TEXT: One More Hour
  A Main Course RPG of Temporary Reprieves
  an Iron Game Chef Entry for 2006
  by Mendel Schmiedekamp
  March 19, 2006
  Forward
  One More Hour is the fourth RPG in the Full
  Course of Love and Death, coming between
  the second main course of The Marriage of
  Persephone and the last, That Oh So Little
  Death. You play the same team as you did
  in The Marriage of Persephone, except due to
  the favor you received in that game, you have
  been given a chance to come back and right
  the wrongs of your untimely death. Unfor-
  tunately, your strand has already been cut,
  so you have only an hour to make that dif-
  ference. After One More Hour, That Oh So
  Little Death acts as a ending for the entire
  full course, but will likely involve at least one
  hero from the team. Like all games in this
  Full Course, One More Hour is intended for
  ﬁve players.
  As a game designed for Iron Game Chef
  2006, it is necessary to discuss the allotments
  made for that contest. Indeed, for the theme
  of time, One More Hour fulﬁlls 8 hours re-
  quirement, spread among any number of ses-
  sions. And it uses the following contest terms:
  Glass, Law, Steel, and Team.
  A Second Chance
  In the last hour of your life, what is it that
  matters? Is it what you can do? Is it who
  you love? Is it your legacy? And what would
  you sacriﬁce to do what is most important to
  you?
  In One More Hour, you face exactly this
  question.
  You play a hero, a member of a
  team of elite masters of their ﬁelds. Nothing
  is beyond your grasp, if only you have the
  time. But now that has all changed, death
  isn’t something you can escape. In no uncer-
  tain terms the team has only one hour left
  to live. And in that time they must decide
  whether to die as heroes or as real people.
  In a life of adventure and glory, little
  things get neglected. Heroes tend to put oﬀ
  mundane concerns, love, family, forgiveness,
  these can be seen to once the world is no
  longer in peril.
  But time runs out for ev-
  eryone.
  And for your heroes, it just did.
  Knowing their fates, the heroes ﬁnd them-
  selves laden with second thoughts and might
  have beens, and suddenly success is anything
  but certain. Now the lofty heroes must strug-
  gle with the mundane and the earth shatter-
  ing, and balance the two in their last hour on
  earth.
  1
  
  Eating Away at You
  One of the themes of One More Hour is that
  time is always vanishing. Reﬂecting this is a
  bowl of snacks or candies, which is reserved
  solely for the game. At the beginning of the
  game the bowl should be ﬁlled with approxi-
  mately sixty of a candy or snack food which is
  amenable to all the players. If no single food
  qualiﬁes, then the bowl can be ﬁlled with a
  mixture.
  As the game continues, you will eat the
  last minutes of the heroes’ lives. And what’s
  more, baring the intermissions, this bowl con-
  tains the only food which you may eat. Bev-
  erages are not constrained, but no food is
  permitted at the table other than the bowl.
  Hunger can be an important part of One
  More Hour, but this should not be taken to
  excess. This limitation is removed when an
  intermission occurs and the bowl of minutes
  are covered and put away.
  A Note on Setting
  One More Hour is intentionally vague about
  the setting.
  This gives the you the option
  of being fantasy adventurers or technothriller
  superspies. All that matters is that the play-
  ers agree on the basics, and the rest will be
  developed as you introduce and overcome ob-
  stacles.
  This ﬂexibility also extends to the reason
  that the team knows its fate. It could be di-
  vine intervention which gives them an extra
  hour, or a prophecy which has come to pass.
  It could be a poison or a curse. It could be
  an implanted bomb which was triggered when
  their masters were killed. Or it could sim-
  ply be a realization, a subtle note of dread
  that comes with the certainty of your own
  death. Only two things matter: the heroes
  know they will die in an hour and they know
  that there is nothing they can do to stop it.
  Anyway to do that is ﬁne, as long as all the
  players agree.
  At The Top of Your Game
  Like any team, the heroes have diﬀerent spe-
  cialties, which complement each other. The
  ﬁrst step in making your hero is to decide
  what three specialties he or she has. These
  can be drawn from anywhere appropriate to
  the decided setting. In a technothriller, the
  specialties might be guns, computers, or dis-
  guise artist. In fantasy they might be sorcery,
  swords, or stealth. Specialties are broad ar-
  eas, and the diﬀerent specialties should delin-
  eate the responsibilities of the team.
  For that reason the ﬁrst specialty of each
  team member should be distinct from the
  others. Later specialties may be shared, but
  it should be clear who the best choice among
  the team is for most major tasks. For this
  reason creating heroes should be done as a
  group activity.
  After specialties are determined, each
  player should then decide on three obliga-
  tions. These are personal matters which the
  hero has neglected on his or her many adven-
  tures. An obligation is something that weighs
  on the hero during these ﬁnal minutes, so it
  should be something important to the hero.
  Good obligations are to family members or
  romantic interests, to retired team members,
  or the like. Perhaps you must say good bye to
  your daughter and apologize for never being
  there. Perhaps you must make sure that your
  crippled husband will be able to be cared for
  when you go.
  Obligations don’t require awesome abili-
  ties to meet, only basic humanity.
  If any-
  thing, obligations should strongly contrast
  the high-powered world of the hero, by the
  simplicity of human emotion and daily life.
  The obligations go in descending order, with
  the ﬁst being the easiest to perform, while
  the last is only possible at that ﬁnal moment
  2
  
