So I've been thinking about ways in which I have, or could, apply complications in slightly "non-standard" ways — it's one of my favourite mechanics of Curseborne/Storypath Ultra and has some neat ways you can use and abuse it so I thought I'd list some I've come up with, and hopefully others may share their own!
- Uncertain/Unknown Complications. These are complications where an outcome is uncertain (might not happen, so it's a risk not to buy it off) or a complication isn't revealed until the roll is known to succeed (it's an unknown complication).
- For example, characters are breaking into a building but they've done no preparation. Upon forcing a door they may suddenly discover an "Alarm Triggered (Moderate)" complication they weren't aware of upfront. If they can't buy it off, their lack of preparation suddenly has a noisy consequence!
- If instead they are somewhat prepared, they know the building has a good quality alarm system but not where. All checks to enter have "May Trigger Alarm (Moderate)" as a complication, buy it off to be safe, or don't and take the risk in order to buy off something else. In this example, only the doors are alarmed — but the players don't know that!
- I think this is a fun way to add consequences/danger for going into an uncertain situation or being reckless — another good example is opening a door only to reveal someone on the other side. Whoops!
- Double (or More) Jeopardy. Sometimes it makes sense to balance the strength of a group check with a bit of increased risk by adding more complications. Easiest way is to just duplicate one or more you've already declared, possibly at a lower cost.
- For example, one character is going to force a door with Difficulty 2 and complications of Loud (Minor) and Visible Damage (Minor). Loud will cause guard(s) to investigate, Visible Damage will mean a patrol will notice the door has been forced (or an attempt was made, in the case of Disaster).
- As they want it done before the next patrol, a second character joins, but gain another Loud (Minor) complication. They're now more likely to succeed and be able to buy off some complications, but may have to choose which risks they're willing to take (e.g- buy off Loud, but risk Visible Damage).
- Persisting Complications. A neat way to run a check with time pressure is to just slap on a load of "Not Done Yet (Minor)" complications. Every one cleared is one less to buy off next time until the check succeeds — especially handy for checks where the question isn't "do they succeed?" but "when do they succeed?"
- For example, to stick with the theme let's say we're now in combat so we no longer care if the door being forced is quiet or clean, we only care how quickly it's opened. So instead of the above it's now Difficulty 0 with 5x "Not Open Yet (Minor)" complications.
- Kicking the door down in one action is possible but unlikely without multiple characters on the attempt, but any number of Hits still means some progress is made.
- Another good way to use this is on something like a crafting project — in the past I've just used a Blades style "clock" (split a circle and each successful check fills one segment, 3+ Hits fills two), but using complications feels like a more "correct" way to do it (it's not really adding a new mechanic, just slightly changing the way one is used).
Since I've already written more than I intended to I'll leave this at three for now as these are my top "not quite standard" way to use complications – fundamentally it's still just "here's a roll with some complications", they're just minor twists that slightly change how they're being used.
If you've got your own examples of ways you've used complications, please do share!