Goal-In, Goal-Out house rule

[Valamir]

Exactly.  Once you have a goal in place that Dr Evil has been humiliated its there.  Its a permanent feature of the gamescape.  One can imagine newscasters bursting into laughter as they report on the story or late night talk show hosts including Dr. Evil jokes in their opening monologue.

Whats VERY cool about this system is that even if Dr. Evil's player wins a goal "Destroy New York City" or  "Leave the White House a Burning Pile of Ash"...he still hasn't removed the humiliation.  You'd still have radio talk show guys like Rush Limbaugh popping off on their program about this "little Dr. Evil weasel who keeps blowing things up...he's like a little child with a new toy.  Someone should give him a spanking".  No matter what he does...he'll get no respect for it...because he's been "Humiliated".

Until he starts a "Goal:  Remove my Humiliation and win the respect of the world" Conflict he'll always be humiliated.


I suspect the above is pretty much exactly how Tony plays already and how he envisions the whole conflict system should work.  Alls this does is provide the mechanical reinforcement to back it up with.

The only think missing from the rule is what to do if someone narrates something that violates a goal.  The rule is now there to say that they can't do that...but who gets to stop them.  Can any player point out that they're in danger of violating an established goal and suggest a change with it going to player vote?

Or, since that sort of collaboration seems against the spirit of Capes, perhaps the recourse players have is to use the new reaction / interrupt Conflict creation rule to create the overturning conflict...

i.e.  "Goal: Capture Dr. Evil" has been won.  Dr Evil is officially captured.
Player A narrates Dr. Evil walking away and catching a bus back to his secret headquarters.  If no body says boo about it...it happens.  But someone noticing that this violates the "Goal in Goal out" principle jumps in and says "wait, no Dr. Evil's been captured...I'm creating Goal: Dr. Evil Escapes" so you can't do that without winning this new Conflict.

Maybe when used that way the reaction Goal doesn't cost a Story Token (but then that gets back to who judges whether a Goal applies or not).

[Vaxalon]

If you make it cost a story token, then you buy the authority to say, "No, wait, you need a goal to do that" by paying the story token.

[Vaxalon]

This INCREASES the value of story tokens.  I like that; this means that people will consider when they spend them, whether they want to have one or two around for this kind of conflict play.

I would also consider having new players start with one or two, just so that this play can start with the very first scene.

[TonyLB]

I think that does what Tony intended for the game

Fred, never ever refer to my supposed intentions in order to try to lend authority to your opinions again.

[Vaxalon]

::hands thrown up in surrender::

I never meant to do anything but state my understanding or lack thereof.

Point taken, I shall not make that mistake again.