the company.  Every time the player successfully accomplishes a goal he's set out to do, it gives him a tag for a +2 on the role against the "tainted reputation" aspect.  I like the idea of making the company a character, but I wouldn't have it go head to head with the antagonist because...

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The NPC who set the whole thing up is a Native diplomate to the colonialists.  He comes from a very powerful clan and has lots of resources and many connections and, meta-gaming, is spec'd for this with his highest skills being contacts and resourses and having stunts that boost those. I actually am using Spymaster from the General NPC's thread.   The PC, head-to-head, would be out of his league.  In a sense, the NPC already got his turn:  set up aspects to tag and then performed the maneuver.  Now it's mostly about the PC's trying to counter.

I would put the burden on the player to explain how he wants to stymie these rumors and rebuild the fortune in the short term. I would then just let the chips fall where they may. Run some missions for him in the short term but maybe limit the amount of shifts they generate to encourage him to leave. My preference is to have action generated by the party however.

I agree here.  I want him to feel he can do what he wants and come up with his own ideas and at the same time there are tangible things the company needs to get it's affairs in order that don't have anything to do with the mystery.  Getting those things in order and showing people the the rumours are untrue would be part of the objective.  I want to make sure he can use both of these tools.

You could also explain to the player, OOC, that you've planned for this to be an obstacle to be overcome over a series of adventures rather than something that he can apply a quick fix for.

I have to keep this in mind.  He wants to reduce the amount of time and maybe I just need to stick to my guns on the duration.  The other option: I could have him make a roll and let him put some shifts gained into lowering the time...but that seems weird...and it would mean he's "off doing tending to business" for the next week while the rest of the party is doing adventures.  I like the idea of time passing, then making the roll and having his actions during that time-frame give a boost to the role, as opposed to rolling and then deciding how much time passes based on the result.

So if part of the plan is to get him out of the city, why not have the character begin salvaging the reputation as the player is asking and then have some circumstance occur that forces him to get out of the city? Assaination attempt...sex scandal...or the aid he seeks being elsewhere. The player still gets what they want (tangible progress) and you get the character where they need to be.

Yeah, that's part of an idea I had. I have adventure hooks that lead elsewhere. Also, I have other plot-hooks for the other players to get them out of town.  One player is an ex-soldier wanted for treason - (hence the reason he's living in a colony) and just ran into his old commanding officer.  Now he's packing his bags and getting out of town.  This might encourage the Merchant PC to leave as well...

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O.k I think I know how I'll run it..but I welcome any other suggestions.  I have time since our next game won't be for many weeks.

[polkaneverdies]

I would make sure to emphasize the difference between the reputation of a person and an empire spanning trading company.

I would go with the suggestion of every roll being a mini quest and taking a certain amount of time.

If he is still insistent on making one gigantic roll I would make him explain exactly what he was trying to do. The reasonableness of his idea would change the base difficulty (similar to a declaration). It should be fairly hard, especially considering that some if his problems are stuff like "London warehouse fires".

Frankly though I think you probably should not  have handled this as a simple aspect placement. Doing that puts the pc  in the mode of removing like any other aspect

[UmbraLux]

How can I play this out?  What kind of actions can the player do.  I don't want to railroad him and I want to give him free choice.  He's specifically going to be changing an aspect to represent the new "responsibility" his character has taken on.

Another idea was to set it up as a mini-game.

Like work spaces.  The quality of your workspace dictates the highest roll you can acheive.  In that sense, the "quality" of the company dictates the highest amount of shifts the player can get.  He can perform tasks to increase the quality of the company. 

Any ideas?

Use the fractal.  Break it up into a couple of appropriate rumors / taints / competing organizations (I'd suggest splitting by task types - social, financial, and competitors.  But specifics of your 'taint' may suggest other ways.), give each a rating and stress track to overcome, and let the PC(s) work towards taking them out.

As a potential example, say a group set them up as the fall guy for a fraudulent operation.  I'd base stress and resisting investigation on the operator's Deceit, add any appropriate aspects & tags, and we have an investigation oriented challenge.  If the group is also trashing them via print and rumor do something similar for a social challenge.  Defeating each is going to be one or more sessions of figuring out who is doing what (and possibly why) until you can successfully debunk (take out) the rumors.  Could be any combination of research, spying, talking to observers, and even strong arming the perps. 

[Mrmdubois]

You could also have the character have a quick fix by recruiting people to head up different portions of the company, r&d, marketing, etc.  That frees him up so its not his problem anymore.  Until the shareholders want to drop him as CEO and promote one of the guys he hired, or one of them is selling info or whatever.

[Taran]

Frankly though I think you probably should not  have handled this as a simple aspect placement. Doing that puts the pc  in the mode of removing like any other aspect

I like all your suggestions, but am focusing on this comment.  What would have been better?  Should I have kept the mechanic out of it?  Maybe just used it as my own reference for success but not tell the player?

Use the fractal.  Break it up into a couple of appropriate rumors / taints / competing organizations (I'd suggest splitting by task types - social, financial, and competitors.  But specifics of your 'taint' may suggest other ways.), give each a rating and stress track to overcome, and let the PC(s) work towards taking them out.

As a potential example, say a group set them up as the fall guy for a fraudulent operation.  I'd base stress and resisting investigation on the operator's Deceit, add any appropriate aspects & tags, and we have an investigation oriented challenge.  If the group is also trashing them via print and rumor do something similar for a social challenge.  Defeating each is going to be one or more sessions of figuring out who is doing what (and possibly why) until you can successfully debunk (take out) the rumors.  Could be any combination of research, spying, talking to observers, and even strong arming the perps. 

This makes my head spin.  Is each challenge run as a combat? where potential actions in said combat is maneuver: spying on "X" and a potential attack is an investigation roll?

[Dr.FunLove]

Let us know how it goes!

[UmbraLux]

This makes my head spin.  Is each challenge run as a combat? where potential actions in said combat is maneuver: spying on "X" and a potential attack is an investigation roll?

You could do it that way.  You'll want to extend the base exchange time if you do.  Hopefully that would lead to more extensive descriptions. 

I was thinking more along the lines of one or more extended consequential contests (YS193) but you have a point, that is fairly close to full conflict.

[polkaneverdies]

It seems to me that you want a lot more mileage out of your npc's actions than a simple aspect is going to grant you. There is some leeway in the invoke for effect area of aspects, but regardless of its name, an aspect  is somewhat limited. (mechanically it is a +2, or some reasonable equivalent as an invoke).  This is the idea your pc is responding to. You framed the situation as an npc rolled an 8, so it seems reasonable to him that if he slaps down some fp and gets a 9 he wins.
 If the situation were reversed and one of your pc's made a great maneuver roll would you allow him to tie up months of an npc's time and effort? I probably wouldn't.

It seems more like you want him to handle it like a consequence. That is entirely possible, but you would need to stat the business up as a character like someone already suggested. Given the npc's skills and stunt's he probably could have arranged an "ambush" that blindsided your pc's company and delivered a consequence the first blow. Then the little miniquests could be undertaken as "justification" to heal the damage or maneuvers to place aspects. Most of these would be on a larger timescale than your standard social rolls. Your npc could continue his attacks or maneuvers. This is the approach I would take if I wanted a real number crunchy way to handle it. (Beware the real possibility of actually crushing his business this way though)

If you simply want something with a persistent influence that helps to move the plot in new directions, I would consider introducing it as a new threat. This way your players know it will take considerable effort to address the rising issues.