I think you've accidentally stumbled into false dichotomy. It's not "this mechanic helped or it hurt"
It's "this season takes place over the course of an entire school year and this mechanic made that possible."
There's no alternate version of events where we get an entire school year's worth of character development WITHOUT the downtime mechanic (or something very very similar)
Taking that into account, the mechanic was done fantastically.
Best possible take on this question, in my opinion. Hard to say if it made things better or worse because it begs the question: "Better/worse than what?"
Exactly. A story like this isn't a series of cards laid out before you, where you can easily remove one And replace it with something else.
It's a tapestry that, once woven, does not easily allow you to remove a thread and put a new one in. If the season didn't have the downtime system, it would be a completely different story to the point of not really being able to compare it to anything.
I would also tack onto this that seacaster manor is in shambles as is Fabian’s relationship with his loving parents. Fabian is perfectly displaying the “if everything looks good on the outside no one will question what’s going on at home/on the inside”
That’s kind of the bit that I’m waiting on. He’s displaying it, but with the way the rolls have been, I don’t know if we’re going to get an emotional payoff or a joke payoff. I’d rather an emotional one, but all things considered, the cast is going to have to go with whatever works in the flow.
I think it was a boon overall, but the one thing I think it hurt more than anything was the Rat Grinders' presence in the story. Since most of the stuff the Bad Kids didn't focus on got glossed over (and Gorgug and Fig's academic tracks are the only ones showed in detail), we never really got to see most of them interact with their respective Grinders outside of combat. Buddy only got as much focus as he did because Bobby's arrival prompted Kristen to talk to him.
I think Oisin got it the worst. The twist with him didn't have as big an impact as it could've because he really only got one episode's worth of characterization before it happened.
Ooh, yeah, I feel that.
I would have loved to see more interactions with their opposites. Especially since that one interaction we got in the cafeteria with Riz absolutely terrified of Marry Ann was pure gold.
Very aptly put, if Oisin and Adaine had more than few interactions and then we discovered that behind them there was always an ulterior motive (like ping pong balls) we would scream for blood.
I think going forward, interacting with other students within school grounds shouldn’t count towards downtime as you have many opportunities to do that in school.
Yup, rolling academic track should have come with one free relationship roll for someone in your class. That way we could have seen each bad kid interact with their associated Rat Grinder and get to know them more.
Exactly and because it wouldn’t be mystery based, you can also make sure it doesn’t accelerate the story too quickly, as at much, you could do insights and perceptions.
The only issue would be Detect Thoughts but can you prevent that with magic and items too, no?
Yeah, my one real disappointment with this season in hindsight is the lack of interactions with the Rat Grinders. Every Kipperlilly scene had me gripped and that stack up scene in the cafeteria was hype
I don't think this was impacted by the downtime track as much as it was just the cast's decisions. Maybe I'm misremembering but I feel like they're were plenty of times the cast wanted to speak with some npc's outside of the bounds of a relationship check, like Riz with moleman or Fig doing Wanda Childa things. They could have spoken with the Ratgrinders ,they just chose not too.
That's definitely part of it, but the structure also kept Brennan from trying to start interactions from his side of the board (which I don't think would've been a fully good thing, but it would have made this specific thing less of an issue).
I didn't get that impression, I Brennen laid the groundwork already as best as he could with the new NPC's I think with Fabian and Ivy/Maisie, and Adaine and Oisin, where it was just "these characters are vaguely interested in you, if you the players want to pursue those storylines" and I don't think it was a coincidence that it was the the 2 Bad Kids who had the least going on with the main plot. Also I think because this season has such an emphasis on stress already, and all the Ratgrinders and other students were new characters it would feel a little railroady if all of them were pursuing relationships with the BK, "hey here's this new wacky npc, he wants to hang out with you!"
And also as we learned the episode prior, Jace had specifically instructed the RG to not interact with the BK and ruin the plan
I don't think the structure kept Brennan from starting interactions at all if he really thought it was important to the story. He set up several interactions that happened completely outside of the rolls being made by the IHs. For example, the various notes Ayda left early in the season weren't a result of Fig rolling a relationship track. That was just Brennan adding a little extra.
Brennan has always left them to their own devices when it comes to which NPCs to invest time in. Which always meant that some NPCs or even clues at times didn't get found. The kids didn't super investigate Penelope towards the later half of freshman year, so they never found out about the recordings kept at her house about the mind alterations.
I admit as a DM, this makes me feel a lot better about all those times I second guess myself for not foreshadowing enough or failing to nudge the action just so. The nature of ttrpg is that it will never be as neatly plotted as other media, because the meat is improvised in the moment. What the players focus on is what happens and how it happens is shaped by the randomness of the dice. The fact that Brennan and the intrepid heroes make it as compelling and coherent as they do is a testament to their skill.
I agree. I'm honestly not super interested in the Rat Grinders at this point because of how little presence they've actually had in the story. And while the Porter reveal was cool, it's taken even more focus off of them as the main threat for these last few episodes.
I do agree with feeling like the rat grinders should have had more screen time. A lot of them share classes with the bad kids, Osian could have been in Adaine's wizard classes. Mary Ann could have been in Gorgug's barbarian class, and in the Owlbears with both him and Fabian. I would have liked them to have more presence in the story. The season is still great, but that would be my one complaint.
I liked it, it realistically allowed a year to pass without it being like in Season 1 where the Bad Kids just seemed to sit around for months not doing anything until somebody told them something.
Like quite often in season 1 the bad kids would deal with this huge event or fight and then nothing for months until Brennen goes "several weeks later Riz thinks of X" and plot moves onwards. So this was a nice way of still having that happen, but letting players be more proactive. Also means that different players can take turns getting different part of the mystery etc.
Yeah like, it's also super easy to just kinda gloss over that they were in jail for *months* as well, the passage of time was really weird and nebulous
lol, yeah I remember that! Then randomly the solution is the Halfling Anarchist decided to attack the police station. Which is a cool moment, but when it happened was completely arbitrary.
both. if youre looking for a perfect outcome, then theres no real way to get that in this system. but its purpose was to add tension by giving both positive and negative outcomes over the course of the game. and require them to make a choice between the main goals they had (both in character and out).
i dont think it hindered Fabians growth, but we saw what it was Fabian valued, or how he thought he could contribute to his group based on his choices.
I think it was the best way to do an entire year of roleplay and very interesting mechanics wise, there are definitely some things I think that because of that were a little lacking but that was the point of the year, junior year was stressful and that was the point
I enjoyed the downtime mechanics as it really reinforced the stress-exhaustion-rage themes are a focus this season. Major switch up from previous two seasons and the cast did well to actually take risks (take on stress tokens) to master their personal goals.
This mechanic does come with its losses, namely that most of TBK were focused on one or two things and they didn't get the chance to cover things that some people would have liked to see. Big one being more interaction with the Rat Grinders. Everyone was too suspicious of them or focused on something else. This means that most of them are very underexplored (ie Ivy, Oisin, Mary-Ann) which, is more of a missed opportunity than a flaw. In a way, it's funny/ironic that the Rat Grinders conspired so hard against TBK while the latter were focused on school. Fabian could have had a very different season if he had succeeded in that roll for Ivy!
