D&D General Fighting Law and Order

[pemerton]

In what way would opening a door with a 7+ lead to a tentacle-monster attack while opening the same door with a 10+ wouldn't? Where's the in-universe justification for that?

Why does the GM rolling a 6 on a wandering monster check mean that six Orcs have just turned the corner into the corridor, but rolling a 5 or less means that they haven't. Where's the in-universe justification for that?

The answer is that they're both techniques for telling the GM when to introduce new adversity. In classic D&D, we imagine that the world is full of monsters, who sometimes show up. (When the WM die comes up 6, then it's game on!) In Dungeon World, we imagine that the world is full of monsters, who sometimes show up. (When the roll is 6-, or maybe even 7-9 as @Aldarc said, the it's game on!)

 

[Aldarc]

So here's my issue with some of this. Let's call the OP's scenario specifically designed to end in TPK a "rocks fall everyone dies" moment. It doesn't have to be this specific scenario, but any scenario where TPK is effectively guaranteed.

I would never run a rocks fall everyone dies scenario. I don't see the point, I'd just talk to the players about the issues I have and we'd figure things out. However, in DW people have said that a rocks fall everyone dies scenario could not happen. Period, full stop. But if the tentacle monster can attack multiple people because the fiction demands it, why can't the fiction demand that rocks fall everyone dies? If the fiction demands that the tentacle monster attacks everyone, couldn't it also demand that each tentacle does enough damage to kill the characters?

I understand that wouldn't be in the spirit of the game, I don't think rocks fall everyone dies is in the spirit of any RPG. I just don't see how the rules can stop the DM or GM from pulling out enough rocks to end up with the same result.

I would say that the answer to your concern here lies in the very beginning of the Gamemastering Section:

The situation around [the players] is rarely “everything’s great, nothing to worry about.” They’re adventurers going on adventures—give them something to react to.
When you describe the situation, always end with “What do you do?” Dungeon World is about action and adventure! Portray a situation that demands a response.

Agenda
Your agenda makes up the things you aim to do at all times while GMing a game of Dungeon World:
• Portray a fantastic world
• Fill the characters’ lives with adventure
• Play to find out what happens
Everything you say and do at the table (and away from the table, too) exists to accomplish these three goals and no others. Things that aren’t on this list aren’t your goals. You’re not trying to beat the players or test their ability to solve complex traps. You’re not here to give the players a chance to explore your finely crafted setting. You’re not trying to kill the players (though monsters might be). You’re most certainly not here to tell everyone a planned-out story.

I would say that the "rocks fall, everyone dies" runs into problems with the bit in bold. Declaring that rocks fall and kill the party isn't giving the party anything to react to and it doesn't begin or end by asking the players "What do you do?" while also failing to uphold the GM's stated agenda, which is what everything, including the GM moves are meant to support.

That said, I think that a fun consequence wouldn't be "rocks fall, everyone dies," but, instead, "rocks fall, and now the party is separated with some on each side of the cave-in."

 

[pemerton]

Sure we do. We just don't get to read about (most of*)those instances in the books; instead we're left to merely assume they happen all the time between the key moments we do get to read about.

Which is a key thing that makes RPG play different from reading a novel: we can allow "nothing happens" moments to occur without any real issue. We're not on a page count, or a time clock, or under any other external limitation.

* - yet even in LotR there's nothing-happens moments. All the unsuccessful attempts at the gates of Moria, for example.

Moria has been discussed to death. It's not the case that nothing happens. There is an attack from the Watcher in the Water.

And as I posted upthread, if it's not on the page, then it's not in the book. Basically by definition. If you want to imagine the "nothing happens" times between events, you can do that while playing DW as much as you can while reading LotR.

As far as "no real issue" for "nothing happens" in RPGing, here are two issues. (1) It is more likely to lead to episodes like the OP's, as players don't know what to do, and fish and flounder about for cues from the GM's narration of the setting. (2) It's boring. Or, at least, not terribly exciting.

 

[pemerton]

I'm sure it isn't intended to play that way, but I have played in a couple PbtA games and that was my experience. The mechanical framework simply felt artificial, like you have to constantly stop and check your move list when you want to do something.

Why were you focusing so much on your character sheet? You just say what your character does. Then, if a move is triggered, resolve it! Otherwise the GM makes a move in response.

