September 26, 2026 · Shadows

Social Encounters, Part 3 of 3: Wave-Based Turns

The resolution. No more initiative rolls, no more contested dice against NPCs — just “whoever starts it, starts it,” with fixed Difficulty numbers that actually mean something about who the NPC is.

Three weeks after Deighton said he’d never use this system, he helped design the version that shipped. The full before-and-after, with the actual text from both drafts, is over on Patreon.