Heh. Yeah, secondary goals can be quite interesting. I did something like that (but not entirely) for my Fallout games last year, and alas it's something I haven't really prepped for this year. It was actually something I thought up at the last minute while I was prepping for the game at the convention, and scribbled down some notes on some index cards I had handy -- basically giving each PC some "personal goal," the accomplishment of which would earn a Golden Benny (like a normal Benny, but it could be used for ANYTHING random -- a card re-draw, forcing an NPC or other PC to reroll, rerolling damage even if you don't have "No Mercy," rerolling something that's not a trait test, etc.). Some players let that secondary goal drive their actions, while others pretty much ignored it ... and either way was just fine with me. It was really just something to spur players to have something to strive for (and if they were able to come up with their OWN goals, then that was just fine
( ... )
Yeah, given you don't know how well your players will pick up the characters, I figure all these secret or known goals and disads will mainly serve as hints toward how the character should get played.
Alternate Rutger thing: he's *in love* with Penny, but he can't admit it-- public disad, bad at talking to women. His secret goal is therefore to put Penny into a bad situation *from which he can rescue her*. So he lets her charge into danger, then he rescues her, versus killing things before they can threaten the crew. Just a random thought.
Setting things up so Penny can get the last touch, and no one else does, is a bit tougher both to play and to justify as a motivation. Wait-- what if he's secretly her dad?
It seems good to emphasize that the game goal is "get the highest-rated show", especially for characters like Lovejoy and Sterling, who care least about what happens to the stars. But even for the PCs, 'winning' doesn't matter nearly as much as good ratings. So they want to make even easy combats look like they're in danger of their life, and look stylish when they fight rather than efficient, and whatnot.
Since it's a different mindset from what the players expect, you probably do need to hammer it in a few times (with the game description, on the charsheets, in the intro, as special skills they have that will boost ratings at a penalty to-hit/damage, etc.) to make sure everyone gets the right idea.
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Alternate Rutger thing: he's *in love* with Penny, but he can't admit it-- public disad, bad at talking to women. His secret goal is therefore to put Penny into a bad situation *from which he can rescue her*. So he lets her charge into danger, then he rescues her, versus killing things before they can threaten the crew. Just a random thought.
Setting things up so Penny can get the last touch, and no one else does, is a bit tougher both to play and to justify as a motivation. Wait-- what if he's secretly her dad?
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Since it's a different mindset from what the players expect, you probably do need to hammer it in a few times (with the game description, on the charsheets, in the intro, as special skills they have that will boost ratings at a penalty to-hit/damage, etc.) to make sure everyone gets the right idea.
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