Dungeon World Gets New Owners, Second Edition Planned

Luke Crane has purchased Dungeon World from its original creators and has plans to make a new edition of the game. Earlier this month, Crane, who previously designed The Burning Wheel and Mouse Guard Roleplaying Games, announced on the Dungeon World+ discord that he had "bought the game from the original creators" (Adam Koebel and Sage LaTorra) with a business partner and was preparing to work on a new edition. Crane did not specify whether either Koebel or LaTorra would be involved in the new edition.

Dungeon World's first edition won several awards when released in 2012, including the 2012 Golden Geek RPG of the Year and the Ennie Awards for Best Rules Gold Winner in 2013. The game was a Powered by the Apocalypse system in which players gained experience points when rolling a 6 or below on a check (which resulted in "trouble" occurring on the check and the opportunity for the DM to make a DM move. The game's co-creator Adam Koebel was a prominent creator and early TTRPG personality until accusations emerged of poor behavior by former partners.

Crane was previously the head of community at Kickstarter and attempted to run a campaign for The Perfect RPG zine back in 2021. He cancelled the campaign after it emerged that Koebel was involved with the project and later resigned from his job as a result of the backlash.

 

[Bae'zel]

Was DW mostly about dungeon crawling? Never tried it, but I thought it was kinda halfway between D&D and PbtA, and D&D has not been mainly focused on crawling since the early 80s, so I did not expect DW to be.

If the change is to get away from dungeon crawling that is one thing, the changes seem to make it a lot more pure PbtA however, which at least to me is something different

When we played it, we certainly didn't do only dungeon crawling.

Basically it was PbtA reframed into D&D ability scores. You could do anything with it. We had a blast (it was especially well suited to comedic sessions).

Most of my players' inside jokes are from hilarious DW sessions.

 

[zakael19]

Was DW mostly about dungeon crawling? Never tried it, but I thought it was kinda halfway between D&D and PbtA, and D&D has not been mainly focused on crawling since the early 80s, so I did not expect DW to be.

If the change is to get away from dungeon crawling that is one thing, the changes seem to make it a lot more pure PbtA however, which at least to me is something different

It was not, really, but the art style and framing (classic monsters, "getting treasure" being an implied focus of the system) felt older school then most people used it for I think.

 

[Elvish Lore]

The game is called Dungeon World 2, not Dungeon World second edition, for what's worth. Like... maybe they need to make it more explicit -- 'Dungeon World Revisited' -- but it's meant less of a replacement and more of an evolution of the state of PbtA fantasy gaming.

Original DW is from another era of gaming, which itself commented upon a much earlier era of gaming. DW needs to evolve if it's going to be part of the conversation... the gritty '70s-early '80s style of fantasy gaming isn't a common experience for anyone over 40. Trying to replicate that but with PbtA technologies feels very backwards looking. The hobby is filled now with people who came up with the "fantasy superheroes doing action-movie set pieces with a strong focus on thespianism" (awesome description, for real) and I look forward to DW embracing at least some of that.

 

[zakael19]

The game is called Dungeon World 2, not Dungeon World second edition, for what's worth. Like... maybe they need to make it more explicit -- 'Dungeon World Revisited' -- but it's meant less of a replacement and more of an evolution of the state of PbtA fantasy gaming.

Original DW is from another era of gaming, which itself commented upon a much earlier era of gaming. DW needs to evolve if it's going to be part of the conversation... the gritty '70s-early '80s style of fantasy gaming isn't a common experience for anyone over 40. Trying to replicate that but with PbtA technologies feels very backwards looking. The hobby is filled now with people who came up with the "fantasy superheroes doing action-movie set pieces with a strong focus on thespianism" (awesome description, for real) and I look forward to DW embracing at least some of that.

DW was maybe informed a little by 2e but really more 3.5e. The characters are way too heroic and competent at the get go to replicate older gen play. It was the trappings that throws people off I think!

Freebooters on the Frontier exists because the other DW descended games don’t handle old school dungeon crawling play well.

concur on them trying to draw a line between DW and this game, trying to reserve judgement on the totality until post-alpha design cohesiveness can be seen.

 

[mamba]

The game is called Dungeon World 2, not Dungeon World second edition, for what's worth. Like... maybe they need to make it more explicit -- 'Dungeon World Revisited' -- but it's meant less of a replacement and more of an evolution of the state of PbtA fantasy gaming.

from what little I know of either game, DW was not what you were describing, so the gameplay style you describe DW2 as moving to is essentially that of DW already and the real change is moving much closer to vanilla PbtA

 

[pemerton]

the real change is moving much closer to vanilla PbtA

I don't know what "vanilla PbtA" means - but presumably Apocalypse World counts as a good example of a PbtA game. And my copy of AW, in the chapter called "Advnaced ****ery", sets out some prototypical rules for Dungeon World (p 279). Those rules are credited to Tony Dowler. My copy of DW has the following in its acknowledgements section (p 361):

The original idea to mash Apocalypse World and D&D together belongs to our good friend Tony Dowler. He was gracious enough to let us build on his concept and carry it through to the shape you see today.​

And much of the actual text of DW - the GM moves, the stuff on fronts, etc - is extremely derivative of AW. To the extent that (in my copy, at least) "make your move but misdirect" is mentioned on p 359 as a principle, even though it doesn't appear in the list of principles on p 162, nor in their elaboration on p 163 (these only say "make a move that follows" and "never speak the name of your move", but omit "make your move but misdirect".

So to me, DW in its original form seems pretty close to AW in its core structure. The player-side moves are different - but to me the kerfuffle about hp seems a bit overblown, treating a matter of technique as if it were some deep principle; and while I can see that there can be an issue with Defy Danger, it seems close enough to Acting Under Fire that it doesn't seem like some wild departure from the basic ideas found in AW.

 

[mamba]

I don't know what "vanilla PbtA" means

more traditional PbtA design, not ‘diluted’ with D&D-isms

to me the kerfuffle about hp seems a bit overblown, treating a matter of technique as if it were some deep principle

it’s more than that though, the stats will be different too, and not just in name. As to HP, maybe you could replace it with conditions, but the handful of conditions feels much too shallow for me to do so (injured, sick, angry, …)

To me it looks like the changes make it align more with PbtA philosophy and remove anything D&D, arriving at generic fantasy, which is a much less unique spot than DW occupies

 

[pemerton]

more traditional PbtA design, not ‘diluted’ with D&D-isms


it’s more than that though, the stats will be different too, and not just in name. As to HP, maybe you could replace it with conditions, but the handful of conditions feels much too shallow for me to do so (injured, sick, angry, …)

To me it looks like the changes make it align more with PbtA philosophy and remove anything D&D, arriving at generic fantasy, which is a much less unique spot than DW occupies

Surely Apocalypse World counts as a "traditional" PbtA design!

And it uses hit points (in the form of a harm clock) to track damage, although it uses fixed values, not dice rolls, for inflicted damage.

I guess I don't know what people in this thread mean by "PbtA philosophy" - but I'm not seeing how closely it's connected to Apocalypse World!