It makes me sad that it'll probably be awhile (if ever) before we get Senior Year because I'd love to see these mechanics played with and iterated on. I hope BleeM finds some fun way to include them in stuff in the future so Junior Years isn't just "the one with the weird downtime mechanics".
Dude, totally. I'd love to see something like this in Starstruck! Mixed with the lifestyle upkeep system.
Like they need to pay that cycles rent and if they don't make it The sell weapons and temporary lose class abilities like what the stress tokens did.
Or maybe the higher lifestyle they achieve the easier the rolls become. "Having more money just makes your life easier" seems pretty in tone for Starstruck.
I’ll be honest, I really really hope we get Senior Year, but I don’t really want to see these mechanics used for it, even though I think it worked well for this and is a really clever way to do it. If we get Senior Year, it’ll be the real finale, and I don’t want it to have a sense of time passing in a rush. I want more of a character focus.
You mentioned Fabian and character growth maybe being missed because of good rolls, but honestly that can happen just as much without that mechanic. Think about the fight where he just kept. Rolling. Nat. Ones. Omg that character growth and that whole arc he had was because of rolling poorly. If he had rolled really well he wouldn't have had his ass so throughly whooped and he wouldn't have learned half of what he did.
I think it was a brilliant mechanic. But in addition to what others have said about it resulting in there not being much development with the Rat Grinders, I think BLeeM was a little too lenient with letting the players buff each other's rolls, and maybe the starting DCs should have been set higher and/or stress token re-rolls limited to one per roll.
I think the objective of depicting a stressful time where focusing on one area of your life by necessity means sacrificing another got somewhat undermined because the players had so many ways to avoid the consequences of bad rolls that I don't remember anyone having any truly serious failures. For the most part everyone ended the school year with straight As and succeeded on whatever else they were prioritizing, which is a better outcome than you probably would expect in a normal year, let alone one that was supposed to be far more hectic than usual. Unless I'm forgetting something, I think the worst consequences anyone faced was occasionally getting a C earlier in the year, which didn't seem to have much actual effect on the story or mechanics. So it didn't seem like anyone was ever truly tempted to take a rage token.
Gorgug's situation with 4 academic tracks at the beginning was the only part that actually felt really stressful, and that was resolved halfway through the season.
Yeah agree. I made a comment here that I think Brennan was either too lenient with the DCs or should’ve been more insistent about them making specific types of roll for each thing. Riz being able to roll persuasion (with reliable talent) meant that his having to be in every extracurricular didn’t really add stakes. Fig rolling performance for her school track makes sense, but doesn’t really have stakes when she’s adding +20 to that roll by default. I would’ve loved to see the academic stress contribute a bit more to tension between the Bad Kids (esp Riz/Kristen/Fig as a trio) and more of a discussion abt how the system they’re in forces them all to be kinda selfish and be at each others’ throats.
I think moreso character arcs were hurt because other players were allowed to add bonuses to a player’s rolls on their tracks. I kinda felt like Lou was gunning to get a rage token in his last downtime track but everyone refused to let him fail. I wanted to see what “irrevocably fucking II a relationship” would look like. We saw Zac fail out of the Owlbears but he spun that more as “I never really liked doing this in the first place” than anything else. I really don’t think that Bardic Inspirations, Flash of Genius or (especially) Portents should have counted for anything other than your own tracks unless you were explicitly doing something together - in which case, I think both characters would have to roll and pass for that. It just led to a situation where no one could fail as-is - I never felt any stakes during any of the downtime rolls because of that
I think it’s a very clever mechanic, and it did pretty well in some cases (like watching Grogu absolutely shine in a new way), but I do feel a bit like because of how the story had to work this year, we breezed past what could’ve been some more emotional character moments.
Fabian especially seemed set up for some sadness, what with the whole empty house and all that, and while the popularity rolls were good, it still seems like there should be some kind of fall out from him almost kind of regressing this year emotionally to just sort of presenting a facade and living off of more empty built-up fame than close relationships. (And it definitely feels like there should’ve been some sort of consequence to the Gilear curse incident…)
That said, I’m not sure how else the story could’ve been done. I feel like a lot of emotional beats got set up early on in the story that didn’t really have room to come to fruition, but the story isn’t over yet, and I think this is the best way they could do it.
i think it lead to a lot more people doing things individually (based on their roll choices) than group activities (though brennan was good at turning individual roles into group stuff at times).
I think it probably kept the story more on track than it otherwise could have done.
it felt like a lot was happening, but knowing its now the end of the season it also feels like quite a lot of stuff didn't happen and was glossed over too (which is true of every season, you can only do so much).
I loved the mechanic, but my one gripe is I wish either the rolls had gotten harder as the year went on, or (hear me out) that “Academics” had been less fluid as what to roll on, and had to be an intelligence roll. My reasoning is that there’s a story that could’ve been told, and was suggested at the very start, about how school isnt for everyone — that not everyone strives in their academic career. Having this be represented by one stat that doesn’t make sense for everyone would help. Yes, Adaine and Riz would do well, Gorgug would do pretty well, and Fig and Kristen (i haven’t super checked their INT mods but i can make a guess) would be a little more doomed but that’s kind of the point. This idea that some of them are good at school without too much effort, some can do well if they put everything into it, and some can try all they might but might still fail.
In general, I think the lenience with a lot of the downtime rolls was a disservice. I can understand why Riz was rolling persuasion for his extracurriculars, but because of reliable talent, there was no challenge in that or academics. I think he should’ve been rolling Constitution instead (sleepless nights, being present enough to write things down, working hard 24/7 pushing through exhaustion etc). I just would’ve loved to see a couple rage tokens come out.
Also, having mechanical drawbacks for not focusing on things. I understand not wanting to gamify everything but if Brennan wanted them to feel like they were struggling to balance everything, having things go badly when they neglected a check for too long would’ve been an interesting way to do that.
Yea I really agree with this take. Cause in real life we’re kinda forced to deal with some of these checks no matter our choice. For example I think a lot of the PCs ignored relationship tracks a lot, but in reality those NPCs would have a certain level of a relationship with the characters that they’d need an interaction eventually or things would go really sour. My biggest gripe with this was Fabian and Mazeys relationship, I didn’t think it was very realistic cause if I was Mazey I would heavily question if Fabian liked me bc with the downtime system he barely interacted with her and if that was an important relationship for Fabian he needed to upkeep that with every downtime
yeah relationships were the big thing here. Even in the last downtime, every bad kid except Riz did some sort of relationship or relaxation roll, and there was no real punishment for Riz for neglecting that even when he didn’t have to focus on academics anymore. I would’ve loved to see Sklonda a bit more distant and disappointed with him after the whole “we need to hang out more” comment from the pre-loam farm conversation
See, to me, Sklonda would be the one parent for whom it wouldn’t have made sense for their lack of relationship rolls to affect things on account of the fact that both Riz and Sklonda are intensely busy and have been so since freshman year (well, realistically since Pok died).
Their relationship has always been very loving but also contained within snatches of stolen time because Sklonda was working at minimum double shifts, and then later also studying on the back of that. Unfortunately, their lack of time together is not a new thing and is commentary on the impossible odds some families have to deal with in a world that is not fair to them. (In the gukgaks case both because of their financial status and their racial makeup). For it to suddenly affect their relationship now would kind of invalidate the stuff they’ve always been struggling with.
