thoughts on Apocalypse World?

[Ovinomancer]

True. It just might not be fore me.

And that's cool. What's really hard to grasp from a traditional viewpoint - and I had trouble with this myself - is just how differently these games actually work. They help you do this stuff on the fly and they actively prevent prep outside of very loose stuff from working. They're built to follow along and produce story. If you're trying to imagine a D&D game where you just make it up as you go, then, yeah, that's sounds bad. I still run 5e, and I do not do this in 5e. It doesn't make a lot of sense for the system, and if that's what you're used to, then the idea itself isn't going to make much sense within your experience set. I also play these other games, and run them, and it's a very different thing I do when I run Blades than when I'm running 5e. And the systems work differently, and aid the different approaches. It's an interesting thing. I'd recommend picking up one of these games -- Ironsworn is both free and based on PbtA and a great and awesome game that does a pretty good job of explaining how it works so differently. On your part, when you read (if you read), start with the premise that these rules create a fun and rewarding game and try to figure out how that works with just what they say -- not with your experience from D&D. Maybe it clicks, maybe it doesn't, or maybe you find out you just don't like it. Or, like me, you find a great other way to play that you can also enjoy.

 

[niklinna]

I picked up Ironsworn based on a prior recommendation here. It looks pretty cool and I'd love to play a few sessions of it. Maybe some folks here who haven't tried PbtA games would like to give it a spin?

 

[Aldarc]

Ah, so it would actually suck for me, personally, then, since I like to at least have an outline of what can or will happen because I'll completely forget otherwise. And because I mostly run horror, which has a lot of mystery and setting design that (for me) needs to be established ahead of time.

It depends on how you set up your fronts. If your front involves a "haunted house" or "supernatural serial killer," then your moves can help set these things. Some of the soft moves in PbtA may involve forecasting an impending threat. The hard move consequence of a failed roll may even involve the PCs finding the body of a victim.

 

[pemerton]

And it's for almost any "Are you (ability) enough to do (action)" and not just exploration. Had a player make a Cha SR 3 to convince a bull to attack the orcs ... PC did speak bovine, so it was indeed convincing, and not driving/intimidating.

Another question about this: do you use the CHA SR in place of the reaction table (which from memory is an optional rule in 5th ed)?

 

[pemerton]

I've never run PbtA horror, but I've run Cthulhu Dark with no prep beyond reading the 4 pages of rules. It worked well.

So I think PbtA horror should be doable, I would think along the lines @Aldarc describes not far upthread.

 

[aramis erak]

Another question about this: do you use the CHA SR in place of the reaction table (which from memory is an optional rule in 5th ed)?

No. But I use it if a player wants to change the reaction....
From last sunday: player who speaks bovine notes the orcs had captured Farmer Braun's prize bull. He's tied up in the kitchen. The bull's reaction was neutral. He decided to convince the bull to go rampage through the Orcs. (I assumed a big prize bull was worth 100MR, but didn't tell the player.) I set the difficulty at SR L2 CHR. He made exactly the needed TN. So, the bull changed from fear of to anger at the orcs. PC didn't get to roll for attacks (he was a room away from the melee) , but he got to roll the bull's 10d6+50 ¹ instead... Also note that I'm using essentially 7.5 but with 5e leveling. Which adds a few types (Leader, Ranger, Specialist Wizard, Citizen), and the simple talent system (it's a label, and a rating rolled on 1d6. Each level adds a new talent at 1d6, or adds 1d6 to an existing talent. When a talent applies, it gets added to the attribute. It also adds a squeaked by zone - a fail of less than level below TN adds level to the dice roll...


-=-=-=-=-
1: It should have been 11d6+50, but I screwed up, forgetting that the first die is free...

 

[Faolyn]

It depends on how you set up your fronts. If your front involves a "haunted house" or "supernatural serial killer," then your moves can help set these things. Some of the soft moves in PbtA may involve forecasting an impending threat. The hard move consequence of a failed roll may even involve the PCs finding the body of a victim.

I just like being able to imagine the horror ahead of time. Saying that there's a haunted house doesn't do much if I can't actually imagine what horrors await in each room and figure out how to describe that image for the PCs. Sometimes I can do that on the fly, but most times my "on the fly" image is very raw or too cliche.

I may like playing a PbtA game (although not one with a sex move*), but I don't think it's the right game for me to run.

* Although I've played characters with a wide variety of sexual orientations, and I've played characters in relationships, both with other PCs and with NPCs, those things were also all planned out in advance. In real life, I'm an aromantic asexual and I've got a fun helping of Asperger's as well. I BSoD with even mild unplanned flirting, let along actual sex. I can't just go "OK, my character and Bob's character go off to have sex" without freezing and feeling panicky, even if that was the entirety of that encounter.

