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Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I'd like to start GM'ing a Dungeon World game sometime in the near future. I've GM'd all sorts of things for years and years, but find myself with less free time to prep sessions this year and DW looks amazing.
I've gone through the source material a bunch and I think I've got the hang of it, but I still have a few blanks to fill in (haw haw).

I think my main concern is hitting a good balance between making stuff up and asking the players to do it for me. A specific example, let's say they're in a dungeon for the first session adventure. They've cleared out a room and kick down a likely-looking door. What's in the next room? Who decides?

"Wizard, what's behind the door?"
"You enter a large room. Bard, what's in here?"
"You enter a small, circular torture chamber. Thief, who's on the rack and who's swinging the whip?"
"You enter a temple to the evil god Akeph (Cleric: "the worst one!") and five blemmysmen (Ranger: "those killed my family!") attack you with curved clubs (Barbarian: "I collect clubs, as we established earlier!"). Fighter, what do you do?"

Of those, which looks most like Good Dungeon Worlding?

Okay, so they clear out the dungeon and emerge victorious with the mayor's rescued prize cow or whatever. Now I'm supposed to make a Steading ("during a snack break"). I'll use cues from the players, like if they keep talking about presenting a gift to the Lord Cardinal it's probably not a complete shithole. Should I press them for more before going through the steading rules or am I basically creating a town from scratch like I would when I run any other RPG?

Play wraps up and I start prepping fronts for next time. By now we've probably got enough meat for a few. What's so special about that cow? What's the Lord Cardinal's game? Does anyone other than the ranger give a poo poo about blemmysmen? But do I then think of something completely new and slot into the existing lore? The "White Gate" example in the book, for instance, did that (hypothetically) spring from a player saying "I was raised in the shadow of the White Gate" or is that the GM going "Here's a dope concept, White Gates, this is now the campaign"?
Is it a case of "adventure fronts are from players, campaign fronts are from the GM"? As in, next session the players will want to continue doing what they were talking about last session, but then I show them hints of a larger narrative. Based on which way they go, I advance my campaign fronts and prep new adventure fronts for next time.

Another thing: I've run into a sentiment online here and there which is basically: The GM only uses Moves. Whenever an interaction takes place between a player and the GM, if it's not covered by a player move it's GM move time. For instance:
Fighter: "A flagon of your finest ale."
Me [thinking]: That's going to cost him a coin... So that's... Use up their resources.
Barkeep: "One coin please sir."
Me [thinking]: Or, hang on, Opportunity and cost?
Wordy Barkeep: "...yes, one coin for a flagon of ale."
Me [thinking]: I guess that ended up being Tell them the requirements or consequences and ask, so...
Weird Barkeep: "Uh, what say you to that offer, sir?"
Like, normally there wouldn't be that mechanical step, I'd just say whatever sounds likely. I can see the advantage of this - I'm looking at the list of moves and suddenly I'm thinking "We don't serve your kind here" or "Ale? We've a special on elf wine, only five coins" instead. But every time? Should I really be striving for that?

I've been thinking a lot about Dungeon World and I'm really excited about it, so apologies for the wall of text. I'm not worried, really, but a bit of input on any of the above would really help me adjust my expectations (and those of my players when I get that far).

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Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Thanks a ton for the input, particularly that long effortpost, Gorbash. You've covered my worries perfectly. Glad to hear that the "Always Be Moving" approach is largely bullshit.

I do think some of my problems are about managing expectations coming from other systems. I tend to play at one extreme of the rules spectrum or the other (hard D&D stuff or low/no system) so had trouble placing DW on that scale. I'm much more at ease now, but I'd love another effortpost if you've got one in you.