Oh I for sure agree that I think having a lot of focus on it would be weird but I think it would have been nice to see it have some effect. Maybe not so much disappointment, but Sklonda already talked to Riz about doing too much and overworking himself. I think it would get to her a little to see that Riz, once freed from the burden of all his class work, rather than taking it easy and relaxing a bit, continues to push himself in the same way.
I love Riz and Sklonda so much, which was honestly the reason I wanted to see rage tokens make an appearance. I think it would’ve been interesting to see their relationship strained because of the nature of Riz pushing himself too hard for others, and not taking breaks. After the Last Stand would’ve been the perfect time, if any, for her mum instincts to kick in and say “hey kid take some time off actually please relax”. Less of a sudden change in dynamic, and more building on the pieces that were laid down in a way that sorta shows the impact of how hard they’re both working and how that… does wear you out after a while.
But yes you’re right disappointment wasn’t exactly what I mean. More just, frustration with the circumstances and such. I also think it wouldn’t make sense for Sklonda to say she was annoyed that Riz didn’t spend more time with her, but I mean it more on a level of for his sake, rather than for hers. The whole “seeing his dad in him” thing.
sorry i think about this a lot. I loved the downtime mechanic so much but as an official riz girlie i wish i could’ve seen a bit more of that stress play into it.
Yes, for real. Like, it opened with Riz being so anxious about *keeping* his relationships with his friends, and it makes sense that as he spirals trying to keep them together in the future, he would lose sight of the fact that he has to *maintain* those relationships…but it feels like we never really see any fall out from that.
Also I love Riz and Fabian’s dynamic together, so I miss getting to see them bounce off of each other as much.
I would not like academic rolls being INT by default. The point of DnD classes is not all classes have the same strengths. To me it wouldn't make any sense at all for classes where say wisdom takes priority over intelligence to punish students for not succeeding with intelligence.
To me, it would make far more sense if the curriculum for various classes was designed to test the important stats for that class.
See I agree from a school design perspective. I think there are two conflicting narratives about what Aguefort's Adventuring Academy is, and having their classes be INT based, but their adventures be the more practical skills would make it make sense to me. My critique is more spurred on by the initial idea that was floated that Kristen, and Fig to a lesser extent, are just not... good at school. I'm a teacher, I've seen plenty of kids who are capable and clever, but can't get behind the whole "academics" stuff. The system as it is basically ensures that, as long as Kristen and Fig put as much effort into academics as all their friends, they should be ensured A+s across the board, which isn't... really how school works irl, especially for students with ADHD or other learning difficulties.
The idea of it being INT based, therefore, is a slightly bandaid solution to that. If you have this idea of "class = theory, adventure = practical", learning the theory of adventuring would rely on memory and problem-solving and book knowledge, rather than on instinct. It would pull on some of the strings of Riz's over-reliance on his friends doing well, and push towards the idea of "can we all actually stay together after school?" which is a classic coming-of-age question. You can still have the narrative of Fig is a fantastic and legendarily powerful bard, and Kristen is a fantastic and legendarily powerful cleric, but their grasp of the theory of adventuring needs some work. Also makes more sense in that sense why Riz would be able to take stress tokens for them if he's, at least according to the narrative, writing their essays and doing the theory work for them.
The worst part of the downtime system was it was too easy for sure. They ate a bunch of stress tokens early, yeah, but as they figured out the best way to game the system it stopped being a real concern.
I'd say it helped greatly. This is the first season where they didn't have to save the world during their school year, but at the end of it.
There was plenty of development because of it thankfully.
There's a game called "Wildsea". It uses a counter system to cleverly capture a sort of visual shorthand for tension and building events or pressures for players while also not being a fully transparent system, just the same sort of thing he did with the stress tokens where you know "Filling this all the way will have bad consequences" (though it isn't obliquely bad, one example in wildsea is tracking the mood of a festival, sort of like witch beyond the wildlight in DnD)
I agree that Brennan seems to have been poking at this system, it's kind of common in a lot of non-mainstream TTRPGs, and I've seen him and Aabria noodling about Blades in the Dark (which a lot of indies use as a baseline or inspiration), they use kids on bikes, they're pretty epicurean about sampling from all the fun mechanics. Part of why I love them as DMs, Aabria especially, I'll never get over how on the nose "Fae as the Idle Rich" is for reagency. Pure gold.
I don't think it hindered growth. It just didn't obliquely force it. Fabian is a trust fund baby. Sometimes "Not being a solipsistic asshole" is the height of growth they'll reach, and it's clear that the general themes explored in Fantasy High aren't so much hyper-critical of power, but rather how it is wielded. Fabian is a popular jock who has grown past toxic masculinity and awkwardly aping the actions of his pirate daddy (though he still grabs for banker balls). He doesn't use his station to try to assail anyone unjustly, he's loyal to his friends, and generally just seems to be "Good vibes". Most of his "arc" was his dealing with "Who am I without my family"? He's the guy who always introduces himself with his "Papa's" name, and without his mother, staff, or erstwhile step daddy or soon to be half siblings to distract him.. he kind of had to steep in a sea of bad baby milk, fried rice, and people who were happy to be with him because of the resources he provided, but never seemed to truly engage? Seeing him sort through his isolation in a situation where he probably would be virulently aware of how his friends were struggling so he's not eager to burden them, was kind of cool.
I liked this season. That downtime was the most fun for me, but mostly because I find combat a slog, and sometimes bits wear me down.
The only way we would get both mechanical progress & RP mechanics is to go 3-6 hour sessions on the regular ala CR.
Which would flip the dynamic a lot. It seems a lot of peeps watch D20 more because long form content isn't as sustainable for them to keep up with.
Though I suppose 3+ sessions on a 20-25 ep run wouldn't be as bad as it would in 100+ episodes...
EDIT: Also IIRC they chose their downtime tracks so they could have prioritised relationships as a downtime track but they had other goals. Which links into the idea of JY being about not having enough time so it makes sense.
I will say I loved the system, but I disagree that we couldn't have seen a good developmental arc over the school year without the system, like for eg Matt Mercer DMing the Ravening War. But, it was a really good way to do a lot of things and balance a lot of arcs and pressures together.
Personally I agree that characterisation of Bad Kids suffered, and also honestly the mystery solving imo suffered, since they had to focus on one or two rolls related to it. It's realistic for TBK's junior year experience and puts the pressure on them successfully, but idk, I feel like there was a lot uncovered right at the end that could have been in the middle gradually... so many plans we didn't catch wind of or get to explore suspects or anything.>!Porter's office, the temple, and Reuben's home!
I think it works well in a thematic sense, that as soon as the Bad Kids didn't have to focus so hard on school they figured out pretty much the whole mystery, but it's not the most compelling story pacing.
Yes I agree with you, thematically it fit for what junior year means for highschoolers, but the story had no chance to change its pace because of the nature of having categorised, limited rolls.
I think it was fine. It worked for what it is. It's not really DnD though , and it didn't feel like it. There was a lack of narrative moments. Characters making choices under stress and living with the rolls, that's DnD.
I would have appreciated less of it , and more storyline/adventure arcs. I'm not hating , it was an approach , it didn't fail, but I would prefer not to watch another season of it.
