Enemy Victory Points

In addition to giving both the PCs and enemies Victory Points, as mentioned under Multiple Point Subsystems, sometimes it makes more sense to have only the enemies gain or lose Victory Points instead of the PCs. Even though the NPCs are also taking actions, it's usually best to increase or reduce the enemy's Victory Points based on just the PCs' actions since it maximizes the feeling of player agency. In some rare cases where the foes act directly against the PCs, you might have both PC and foe actions increase the foe's Victory Points. Implementing such a subsystem might mean flipping the normal rolls. For instance, if the PCs were trying to lower their enemies' Influence over a faction, a critical success by a PC would lower the Influence by 2, a success would lower the Influence by 1, and a critical failure might give the enemies something to exploit, raising their Influence by 1. This uses the same effects as an accumulating roll, but “damages” the enemies' VP instead of gaining VP for the PCs' side. While this is very similar mechanically to the PCs gaining VP, the thematic connection is much stronger for an intrigue-based story.