 

[Micah Sweet]

See, this is one of those things that's a bit hard to grasp--it's taking me a while as well. But this is why the games all say, "to do it, you have to do it." Moves aren't actions, skills, abilities, feats, or anything else like that. A move is simply a way to move the story along.

And quite frankly, having to figure out what skill or feat or class ability you're going to use in a tradgame like D&D is a requirement to figure out what your proposed action counts as. As someone else said, you're just so used to it, you've internalized it. I can't tell you how many times even the most experienced gamers at my table have had to look at their D&D sheets to remember if they had such-and-such an ability.

Example: say that the bad guys are closing in and one of the players says, "We gotta get out of here; where's the exit?"

In D&D, the DM might say "it's over there, but you think you hear growling from that direction," or they might say "roll Wisdom (Perception)," if the exit isn't immediately obvious.

In MotW, the Keeper might say "it's over there, but you think you hear growling from that direction" (which happens to be the Keeper's Reveal Future Badness move), or they might say "it sounds like you're trying to Read A Bad Situation. Roll +Sharp," if the exit isn't immediately obvious.

Same thing.

And if there's no move that stands out as the obvious choice, then there are basically two options: One, you can always have the player Act Under Pressure if there is, in fact, something putting pressure on them (for instance, having to get out of the area before whatever was growling comes after them); and two, you simply don't have them roll, especially if there's no pressure (such as if they go for the obvious exit and you know the monsters aren't actually there to attack them).

The PC does what they wanted to do, and you as the GM can put a cost there, if you like, in the form of the GM moves. For instance, if the PCs want to search the room, then in DW there's the Discern Realities move, which, if successfully rolled, allows you to find treasure. But if there's nothing standing in the way of them finding the treasure but time, you could also just say "You can search the room thoroughly, but it'll take some time to do so, and the noise you make while doing so is likely to draw attention. What do you do?" and this would likely be "Reveal Unwelcome Truth" or possibly "Show Signs Of An Approaching Threat." (I haven't read enough DW to know.)

That's it. You don't actually pick your move. You don't examine your sheet looking for what best fits the action you want to do. You just talk it out. Really, the only reason GM moves even exist is to help out newbies.

Well, a different set of rules, especially with a narrative bent to them (I really don't like anything having to do with FATE-like statements on the character sheet) leads me to just not see any reason to bother with the system in a fantasy setting, where I'm just a lot more comfortable with a D&D-style game. In fact, the only game I've ever considered that has some of those elements is Star Trek Adventures, and that's only because I really like Star Trek.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Why does the GM rolling a 6 on a wandering monster check mean that six Orcs have just turned the corner into the corridor, but rolling a 5 or less means that they haven't. Where's the in-universe justification for that?

The answer is that they're both techniques for telling the GM when to introduce new adversity. In classic D&D, we imagine that the world is full of monsters, who sometimes show up. (When the WM die comes up 6, then it's game on!) In Dungeon World, we imagine that the world is full of monsters, who sometimes show up. (When the roll is 6-, or maybe even 7-9 as @Aldarc said, the it's game on!)

The DW roll has nothing to do with wandering monsters, while the wandering monster roll is there for that specific purpose. The effect doesn't follow from why the player made the roll.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Why were you focusing so much on your character sheet? You just say what your character does. Then, if a move is triggered, resolve it! Otherwise the GM makes a move in response.

Then why are the moves on your character sheet at all, if you're not supposed to think about them?

 

[pemerton]

Which seems a bit odd, given that the bolded is also the exact function of a script in a play or movie.

I don't think your games are (or are intended to be) scripted in the least. That said, if everyone's input is that tightly constrained how can any of the participants say or do something unexpected, or with unexpected timing?

Your question has already been answered in this thread:

DW, like its parent AW, takes for granted that RPGing is a conversation. The participants say things, and in the process of, and as a result of, saying those things, they create a shared fiction. That shared fiction concerns the fantasy adventures of some D&D-style protagonists.

DW, like its parent AW, sets out a procedure for that conversation to follow: it's not free-form. As @hawkeyefan posted not a long way upthread, it specifies certain "triggers" for whose job it is to say what.