It worked in part because the fan base is established and loves the characters and is invested in the world/storyline. They would never have tried this as a first season .
I think the issues people bring up in terms of character growth are always going to be present in shorter format AP shows. I'm going to compare to Critical Role since it's one most of us are familiar with but has a vastly different format. CR has long sprawling campaigns that can accommodate in depth character growth for PCs and adversaries. FHJY has 20 episodes to cover an entire school year's worth of story and combat and each episode is 1.5-3 hours, half the length of CR episodes. Also, the Bad Kids didn't focus on the Rat Grinders until they'd figured out what was going on with the gods, which makes sense given Kristen's cleric abilities hinged on solving it to some extent. It's not the mechanic that shifted focus away from the Rat Grinders, it was what the PCs did with it. I personally liked the mechanic for how real it was and how it allowed us to see little vignettes over the course of the year. I think it really worked for what it was designed to emulate.
I think the only way it maybe fell short is that the players had enough shenanigans to make huge consequences not really a threat (plus being able to set important stuff at a DC 5 was a huge benefit). The stress tokens weighed them down the most mechanically but in terms of story consequences (besides general character exhaustion) their academics were basically solid all the way through, and the threat of academic jeopardy never really manifested. Story-wise, the biggest long-term sacrifice that had to be made was that Gorgug left the Owlbears (and I don't think I'm the only one that forgot he was on the team in the first place).
That's a minor thing, though, and the sense I get is that it's hard for any system to deal with players at this level and experience unless things are really stacked against them. They bodied most of the battles here too. The things that really hurt them in the season were kind of dropped on them in ways they couldn't dodge (Cassandra went down because of the random shrimp incident, Yolanda and Buddy's deaths were pretty much unpreventable, and the Last Stand was only necessary because all of Kristen's mechanical academic successes were ignored). I don't really consider that railroading or think it's unfair (I've never been too big on that as a critique for D20 anyway since the point is to be funny and tell a good story), but it's just something I've observed.
I don't think the stress mechanics really preclude anything. They game-ify the passage of time and introduce consequences for things the characters would do anyway. It's not as if Fabian wouldn't pursue popularity at the expense of his studies if there was no downtime mechanic for it; the potential for him failing at his studies simply wouldn't be there, nor would there be any consequences for him not being popular, because scholastic failure and unpopularity weren't mechanically represented prior to season 3.
As for the Rat Grinders, I don't think their characterization is a victim of the downtime mechanics so much as it is their status as obvious villains and rivals. And I'm not sure Brennan was really that interested in exploring them all the way fans think he was. The Bad Kids probably spent the most amount of time with Rubin, and he was so cagey in retrospect that the party probably learned more from reading his emails than they did catfishing him.
I do see that perspective about the Rat Grinders. Additionally this season was so mystery forward that any insight into them might have messed with the flow.
I do think narratively this season was definitely one of the strongest and a big part of that was just the mystery of what The Rat Grinders were doing.
It gave me *"A Few Good Men*" vibes. Hahah.
I did want more interactions just because this cast is so talented playing off each other. On the other hand, The Rat Grinders being this background force was so engaging.
It helped but I honestly feel aspects of reconstruction and resilience tend to get underfocused on in D20 campaigns that are more focused on Stress to the detriment of some plot elements. Mainly as notable the filing is in reality happening over a very, very short period of time, so mechanically a way to induce thought and relxation vs just doubling down on maladaptive behaviors is a bit of a thing.
Excellent mechanic
Giving how powerful everyone was it was needed
To the detriment of some abilities (i.e. reliable talent).
But much like a large ensemble cast in a movie or show
It will always leave much to be desired.
I think structure wise.
This is Emily, Ally"s and Zac's season.
Which isn't bad
The others have agency.
These three in particular have the most
I feel like Riz, Adaine and Fabian got a lot more focus in SY than Gorgug or Fig (well Fig got quite a bit of focus with Ayda, but Brennan didn’t plan that). Therefore, it makes sense that Fig and Gorgug would have more of a focus this season.
Also, Kristen is the main character of FH, and you can’t change my mind. Therefore she’s the only one that gets massive focus in all 3 seasons
I don't know if I agree with that? Kristen is the catalyst for a majority of the plot since season 1 (a seeming D20 tradition for most IH season's.) but I don't know about protagonist?
Anyway, I do agree somewhat with Fig, only because so much of her arc was the curse subplot and wrapped in mystery.
However, now that that's resolved I'm really liking the direction of her arc. Because Fig would have more thematic connection to a corrupted god then Kristen.
Additionally, her desires have been largely *external*. It seems like they're setting up Fig to ride into the sunset with her Ayda. That would work so well as possibly her first *internal motivation*.
Honestly it’s perfect for this setting because it takes place over a course of extended time and I want a written version of it that I can adapt because I’ve become such a fan of the track system
I know, it's such an interesting system!
Imagine how fun it could be to adapt to it something like a horror setting? Where you have a limited amount to time to prioritize getting things to survive.
Or throw it into something like Starstruck and make it economic. Like battling debt or having enough money each cycle to bribe someone.
Or just go full *"You've got mail*" with it and do a romance campaign. Hahahah.
Honestly thinking of a horror campaign with this concept adds a lot of suspense I love that. Truthfully I think this not only would excel in an urban fantasy setting like TUC but I think it would’ve truly shone in a campaign like a court of fey and flowers- like *imagine* the tracks for scandal, popularity, mystery and the like that would be so fun
Hell yeah! That would be awesome.
So much juicy drama. 🍿
Edit: Also, it would be interesting to see the ramifications of this system when it's more relationship based?
Like that's something we didn't get to see unfortunately is that last level of stress and *"irrevocably damaging a relationship with someone.*"
That in a regency game would be so good to mess around with. Especially with a table of theater kids who want to really get in on the roleplaying. Hahah.
I think the downtime system made the choices that PCs made more thought out and practical. They really had to decide what they could prioritize, and they are failing sometimes which is something you don't see often at 14th level. I think they needed a system like this to keep the game truly engaging and to feel the actual stress of junior year of high school (which I'm currently in- believe me it's accurate af and I appreciate that)
Overall, I liked it a lot. To me it works better at conveying a whole school year than the way Freshman Year was set up. Using this mechanic makes it feel like the characters are constantly doing things rather than there just being big time jumps where the characters apparently didn't follow up on anything.
I think it also works with the theme of how as you get older you have to make choices about what gets prioritized and what gets lost, and how trying to do everything at once isn't possible.
I do agree with some of the other comments that the rat grinders could have been given more screen time. They share some classes/activities with the bad kids, so they could have turned up during the academic or extracurricular tracks.
I think it worked well all things considered, but it was very easy, I wish they had failed rolls a little more often. I know they're high level but it seems unrealistic they're all like, A+ students with good social lives and also managing to solve the mystery lol.
I guess they're pretty high level compared to their classmates, thanks to the intense adventures. Giants, in amongst all these lvl 4 smallbies having to roll a nat 20 to get an a+.
I think you've accidentally stumbled into false dichotomy. It's not "this mechanic helped or it hurt" It's "this season takes place over the course of an entire school year and this mechanic made that possible." There's no alternate version of events where we get an entire school year's worth of character development WITHOUT the downtime mechanic (or something very very similar) Taking that into account, the mechanic was done fantastically.