Also, this

Halloween Jack posted:

"If your PBTA solution is more fraught and complex than a more 'traditional' game would be, what the gently caress."
will be my mantra going forward.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
More good advice, thanks!

kaffo posted:

Wilds, Drives and Flags

These all look great, but I think I'll stick with vanilla for my first game. I don't want to be referencing too many different sources.
Plus, while flags look great, I think bonds will work better for my player group. I figure the fact that each bond has two preset players involved means one of them will always be ready to pick up the creative slack, so to speak.
I have to admit, I love the old school alignments. It's been a while since I've played straight D&D, so I'm probably going to be leaning on a lot of those nostalgic concepts. I'm just sorry Defy Danger didn't end up being called "Saving Throw".

The idea that you have to, how to put it, "earn" your moves through the fiction is one of the things that look really attractive to me. I love the dragon example. The generally low HP counts speaks to me as well, as I've always disliked that death-by-papercuts mechanic in other systems. I'm coming off a Cthulhu campaign I ran in WaRP where the fights tended to be pretty short and brutal, so the transition should be easy enough for my players. Once you manage to get the (fictional) drop on someone, they're probably going down, but the fiction comes first.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I thought I was already pretty hot for DW, but with replies I've gotten here are I cannot WAIT to get started. Thanks, DW thread. Will probably report in after our first session with more praise.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I know I'm overthinking this, but how often and when do you use debilities? The Rulebook doesn't really cover dealing out debilities outside of the specific (and custom) moves that mention them. Do you just tack them on whenever you Deal Damage with an unusual source? Do they replace the damage? Are they monster moves? What about non-combat sources of debility? Like, it makes perfect sense that rooting around the sewers makes you sick, and while this could be handled exclusively in fiction (leading to a chain of soft moves), the "Sick" debility is right there. I guess that's a good spot for a custom move ("when you root around the sewers roll +CON" etc) but that seems a bit cumbersome.

Similarly, bonuses and penalties have a number of move-specific sources, but do you ever dole them out ad-hoc when it follows the fiction? If ducking through the Penitence Test was Defy Danger (+DEX) the first time, and for some reason it's more difficult now (someone turned out the lights, let's say), would you put a penalty on the roll? Or just pile on more moves, like, "I get 12 on my DD so I'm through, right?" "Yeah, you duck through the blades perfectly, and you're sure you're almost out, but the darkness suddenly makes you question your sense of direction. The next step you take is either clear of the hallway... or straight back into the blades. You honestly don't know which at this point. What do you do?"
So the player asks what happens after his successful roll, ball's in my court and I'm... Revealing an unwelcome truth? Or maybe the darkened dungeon has a "confuse the senses" location move now. Or I'm just putting them in a spot. Either way, it feels a bit like I'm cheapening the success of the first DD.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

1st Stage Midboss posted:

To me, "do this again, but in the dark" sounds more like they'd have to solve the problem with quick thinking (remembering precisely what the y did the first time) or mental fortitude (having confidence in their sense of direction etc), so I'd ask them to Defy Danger with +Int or +Wis rather than +Dex. It might be a harder roll for them, and even if they're better at that than just dodging around, it definitely establishes the problem as a different one.
Oh, for sure. I was trying my damndest to think of a "same, but harder" situation, but I suppose it'll never be like that in reality. The "difficulty" factor will probably always make players frame their solution in a different way.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Lurdiak posted:

This probably gets asked a lot, but how does one replenish ammo once it's marked off? I know the number's just an abstraction of how many times you can mark off, but when it's all gone, what do you do? Is it something to purchase? If so, what does it cost?

From the weapon list (p 326 in my rulebook):
Bundle of Arrows 3 ammo, 1 coin, 1 weight
Buy that like anything else with the Supply move, I guess.

e: I don't know how to deal with ranged weapons that don't have the ammo tag, like throwing daggers.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Lurdiak posted:

I've seen splatbooks just add the ammo tag to throwing daggers, so I guess you're not the only one who's confused.

I also am not quite sure why elven arrows are 20 times the price of a regular bundle if all they've got going is one more ammo point to mark off.

