Bands

"Go Team Venture!"

Supernatural creatures can easily overpower a single human, and many of them have at least the potential to live forever. But that potential can only be realized if they are not summarily destroyed before forever draws near. The response has been for small groups of supernatural creatures to watch each other's backs and contribute to each others' goals. These small teams are just as needed and just as effective as the hunting parties mankind first organized to fight cave bears. It has been suggested that the practice of supernatural creatures making these bands is perhaps no less old.

I honestly don't care if you call your team a "team" or a "band" or a "pack" or "coven" or "herd" or "Fred". It's not important. What is important is that the player characters are a Scooby gang that works together and shares screen time. They'll be in the same areas a lot, working towards the same goals, and so on and so forth. These bands of supernaturals are pretty common, largely because of the whole thing that while there are seven billion humans, there are only about six hundred thousand supernaturals. These guys are possibly your only friends, the only people you have shared experience potential with, and so on and so forth. Small, close knit social groups are very much the rule, which is convenient for a cooperative storytelling framework.

Loyalty to these small groups is assumed to be greater than loyalty to any world spanning clubs. The Makhzen does not expect that you will betray your friends for them, because it seriously isn't like you can go out and get new friends. Immortality is a long time, and the number of supernaturals is never that large, so personal loyalties are considered extremely important by just about every one.

Most bands are generally 3-8 supernatural people with possibly some trusted retainers given quasi-membership. This is great for the game, because one of them could very well be "the player characters and maybe an NPC or two". And indeed, the general assumption is that players will be part of the same band. Doing things this way allows the mission statement of the band to act as velcro to attach plot hooks to every player character, ensuring that the major action doesn't leave anyone behind. A band of Scooby Doo detectives can get all the players into the action right away when any of the characters finds out about a supposedly haunted house, while a band of relic hunters can get the players up to speed with just the subtlest hint about the whereabouts of a famous pistol. Even a band of guys who meet together for pizza and poker night can be righteously mobilized when supernatural goings-on hamper their evening ritual.

Bands are thus structurally a very important part of the story arc for any group playing After Sundown, because they provide a reason for the players to be telling the same story instead of having their characters drift apart and do their own thing. It is also important to note that many of the famous bands from genre television shows like X Files, American Gothic, and Supernatural only have two characters in them much of the time. Since After Sundown is a cooperative storytelling game, that is an unreasonable expectation to have. A better template would usually be the bands from more ensemble cast shows like Angel or even Scooby Doo.