Escalation #

Escalation is something that represents an overall indication of momentum, tension, a situation heating up, or some similar sentiment.

Escalation ranges from 0 to 6. It should increase when things start getting more intense and decrease when the situation is less intense.

Escalation was heavily influenced by the 13th Age mechanic of the same name, in which it was almost purely a measure of how long combat took, added to attack rolls, and gated certain abilities. I’ve chosen to make it more foundational here because it’s such a useful tool in general!

One thing to really keep in mind is that you should playtest, figure out what Escalation is often at, and then adjust from there. Making abilities that only make sense at Escalation 6 is nonsensical if it rarely gets there!

Adjusting upward and downward #

Typically, Escalation adds to or subtracts from the Total of rolls that player characters make. In Total//Effect, Escalation is typically the ONLY thing that adds to or subtracts from a roll. This is intentional.

See the note for Advantage and Disadvantage in Rolling Dice.

It typically makes sense to add Escalation to rolls for actions that should be emphasized as the situation gets hairier. For more “heroic” games, you can just add Escalation to every roll players make. In these kinds of games, you can also use Escalation as a measure of preparedness, or a way to reward players who did something to improve a situation.

Adjusting up and down has a pretty major impact on Totals even at low escalation. +/- 2 is equivalent to an Advantage or Disadvantage, and +/- 4 is equivalent to 3 Advantage or Disadavantage! As such, be mindful of this and apply it with intent.

Keep in mind that Escalation won’t have any impact on Effect dice. A roll of 1, 1, 3 is going to be Low Die 1, Mid Die 2, and High Die 3 even if you add 6 Escalation to it.

Valiant Horizon #

Escalation always adds to players’ rolls in Valiant Horizon. It increases every round, and its starting point in combat can be increased temporarily with preparation.

Conversely, you can also use Escalation to make certain kinds of rolls less useful as things get hairier. In that case, subtract it from those rolls.

NULL_SPACE #

Escalation usually adds to Toughness rolls and usually subtracts from Focus rolls. This represents more brute-force effects being more effective and thinking slowly being less effective as adrenaline goes up and people get hastier and less careful. Certain character traits and effects can add it to Reflexes rolls or negate the Focus penalty.

A timer that the crew is under progresses, and the Narrator decides that this is enough to raise the stakes: they raise Escalation from 0 to 1, meaning Toughness rolls gain +1 and Focus rolls gain -1.

Use for effects #

You can also use Escalation like you would use an Effect: as a discrete value that increases. (Sometimes it makes sense to halve it before use.)

Valiant Horizon #

Champion and Ranger both have traits that let them add Escalation to Harm under certain conditions.

Gate abilities #

You can use Escalation as something that either prevents or enables certain abilities when it’s high enough.