Capers

[Stormborn]

I saw a bit of Ocean's 13 the other day. It reminded me how much I love "caper" movies. You know, where the main characters have to pull a caper (kay-per, N: a high spirited escapade) for one reason or another. The Sting, the original Ocean's 11, the George Clooney versions, even to some degree the infinite versions of Cannonball Run (I count at least 5). And many more than I can name. There are alot of westerns in that catagory as well. I also would love to run or play one in a game.

I don't think that will ever happen.

For one thing it requires complete player initative. Sure, the GM can say "Shady McCrooked blackmails all of you into stealing the McGuffin of Infinite Wealth" but thats where the GMs input ends. The players, not the PCs, have to decide what to do next. They have to try and think like Danny Ocean, and most players that I know or have even virtual experince of just cannot.

Second it requires an great deal of work ahead of time on the GMs part. The GM has to know down to the smallest detail not only the layout and security of a target building but the behavior of every individual associated with the target. He has to know all the possible escape routes, all the obstacles along the way, all of the rivals, and all of the seemingly random complications (that all GMs know are not random). IOW he needs to know "Every engineer on every train, all of their children and all of their names, every handout in every town, and every lock that aint locked when no one's around."

As far as I know there are no published adventures that are fully a caper, although they seem the closest thing in popular culture to the kind of thing DnD Adventures should be. Maybe there is some out for Shadowrun, as that seems a setting just begging for this kind of adventure. Maybe I am just missing out.

Anyone know of any?

(BTW: this is cross posted from my mostly RPG related blog. Any replies can be posted there or here.)

 

[EricNoah]

A perfect example of the ways fiction and gaming do not necessarily coexist peacefully. Super-tight plotting is not a feature of most RPG sessions.

 

[roguerouge]

Sure there is. Any module where you do an assassination of an enemy leader in their castle is a caper job, just not for money. Tower of the Last Baron (Paizo) and Sons of Gruumsh (WotC) strike me as very heisty. You get in unnoticed, you do your thing, you escape.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Second it requires an great deal of work ahead of time on the GMs part. The GM has to know down to the smallest detail not only the layout and security of a target building but the behavior of every individual associated with the target. He has to know all the possible escape routes, all the obstacles along the way, all of the rivals, and all of the seemingly random complications (that all GMs know are not random). IOW he needs to know "Every engineer on every train, all of their children and all of their names, every handout in every town, and every lock that aint locked when no one's around."

Not necessarily. A lot of that sort of thing can be winged. If the players never ask about the sewers running beneath the building, the GM doesn't need to know whether there are any. If the players do ask about the sewers running beneath the building, the GM decides at that instant if there are any, and whether they're a viable access.

I think a caper game can be run, as long as the GM is willing to be flexible and roll with the unexpected.

takyris suggested a mechanic a couple of years ago, when I was gearing up to run a heist game - he proposed the 'twist point'. Each player has one twist point, which can be played at an appropriate moment in the game... and mimics those moments in Ocean's 11 where something is about to happen, and then we get a flashback that shows events that occurred earlier which alter the current situation. Those instants where something unforeseen and bad... turns out to be all part of the plan.

So the PCs are captured by the target's guards, and thrown into the cells in the basement. At this point, Lidda plays her twist point, and gives us a flashback to two days earlier, when she caught up with Angus, the jailer, in a local bar and paid him off. Now, back in the present, Lidda waits for the sounds of the guards to disappear back up the stairs...

"Well, if Angus is worth what we paid him..." Lidda counts bricks from the rear corner of the room, and when she gets to thirteen, she wiggles the stone gently - sure enough, it is loose, and slides out to reveal a key in the damp cavity behind. Lidda holds up the key to show the others with a cheerful grin. "So now we're inside the building, and all the guards are out patrolling the perimeter to make sure nobody else breaks in..."