 

[niklinna]

I just like being able to imagine the horror ahead of time. Saying that there's a haunted house doesn't do much if I can't actually imagine what horrors await in each room and figure out how to describe that image for the PCs. Sometimes I can do that on the fly, but most times my "on the fly" image is very raw or too cliche.

Ah, what you are describing is an environment with horrific things in it, not a story that has to be scripted in detail. PbtA games can handle that just fine, and you can leave a few things unplanned to have some room for ideas that come to mind mid-play (from your or from the players! "What's the more horrible thing you could imagine being in this room?").

I may like playing a PbtA game (although not one with a sex move*), but I don't think it's the right game for me to run.

Sex moves are particular to some PbtA games, by no means all. Ironsworn has Bonds, for example. It's a bit of a shame that the original had such a hot-button feature. Blades in the Dark doesn't even have a formal relationships-between-PCs thing.

 

[Aldarc]

I just like being able to imagine the horror ahead of time. Saying that there's a haunted house doesn't do much if I can't actually imagine what horrors await in each room and figure out how to describe that image for the PCs. Sometimes I can do that on the fly, but most times my "on the fly" image is very raw or too cliche.

You could certainly write notes about what sort of things might be in your haunted house as part of your Front and establish a countdown clock for when badness escalates, but PbtA games don't want GMs to script plots. It's unsurprisingly similar to the Alexandrian's whole "prep situations, not plots" line of thinking.*

* insert the usual bit about how both OSR and story games represent two divergent counter-responses to traditionalist gaming and GM-curated stories with similar interests in emergent stories.

I may like playing a PbtA game (although not one with a sex move*), but I don't think it's the right game for me to run.

That's fair. PbtA can be demanding in how it expects the GM in the moment to generate appropriate consequences that flows from the fiction. It takes practice to hone as a skill.

Ah, what you are describing is an environment with horrific things in it, not a story that has to be scripted in detail. PbtA games can handle that just fine, and you can leave a few things unplanned to have some room for ideas that come to mind mid-play (from your or from the players! "What's the more horrible thing you could imagine being in this room?").

Agreed.

Sex moves are particular to some PbtA games, by no means all. Ironsworn has Bonds, for example. It's a bit of a shame that the original had such a hot-button feature. Blades in the Dark doesn't even have a formal relationships-between-PCs thing.

Sex moves in Avatar the Last Airbender would be odd and out of place, and I doubt Nickelodeon would have been fans of it either.

 

[Faolyn]

You could certainly write notes about what sort of things might be in your haunted house as part of your Front and establish a countdown clock for when badness escalates, but PbtA games don't want GMs to script plots. It's unsurprisingly similar to the Alexandrian's whole "prep situations, not plots" line of thinking.*

That might be a good way for me to do horror (I definitely follow the situations, not plots idea--if only because plots have so many moving pieces I tend to forget them!). Which PbtA game would be best for that, though? IIRC Dungeon World--and correct me if I'm wrong--leans heavily into restricting race and class, or uses race-as-class, both of which are things I hate with the power of a thousand suns. Even though I run a mostly-human-only Ravenloft, the idea that those restrictions are built into the game anyway bothers me enough to not want to spend money on the system.

That's fair. PbtA can be demanding in how it expects the GM in the moment to generate appropriate consequences that flows from the fiction. It takes practice to hone as a skill.

Yeah. I'm not adverse to trying it at all. I just think I need more (preferably written) examples, and specifically with notes as to why things were done that way. The AW book's examples are... lacking. They seem to be written for those who immediately get the idea, not for those who are struggling with the differences.

I have a few other issues with AW. It creates just enough of an implied universe, what with the psychic maelstrom, to make me kind of have to play in it, but not enough to truly paint a picture of what it's like (compare to a game like Troika!--which I also haven't played yet, sadly--where I can just see the golden barges sailing through the hump-backed sky in my mind). The examples in the "Barf the Apocalypse" section don't cause me to imagine what the world as a whole is like.

But the PbtA system itself makes me want to figure it out.

Sex moves are particular to some PbtA games, by no means all. Ironsworn has Bonds, for example. It's a bit of a shame that the original had such a hot-button feature. Blades in the Dark doesn't even have a formal relationships-between-PCs thing.

Blades in the Dark is another thing I have issues with. Such a beautiful, amazing setting, perhaps one of the most unusual and interesting post-apocalyses I've ever seen... and they're wasting it on heists. Heists are great, but I can do that anywhere. In a setting where the sun is broken, I want to explore the world and deal with the consequences of that, not just steal things and create gangs.