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Venture

Orchestration

Orchestration is the aspect of Bureaucracy used to lead a team or make actions at an organization level.

In short, orchestration covers “being the boss.”

Projects

The core of orchestration is projects, a discrete course of action that the group you lead undertakes to achieve a tangible goal.

Designing a project is a player decision, not a character decision. When you outline a project, you should think of it from a player perspective – what tasks do you think will be fun to show on-screen? How do you want to encourage other players to engage with your project?

Goal

Every project has a goal. The goal is a short statement that encapsulates what the project is meant to achieve.

Example goals include “open a tea house in Myion”, “plant some spies in House Mnemon”, “raise a manse on the Red Plum Grove”, “set up a new trade route along the southern shore”, “set up a new tax code for this ministry”, etc.

Progress

Progress measures how much of a project you have completed. Every project requires some amount of Progress, usually 20-30 for sizeable projects.

You can gain Progress by completing Milestones and Work Tasks.

Milestones

A Milestone is a major step to completing the project. Every Milestone is a big step toward tangible completion of the project. Completing a Milestone gives you 5 Progress.

You can only complete a Milestone once per project.

Work Tasks

Work Tasks represent the “background work” that your organization is doing to complete a project. Each Work Task gives you 1 Progress. You complete a Work Task by featuring it in a scene – you just do it, and you get the Progress.

You can complete up to 1 Work Task per scene.

Failure Conditions

A failure condition is an existential threat to your project. Maybe your caravan got blasted by storms or your tea house has been vandalized by a rival.

Overcoming a failure condition is a Bureaucracy roll, where you tell us how your brilliant systems and expertise have resolved the issue. Maybe you foresaw the storm and brought extra provisions and shelter, or you go out and pay some street kids to clean the grafitti and help you track down who did it.

Resolving a failure condition gives you 3 Progress. You can invoke a failure condition during any downtime, as long as that failure condition makes sense in that downtime.

Example Project: Establishing a Famous Tea House in Myion

GOAL: Open a tea house in the city of Myion and make it famous and respected.

PROGRESS: 0/20.

MILESTONES:

Gain 5 Progress on this project when you

  • Acquire a teahouse and hold a grand opening.
  • Host a high-society party to show off your reputation.
  • Travel to another city and mention your tea house by name, and someone marvels at its success and good reputation.

WORK TASKS:

Gain 1 Progress on this project when you

  • Serve tea and talk to your regulars.
  • Have a cool dramatic moment in your tea shop, like a duel or debate.
  • Advertise your tea house by handing out fliers or paying street criers.
  • Mention the tea house to a Cathak or anyone else wealthy and powerful.
  • Peruse teas for purchase and comment on their quality.
  • Act against a rival shop to big-up your own.
  • Do your books or make a staffing decision.

Organizational Decisions

Organizational decisions impact your whole organization. They predominantly use Bureaucracy, as your skill at understanding systems impacts your ability to effectively execute your vision.

Getting People

You can always use Bureaucracy to arrange for contractors: people who you pay or bribe to get things done now, with no obligation of coming back in the future. Hiring children to wash vandalism off your store or contracting an assassin for a single hit are probably contracts.

Recruiting a large, permanent base of support is probably a project. Converting the masses to your new religion or seeding spies in an entire House are worth a whole project.

Supply Chain

You can use Bureaucracy to study markets or exchanges and identify a good source for your organization. Getting your hands on a supplier for exotic tea or charting a course for your caravan are supply chain problems.

Many supply chain issues will be administrative tasks. Some really big supply chain goals, like opening a whole new trade route across the Inland Sea, are probably projects.

Other Tasks

Sometimes issues pop up and you just have to deal with them. Sometimes somebody needs to be fired right now to save embarassment. Sometimes a radical subsect of your cult starts sacrificing humans to your glory and you’ve just got to get them in line.

Adjudicate these tasks on the fly. Remember that you can always use Bureaucracy to effectively execute your vision as the leader of an organization.

Good Decisions

The orchestration system primarily represents being an effective leader. It allows you to get your organization to do what you want. It does not tell you what a “good decision” is – that’s still ultimately up to you. No roll will automatically let you be a good king; instead, the rolls represent how much you are able to get your kingdom to act as you want it to.