Sunday’s one-shot RPG session was pretty fantastic, and it came down to three questions I asked halfway through character creation:

Rob – Your character is handsome, likeable, successful… and unlucky at love. Which character at this table is currently dating your ex? (Rob said “Paul’s”)

Paul – Your character is the hot-shot up-and-coming mecha pilot. You even surprised your veteran instructor with a ridiculous maneuver copied from the Professional Robot Fighting League. Scott, what was the name of this gambit? (Scott called it “The Reacharound”)

Scott and Rob – Your characters have something about their appearance in common. It might be the same clothes, same features (twins?), jewelry, something. Paul – what is it? (Paul chose a “tattoo”.)

 

I told them to not to elaborate, that we’d find out the significance of all three of those things during play.

And from those humble beginnings, an improvised epic story emerged of three mech pilots who grew up together in a rough district, practically brothers who rib each other mercilessly and even fight but at the end of the day always have each other’s back.

Amidst falling rockets and hails of autocannon fire, they had to choose between rescuing “Stacey” of tattoo-fame or smuggling their liege out of a city during an attempted coup.

 

Their troubled upbringing saved their necks as they broke into a car and hotwired it, pursued by MPs. The climactic battle involved a hail mary sprint by the hot shot pilot up to two enemy mechs and wedging grenades between their legs as he slid past – and with some really great rolls, we finally learned what the Reacharound was!

This game was an improvised one-shot set in the Battletech universe using Heavy Gear mechs and rules, neither of which have any explicit storytelling mechanics. But inspired by the likes of Dungeon World and Fiasco, I threw in those leading questions and a few others throughout the game, I gave the players bennies whenever they played them out or built upon them, and we had a great time!

After the game, the players seriously wanted to keep going to find out what happens, that they never would have come up with that party background and dynamic, and that the interweaving of the characters “made the session more meaningful”. As a GM, I couldn’t be happier.

I encourage everyone to try out some storytelling games as they can add another tool to your roleplaying kit, even in tactical hex-based robot wargames!