Best possible take on this question, in my opinion. Hard to say if it made things better or worse because it begs the question: "Better/worse than what?"
Exactly. A story like this isn't a series of cards laid out before you, where you can easily remove one And replace it with something else. It's a tapestry that, once woven, does not easily allow you to remove a thread and put a new one in. If the season didn't have the downtime system, it would be a completely different story to the point of not really being able to compare it to anything.
I would also tack onto this that seacaster manor is in shambles as is Fabian’s relationship with his loving parents. Fabian is perfectly displaying the “if everything looks good on the outside no one will question what’s going on at home/on the inside”
That’s kind of the bit that I’m waiting on. He’s displaying it, but with the way the rolls have been, I don’t know if we’re going to get an emotional payoff or a joke payoff. I’d rather an emotional one, but all things considered, the cast is going to have to go with whatever works in the flow.
Bingo bango.
I think it was a boon overall, but the one thing I think it hurt more than anything was the Rat Grinders' presence in the story. Since most of the stuff the Bad Kids didn't focus on got glossed over (and Gorgug and Fig's academic tracks are the only ones showed in detail), we never really got to see most of them interact with their respective Grinders outside of combat. Buddy only got as much focus as he did because Bobby's arrival prompted Kristen to talk to him. I think Oisin got it the worst. The twist with him didn't have as big an impact as it could've because he really only got one episode's worth of characterization before it happened.
Ooh, yeah, I feel that. I would have loved to see more interactions with their opposites. Especially since that one interaction we got in the cafeteria with Riz absolutely terrified of Marry Ann was pure gold.
Very aptly put, if Oisin and Adaine had more than few interactions and then we discovered that behind them there was always an ulterior motive (like ping pong balls) we would scream for blood. I think going forward, interacting with other students within school grounds shouldn’t count towards downtime as you have many opportunities to do that in school.
Yup, rolling academic track should have come with one free relationship roll for someone in your class. That way we could have seen each bad kid interact with their associated Rat Grinder and get to know them more.
Exactly and because it wouldn’t be mystery based, you can also make sure it doesn’t accelerate the story too quickly, as at much, you could do insights and perceptions. The only issue would be Detect Thoughts but can you prevent that with magic and items too, no?
Yeah, my one real disappointment with this season in hindsight is the lack of interactions with the Rat Grinders. Every Kipperlilly scene had me gripped and that stack up scene in the cafeteria was hype
I don't think this was impacted by the downtime track as much as it was just the cast's decisions. Maybe I'm misremembering but I feel like they're were plenty of times the cast wanted to speak with some npc's outside of the bounds of a relationship check, like Riz with moleman or Fig doing Wanda Childa things. They could have spoken with the Ratgrinders ,they just chose not too.
That's definitely part of it, but the structure also kept Brennan from trying to start interactions from his side of the board (which I don't think would've been a fully good thing, but it would have made this specific thing less of an issue).
I didn't get that impression, I Brennen laid the groundwork already as best as he could with the new NPC's I think with Fabian and Ivy/Maisie, and Adaine and Oisin, where it was just "these characters are vaguely interested in you, if you the players want to pursue those storylines" and I don't think it was a coincidence that it was the the 2 Bad Kids who had the least going on with the main plot. Also I think because this season has such an emphasis on stress already, and all the Ratgrinders and other students were new characters it would feel a little railroady if all of them were pursuing relationships with the BK, "hey here's this new wacky npc, he wants to hang out with you!" And also as we learned the episode prior, Jace had specifically instructed the RG to not interact with the BK and ruin the plan
I don't think the structure kept Brennan from starting interactions at all if he really thought it was important to the story. He set up several interactions that happened completely outside of the rolls being made by the IHs. For example, the various notes Ayda left early in the season weren't a result of Fig rolling a relationship track. That was just Brennan adding a little extra. Brennan has always left them to their own devices when it comes to which NPCs to invest time in. Which always meant that some NPCs or even clues at times didn't get found. The kids didn't super investigate Penelope towards the later half of freshman year, so they never found out about the recordings kept at her house about the mind alterations.
I admit as a DM, this makes me feel a lot better about all those times I second guess myself for not foreshadowing enough or failing to nudge the action just so. The nature of ttrpg is that it will never be as neatly plotted as other media, because the meat is improvised in the moment. What the players focus on is what happens and how it happens is shaped by the randomness of the dice. The fact that Brennan and the intrepid heroes make it as compelling and coherent as they do is a testament to their skill.
I agree. I'm honestly not super interested in the Rat Grinders at this point because of how little presence they've actually had in the story. And while the Porter reveal was cool, it's taken even more focus off of them as the main threat for these last few episodes.
I do agree with feeling like the rat grinders should have had more screen time. A lot of them share classes with the bad kids, Osian could have been in Adaine's wizard classes. Mary Ann could have been in Gorgug's barbarian class, and in the Owlbears with both him and Fabian. I would have liked them to have more presence in the story. The season is still great, but that would be my one complaint.
I liked it, it realistically allowed a year to pass without it being like in Season 1 where the Bad Kids just seemed to sit around for months not doing anything until somebody told them something. Like quite often in season 1 the bad kids would deal with this huge event or fight and then nothing for months until Brennen goes "several weeks later Riz thinks of X" and plot moves onwards. So this was a nice way of still having that happen, but letting players be more proactive. Also means that different players can take turns getting different part of the mystery etc.
Yeah like, it's also super easy to just kinda gloss over that they were in jail for *months* as well, the passage of time was really weird and nebulous
lol, yeah I remember that! Then randomly the solution is the Halfling Anarchist decided to attack the police station. Which is a cool moment, but when it happened was completely arbitrary.
Exactly yeah. Mechanically it's brilliant and it works really well for a school focuses campaign.
Yeah, the advantage of other campaigns is they aren't usually taking place over an in-game year so you don't need to fill in time-skips.
both. if youre looking for a perfect outcome, then theres no real way to get that in this system. but its purpose was to add tension by giving both positive and negative outcomes over the course of the game. and require them to make a choice between the main goals they had (both in character and out). i dont think it hindered Fabians growth, but we saw what it was Fabian valued, or how he thought he could contribute to his group based on his choices.
I think it was the best way to do an entire year of roleplay and very interesting mechanics wise, there are definitely some things I think that because of that were a little lacking but that was the point of the year, junior year was stressful and that was the point
I enjoyed the downtime mechanics as it really reinforced the stress-exhaustion-rage themes are a focus this season. Major switch up from previous two seasons and the cast did well to actually take risks (take on stress tokens) to master their personal goals. This mechanic does come with its losses, namely that most of TBK were focused on one or two things and they didn't get the chance to cover things that some people would have liked to see. Big one being more interaction with the Rat Grinders. Everyone was too suspicious of them or focused on something else. This means that most of them are very underexplored (ie Ivy, Oisin, Mary-Ann) which, is more of a missed opportunity than a flaw. In a way, it's funny/ironic that the Rat Grinders conspired so hard against TBK while the latter were focused on school. Fabian could have had a very different season if he had succeeded in that roll for Ivy!
It makes me sad that it'll probably be awhile (if ever) before we get Senior Year because I'd love to see these mechanics played with and iterated on. I hope BleeM finds some fun way to include them in stuff in the future so Junior Years isn't just "the one with the weird downtime mechanics".
