Disclaimer: Drew is a friend, and I received this RPG for free with no strings attached.
You Son of a Bitch, I’m In! (henceforth YSB) is a one-page (double-sided) Heist RPG by Drew Gotobed. It takes heavy inspiration from the game One Last Job by Grant Howitt, particularly with regards to character creation and tone. In fact, one could make an argument that YSB is a streamlined re-imagining of One Last Job as a one-page RPG.
The premise of YSB is simple: The GM takes on the role of “The Boss,” an NPC who’s looking to hire a crew for a job/heist. The Boss doesn’t take part in the heist, only the organizer. The Boss describes the job, including where it takes place and what the object of the job is (steal cash, lift a priceless artifact, etc.), then describes a character whose skills will be needed to overcome a complication to the heist. Any player may opt to claim that character, doing a quick roleplaying scene revealing where/how that character is recruited (“You son of a bitch, I’m in!”) and what sort of “problem” drives the character to accept the job, allowing for some tweaking of the concept as the player and The Boss both see fit. That PC then describes another character they’ll need to accomplish the job, and thus the process is repeated until each player has claimed a character and roleplayed their recruitment scene.
Once everyone has claimed a character, The Boss and PCs can take a few minutes to discuss the heist and any preparations that might need to be made, including how they plan to overcome the job’s complications. As soon as everyone has a rough idea of how they plan to approach the job, The Boss sets the first scene. Scenes generally are roleplayed based on each complication the PCs faced in the job.
The PCs roleplay their reactions and make a test whenever they want to take any action with a chance of failure/risk. For the test, The Boss rolls a difficulty pool of 1-3 d6s, depending on the difficulty of the test (Easy, Challenging, or Hard), keeping the two highest dice as the total. If the PC’s character concept would give them an edge for the task, they roll 3d6, keeping the highest two for their total. Otherwise, they roll 2d6. If the PC’s total beats the difficulty roll, they succeed; if they roll equal to or less than the difficulty, they fail the test. Any dice that roll 1s cannot be included in the total, but rather allow The Boss to introduce a new complication to the job for each 1 rolled, whenever appropriate. The game ends once the PCs either successfully overcome all the complications and pull off the heist or when they are captured/forced to retreat.
YSB is fairly freeform and rules-lite, making it great for “beer and pretzels” gaming sessions or one-shots. The game is also extremely replayable since the sorts of heists and characters that can be played are limited only by a group’s imagination. The game also includes a fun random heist generator in case the GM is feeling uncreative or lazy.
You can find You Son of a Bitch, I’m In! on DriveThruRPG as a pay-what-you-want PDF.
Do you have thoughts or questions about the article or suggestions for future content? Leave a comment below or drop me a line at jtdimino@d20radio.com.
J.T. Dimino
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