Unfortunately, even this does not solve the real problem of a heist: you need to detail everything at the location of the heist and you need to detail every single person remotely involved in the location of the heist. And you need some way to convey this information to the group without boring everyone to tears. Reading long dossiers is not conducive to fun.
It's definitely a tricky balance.
Doing this in a storytelling game is much easier: Instead of planning everything out in detail, your create mechanics that allow the players to define the specifics of the mission as they're playing it.
But I'm reminded of the
Three Clue Rule, where Justin Alexander writes: "But while it may result in a game session which superficially follows the structure of a mystery story, I think it fails because it doesn't particularly feel as if you're
playing a mystery." Similarly, while this can create the structure of a heist story, it fails because it doesn't actually feel as if you're playing the role of Danny Ocean.
Unlike the mystery story -- where I feel the Three Clue Rule gives you a viable structure in which you can play a competent detective -- I'm not sure that the heist story is a soluble one. The enjoyment we derive from a mystery (wondering what the solution is) maps to the protagonist (who also wants to solve the mystery). But the enjoyment we derive from a heist movie (puzzling out what the con is) doesn't map to the protagonist at all (who's actually planning out the con).
IOW, playing Danny Ocean or Thomas Crown doesn't scratch the same itch as watching Danny Ocean or Thomas Crown in action scratches.
With that being said, the angle I would explore would be to keep the play-generated content of the storytelling game but hide it behind the GM screen while simultaneously making the creation of the plan into part of the mechanics of the system.
To be truly effective, I think this would need some meaningful and fairly unique structure. But the basic idea would be that the GM would start with only the broadest outline of an idea ("there's a hotel") and that idea would be fleshed out in response to player investigation ("we need a way in", "gimme a scout check", "25", "there's access to the central cooling shafts through the air conditioning plant on the roof").
It would probably be useful within that structure for most or all failures to be taken off the table. So if you fail on your check, you don't fail to find a way into the building. Instead, the way into the building is complicated ("you find a cooling shaft, but it's been rigged with motion-detction lasers").
A few more interesting design points:
(1) You want to avoid leaving each scenario so broad that the players are essentially painting on a blank canvas each time. OTOH, you don't want so much specificity that they bog down in dossiers or need to be railroaded to the GM's predetermined plan for the heist. Where exactly is that happy medium?
(2) Would it be possible to classify each type of common con, figure out the common denominators, and then design scenarios so that any con can work as long as its planned right? (Without turning prep into a nightmare.) Maybe if we can find enough common denominators.
You know how con movies always have people referring to different cons by nicknames? I've always wanted to track down a list of all the classic cons, but never had any luck. Anybody know of a resource for that?
The tower as analogue to the shakiness of the dream just seems too perfect.