Fictional positioning? I.e. ask your players, I guess. Maybe they burn orcs like elven rope burns Gollum. Maybe it's impossible to hit an ally with them. Maybe they're made of the bones of dwarves. Maybe they sing (really short) secrets as they fly.
If DW was a little more generic, they'd probably just be called "Magic arrows [specify enchantment]".

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Lurdiak posted:

I really need to get into the descriptive storytelling mindset more.

It's what really attracts me to DW, but bear in mind my previous posts on this page: I have never played DW, I only read about it obsessively while counting the days till our first session.

My immediate fear about the fictional approach is the player who goes "They never miss, kill instantly and confer invisibility." I suppose you either go "no" or everyone bends over backwards to explain why you still have to follow the Volley rules for these god-killers.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Glazius posted:

If your character has advanced to being the king of bank shots and gotten a move that lets them tell the DM where the first bounce goes, sure, "back in my hand" would work.

Absent that, you do what the thrown tag says.

Oh yeah, it's a tag! Hadn't noticed, that makes sense.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

MTV Crib Death posted:

Okay so I've been spending some time thinking about the smash-up between Bard and Thief that better fits into Dungeon Planet. I really like the Dungeon Planet book, but it feels half done when it comes to classes. The new classes are great, but the idea that the run-of-the-mill bard, thief, and wizard fit into the setting without any friction doesn't seem right to me. That might be my own sci-fi biases showing though.

In any case, I present The Pilot v1.0. It needs more advanced moves but I think the base is a solid mash up that combines to create a Han Solo/Jack Burton/Alex Rogan type character for spacey adventures. Tear it apart, please. I'll be play-testing it this weekend and can make changes right up to the hour before we sit down to play.

Seen It All Before is obviously based on Trap Expert, but differs slightly, missing "...as you walk through the area". So this isn't really a critique of your move (which seems more streamlined), but how do people play the original move? I can't imagine anyone doesn't just spend all their hold right away instead of walking around a possibly trap-filled area.
Anyway, if you want to lose that confusion, why not just have "On a 10+ choose 3. On a 7–9 choose 1." Makes it a slightly more Spout Lore-ish move too, like the pilot takes one look at the featureless room, recognizes an emblem or price tag or something and goes "Aw man, PulsaCorp SnekPits. Mk IIs, too, looks like."

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Extremely appropriate, love the flavour. Its definitely a defining move for the playbook. The scoundrel making good at the last second.
I get that it's meant to be a rare, down to the wire thing, but its, uh, "mechanical" attractiveness as a move is going to depend heavily on the GM's tendency to throw certain death at players.

How about something that plays both sides of the coin somehow? Like, gives the pilot hold when he's being a selfish prick that he can spend on bonuses to Defend or Aid? (https://youtu.be/COCmaZA3d08)
As it stands the move wouldn't look out of place for a Paladin (or "bright side laser sword priest" as the case may be). I'd probably still pick it, though, so v:v:v

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Haha, I'm only familiar with the core classes, and I think they use "hold" mostly. But yeah, a mechanic that lets the character get away with being kind of a dick occasionally because the other players know he'll bail them out later seems like a good idea. I think in the long run the abilities should increase the help he gives rather than doubling down on the scoundrel stuff, if only to keep him from getting kicked out of the party. He'll end up a goody two shoes in a thin veneer of snark that way, but hey, so did Han.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
"Ego"?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I know Flags are everyone's favourite thing, but if playing with standard bonds, how many would you encourage players to create at startup? Is it a bad idea to do all of the listed ones?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
drat, Perilous Wilds and 20 Starters have some tasty production.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
As worded I'd say pick from the list and the GM decides details. Of course since the player defines their own god, they get a lot of say in what that god would do ("use the answers"). And they can always preface it with what they're hoping for. So somewhere in between.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Tricky posted:

The Witch is always a fun one.

