I’ve been chronicling an experiment I ran over the summer with my gaming group to play a different RPG every week, and try to keep a contiguous storyline going. While the experiment itself is over, I’m a little behind on the articles. If you want to read from the beginning, the first article is here.
Last time, I talked about our unscheduled foray into Pathfinder, and how we incorporated that into the summer’s story. (TL;DR The Shadowrun PCs played an RPG. Very meta.) This week, the PCs got a message that another job needed to be done, and this time it required more finesse. More planning. More subterfuge and a less direct approach. In short, it required a heist.
Leverage
Leverage is an RPG based on a TV show. The show follows a group of ex-thieves who help the disenfranchised using “unconventional” (read: illegal) means (but for the greater good, of course). I believe one would categorize it in the “heist” genre. Mechanically, the Leverage RPG is built on the Cortex+ system, which is shared by other RPGs like Smallville and (the now out of print) Marvel RPG. It works like this: Every character has an array of abilities and an array of “job descriptions” known as Roles. The abilities are what you would expect (Strength, Agility, Willpower, et al.) and the Roles are niches that members of a heist team fill – thief, grifter, hitter, etc. To each of these abilities and roles, there is a die assigned – d4 through d10. When the GM calls for a check, the player rolls a prescribed combination of ability and job. So, to pick a lock, the player might have to roll Agility (or Intelligence) and Thief. If the PC’s main role in the group is thief, they probably have a d10 in each, and will roll 2d10 to determine level of success. On the other hand, the group’s Hitter might only have a d8 and a d4, respectively, and is therefore worse at picking locks. So, the player rolls and adds up the result. They are either aiming to beat a “DC” or rolling against an NPC.
There are also Assets and Complications that can add dice to the player’s roll or the GM’s roll. These are usually d6’s, and are dictated by what may be happening (or has happened) in the story. And here’s where readers will begin to see similarities to Fate (and for good reason, since some of the same minds worked on both). Also, characters, on top of their abilities and roles, have traits that they can play off of for an advantage in a situation. Finally, players are given “Plot Points” that they can spend to either activate special abilities or affect the story in some other way. Unlike Fate Points however, a player can never “pay a point” to refuse a story complication. Instead, complications occur (and Plot Points are earned) when a player rolls a 1 on any of their dice.
Of course, there are other nuances, but you’ll have to buy the book
In our session, we played The Quickstart Job which is exactly what it sounds like. This set of quickstart rules introduced the mechanics of Leverage beautifully, but failed to help players learn what it was like to play Leverage. How is that possible? Well, one of my players said it best: “The whole fun of a heist is planning it!” But the Quickstart Job throws the players into the heist after it is planned and sets them on rails from which there is little room for deviation for the rest of the session.
I can see why the quickstart rules would do that. In order to present all the major rules and types of scenarios that a group will encounter, the quickstart rules need to force the players into the scenarios that use those rules. However, forcing players into situations kind of goes against the grain of what a story RPG is supposed to be about. For example, the Leverage quickstart forces the characters into a combat so that (I’m guessing) the players can see how combat is supposed to work in the system. (Also, so that the Hitter has something to do). However, it’s conceivable that the players could have avoided the combat altogether, had they been given more agency within the game.
Unfortunately, we all walked away from the session with very little sense of what it is like to play Leverage – beyond a mechanical knowledge of “when you want to do this or that, you need to roll these dice or spend plot points.” There was very little room for the group to improvise or go off script. And, as my player said, they didn’t even get to plan the heist.
Problems with the quickstart aside, the system seems to be very fun. It has inherent triggers that force complications on the story, while at the same time giving players the resources (Plot Points) to (hopefully) overcome those complications. The full rule book, which I subsequently read, has plenty of tools for both the players and GM, including a synopsis of all the TV show plots, in case a GM needs some story ideas. I would definitely run this one again, but I may need to play a session or two myself under an experienced GM in order to get a better feel for the game.
If you like Fate, other Cortex+ games, or the heist genre (I know I do), then Leverage is worth picking up.
Next time, I will be discussing Dread, which was our last RPG of the experiment. Be sure to check back!
Leverage is available through Amazon.
Benoit
Benoit is the editor in chief of Roving Band of Misfits. He also does most of the writing. When he's not writing for the game, he's usually building something with his Hirst Arts molds or painting minis. He's been playing and running D&D for, oh, about 10 years now. But who's counting?
When playing Leverage you normally don’t ever actually “plan” the heist. What you say. Well yes, you dont really plan it. You do in broad strokes mostly based on the roles you play in the crew. Much of the “Plan” evolves organically during play as “Flashbacks” and assets created during the events of play where the players actually retcon the action to swing it their way. [think of a Flashback as a “planning” asset if you will, that may make more sense] In some ways it reminds me a lot of playing old WoD Mage …anyway it can be odd if your not into the conceits of the game. Try wilderness of Mirrors or Black Seven for a more “procedural” approach to a mission.
I think that this system would definitely have benefited from someone more experienced running us through it, instead of me just trying to muddle through for the first time.