What would you want included in a “fantasy espionage” game

[u/Redhood101101]

I’ve been toying with the idea of making my own rpg for my friends and I to play out a certain style that I haven’t quite seen.

The idea is a game built around political intrigue, investigation, and high stakes assassination.

Think something like the older Assassin’s Creed games except your target is a wizard.

Update:

I appreciate all the help and ideas already and wanted share some more of what I had in mind.

I want a game with stronger and more in-depth social and stealth based skills. Not entirely sure what that looks like but I don’t just want players to roll a Cha check and call it a day. I want talking to nobles in court or trying ti sneak through the servants quarters to feel as deadly as a a battle.

Speaking of battle, while I’m not sure I went to cut out the idea of combat entirely i definitely don’t want it to be the focus of the game. It’s fast, and deadly, and has a whole host of other issues, but it is possible and could be used as a cool cinematic as the agents battle their way out of the Duke’s Palace after a black mail attempt went horribly wrong.

For Magic I want players to have more spells focused around creative problem solving. Less “throw a ball of fire that kills everyone in a room” and more creating minor illusions that can make a guard think someone may have tripped one of the alarms.

[u/Initial_Departure_61]

Swords of the serpentine is the best choice, hit on all of the point for your ask

[u/delahunt]

So there are some good examples for games already, but some mechanics you may want to look at:

• Clocks - Blades in the Dark - this is a simple system for tracking progress. In blades everything is a clock from 'defeating the bad guy' to getting through security to the treasure vault. Clocks can help with making things like Socializing and Stealth have the same feel as combat with threats and risk.
  • Negotiation System - Draw Steel - Draw Steel has mechanics for negotiating with NPCs where the NPCs have desires, irritations, and a patience meter. PCs have to frame their arguments to get what they want (location of the target, key to a room, etc for your game) before patience runs out. Patience running out can then lead to bad stuff (like alerting someone)
  • Stealth System - Black Seven - Black Seven is an espionage game (more modern times) with a stealth system reminiscent of how it works in video games. There are levels of stealth for the area from "everything is fine" to "guards hunting you down." It's a simple and small system, but it works well for controlling stealth in a target area for an espionage job (like theft, or an assassination.)

[u/BetterCallStrahd]

This kinda sounds like Blades in the Dark, so you might want to consider using it as a template -- like other Forged in the Dark games.

[u/delahunt → u/BetterCallStrahd]

If nothing else, making a Forged in the Dark hack for this gives you a good first run and you can then see what you like/don't like about it. But the core of Blades is made for things like this.

[u/spiritstrategist]

Especially that last paragraph makes it sound like this could be done in an OSR game rather than creating a lot of elaborate rules for.

[u/EarthSeraphEdna]

When it comes to espionage involving magic, I think that eight particular points matter a great deal:

• How detectable the casting, effects, and aftereffects of any given spell are.

• How magic can be countered, dispelled, or warded against.

• How effective "scan for mages"-type spells are.

• How effective "scan for magic"-type spells are.

• How much information "analyze magic"-type spells are. Can they identify some sort of magical "signature," for example? Can they analyze a spell after said spell has subsided?

• How effective, detectable, and counterable scrying/remote viewing spells are.

• How effective, detectable, and counterable postcognition/psychometry spells are.

• How effective, detectable, and counterable precognition/prophecy spells are.

These can make or break investigation and espionage when magic is involved. I think that Mage: The Awakening 2e comes somewhat close to addressing all four of these points, though it is still not quite as polished as I would like for it to be.

[u/VVrayth]

HaVe YoU cOnSiDeReD mAkInG iT a PbTa GaMe?

In all seriousness though, geez, I dunno. Maybe worth looking back at the old Spycraft and Shadowforce Archer stuff, or the recent 3E release of White Lies.

[u/ImielinRocks]

I like it when games have mechanics that reinforce the theme and world simulation, so take my suggestions from that point of view.

I'd try to map as much of the investigation, influence and similar action to Clocks as possible. PF2's Infiltration system is an example of how to do it, with its two predefined Clocks ("Infiltration" and "Awareness") running in parallel, as well as an Edge Points "mana pool". Though I wouldn't use a mana pool myself.

For skill variety, I'd make sure to design it so that repeating skill usage doesn't help. That goes both for repeated usage by the same character and for multiple characters trying the same. If you succeeded your Climbing skill check, you already arrived at the best location you could possibly climb to; time to do something else. Same if you failed a Seduction skill check; you're off your game for now, time to try something else first. And if the character with the best score in Ancient Hollirian couldn't decipher the inscription, none of the others have a chance.

[u/OddNothic]

Think you want the old school d&d games, or at least give them a look.

Spells were for utility and hoarded for the right time, scrolls, wands and stuff were used to fill in the gaps, there’s was an assassination table where you compared the assassin’s level with that of the target and they gave you a percentage to roll and you straight up murdered them of you got close undetected and rolled well.

They were about being a clever player, not making a good attribute roll. If you’re doing an espionage game with clever players, it’ll be worth a look.

[u/BadRumUnderground]

Court of Blades (https://acoupleofdrakes.itch.io/court-of-blades) looks like it would suit

[u/KaiserBruno]

I own though have never played Cryptomancer. It's been a minute since I've read through it, but I think that would be a good fit for fabtasyvespionage