The most common thing for a player (cf GM) to say is what it is that their character does. When they say that, either it will trigger a player-side move, or it will not. The list of player-side moves is finite, and each states a trigger, which (with one or two exceptions that can be ignored for present purposes) takes the form of a description of an action in the fiction, like when you take aim and shoot at an enemy in range (in DW, this triggers the player-side move Volley). If a player-side move is triggered, the dice must be rolled (because of the rule "if you do it, you do it") and depending on the result (after modifiers), either the player or the GM (sometimes both) are instructed to add something further to the conversation (eg one possible result for Volley is that "You have to move to get the shot placing you in danger as described by the GM" - so the player describes "I move to get in my shot" and the GM describes the resulting danger, drawing on the established elements of the shared fiction (as per the earlier conversation), plus whatever other ideas they might have, to do so).

If the result of the roll for a player-side move is 6 or less, then the GM gets to make as hard a move as they like. More on this shortly.

If a player describes their PC doing something that does not trigger a player-side move, then the rule is that the GM "makes a move", that is, says something in the contribution. This should be a soft move, unless the player is handing the GM a golden opportunity to follow through on a threat that has already been established in the shared fiction (as a result of an earlier move).

Sometimes, in play, the players don't describe their PCs doing things, but rather look to the GM to get a sense of what is going on around them, or to get some framing, or just because they're not sure what happens next. When this happens, the GM "makes a move". Just as mentioned in the previous paragraph, this should be a soft move unless the players are handing the GM a golden opportunity to follow through on an earlier move.

When the GM makes a soft move, this means describing something in the fiction that increases the risk, or threat, or apprehension, or stakes - to speak in general terms, it contributes to the rising action. But a soft move does not foreclose the current aspiration the player has for their PC in the fictional situation. By way of contrast, a hard move consists in the GM describing something that does, in some fashion or to some extent, foreclose in that way. In other words, a hard move is immediate and irrevocable in its effect. The most generic example of a hard move is dealing damage, but obviously in many situations other, perhaps more interesting, hard moves will be possible.

The basic sequence of play that results from these rules is this: there is rising action, as the players describe their PCs doing things that do not trigger player-side moves, and the GM responds with soft moves. Then a player has their PC do something that triggers a player-side move; or, perhaps a player has their PC do something that hands the GM an opportunity. In the latter case, the rising action resolves into some sort of crisis or climax (as the GM makes a hard move). In the former case, depending on the result of the dice roll, the same may be true; or, perhaps, the result of the dice roll is another soft move (eg as per the example of Volley above, the GM describes the PC moving into a new sort of danger); or, perhaps the result of the dice roll is some sort of victory for the PC (eg in dealing their damage as a result of Volley, they kill their enemy, just ending the threat they are facing).

The most radical contrasts with D&D, as typically played are these: (i) the GM can only make a hard move in the situations I've described; the GM has no licence to make a hard move because that's what would follow from the logic of their as-yet-unrevealed prep; (ii) the GM is not permitted to narrate fiction which is not either a hard move (some sort of immediate, irrevocable crisis or climax) or a soft move (some sort of contribution to the rising action). In other words, "nothing happens" is not a legitimate move for a DW or AW GM.

<snip>

DW emphasises the GM's role in either contributing to the rising action (soft moves) or - in the circumstances that the rules dictate - contributing to crisis or climax (hard moves). When making those contributions, the GM will naturally draw on ideas about jails, and legal systems, and NPCs, but in aid of performing their job in the conversation as dictated by the rules of the game.

 

[pemerton]

Nothing can stop a game from occasionally being a bit dull.

Really? You say this because you've surveyed all the games in the world?

When I play BW it's not occasionally a bit dull. When I play Cthulhu Dark and Wuthering Heights and In A Wicked Age it's not occasionally a bit dull. When I play Prince Valiant, it's not occasionally a bit dull.

When I play Classic Traveller it's occasionally a bit dull, most often because Traveller handles wealth and expenditure through tracking every credit, which is tedious. As I've often posted, it would be better with a BW-style Resources/Wealth system.

One point of the structure of play in DW is to make sure that play avoids being dull.

 

[Micah Sweet]

This whole thing seems to have reached its fullest extent. Some people like DW and similarly-designed games, and others don't. The ones who don't have had plenty of opportunity to understand the ones who do, and it doesn't seem like anyone is going to change their mind. No one seems to be in favor of the OP's side in all this, so it seems the relevant points have all been made.

Am I wrong?