This is a concept for a mystery one-shot, or a single-session scenario that we can drop into a larger game. Inspired by the excellent mystery video game Return of the Obra Dinn, and my experience using flashbacks in several RPGs, in turn inspired by their use in Blades in the Dark.
The PCs are tasked with solving a mystery. They need to solve it at the location of some major event. We’ll use something tropey as an example: a mansion where a dozen people were murdered at different times, in different ways, possibly by each other; possibly by a killer who is now on the loose; possibly some combination of both, or something else entirely. There are no survivors, and the forensic evidence at hand is insufficient or contradictory. The PCs are tasked with determining who killed who, and why. Fortunately, they have access to some magic or technology that allows them to flash back to the events of the night when the murders took place.
When the PCs flash back, they temporarily take control of one or more NPCs in the flashback scene. Depending on the number of PCs in the party, the number of dead NPCs, and the desired length and complexity of the session, we could frame this a few different ways. One PC could flash back at a time. Or the entire group could flash back and control different people in the scene. Or the party could control a single NPC by committee.
Regardless of method, the flashbacks – like any flashback in a TTRPG – will include both fixed and fluid information. Nothing in the flashback can contradict already-known facts that were established by the present-day condition of the location, or facts established in previous flashbacks.
Most importantly, the PCs cannot save the NPCs they control during flashbacks. Their fates are sealed. Every flashback is going to end with one or more deaths. But beyond that fixed end point, the PCs have broad discretion to play these characters as they wish.
Players can (and to an extent should) play these characters as they would act in the scene. These characters are trying to survive, even if the players know they won’t, and it is good roleplay to act out their futile attempt to live. But players should also treat these characters like 0-level characters in a funnel. Their deaths are a matter of when, not if, and they should be viewed as a means to an end, not a long-term vehicle for self-identification, performance, and role-actualization through play. The real goal is to have these characters act in a way that generates information that the present-day PCs can use to solve the mystery.
The PCs do not necessarily encounter the flashbacks in chronological order. Indeed, experiencing them out of order creates an extra challenge. Obviously any flashback must conform to a previous flashback that predated it. If a flashback at 6 p.m. in the gallery establishes that the valuable diamond was stolen from its glass case, a “later” flashback taking place at 8 p.m. should not feature the diamond still in the intact case.
But flashbacks also need to respect previous flashbacks that come chronologically after them. If an 11 p.m. flashback features a time bomb going off in the foyer, then a “later” flashback taking place at 10 p.m. should commit to the idea that the bomb is ticking down, and no action that the characters take during the 10 p.m. flashback can contradict what has “already happened" in the 11 p.m. flashback. If the bomb appears in another room in an “earlier” flashback (which happens "later" in present-day time), someone or something needs to move it to the foyer.
So in one sense, the characters have enormous flexibility when flashing back to ask questions or gather information that will help them solve the mystery in the present. But the more times they flash back, the more established information will constrict their actions in future flashbacks.
To enforce the complications of fixed information, the GM will need to carefully note what and who is where and when. A table divided by location on the x-axis and time of day on the y-axis is likely helpful, noting a few key details for each flashback; who was present, who died (if anyone), and what important items were present. The game of Clue is instructive here; if the PCs can answer a classic who/what/where question posed in Clue style, they have likely solved part or all of the mystery.
The PCs get one flashback per room per hour-long time slot. So if the mansion includes six rooms of interest, and the events occurred between 6 p.m. and midnight, there would be 36 possible flashbacks to solve the mystery.
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