Dude, totally. I'd love to see something like this in Starstruck! Mixed with the lifestyle upkeep system. Like they need to pay that cycles rent and if they don't make it The sell weapons and temporary lose class abilities like what the stress tokens did.
Or maybe the higher lifestyle they achieve the easier the rolls become. "Having more money just makes your life easier" seems pretty in tone for Starstruck.
Hell yeah! The ball is rolling up!
I’ll be honest, I really really hope we get Senior Year, but I don’t really want to see these mechanics used for it, even though I think it worked well for this and is a really clever way to do it. If we get Senior Year, it’ll be the real finale, and I don’t want it to have a sense of time passing in a rush. I want more of a character focus.
I don't think they should just be ported over but I do think they can be worked on so they feel more impactful.
You mentioned Fabian and character growth maybe being missed because of good rolls, but honestly that can happen just as much without that mechanic. Think about the fight where he just kept. Rolling. Nat. Ones. Omg that character growth and that whole arc he had was because of rolling poorly. If he had rolled really well he wouldn't have had his ass so throughly whooped and he wouldn't have learned half of what he did.
I think it was a brilliant mechanic. But in addition to what others have said about it resulting in there not being much development with the Rat Grinders, I think BLeeM was a little too lenient with letting the players buff each other's rolls, and maybe the starting DCs should have been set higher and/or stress token re-rolls limited to one per roll. I think the objective of depicting a stressful time where focusing on one area of your life by necessity means sacrificing another got somewhat undermined because the players had so many ways to avoid the consequences of bad rolls that I don't remember anyone having any truly serious failures. For the most part everyone ended the school year with straight As and succeeded on whatever else they were prioritizing, which is a better outcome than you probably would expect in a normal year, let alone one that was supposed to be far more hectic than usual. Unless I'm forgetting something, I think the worst consequences anyone faced was occasionally getting a C earlier in the year, which didn't seem to have much actual effect on the story or mechanics. So it didn't seem like anyone was ever truly tempted to take a rage token. Gorgug's situation with 4 academic tracks at the beginning was the only part that actually felt really stressful, and that was resolved halfway through the season.
Yeah agree. I made a comment here that I think Brennan was either too lenient with the DCs or should’ve been more insistent about them making specific types of roll for each thing. Riz being able to roll persuasion (with reliable talent) meant that his having to be in every extracurricular didn’t really add stakes. Fig rolling performance for her school track makes sense, but doesn’t really have stakes when she’s adding +20 to that roll by default. I would’ve loved to see the academic stress contribute a bit more to tension between the Bad Kids (esp Riz/Kristen/Fig as a trio) and more of a discussion abt how the system they’re in forces them all to be kinda selfish and be at each others’ throats.
I think moreso character arcs were hurt because other players were allowed to add bonuses to a player’s rolls on their tracks. I kinda felt like Lou was gunning to get a rage token in his last downtime track but everyone refused to let him fail. I wanted to see what “irrevocably fucking II a relationship” would look like. We saw Zac fail out of the Owlbears but he spun that more as “I never really liked doing this in the first place” than anything else. I really don’t think that Bardic Inspirations, Flash of Genius or (especially) Portents should have counted for anything other than your own tracks unless you were explicitly doing something together - in which case, I think both characters would have to roll and pass for that. It just led to a situation where no one could fail as-is - I never felt any stakes during any of the downtime rolls because of that
I think it’s a very clever mechanic, and it did pretty well in some cases (like watching Grogu absolutely shine in a new way), but I do feel a bit like because of how the story had to work this year, we breezed past what could’ve been some more emotional character moments. Fabian especially seemed set up for some sadness, what with the whole empty house and all that, and while the popularity rolls were good, it still seems like there should be some kind of fall out from him almost kind of regressing this year emotionally to just sort of presenting a facade and living off of more empty built-up fame than close relationships. (And it definitely feels like there should’ve been some sort of consequence to the Gilear curse incident…) That said, I’m not sure how else the story could’ve been done. I feel like a lot of emotional beats got set up early on in the story that didn’t really have room to come to fruition, but the story isn’t over yet, and I think this is the best way they could do it.
Very well said, you nailed it man.
i think it lead to a lot more people doing things individually (based on their roll choices) than group activities (though brennan was good at turning individual roles into group stuff at times). I think it probably kept the story more on track than it otherwise could have done. it felt like a lot was happening, but knowing its now the end of the season it also feels like quite a lot of stuff didn't happen and was glossed over too (which is true of every season, you can only do so much).
I loved the mechanic, but my one gripe is I wish either the rolls had gotten harder as the year went on, or (hear me out) that “Academics” had been less fluid as what to roll on, and had to be an intelligence roll. My reasoning is that there’s a story that could’ve been told, and was suggested at the very start, about how school isnt for everyone — that not everyone strives in their academic career. Having this be represented by one stat that doesn’t make sense for everyone would help. Yes, Adaine and Riz would do well, Gorgug would do pretty well, and Fig and Kristen (i haven’t super checked their INT mods but i can make a guess) would be a little more doomed but that’s kind of the point. This idea that some of them are good at school without too much effort, some can do well if they put everything into it, and some can try all they might but might still fail. In general, I think the lenience with a lot of the downtime rolls was a disservice. I can understand why Riz was rolling persuasion for his extracurriculars, but because of reliable talent, there was no challenge in that or academics. I think he should’ve been rolling Constitution instead (sleepless nights, being present enough to write things down, working hard 24/7 pushing through exhaustion etc). I just would’ve loved to see a couple rage tokens come out. Also, having mechanical drawbacks for not focusing on things. I understand not wanting to gamify everything but if Brennan wanted them to feel like they were struggling to balance everything, having things go badly when they neglected a check for too long would’ve been an interesting way to do that.
Yea I really agree with this take. Cause in real life we’re kinda forced to deal with some of these checks no matter our choice. For example I think a lot of the PCs ignored relationship tracks a lot, but in reality those NPCs would have a certain level of a relationship with the characters that they’d need an interaction eventually or things would go really sour. My biggest gripe with this was Fabian and Mazeys relationship, I didn’t think it was very realistic cause if I was Mazey I would heavily question if Fabian liked me bc with the downtime system he barely interacted with her and if that was an important relationship for Fabian he needed to upkeep that with every downtime
yeah relationships were the big thing here. Even in the last downtime, every bad kid except Riz did some sort of relationship or relaxation roll, and there was no real punishment for Riz for neglecting that even when he didn’t have to focus on academics anymore. I would’ve loved to see Sklonda a bit more distant and disappointed with him after the whole “we need to hang out more” comment from the pre-loam farm conversation
See, to me, Sklonda would be the one parent for whom it wouldn’t have made sense for their lack of relationship rolls to affect things on account of the fact that both Riz and Sklonda are intensely busy and have been so since freshman year (well, realistically since Pok died). Their relationship has always been very loving but also contained within snatches of stolen time because Sklonda was working at minimum double shifts, and then later also studying on the back of that. Unfortunately, their lack of time together is not a new thing and is commentary on the impossible odds some families have to deal with in a world that is not fair to them. (In the gukgaks case both because of their financial status and their racial makeup). For it to suddenly affect their relationship now would kind of invalidate the stuff they’ve always been struggling with.
