The Mission Loop

Momenta Core Rules · Moment 5 · Missions and Campaigns · Chapter 28

Momenta is a mission-structured game. A campaign proceeds as a series of missions, with each mission involving a handful of combats and narrative scenes. Characters advance by completing mission objectives, not by solely defeating enemies.

Mission Arcs, Objectives, and Clock

The GM frames each mission as a mission arc - a set of objectives the party may pursue, with full agency over which they take on and in what order. Every mission arc has:

• One or more main mission objective - This is the spine of the mission, and usually directly references and advances the campaign plotline.
• A number of optional side mission objectives - These are optional objectives that can be pursued by the players, but is not critical for the mission’s success.
• An optional mission clock, measured in beats - A beat is an abstract unit of mission progress, and is not intended to represent a fixed duration of time, like a calendar day. The clock indicates the total number of beats available before the situation turns for the worse.
• A minimum beat cost per objective - If the mission clock is in play, then pursuing each objective will cost a certain number of beats as determined by the GM (minimum 1).
• A merit reward per objective, paid on completion.

Example: The party members arrive at Grimland, and meet with the king, who told them that the princess was kidnapped and brought to the cave in the north. At the same time, the city has been suffering from famine due to a mysterious creature that has been destroying their crops. With this premise, the GM sets up the mission arc as follows:

Mission Arc: Grimland

• Objectives:
  • [Main] Rescue the princess (2 beats, +3 merits)
  • [Side] Help find food for the city (1 beat, +1 merit)
  • [Side] Find out what has been destroying the city’s crops (1 beat, +1 merit)
• Clock: 6 beats

Spending the Mission Clock

• Pursuing objectives (both main and side) spends beats. Every objective will have a beat cost.
• Voluntarily taking downtime also costs one beat.

Running out the clock results in degraded outcomes, not failure. An exhausted mission clock does not erase the objectives; it worsens them. Any objective completed after the clock runs out only pays half its merit reward, and the GM narrates the consequence or cost. The clock provides players with urgency, but it is not a game-over timer. A mission arc with no mission clock simply applies no time pressure; the push-on tension then rests on the combat economy alone.

Design Note: The clock is a budget that the party manages. Parties can decide if they want to attempt everything and risk running short of clock, or focus on only what matters and bank it safely.

Campaign Difficulty

There are three default campaign difficulty levels in Momenta - The GM can choose which difficulty level to use for their campaign. Most games are on the standard “Heroic” difficulty level. Difficulty levels will impact starting rank, rate of advancement, and encounter building guidelines.

Design Note: In Momenta, the default difficulty level is “Heroic”, and all of the balance, encounter building, and adventure pacing are based on that. As a general pacing guide, at “Heroic” difficulty level, a party should clear roughly one tier of play (six character ranks) for every five missions, or about 1.2 character ranks per mission.