Advancement

Advancement forms the core of the game - it dictates how characters grow in power, and what their aims and actions are, and as such the central reasons for advancement is a very important design decision to make.

Picking it out is one of the hardest parts of your job; it can’t be too easy, or too hard, and it has to encourage the right sort of play. Don’t be afraid to change or modify it halfway through as your setting and system grow around it.

Depending on the scale of the actions performed, you might divide up advancement into size categories - Minor and Major, or Low, Medium and High, for example. When a character advances, their player can select an additional ability from the lists available to them.

Example Advancement Requirements

In a traditional fantasy game, the characters advance when they clear an area of monsters, recover treasure, or otherwise impose the will of their civilisation on the world.

In a noir detective game, the characters advance when they uncover the truth behind the world - a high advance for solving a whole case, and a low advance for getting answers out of a recalcitrant witness.

In a sci-fi game, the characters advance when they discover new planets and technology or make contact with strange alien species.

In a criminal game, the characters advance when they steal things from other people.

In an urban horror magic game, the characters advance when they sacrifice something important to their driving obsession.

In an exorcism game, the characters advance when they bring a demon (or agents of demons) to justice, banishing or binding it.

In a horror game, the characters advance when they uncover hard-to-find information or equipment vital to combating or escaping the threat. (In this game, equipment and advancement are one and the same, and finding a cache of items might allow every character present to take a low advance.)

In a cultist game, the characters advance when they enact the will of their dark lord and bring his summoning closer to reality.