Which one? There's a couple on DTRPG

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Agree that this may not be what your players signed up for. Couple of thoughts:
Looking at IRL whaling you don't have to make it the Last Skywhale or the Biggest Skywhale to put the PCs in peril. Whaling is plenty dangerous at the best of times. Just make sure anyone they talk to about whaling is retired with missing limbs, scars etc to build that aspect up. Have skywhaling shipwrecks dot the landscape (and/or cityscape) too. Occasional debris could be a fun 6-.
Give them a lead on a cheap ship with some personal attachment.
Whaling grounds are weird and mysterious and hard to find reliably and skywhalers are the kind of desperate hardasses who do NOT share.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Finally starting play tomorrow, gently caress yeah. I've been fighting the urge to prep so hard, I keep having an irrational fear that I'll flub the player questions and we won't end up with anything to play against. But I've got a couple of ideas for an opening action scene, a few monsters I'd have fun with and, if all else fails, 20 Dungeon Starters.

I'll be running for five players this first session, and we'll have a bit of drop-in-drop-out over the coming sessions. Just to streamline things, I'm going to start off with bonds and then I may add flags in the coming sessions, just because those seem better for games with varying players. How does that sound, DW thread?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Update: First session went extremely well. Flagged a bit in the Q&A, but regained a lot of momentum in the initial action scene. Might have leaned a little heavily on "deal damage", but I thought the fiction supported it.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Man I nearly killed two of them in the first fight. They'd been pretty badly ambushed so the fictional ball was in my court, so to speak, and every move I made had the threat of violence behind it. Then it kind of snowballed with a few nasty misses. And once the monsters started dealing damage, it felt wrong to dial back. They got through it heroically and were able to trigger the long recovery move afterwards, though. Awesome energy. Can't wait for next session.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I'll soften up the moves next session. I think it'll represent their increased preparedness nicely.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Rotten Red Rod posted:

Sounds like Wisdom to me, purely from a thematic standpoint. Relying on pure intuition and senses has always been in the Wisdom wheelhouse in D&D and such.

The wisdom debility description backs this up:

Confused (WIS): Ears ringing. Vision blurred. You’re more than
a little out of it

I'd let a Fighter explain why they can just hack and slash, though. Fighting well is the extraordinary thing the Fighter has, so I feel like it's good to play it up.
Depending on the situation maybe discern realities first, then H&S on a hit, DD on a partial and something soft on a miss?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Subjunctive posted:

I thought it was also used for things like “read the dynamic in the room”, but I could be wrong.

The trigger is just "When you closely study a situation or person" so I can see the argument for it taking time. Matter of taste, I suppose.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Are they going to need a crew besides themselves? Might be fun to tie a colourful crewmember to each thing they need.

Sam Strangename is one of the few people who can acquire and prepare raw [the thing you need]. What's more, he's one of the very few people dumb enough to sell his services against the embargoes of the Whaling Houses. Now you've finally found him. Sadly, he's in one of the Earl's cells, awaiting the rope-and-spears in the morning.
They told you Sally Sailortheme [maintains] her [whaling mcguffin] better than anyone. They told you she was desperate for new employment. This was all true, and now you're in the tavern back room with her and a hastily-signed contract, and she's explaining that the noise from outside is probably her previous employer, underworld kingpin Pin Kington, who wants to discuss her severance.
A [navigational instrument] isn't a thing, it's a person. The monks of Hard'tofind valley attune their senses to the winds around them and are invaluable to those whaling crews who brave the jungle dangers and successfully petition the Grand Master to take on one of his students. Up to your knees in the quicksand and surrounded by [jungle monsters], you can't help but wonder if that map you bought was the real deal.

That sort of thing!

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
It is extremely cool to have a few concrete fronts going on, though. Really lights a fire under your players when they gently caress around like you would in D&D and you just keep springing portents on them.
Last session my players made the tough choice to leave town and pursue a nebulous hint in a quest for the greater good instead of rushing out and cracking heads on the two dangers poised to eat the city, and it was GREAT.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
As far as always using moves, I've found it helpful to do whatever the hell I want and then after the session go "ah yes, this was clearly Show a Downside - that one was Use Their Resources. I'm so good at this."
For me, having the list of GM Moves is mostly a way to remind myself never to go "oh huh, yeah, that's nothing interesting... don't have anything prepped here... yeah nothing happens... now what do you do?".
And I don't really think in terms of GM moves for partials anyway - those usually come with their own downsides.

