When to Tune?

There is no point in tuning your story until you have the entire shell of it up and running. Until that point, simply make sure your variable grants and conditions are checking against the number 1. The 1 will remind you to plug in a real number later.

Variable Grants

• You should stick to small numbers; this isn’t an RPG where players get excited by large numbers whizzing by; it’s much harder to conceptualize and balance variable increases of 10, 15, 20 than it is with +1, +2, +3.
• If you want to create more nuance in your story, provide more than 1 option of improving a particular variable.

For instance if it’s a detective story and you’re trying to break a suspect in an interrogation, you could provide 3 options: - Threaten suspect: No benefit, suspects shuts down - Connect with suspect: +1 to BREAK_WILLPOWER - Offer a way out for his family: +2 to BREAK_WILLPOWER

Requirement Gate

Gate Mix

Think of having a mix of 3 types of gates. Here’s some guidelines but feel free to deviate by 10-20%

• Easy gates: 50%
• Medium gates: 30%
• Hard gates: 20%

You can definitely mix and match gates in the same choice given you have the option of up to 6 options per choice.

• If the interrogation reaches the end and the maximum possible value of BREAK_WILLPOWER is 10, you could provide a choice with 3 options.
  • Ungated: One option has no gate
  • Easy gate: One option requires [if: BREAK_WILLPOWER 5]
  • Hard gate: One option requires [if: BREAK_WILLPOWER 8]

Gate Values

At each gate you want to calculate the maximum value you could have on your variable.

For each of the gates types, you’ll want to gate by a % of the max value that variable could be.

• Easy gates: 50% of the max
• Medium gates: 65% of the max
• Hard gates: 80% of the max

Cost Gate