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Apocalypse World / Re: 2nd Edition and Seize by Force (and similar moves)
« on: March 22, 2017, 06:10:57 PM »Right, but absent the direction to make a hard and direct move on a miss, how do you apply that collateral damage? Or are you just saying, "Yeah, sure, you mess those guys up, but you spray so many bullets that [thing you care about] of which you've taken definite hold is somehow fucked up" in response to the Gunlugger, regardless of success or failure? That's putting your bloody fingerprints all over something for sure, but is it being a fan of the character? Are you telling me that if I'm willing to burn my hold to keep someone safe and eat whatever damage comes my way that that someone might still be harmed in the process? That seems kind of raw.
Uh...you use a messy, area, or autofire weapon (and most really nasty weapons are one of the three), and you can expect some collateral damage even on a hit. Not on something you 'take definite hold' of, no, but other stuff remains fair game. You certainly don't need a miss to say that some stuff got messed up in the scuffle, and even if you do, you can probably get the players to make another move or two in response to the battle (reading the sitch to see if it's really over, for example) and note the collateral damage then. That's when the characters notice it, after all.
And of course you can apply that collateral damage to other stuff that's not part of the immediate stakes of the conflict (i.e. I'm keeping Person X safe but inadvertently kill Person Y in the process), but that's something that's incredibly situationally-dependent. In most of the examples given, it's not like these conflicts are taking place around a bunch of innocent bystanders. For sure you can add innocent bystanders to increase dramatic tension, but see above under: maybe warn new MCs that this is an issue.
Well, if you're out in the middle of nowhere with no potential for collateral damage, the consequences have to be at one remove, but these are people you're killing. Their family and friends aren't gonna be happy about that. Nor is their boss. But yeah, it's a lot safer to go all out in the middle of the burn flats than in town. I think that's a good thing, and properly reflects the fictional difference between those two situations.
And in terms of responding to these situations, before under AW1 it was easy: miss on SBF? You have failed to do what you set out to do, and can expect a hard, direct move from the MC in response.
Now, miss on SBF under AW2? You might still succeed. But the cost will be higher. Unless you're heavily armored up, in which case it won't. And there's nothing that says the MC can't make a hard move. So maybe he or she will. Or not. But you're still in battle. Probably. Or whatever.
That's what I mean by ambiguity.
For an experienced MC, the change probably won't make a whole lot of difference at the actual table. But I have a hard time seeing how the new way provides any additional clarity for people new to the system.
See, I'm not sure I agree. I mean, I'm not exactly new, I owned AW 1E, but the first game I ran of it was right after 2E came out (I'd run MotW before that, but that's not quite the same). I actually found the way it works in 2E made combat flow better. I mean, the necessity of an MC move on a miss really does just bring things to a halt, while the 2E method leaves things open for battle moves to flow into each other better. Any one is less risky, but assuming you don't kill everyone immediately, I think the total is generally more dangerous simply because there are more battle moves chained together.
The Harm move is also a bit more front and center, and really, does a lot of what you want and happens even if you take 0 harm. Heck, even a Gunlugger who always takes 0 Harm has a 1/6 chance of being knocked unconscious every time he's hit if the MC feels like it (10+ on the Harm roll...) Really, almost all the logical consequences of a failed Seize By Force are covered by one of the 7+ results on a Harm roll.