As for coin, have a look at the treasure table for monsters. The values sort of surprised me, at least. You can find 4d10 coins or 2d10x100 coins worth of fine art in an orc's stash, so probably don't sweat someone offering the characters a cool hundo for whatever. It might help you to work out what the characters want to buy. For instance, if a Perilous Journey is in the cards, work out how much they'll be spending on rations and decide whether that amount should be NBD or ruinous. If they want to buy a boat, keep or tavern, plop down an arbitrary cost for it and dole out that/n over n sessions.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Glazius posted:

Make moves all the time! Make moves on a 10+! When you talk as a GM you can talk to describe the fantastic world or fill your players' lives with adventure but when you want the players to respond you should always finish with a move.

What moves do you make on a 10+? Play to a class, offer an opportunity, tell them the requirements, show an approaching threat. You can do all of that without compromising an inmediate success.

And on a 7-9 like the Hunt and Track 7-9, where the move doesn't say anything about a downside, try not to compromise that either. The downside is the ranger doesn't get to play Sherlock along the way.

No, I mean, I'm always making moves since the players are always looking to me to see what happens. But for player moves the move generally sorts itself out, and THEN they look to me, so I describe what follows that move. Even on a miss, it can often make sense to follow the "punishment" move with something else. As a simple example, the threat just Deals Damage and then something else Puts Someone in a Spot to keep the action flowing. Same thing on a hit, the success thing is narrated and then something else happens.

And like, I don't consider "worse outcome" from Defy Danger a Move, for instance. Nor the attract unwanted attention things. You don't need the Move mechanic there, the fiction and wording of the partial should be enough. Although it doesn't hurt to think in those terms, of course.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Overemotional Robot posted:

Is there a prophecy type move in any playbook? Something where someone sleeps and gets a dream or anything like that?

Communion of Whispers in the Druid playbook is sort of this.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I'm running a DW session this week, and thought I'd do a halloween theme. The players are trapped in the middle of a spooky temple anyway, and their source of friendly magical light is about to disappear on his spooked pegasus. What better way to theme the session than a colourful custom move? I was hoping the thread would help me design it. Here's what I've got so far:

Spooked! 🎃🦇👻
When something spooky surprises you, decide whether this scares you or not. If it does, tell the GM why and mark XP. Before taking any direct action against the source of your fear, roll +CON to overcome your terror. ✴On a hit you may carry on (but any rolls made are still at -1). ✴On a 7-9 also choose one:
  • You’ll need someone else’s help.
  • You'll become paralyzed with fear for a few crucial moments afterwards.
  • Your nerves fray further. Mark sick.

I sort of dislike custom moves that are just a reskin of Defy Danger, but I want to give players an option to roll anyway. The whole "if you do, mark XP" seems pretty tried and true (not by me, though) and the idea of offering players a treat seems appropriate. The roll... I'm not 100% happy about. I could just leave it as "ur scared" and that naturally triggers Defy Danger or other GM moves. That just leaves the move a little... bloodless.

I also don't like things that make all players roll simultaneously, so I don't want this to trigger for everyone when a ghostly goblin leaps out at the party. The idea is that I'll only surprise one person and their reaction will warn the rest of the party. This will be tough to regulate once the black witch's cat is out of the bag, though. So I'd like to do something about the wording of the trigger.
I could have it be "when something scares you stiff" and reveal it from play start? Or at the first spooky happening?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
In the end I went with

quote:

Spooked! 🎃🦇👻
When something spooky in the Temple of the Nightwings scares you senseless, tell the GM why it scares you and mark XP. Before taking any direct action against the source of your fear, roll +CON to overcome your terror. ✴On a hit you may carry on, but any rolls made are at -1. ✴On a 7-9 also choose one:
  • You can’t do it alone.
  • You manage it, but become paralyzed with fear for a few crucial moments afterwards.
  • Your nerves fray further. Mark sick.
Made the trigger a little more location specific so we're not triggering it in future (the temple imploded at session end).

