Quick Shot on CAPERS Noir

I have an interview today with Craig Campbell on CAPERS Noir, which is currently on Kickstarter! Super interested to see what’s up with this new installment in the CAPERS system.

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Three circular images wreathed in smoke displaying a woman in a 1940s style fitted jacket and skirt with her hair in a bun as she creeps around corners, takes down information from a uniformed woman, and speaks across a table to a man who is sliding a paper across to her.

What is CAPERS Noir, both as a product and as your vision?

CAPERS Noir is the first supplement for my award-winning CAPERS RPG. It provides new character options and new GM tools as well as an alternative setting for the game. It takes the core game setting of the 1920s Prohibition era and moves it forward twenty  years to the WW2 years. This alternative setting shifts from gangster shoot-em-ups to moody, atmospheric, crime noir stories filled with mystery and some horror elements. The additional rules and tools help fill out this noir setting but are also perfectly usable in the core Roaring Twenties setting. 

This supplement is a test case for me, to see if CAPERS has the legs to become a full game line. The early success of the Kickstarter makes me feel it does. The fan base (old and new) have been very enthusiastic, supportive, and looking forward to seeing more. I have plans to publish at least two more supplements, each about the same size as CAPERS Noir. Each will take a similar path of being an alternative historical period/setting/theme while also expanding options for all other versions of the game. My hope is to explore a variety of “cops vs robbers” themes and tropes with these supplements.

What are the Noir rules like and how do they change CAPERS?

The core rules of CAPERS Noir are still the same (and you need the core book to play). There are some new powers, and I’ve tried some different things with how you gain abilities and boosts, flexing the powers system a bit. The first big difference is that CAPERS Noir includes investigation rules using the core playing card mechanics. This rule subset allows an investigation to move forward (that is, clues keep getting found) without shutting down the whole thing over one bad trait check. Success and failure on the investigation checks instead describes how you gain additional information or add complications to the story.

At the end of a hallway, three silhouettes appearing to be two men and a young girl are backlit by a window, and their shadows cast down the hall past multiple doorways to a man standing with a rifle pointed their way.

Additionally, the horror elements brought to bear in CAPERS Noir provides for the possibility that your character’s soul will be corrupted. Temptation lies around every corner. Committing terrible acts at the wrong time can bring you a bit more power, but at a cost. A “shade track” defines how far your character has fallen to darkness and what benefits and hindrances this causes. You can pull yourself back out in a few different ways, most commonly by paying attention to and pursuing your “beacon,” a person, place, or thing that you hold dear and seek to help and protect. 

What have you put together to flesh out a 1940s setting and explore that complex era?

Noir fiction and film that developed in the 20s and 30s (and feed forward into the 40s and 50s) are at the core of CAPERS Noir. The crime noir themes of the alternate setting explore the darker side of humanity, nihilism, fatalism, cynicism. Things aren’t what they seem, morally gray characters are everywhere, and the protagonist doesn’t always “win.” It’s a world of mystery and darkness, where the good must struggle simply to stay good and the darker characters are at risk of falling deeper into darkness even more easily. Plus, lots of characters smoking cigarettes in the rain. 

The supplement doesn’t deal directly with World War 2, but the ravages of war and its aftermath certainly are on characters’ minds in the game. (And that’s not to say I won’t ever explore the actual war, with super-powered characters taking part, in some future supplement.) 

The CAPERS Noir Kickstarter promotional image noting that it funded in 30 minutes over a noir scene of 1940s cars passing down the street as two smartly-dressed individuals smoke under a street lamp. The tagline reads "An RPG of Criminals, Cops, Mystery, and Monsters!"

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Thanks so much for the interview Craig, and the promise of more CAPERS! I hope you all enjoyed the interview and that you’ll check out CAPERS Noir on Kickstarter today!