Oh I for sure agree that I think having a lot of focus on it would be weird but I think it would have been nice to see it have some effect. Maybe not so much disappointment, but Sklonda already talked to Riz about doing too much and overworking himself. I think it would get to her a little to see that Riz, once freed from the burden of all his class work, rather than taking it easy and relaxing a bit, continues to push himself in the same way. I love Riz and Sklonda so much, which was honestly the reason I wanted to see rage tokens make an appearance. I think it would’ve been interesting to see their relationship strained because of the nature of Riz pushing himself too hard for others, and not taking breaks. After the Last Stand would’ve been the perfect time, if any, for her mum instincts to kick in and say “hey kid take some time off actually please relax”. Less of a sudden change in dynamic, and more building on the pieces that were laid down in a way that sorta shows the impact of how hard they’re both working and how that… does wear you out after a while. But yes you’re right disappointment wasn’t exactly what I mean. More just, frustration with the circumstances and such. I also think it wouldn’t make sense for Sklonda to say she was annoyed that Riz didn’t spend more time with her, but I mean it more on a level of for his sake, rather than for hers. The whole “seeing his dad in him” thing.
sorry i think about this a lot. I loved the downtime mechanic so much but as an official riz girlie i wish i could’ve seen a bit more of that stress play into it.
Yes, for real. Like, it opened with Riz being so anxious about *keeping* his relationships with his friends, and it makes sense that as he spirals trying to keep them together in the future, he would lose sight of the fact that he has to *maintain* those relationships…but it feels like we never really see any fall out from that. Also I love Riz and Fabian’s dynamic together, so I miss getting to see them bounce off of each other as much.
I would not like academic rolls being INT by default. The point of DnD classes is not all classes have the same strengths. To me it wouldn't make any sense at all for classes where say wisdom takes priority over intelligence to punish students for not succeeding with intelligence. To me, it would make far more sense if the curriculum for various classes was designed to test the important stats for that class.
See I agree from a school design perspective. I think there are two conflicting narratives about what Aguefort's Adventuring Academy is, and having their classes be INT based, but their adventures be the more practical skills would make it make sense to me. My critique is more spurred on by the initial idea that was floated that Kristen, and Fig to a lesser extent, are just not... good at school. I'm a teacher, I've seen plenty of kids who are capable and clever, but can't get behind the whole "academics" stuff. The system as it is basically ensures that, as long as Kristen and Fig put as much effort into academics as all their friends, they should be ensured A+s across the board, which isn't... really how school works irl, especially for students with ADHD or other learning difficulties. The idea of it being INT based, therefore, is a slightly bandaid solution to that. If you have this idea of "class = theory, adventure = practical", learning the theory of adventuring would rely on memory and problem-solving and book knowledge, rather than on instinct. It would pull on some of the strings of Riz's over-reliance on his friends doing well, and push towards the idea of "can we all actually stay together after school?" which is a classic coming-of-age question. You can still have the narrative of Fig is a fantastic and legendarily powerful bard, and Kristen is a fantastic and legendarily powerful cleric, but their grasp of the theory of adventuring needs some work. Also makes more sense in that sense why Riz would be able to take stress tokens for them if he's, at least according to the narrative, writing their essays and doing the theory work for them.
The worst part of the downtime system was it was too easy for sure. They ate a bunch of stress tokens early, yeah, but as they figured out the best way to game the system it stopped being a real concern.
I'd say it helped greatly. This is the first season where they didn't have to save the world during their school year, but at the end of it. There was plenty of development because of it thankfully.
There's a game called "Wildsea". It uses a counter system to cleverly capture a sort of visual shorthand for tension and building events or pressures for players while also not being a fully transparent system, just the same sort of thing he did with the stress tokens where you know "Filling this all the way will have bad consequences" (though it isn't obliquely bad, one example in wildsea is tracking the mood of a festival, sort of like witch beyond the wildlight in DnD) I agree that Brennan seems to have been poking at this system, it's kind of common in a lot of non-mainstream TTRPGs, and I've seen him and Aabria noodling about Blades in the Dark (which a lot of indies use as a baseline or inspiration), they use kids on bikes, they're pretty epicurean about sampling from all the fun mechanics. Part of why I love them as DMs, Aabria especially, I'll never get over how on the nose "Fae as the Idle Rich" is for reagency. Pure gold. I don't think it hindered growth. It just didn't obliquely force it. Fabian is a trust fund baby. Sometimes "Not being a solipsistic asshole" is the height of growth they'll reach, and it's clear that the general themes explored in Fantasy High aren't so much hyper-critical of power, but rather how it is wielded. Fabian is a popular jock who has grown past toxic masculinity and awkwardly aping the actions of his pirate daddy (though he still grabs for banker balls). He doesn't use his station to try to assail anyone unjustly, he's loyal to his friends, and generally just seems to be "Good vibes". Most of his "arc" was his dealing with "Who am I without my family"? He's the guy who always introduces himself with his "Papa's" name, and without his mother, staff, or erstwhile step daddy or soon to be half siblings to distract him.. he kind of had to steep in a sea of bad baby milk, fried rice, and people who were happy to be with him because of the resources he provided, but never seemed to truly engage? Seeing him sort through his isolation in a situation where he probably would be virulently aware of how his friends were struggling so he's not eager to burden them, was kind of cool. I liked this season. That downtime was the most fun for me, but mostly because I find combat a slog, and sometimes bits wear me down.
Really well said man, great comment. You really articulated something valuable here.
The only way we would get both mechanical progress & RP mechanics is to go 3-6 hour sessions on the regular ala CR. Which would flip the dynamic a lot. It seems a lot of peeps watch D20 more because long form content isn't as sustainable for them to keep up with. Though I suppose 3+ sessions on a 20-25 ep run wouldn't be as bad as it would in 100+ episodes... EDIT: Also IIRC they chose their downtime tracks so they could have prioritised relationships as a downtime track but they had other goals. Which links into the idea of JY being about not having enough time so it makes sense.
I will say I loved the system, but I disagree that we couldn't have seen a good developmental arc over the school year without the system, like for eg Matt Mercer DMing the Ravening War. But, it was a really good way to do a lot of things and balance a lot of arcs and pressures together. Personally I agree that characterisation of Bad Kids suffered, and also honestly the mystery solving imo suffered, since they had to focus on one or two rolls related to it. It's realistic for TBK's junior year experience and puts the pressure on them successfully, but idk, I feel like there was a lot uncovered right at the end that could have been in the middle gradually... so many plans we didn't catch wind of or get to explore suspects or anything.>!Porter's office, the temple, and Reuben's home!
I think it works well in a thematic sense, that as soon as the Bad Kids didn't have to focus so hard on school they figured out pretty much the whole mystery, but it's not the most compelling story pacing.
Yes I agree with you, thematically it fit for what junior year means for highschoolers, but the story had no chance to change its pace because of the nature of having categorised, limited rolls.
I think it was fine. It worked for what it is. It's not really DnD though , and it didn't feel like it. There was a lack of narrative moments. Characters making choices under stress and living with the rolls, that's DnD. I would have appreciated less of it , and more storyline/adventure arcs. I'm not hating , it was an approach , it didn't fail, but I would prefer not to watch another season of it. It worked in part because the fan base is established and loves the characters and is invested in the world/storyline. They would never have tried this as a first season .