Worked as intended, players love XP and character development, so they got spooked by a few different things. I couldn't pop too many skeletons out of closets at them, so they were sort of limited to getting spooked by existing enemies and each other. One player kept acing his con rolls and killing stuff he was terrified of, so that was an unexpected outcome. Good catalyst for bond evolution, though. The ranger cast Guidance for the first time and nailed the description, so now that spell terrifies half the party going forward, also a bonus.
Good session in general. The Ranger taking God Amidst the wastes gave some great world building, and when I asked for input for a new faction we ended up with a caste-based society of phrenomancers, which, come on.

e: included full move text

Shanty fucked around with this message at 10:41 on Oct 29, 2018

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

kaffo posted:

So I had a bit of a dip in my campaign where I felt I lost the... fire in my games, and I really couldn't put my finger on it
I felt like I was doing stuff the same, players were saying they were having fun, but at the table there just wasn't that same energy which got both me and them really going... something was missing

Well this week I got it back. I left last week on a cliff hanger where the lookout got a partial success on his roll, so something was coming but he didn't have time to warn the party. I told him it was lots of small noises in the bushes and left it there

Mid week I had the idea of kung fu pygmies and decided I was going to go full ham it up for the session. I got out my big rear end speakers and waited for everyone to sit down, then started blasting out drums, bells and whistles then described how they got surrounded by literally dozens of them
The paladin got about as far as "oh shi-" before they got charged and they got really into the fight. It was great fun. Followed that up with the cleric failing a cure light wounds which let me use a custom GM move of "Show off another team's stuff" by doing a drive by in a demon powered air ship. They were in awe

I got my groove back :dance:

I just had a session where the players were massively outnumbered and that just works so well in Dungeon World. The wizard ended up holding the guards off with the threat of a fireball, and the switch from "combat" to "tense standoff" was so smooth. In D&D you would have had to end combat and sort of take control of the narrative by GM fiat. In DW, suddenly triggering parley in the middle of a tense situation because poo poo's getting too real just flows nicely.
It actually felt a lot like one of those moments in a MGS game where you've hosed up and triggered the alert, but fight your way out of the first response team and then hide until you've evaded the search team.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

whydirt posted:

What's the reason behind Defend dealing flat damage equal to your level in place of your vanilla damage die? It seems out of place in a game where very few things directly scale off your level.

I guess to make it more dependable and maybe simplify it a bit. It can be a bit of a speed bump in combat as it is, I can only see that getting worse if you had to risk assess your damage die every time you spend hold.

What's the thread's take on whether weapon tags, forwards to damage etc apply to that, by the way?

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I don't like those reverse moves, because the 6- is where a lot of the magic happens in DW for me. Why not just roll -corruption? ✴10+ is nothing, ✴7-9 is choose 1.

I think making it a specific debility would add more flavour. Are they feeling woozy and losing their teeth? Sick. Are their heads filled with the buzzing of dead prophets? Stunned or Confused. Since you can only pick that option once (until you clear it) that forces players into the other options more quickly and gives it a downward spiral feel.

How about having one of the options just being "mark corruption"? But doesn't that make it essentially "free" if you can just mark corruption forever? No. That's where 6- comes in, giving you extremely strong fictional justification to do anything to the idiot with 4 corruption on their sheet.

As for "your mind is slipping", that's either just Confused, or you need to spin that off into a separate move. It might be a sort of end-point for the corruption. When you can't mark the debility and can't afford to to take more corruption, you get hit with a more permanent condition.
  • Mark Stunned or Confused.
  • Mark an additional corruption, up to 5.
  • Contract "Soul Poisoning". See below.
Soul poisoned
While suffering from soul poisoning, take -1 ongoing to any roll that requires forethought. On a miss, in addition to the usual results, tell the GM something important from your past. The GM will tell you how that memory is lost, confused or replaced.

