Bone Orchard is an idea I had that never got developed much, but I've had ideas for it lately. Now that MADcorp alpha is ready, I can think about Bone Orchard without feeling guilty.

I don't know how to explain Bone Orchard yet. It's kind of Gothic but also kind of folksy. As I'm envisioning it, you could play an Edgar Allan Poe story with it, and also a Shirley Jackson, but really only the ones with little to no supernatural content (e.g. yes to We Have Always Lived in the Castle, not so much to The Hanting of Hill House -- but The Sundial is A-OK because it's quite possible that the "ghost" was just the product of madness). But it's not really setting out to emulate that stuff; that stuff's just in the same general sandbox, as it were. Dark and brooding, presenting horror that originates from the things that people do rather than from what happens to and around them.

It focuses on a small community, a village called Bone Orchard, that is rife with tradition, superstition, and petty squabbles. Conflict originates from characters chafing against the yoke of tradition or otherwise upsetting the balance of the community through actions of passion, necessity (including psychological compulsion), and/or ambition. Chargen will focus on this idea, making sure that each PC ends up with a clearly defined role in the village, with clearly defined obligations and concerns, and then ends up with a reason to fuck all that up, or at least put it at serious risk. For instance, a valuable opportunity that demands a price, or the commission of a crime of passion that necessitates covering things up, or dire straits that demand desperate measures, or the sudden acquisition of a new and important obligation that conflicts with an extant and equally important obligation.

(Yes, that's pretty much Kickers, and, yes, I did therefore consider just making this a Sorcerer supplement, but I think it will benefit from a different treatment.)

What I need some help with is a primary factor of the resolution system. Resolution will be called for when any PC (but not NPC; see below for why) endeavors to do one of the things presented in a list of plot-significant things that people do in this sort of fiction. Each of these endeavors comes with a set of favored and/or required circumstances, and a set of risks and dangers associated with it, and there's a card-playing mechanic that assigns authority over the outcomes of those stipulated risks and dangers -- and only those -- to one of the players whose character is party in some manner to that endeavor (be he an accomplice, beneficiary, victim, whatever). In other words, it's a narration-passing mechanic in the PTA or Dust Devils fashion, but the scope of that narration is limited. (You can also bribe the narrator.)

The details of the card playing mechanic aren't important at this juncture. First things first, I need to compile a list of things that people do in this genre that move the plot, particularly things that can go badly in some way. I've got a lot of them already, but I want to brainstorm. I'm aware that I haven't done the best job of communicating what this genre is; hopefully the endeavors I've already come up with will make it clear. As for the length of the list, I'm not concerned about it. A.) the list will be as long as it needs to be, and B.) I think it's better to design more than is needed then pare it back than it is to not design enough.

So, here's the endeavors I've got so far:

Appealing to someone's better nature
Communicating sensitive information to other parties
Consoling someone
Convalescing from injury or illness
Dominating someone's will
Dueling, and other violence in which two people both mean to kill each other
Entrusting a secret
Escaping from an unpleasant circumstance
Forging a document
Investigation, research; discovering important information that casts a new light on things
Manipulating someone into action
Murder (through violence)
Poisoning someone
Producing something through labor/industry/artistry
Resisting someone's will
Revelling/celebrating
Rhetoric
Sabotage, arson, and other willful destruction of property
Seduction
Subduing someone physically
Submitting to someone's will (because the alternative is worse, or because there's an advantage to be gained thereby. Like enduring duress in Poison'd.)
Suicide
Summoning the will to live
Theft
Trespassing
Violating someone
Withstanding hardship/peril

The central thing tying all these together is that they are plot junctures -- that is, they are all points at which the Situation changes and can't go back. This is why NPCs don't use the resolution mechanics. The GM's job is to pressure the PCs into engaging in such endeavors, and he does that primarily through the NPCs. So, while an NPC may attempt murder, it's done to pressure (although never force) a PC to do something about it.