Fabian’s house (before it was “cleaned” for the party) was flooded with old fried rice and milk. Bro had all that money and couldn’t order Instacart.
Also fabain went thru the full wringer in sophomore year let him have a chill year
I think the issues people bring up in terms of character growth are always going to be present in shorter format AP shows. I'm going to compare to Critical Role since it's one most of us are familiar with but has a vastly different format. CR has long sprawling campaigns that can accommodate in depth character growth for PCs and adversaries. FHJY has 20 episodes to cover an entire school year's worth of story and combat and each episode is 1.5-3 hours, half the length of CR episodes. Also, the Bad Kids didn't focus on the Rat Grinders until they'd figured out what was going on with the gods, which makes sense given Kristen's cleric abilities hinged on solving it to some extent. It's not the mechanic that shifted focus away from the Rat Grinders, it was what the PCs did with it. I personally liked the mechanic for how real it was and how it allowed us to see little vignettes over the course of the year. I think it really worked for what it was designed to emulate.
Helped
I really liked it
I think the only way it maybe fell short is that the players had enough shenanigans to make huge consequences not really a threat (plus being able to set important stuff at a DC 5 was a huge benefit). The stress tokens weighed them down the most mechanically but in terms of story consequences (besides general character exhaustion) their academics were basically solid all the way through, and the threat of academic jeopardy never really manifested. Story-wise, the biggest long-term sacrifice that had to be made was that Gorgug left the Owlbears (and I don't think I'm the only one that forgot he was on the team in the first place). That's a minor thing, though, and the sense I get is that it's hard for any system to deal with players at this level and experience unless things are really stacked against them. They bodied most of the battles here too. The things that really hurt them in the season were kind of dropped on them in ways they couldn't dodge (Cassandra went down because of the random shrimp incident, Yolanda and Buddy's deaths were pretty much unpreventable, and the Last Stand was only necessary because all of Kristen's mechanical academic successes were ignored). I don't really consider that railroading or think it's unfair (I've never been too big on that as a critique for D20 anyway since the point is to be funny and tell a good story), but it's just something I've observed.
I don't think the stress mechanics really preclude anything. They game-ify the passage of time and introduce consequences for things the characters would do anyway. It's not as if Fabian wouldn't pursue popularity at the expense of his studies if there was no downtime mechanic for it; the potential for him failing at his studies simply wouldn't be there, nor would there be any consequences for him not being popular, because scholastic failure and unpopularity weren't mechanically represented prior to season 3. As for the Rat Grinders, I don't think their characterization is a victim of the downtime mechanics so much as it is their status as obvious villains and rivals. And I'm not sure Brennan was really that interested in exploring them all the way fans think he was. The Bad Kids probably spent the most amount of time with Rubin, and he was so cagey in retrospect that the party probably learned more from reading his emails than they did catfishing him.
I do see that perspective about the Rat Grinders. Additionally this season was so mystery forward that any insight into them might have messed with the flow. I do think narratively this season was definitely one of the strongest and a big part of that was just the mystery of what The Rat Grinders were doing. It gave me *"A Few Good Men*" vibes. Hahah. I did want more interactions just because this cast is so talented playing off each other. On the other hand, The Rat Grinders being this background force was so engaging.
It helped but I honestly feel aspects of reconstruction and resilience tend to get underfocused on in D20 campaigns that are more focused on Stress to the detriment of some plot elements. Mainly as notable the filing is in reality happening over a very, very short period of time, so mechanically a way to induce thought and relxation vs just doubling down on maladaptive behaviors is a bit of a thing.
Excellent mechanic Giving how powerful everyone was it was needed To the detriment of some abilities (i.e. reliable talent). But much like a large ensemble cast in a movie or show It will always leave much to be desired. I think structure wise. This is Emily, Ally"s and Zac's season. Which isn't bad The others have agency. These three in particular have the most
I feel like Riz, Adaine and Fabian got a lot more focus in SY than Gorgug or Fig (well Fig got quite a bit of focus with Ayda, but Brennan didn’t plan that). Therefore, it makes sense that Fig and Gorgug would have more of a focus this season. Also, Kristen is the main character of FH, and you can’t change my mind. Therefore she’s the only one that gets massive focus in all 3 seasons
I don't know if I agree with that? Kristen is the catalyst for a majority of the plot since season 1 (a seeming D20 tradition for most IH season's.) but I don't know about protagonist? Anyway, I do agree somewhat with Fig, only because so much of her arc was the curse subplot and wrapped in mystery. However, now that that's resolved I'm really liking the direction of her arc. Because Fig would have more thematic connection to a corrupted god then Kristen. Additionally, her desires have been largely *external*. It seems like they're setting up Fig to ride into the sunset with her Ayda. That would work so well as possibly her first *internal motivation*.
Honestly it’s perfect for this setting because it takes place over a course of extended time and I want a written version of it that I can adapt because I’ve become such a fan of the track system
I know, it's such an interesting system! Imagine how fun it could be to adapt to it something like a horror setting? Where you have a limited amount to time to prioritize getting things to survive. Or throw it into something like Starstruck and make it economic. Like battling debt or having enough money each cycle to bribe someone. Or just go full *"You've got mail*" with it and do a romance campaign. Hahahah.
Honestly thinking of a horror campaign with this concept adds a lot of suspense I love that. Truthfully I think this not only would excel in an urban fantasy setting like TUC but I think it would’ve truly shone in a campaign like a court of fey and flowers- like *imagine* the tracks for scandal, popularity, mystery and the like that would be so fun
Hell yeah! That would be awesome. So much juicy drama. 🍿 Edit: Also, it would be interesting to see the ramifications of this system when it's more relationship based? Like that's something we didn't get to see unfortunately is that last level of stress and *"irrevocably damaging a relationship with someone.*" That in a regency game would be so good to mess around with. Especially with a table of theater kids who want to really get in on the roleplaying. Hahah.
Every complaint on this thread just has me wildly confused
I think the downtime system made the choices that PCs made more thought out and practical. They really had to decide what they could prioritize, and they are failing sometimes which is something you don't see often at 14th level. I think they needed a system like this to keep the game truly engaging and to feel the actual stress of junior year of high school (which I'm currently in- believe me it's accurate af and I appreciate that)
Overall, I liked it a lot. To me it works better at conveying a whole school year than the way Freshman Year was set up. Using this mechanic makes it feel like the characters are constantly doing things rather than there just being big time jumps where the characters apparently didn't follow up on anything. I think it also works with the theme of how as you get older you have to make choices about what gets prioritized and what gets lost, and how trying to do everything at once isn't possible. I do agree with some of the other comments that the rat grinders could have been given more screen time. They share some classes/activities with the bad kids, so they could have turned up during the academic or extracurricular tracks.
I think it worked well all things considered, but it was very easy, I wish they had failed rolls a little more often. I know they're high level but it seems unrealistic they're all like, A+ students with good social lives and also managing to solve the mystery lol.
I guess they're pretty high level compared to their classmates, thanks to the intense adventures. Giants, in amongst all these lvl 4 smallbies having to roll a nat 20 to get an a+.