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To be clear/fair, I think I may have started the "negotiation" semantic tangent when what I meant was how a Blades crew has a ton of mechanics they can bring to bear on a situation to affect the original Position and Effect call the GM makes prior to taking up dice (and of course, Resistance...

In fact @Crimson Longinus you could do everything Blades does around the P&E discussion in a D&D game. Let's talk a little bit about what Position and Effect really are, right? Position, expanded, to my understanding is: "what you risk when you take this action, given everything established...

The negotiation is largely mechanical, not mind reading! And the game has explicit procedures for how to consider both Position and Effect! If you trade position for effect, you get better effect. When the GM sets position and effect to start, it's open and transparent and they should explain...

Chambers has been covered, so no need for me to reiterate her. The Goblin Emperor - my favorite book of the century to date. Implicitly about hope and compassion.

It’s in the possibility cloud. You index the resources, world (you are told to make Doskvol a place of ghosts), characters (there’s a Whisper - they deal with ghosts, I’m to be a Fan of the Characters), and information when you unravel the possibility cloud into concrete obstacles. We’re not...

Right. If there's an obstacle (or Threat), you're in Action Roll territory. Your goal is information to take some next step, but it's chancy. I tend to keep things in Fortune Roll territory (since Im telegraphing & following through with Threats) as a way to shape the score-world, and only in...

As I've said many times, and the book does as well, Gather Intel is generally assumed to be a Fortune Roll. In this case, they were considering the Arcane Stuff (the Whisper has a specific question on their playbook about this), and the Leech glanced over the mechanisms to see if there were...

Risk int roll? If you’re asking how they determined what/if there was a trap - I telegraphed trouble before it strikes (the well sealed room, circle on the floor, faraday cage like strips in the wall when they melted through). Their quick gather intel gave them a better Position (simply...

A clock is a round progress bar. Blades’ innovation was just encouraging their use as keeping consequences and changes very player facing. Clock ticks or unticks happen broadly on 3 things: a) as a consequence of a roll (resist-able), b) as a result of a fortune roll for faction ones during...

A) 1)what have I written down? My prep informs if there’s a trap, and what the DC for finding and disabling is. Depending on the questions the players ask, they’ll either activate the Skills on their sheet or simply ask for details. 2) I’d ask if there’s signs of a trap with some questions, at...

AW2e does tell the players their characters should start off as allies. They may not stay that way, and they don’t have to be friends. A question asked of the characters (and made much more explicit in AW:BO) is what will you make of this broken world. Along with the Ungiven Future...

YOu need to look at the character and what they value, what they see as important, who matters to them, what they want to protect/gain, & etc to do any of the things listed in those GM moves. If you dont know what the character wants, how can you offer them an opportunity? If you don't know what...

Two good examples, first what AW2e tells the MC(GM) to do for session 1: • MC the game. Bring it. • Describe. Barf forth apocalyptica. • Springboard off character creation. • Ask every question you think of. • Leave yourself things to wonder about. • Look for where they’re not in control. •...

I generally hear sandbox used in conjunction with OSR/old school style play these days, and it absolutely has a whole lot of preset hooks/content developed that the players can go out and explore. All the good hex map stuff, rumor tables, random encounter tables, perhaps some degree of a larger...

My understanding is it’s two fold, and absolutely on al sides of the table. It’s about the game writ large (we play blades to find out if our fledgling crew can thrive amongst the competing threats & the scoundrels own vices), and about the moment to moment questions that arise in the course of...

On this note, most of my Tuesday group also plays D&D together in the very neo-trad fashion that's the norm among a lot of the newer/younger players right now. I'll often come back from break to them kinda working out the next conflict between their characters, or what scene they're going to...

The "frog person who's afraid of water" as a pre-made character was the best part of that entire sample adventure.

Coming back in to kinda try to go back to the OP. For the following I'll posit that "GM Fiat" is when the person placed in the GM authority role makes a decision about outcomes of play that either a) arbitrarily cancels a player's intent and ability (eg: the Alarm scenario in the OP); or b) in...

Ye old “always say what the fiction demands.” Although a lot of that is in the Faction / district details as well, like your example.

If you're talking about the accursed "how long should a score be" I cited the page number and guidance already. If that just doesnt feel idk, concrete enough or you all want to use the intentional design theory behind the guidance there as a bludgeon to say that "haha no narrative play is just...