I had this weird experience picking apart the design of Agon.

Agon (second edition specifically, but I’ll be saying just Agon for the rest of this piece), by John Harper and Sean Nittner, is a game of Greek heroes, big action, and gaining Glory. It’s silly and fun and like The Odyssey plus The Fast and the Furious.

It’s got one main mechanic, a conflict resolution system that covers an entire scene and every player’s action in that scene with a single roll. The GM rolls for antagonistic forces, players roll to see if they best them, and then you go from worst player result up to best player result with each player taking a moment to describe their horrible failure or wild success within the scene…