Zinequest retrospective: Black Mass

Black Mass, by Will Jobst

The pitch: A tarot-based game for four to eight players about two girls leaving Salem to seek a black mass in the woods.

Why I backed: Creepy cool aesthetic, plus I’m a sucker for tarot RPG stuff.

What I received: A zine with a beautiful cover whose typography and layout evoke old pamphlets. Lovely creepy illustrations on front and back. Inside there are a few more illustrations, along with a bunch of photography that looks good in the pdf but is somehow less effective in print. The cover is slightly bigger than the pages inside in a way that makes it oddly uncomfortable to hold and flip through. It came with two tarot-sized cards with illustrations of the protagonists. Very cool. There is also some ambient music that goes with the game, but I haven’t listened to it.

How it works: The players share control of the two protagonists. Each player gets one “persona” for each girl - essentially an aspect of her personality that can come to the fore and take control. There is a GM, called the Proctor. The game proceeds in three phases. First, there’s a very structured prologue. Then there is walk through the woods, which is played as a typical GM’d rpg. Resolution is done by drawing tarot cards. A suited card is a success, and it’s a double success if the suit matches the action. An arcana allows the GM to introduce failure, complications, etc. Players can spend additional tarot cards to enhance their success. From my reading of the rules, each player gets three tarot cards for the whole game. Using the resolution system costs a tarot card. When a player declares that they’re relinquishing control of a character, they can spend a tarot card to either check off one of their character’s optional objectives (narrating some events that fulfill the objective), or to control “how the character ends up.” Some special persona abilities also cost cards. When you’re out of cards, you can’t inhabit either PC. After the woods phase there is the black mass, in which the players get to play the tarot cards from the discard pile and narrate the characters’ future.

What I thought: There is a lot to like in Black Mass. I think the game is likely quite good, and I would jump at the chance to play it with the designer, but there are some significant issues with the text. Despite having read it fairly carefully, I don’t feel like I know how to play.

The game’s pitch is very attractive. It’s a tight one-shot set-up. The setting material provided is evocative and well-written, and the prompts and persona choices seem like they would do a great job setting up the game and getting the players invested for their journey through the woods. I like how the game offers three tones (witchy gothic, moody and introspective, bloody horror).

The multiple personas concept reminds me of Bluebeard’s Bride, which I would assume inspired this game in more ways than one. (Note to designers: include a ludography. Even in your zine! It’s more important than a two-page list of kickstarter backers). But BB didn’t work for me, and I like many of the choices made here better - the personas are more interesting, and the resolution system better suited to the style of play than the raw PBTA used in Bluebeard’s.

Unfortunately I have some significant issues with Black Mass as a text. Not the quality of the prose; that’s excellent. The problem is that RPG books are also technical writing, and this does not do its job well. Key rules concepts are unclear:

• What is the purpose of the tarot spread created during the prologue phase? How do those cards interact with the game? When do cards get placed on the portion of the spread reflecting the characters’ present? A full explanation of the spread’s different roles in the game should (a) exist, (b) all be in one place, and (c) accompany the diagram of the spread. 
•  As written, it seems like each player gets three tarot cards, representing at most three interactions with the resolution system, for the entire game. That seems unsatisfying and counter-intuitive. If it’s true, it should be called out more explicity and explained. If not… well, that would be important. 
• Can I spend tarot cards to buy success benefits even if I drew an arcana in the resolution phase?  
• How does it work when a persona has an ability that enhances one of the core abilities but uses a different trump suit? 
• The Black Mass phase, the final third of the game, receives less than half a page of explanation. It’s written in very broad language that does not provide enough detail of the procedures. 

Finally, I have two critiques of the game not related to clarity of text.

• First, despite the attention paid to tone, I think there’s a fourth tone that runs through this game, which is high magic/high weirdness, at times almost psychedelic or superheroic. This is visible in many of the “bloody horror” prompts and especially in persona-specific epilogue material on the character sheet, which invites the players to conjure shadow armies, turn into a giant spider, etc. I don’t think it’s necessarily a problem, but I could imagine the epilogues being quite jarring as a result. 
• Second, the characters each have black mass “requirements,” which are objectives for the character (e.g. “find the wood’s last spider.”). But the text explains that these are optional, and they don’t seem to connect well to the Black Mass phase itself. Moreover, the objectives can only be accomplished by spending tarot cards at the end of scenes. Why can’t they be accomplished in the fiction instead? Their role in the game’s system and structure does not feel fully baked. 

What I’m going to do with it: I was originally hoping to run Black Mass, but given my difficulty with the rules I don’t think that’s likely to happen. However, it’s still a beautiful object full of interesting ideas. I will be holding onto my print copy.