Or something like that. Probably best not to have that move trigger a roll as well. Since it's not a debility, you can't just shake it with rest. Getting rid of it is strictly a fiction thing (unless some playbook has an unpoisoning move, which is a cool opportunity for that character).

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
The 6- thing is definitely just a playstyle/preference thing, so absolutely go hog wild. The soul corruption thing is a cool mechanism regardless of how you roll.

Speaking of custom moves, here's one I plan to spring on my players tonight:

Festive Event
When you freely give someone a present in the spirit of Festive Event, roll +bond. ✴On a 10+ gain a permanent magical bond with that person and you both mark XP. ✴On a 7-9 you may immediately resolve one of your bonds with that person. You mark XP even if you didn't. ✴On a 6- your present is poorly received (they’ll tell you why). Mark XP and take -1 ongoing to aid rolls until you shake your reputation as a bad gift giver.

The name is TBD, I'll start the session by asking the players about the calender/moons/astrology and get them to name Festive Event. A permanent extra bond is strong stuff, I know, but I just thought it was so fitting. And I do want to encourage aid rolls. My only concern is that people who don't have bonds already aren't going to get a particularly interesting effect on their 7-9.

Shanty fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Dec 20, 2018

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Glazius posted:

Maybe you always get the bond, but first roll +bond and on a 7-9 GM picks one bad thing, on a 6- all three? You feel it wasn't adequate (as existing move), it's frozen in time (can't resolve for XP), you feel disconnected from everyone else (-1 ongoing to aid them until the Festive Event moon is new, or similar significant interval)

Great suggestions, but we already played it as is. 7-9s all around except, appropriately enough, the one guy who tried to regift.
It ended up being called Five Finger Night - the darkest night of the year. The idea is that thieves are extra active on this night, so people give each other gifts to make sure no one is left empty-handed. Very touching stuff.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs

Overemotional Robot posted:

I'm also thinking about doing a stream called Worldbuilding Wednesdays where I make maps and make worlds and stuff that are just for their own entertainment, or someone else to crib from.

Check out Microscope if you haven't already.

Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
I'd say get a feel for how much the players are gung go for the world/plot generation stuff and have a strong adventure starter that you like on hand if you think they'll need coaxing.
"20 Adventure Starters" is probably fine if one of them grabs you.

Don't do this if there's any chance they'll come up with cool poo poo on their own, because that's when the game really shines.

So if you ask the Paladin about their quest and they're like "uh slay evil" you bust out one of the starters and circle back like "so why slay it here?" But if they go "to drive the moon mage from the harplands" or someone else goes "and evil's name is Thraxgorang the Severer of Hands"? Cool, you're on.

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Shanty
Nov 7, 2005

I Love Dogs
Just have them chose one or two bonds to fill in with NPCs. That should pick up the world-building slack you're missing from not having other players. If this is just a one-shot preparation for another game, really stress that you can go hogwild with it. "Where did you get your sword?" "Uh, from my father" "Okay, and what was he the God of before he died?". Get this player into that mind set and it should really juice up world building for the full group.

Do also note that you can play crunch heavy in DW. A lot of moves explicitly build on each other mechanically. Things like stacking armor on a fighter or damage on a thief definitely apply here. The best part is that because it's Dungeon World, the GM has to be a fan of the characters! So it doesn't become this D&D puzzle of "how do I hold up my end of the bargain, i.e. lower this fighter's hit points most effectively? uh, incorporeal enemies, ability drain, etc etc". Instead you just take for granted that this fighter is a walking tank - and that that's awesome - and tell stories about that. Put him up against 20 enemies that don't have a chance of dealing any damage through armour. What does that look like? (a fuckin Frank Frazetta painting).

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