First Impressions - A Town called Malice [UPDATED]

Nordic Horror

I saw A Town called Malice and instantly the idea hooked me. Several of my gaming friends said that they'd looked at it and immediately thought of me. I've been waiting patiently for the PDF to become available this August, as I've offered it as a game at the Furnace RPG convention in October 2019. Unlike many other games, the publisher delivered it bang on time and I've enjoyed the chance that the break away from home has given me read it.

So what is 'A Town called Malice' and does it hit the sweet spot for me?

The game is set in the small, isolated community of Malice which is struggling to survive. A significant event is coming, one that the people of the town hope will turn things around. But then a body is discovered, with a Darkness lurking behind, threatening to snuff out the hopes of the community. Players take the roles of key characters in Malice, archetypes with complicated and messy relationships that threaten the ability of the community to pull together. The weather and isolation mean that the community must find its way to overcome the threats against it without external help.

Each character introduces a location into the town, with a related Civilian (NPC). The players flesh out the locations and the civilians at the start and more details can be developed through play. The game encourages you to intermesh relationships with the civilians as hooks for the story to develop upon.

Malice differentiates itself as a story game rather than a roleplaying game. It describes this difference in that individual characters do not have stats that influence the game engine, and that a gamesmaster is not necessary to play. The story is broken into two Acts before the final denouement (three Acts if there are more players). Action is developed through structured scenes that come to a conclusion based upon the narrative and the player's roleplaying. In each scene, one player is in the Spotlight, with narrative control. The outcome is ultimately determined by rolling a pool of d6 built by the characters against an opposition pool based upon the stage that the story is at. Each dice has a fifty-fifty chance of success, with the players winning if they gain a win or tie in the number of successes against the pool.

There are three pillars that drive the game; Body, Event and the Darkness. Each has a number of dice associated with it. The Body pillar is the immediate focus, as the players try and establish what has happened and ultimately reveal what the Darkness is that they are facing.

Scenes can address any of the three pillars, a character's personal agenda or the relationships between characters. Addressing personal agendas gains the player character points which can be spent to introduce elements into the story; locations, civilians, and special items. This is the only scene type that does not need a dice roll to resolve. Addressing the Body pillar reduces the number of dice that it has, and allows the Spotlight player to either strengthen the Event pillar or diminish the Darkness threatening them. Once the Body pillar is reduced to zero, the nature of the darkness is revealed. Addressing the Event allows it to be strengthened, but failure will harm it. Likewise, the Darkness, except a failure will allow it to Manifest further either in the form of something threatening or with the death of a Civilian causing a further body being found.

At the start of the game, each player establishes a relationship between their character and the characters of the two players sitting either side of them. Half of the total relationships in the game will be negative ('Kult') and half positive ('Heit') at the start. The final type of scene is to address the negative relationships, with the outcome being a character point and the opportunity to shift a Kult relationship to Heit. This is important because the Kult relationships will oppose the success of the Event at the end of the game.

In the normal two Act structure, each player will have the Spotlight twice per Act. It is expected (but not mandatory) that the Body pillar will be investigated and resolved during the first Act. The second Act starts with the Darkness growing in power.

At the end of the final Act, the players build two pools. One is to support the Event, which is opposed by the remaining Kult dice. The other is to oppose the Darkness pillar's dice. Each player adds their own dice to the pool that they feel is most appropriate. Unspent character points can be used to add more dice to the pools. Any remaining body dice are distributed in opposition to the players. The pools are resolved and the players build a montage scene to describe the outcome. It is possible for the Darkness to survive yet the Event succeed and vice versa.

The game comes with two playsets; one is set in the Canadian North with the logging town of Malice threatened by the storm of the century. The other is set in the Arctic north, with the settlement of Malice threatened by the stability of the glacier above it. More playsets are promised by the publisher thanks to the Kickstarter stretch goals.

Overall, I think that this should work well with the right group of players. I'm looking forward to bringing it to the table at Furnace.

This is based on the initial PDF release which is 130 pages long, clearly laid out with great and atmospheric illustrations.

21 August 2019

[UPDATE] 
My blog gets syndicated on the Tavern, and one of the readers felt that the impressions above weren't clear enough. Here's take two:

Essentials:

• The players are all characters (archetypes) of roles in an isolated, small community that is struggling to get by.
• Each character has a relationship with two others.
• These are positive (Heit) or negative (Kult)
• Half the relationships at the start are Heit, half Kult
• Characters can get character points which give them a mechanical advantage (extra dice).
• An event is going to happen that the community hopes will change things for the better.
• A body is found; the body links back to a Dark threat (which may or may not be supernatural)
• The game is set at the scene level, and each player's character will get a turn in the spotlight.
• Usually, the game has two Acts over which the characters will have 4 spotlight opportunities
• The players co-create the locations and the civilians (NPCs) that are found at them.
• There are three pillars which reflect the state of the game
• The Body - the state of the investigation
• The Event - the preparation and planning for the event
• The Darkness - the strength of the evil
• Each scene can change the state of these pillars, or push a character's personal agenda, or affect a relationship.
• Each scene is resolved with the spotlight player rolling a pool of D6 against an opposition pool.
• 4,5,6 is a success
• equal or more successes mean the scene resolves how the player wants
• failure will negatively impact the Event or Darkness
• Act 1 is mainly about understanding what killed the Body and what form the Darkness takes
• Act 2 intensifies and draws towards a conclusion
• The final confrontation plays out as a result of the scenes the players were in earlier
• The Event pillar is resolved against the remaining Kult (negative) relationship dice plus any character dice
• The Darkness pillar is opposed by character dice
• Both player pools can be boosted with the send of character points
• It's possible that the outcome will have a success in either pool but not both
• The players take the results and do a final montage scene that wraps things up.

23 August 2019