STATE CINEMA
A game by Sean Fager, Insert Name, and Insert Name

His Majesty, a secret admirer of Hollywood and Bollywood films, has decreed that the State media shall make an action television series about the evil machinations of the vile foreign powers, personified by fantastic super villains, who will be defeated by himself (played by a body double) every week for the glory of the One True State.

You should be honored, actors, for the chance to partake in this new wave of cinema.  Congratulations.  Please design and build a costume for your villain and report to the old grain warehouse by the abandoned military base on Monday.

Designing a Character

Come up with a name for your actor.  

They start with a HEALTH of three, a SANITY of five, and a FAMILY between one and four, your choice.  Name the family members, and their relation to the actor.

Choose an ORIGIN for their villain : Mutant, robot, alien, monster, or capitalist. 

Pick a NAME for their villain too.

Assign the following values to your skills – 5, 4, 3, 2.  When the GM asks you to roll, roll a D6 and hope to get your skill number or below.  If you roll above your skill, explain how your actor messes up.  If the GM is unsatisfied with your explanation for the failure, they will add to it.  If you roll a one then your action films particularly well, and you've acted particularly efficiently.  Take a token.

WIRE FLYING – You will have to roll this while doing certain special effects, like diving from His Majesty's great satellite onto a 747, over-the-top martial arts, or if pushed off a building.  If it goes on film and involves being suspended in the air, it takes a WIRE FLYING roll.

SCENERY CHEWING – Raging.  Trashing a room.  Monologuing.  Make a SCENERY CHEWING roll when you actor speaks but doesn't converse, acts as if they were the only important person in the room, or generally steals the spotlight.

DRAMATIC FLAIR – An emotional conversation, where the audience learns something about the villain or maybe comes to pity them a little.  An artsy moment that shows the villain as a person,or, in the case of a Capitalist, almost a person. Make a DRAMATIC FLAIR roll when viewer heartstrings are being pulled.  

STAGE COMBAT – Resisted violence comes down to stage combat. A knife fight is STAGE COMBAT.   As is shooting a gun, or attacking with a fighter jet, or ramming someone with a car.  When your actor's acting involves overt violence against another, roll STAGE COMBAT.

If you roll over your actor's skill rating, it is still possible to succeed by embracing the mania of method acting – reduce your SANITY by one for each number over the target number you rolled to succeed.  This is optional, of course.

The Game In Play

Each game session covers one or more episode recordings.  Each recording is divided into two parts : The Recording and The Fallout.  

The Recording

When play starts the GM will set a timer for 22 to 27 minutes (add 21 to a die roll) and one player will begin explaining what their character is doing.  Unfortunately all of The One True State's scriptwriters are being reeducated, so the actors will have to improvise.  Start off with something relating to an evil plan.  Any time an actor does something that in the GM's opinion would require a roll they must make one.  Other actors may enter the scene at will.  If an event strikes the GM as particularly nonsensical then they can declare that the director has called cut,express their complaint, and set the story back to an earlier moment right before the objectionable thing happened.

When the timer goes off, the body double of His Majesty arrives on set.  He will sometimes be drunk, or high, or in an otherwise awkward situation, but as one with the face of His Majesty he is close to godliness and his indiscretions are forgivable.  The GM will set the timer for 3 to 8 minutes (30 minutes minus however long the episode has already played out) and then play “His Majesty” who must look heroic and win the day.  The actor has a skill of 3 in each category.  

The Fallout

If a villain's machinations are not defeated by the episode's end, when the timer goes off for the second time, it will probably be taken as a mockery of His Majesty.  Corrective Officers will arrive in the night to administer Corrective Training through Physical Motivation – Reduce the actor's Health by one, permanently, before the beginning of the next episode.

Exceptional acting earns a bonus – each token awarded for rolling a one represents enough pay to get food for one person.  If an actor doesn't have enough food for himself and each member of his family he loses a Health point permanently.  In any event, each player loses all their tokens before the next recording session.

If an actor is reduced to zero heath they do not show up to work the next day and are never seen again.  

A character gains SANITY equal to their FAMILY after each episode, up to five points in total.

If an actor's family member is accused of treason by any player at any point they will be transferred to State custody and moved to a remote location for questioning with the assurance that the innocent have nothing to fear.  They will never be seen again.

GMing State Cinema

There may be players trying to speak over each other.  In general, listen to the players who have actors already on scene, who are doing things requiring die rolls, who haven't made a roll recently, or who are proposing things that will complicate His Majesty when he shows up on scene.

His Majesty's double is not a great actor, and not at risk like the others.  Play him at a thoughtful pace.  The actor's characters should have to act self-destructively more often than not to avoid having outstanding plot points by the end of the episode.

[Current End]