  when the world hangs in the balance.
  Once each hero has three specialties and
  three obligations, the last step before starting
  to play is for each player to add an obstacle,
  and then for all the players to agree on a ﬁnal
  obstacle, which is the ultimate threat or chal-
  lenge they must overcome. Normal obstacles
  are threats, dangers, or simply problems that
  the team must overcome before reaching the
  ﬁnal obstacle. For each obstacle roll a d4, and
  list the result as the tries needed to overcome
  it. The ﬁnal obstacle is not rolled now, as it
  cannot be tried until the ﬁnal moments, when
  the team ﬁnally has the chance to overcome
  it and save the world.
  Record all of these
  on the ﬁrst obstacle sheet, although for most
  games two obstacle sheets will be needed, as
  obstacles are overcome and new ones appear.
  When the ﬁnal obstacle is determined,
  you must also determine what is at risk. This
  is what will happen if that ﬁnal obstacle is not
  overcome. This outcome must be unaccept-
  able to the heroes and extreme. There should
  be no doubt that the heroes actions can save
  many people if they succeed on their mission.
  Saving the World
  Once the initial and ﬁnal obstacles are de-
  cided, the actual game play begins. The ba-
  sic structure of playing One More Hour is
  a rotating narration, starting with the team
  leader and passing to the right. When it is
  his or her turn to narrate, every player has a
  choice between two laws. On one hand, the
  law of steel helps to overcome the obstacles to
  victory, but risks consuming the minutes re-
  maining. On the other, the law of glass helps
  to salve the obligations of mundane life, but
  adds new obstacles to be overcome. In either
  case, you narrate the actions of your charac-
  ter and their outcomes. Success is automatic,
  instead it is the cost that is uncertain.
  Obstacles: The Law of Steel
  The law of steel is simple. You attempt to
  overcome an obstacle.
  This counts as one
  try against that obstacle.
  If the accumu-
  lated tries equals the number needed, then
  that obstacle is overcome and your narration
  describes this. The risk with the law of steel,
  is that you may need to take some of your
  team’s valuable time to accomplish your goal.
  Once you describe what you are doing
  and what specialty you are using, roll any
  dice listed next to your unresolved obliga-
  tions. For each of these which rolls above the
  number next to your specialty you must con-
  sume a minute. These dice represent the hero
  hesitating due to the weight of his or her obli-
  gations. The only way to remove these dice is
  to resolve obligations using the law of glass.
  For example, if you have resolved your
  ﬁrst obligation, but not your second, and you
  attack the cybernetic iguana hordes with your
  swordﬁghting specialty (with a number of 7),
  you would roll a d8 and a d10, but not a d6
  because your ﬁrst obligation is resolved. If
  the d8 rolls an 8 you consume a minute and
  if the d10 rolls an 8 or higher, you consume
  a minute.
  If they both roll that high, you
  consume two minutes, one for each. In any
  case, you add an extra try to the cybernetic
  iguana hordes, and if the total tries equals
  the needed ones, you defeat the hordes with
  your swordﬁghting, otherwise you push them
  back, but don’t eliminate them.
  If you ever consume the last minute, then
  ﬁnish describing your action and on the next
  player’s turn the ﬁnal moments begin.
  Obligations: The Law of Glass
  The law of glass allows you to move toward
  resolving your obligations. Only the ﬁrst two
  obligations can be overcome in this manner,
  the last one can only be resolved by taking
  your last action to do so.
  For those ﬁrst
  3
  
  two obligation you describe how you are mak-
  ing progress in resolving that obligation and
  record an additional try. Then describe how
  your preoccupation has allowed another ob-
  stacle to arise. Add this obstacle, and roll a
  d4 for the number of tries it requires.
  For example, if your obligation is to send
  a letter to your aged father, telling him who
  you really are and apologizing for failing to
  attend your mother’s funeral, then you may
  take a law of glass scene to compose the letter,
  struggling to put the words down as bullets
  ﬂy over head.
  But you are so preoccupied
  that you don’t watch the rear as you were
  told, and tank begins to roll down the street
  toward where your team is holed up. You roll
  the d4, indicating that the tank will require
  three tries to overcome.
  Intermissions
  If a player ever ends his or her turn with
  no non-ﬁnal obstacles left, then the players
  may take an intermission. This is a break of
  any length and, most importantly, allows the
  players to eat normally. When the intermis-
  sion ends, or even immediately if the players
  elect to not take an intermission, play con-
  tinues with the next player, and each player
  must use law of glass for their next action, as
  the heroes as well as the players take advan-
  tage of the sudden calm.
  At The End of The World
  When the last minute is consumed, the ﬁnal
  moments begin. Immediately any remaining
  obstacles are reduced to one try. Also, the
  ﬁnal obstacle is rolled, with a d4, indicating
  the number of tries needed to defeat that last
  threat. Then, starting with the next player
  in line, each player may add one try to any
  remaining obligation or obstacle for each obli-
  gation resolved before these moments. This
  may resolve the third obligation and the ﬁnal
  obstacle, however the ﬁnal obstacle can only
  be tried if no other obstacles remain.
  When each player has had their chance, if
  the ﬁnal obstacle is overcome, then the world
  has been saved. If not, whatever was put at
  risk has been lost. In either case, the players
  get one more narration, this time describing
  the death of his or her hero.
  The ﬁnal moments are when everything
  comes together, or everything falls apart.
  Each team member must decide what to do
  on their own. And ultimately, they must live
  and die with the consequences.
  4
  
  Hero Sheet
  Player Name:
  Hero Name:
  First Specialty (7):
  Second Specialty (5):
  Third Specialty (3):
  First Obligation (3 tries - d6):
  Tries:
  Second Obligation (5 tries - d8):
  Tries:
  Third Obligation (last try - d10): Tries:
  5
  
  Obstacle Sheet
  Final Obstacle:
  At Risk:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Obstacle:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries Needed:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  Tries So Far:
  6
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Collections/Collaborative & Peer & Gm-less & Shifting GM/Full Course of Love and Death/One_More_Hour.pdf