Hofner the Savvyhead for hire in High City, who’s got big ideas and sees barter as a means to that end, and her crew, Summertime, Ballpein, and Latte (her identical twin sister);
Kali the Hardholder of High City, who wants to get everything neatly under her jackboot for order and power’s sake;
Paypal the Swapper who deals mainly in medical supplies, raw materials, and low-tech gadgets and doesn’t always swap fair, and his crew, Diamond the face, Dirt and Stark the muscle, and Cellphone his long-time friend and assistant.

Welcome to Denver, or what’s left of it. High City’s the main action in the area—it’s where everyone comes to market. There’s other holds and camps scattered through the area. Kali’s thugs keep a tight perimeter around the city, and boy are they ever serious about it. They’re a large gang of savage fucking jackals—but they’re very well disciplined. Outside High City, it’s mountains, cliffs, and swamp; to the east, it’s always raining. People don’t really go east.

Everybody knocks their start of session rolls out of the park. Kali wakes up to her general, Shiva, dragging in some dumb kid who tried to cross the perimeter into High City. He’s yelling about his family out in Grey’s End being sick, but Kali doesn’t really give a shit, tells him he can stay in High City and work until he earns enough to hire a doctor.

Paypal is setting up shop in the morning when Forty, another of Kali’s gang, approaches him for a hookup. She’d done some spying on Kali for him (strictly business don’tcha know) and now she wants some long-range radios, so Paypal goes to hit up Hofner. They haggled for a minute; Hofner gets the upper hand and it comes out that Paypal once robbed Ballpein, one of Hofner’s crew, of some valuable electronic shit, and Ballpein is pissed at him. Then Paypal snake-eyes a manipulation roll, and Ballpein storms out, and he has to settle for some really shitty radios.

Meanwhile, Kali is checking up on her people, and we meet Matilda and the Doc. Matilda’s a creepy tall woman who smiles a lot and has brainpowers (Kali keeps her around as another weapon in her arsenal against dissent); the Doc is a doctor. Kali hunts the market for needed medicines as Matilda trails along, and then heads down to Hofner’s to see about getting the Doc’s iron lung machine fixed, as Paypal heads back to the market.


Next scene, Kali shows up at Hofner’s with Matilda trailing after her and gives Hof some scratch to come take a look at the iron lung. Matilda is very very very interested in Hofner’s special radio (Hofner has the move where a component of her workspace can do augury). Then Kali and Matilda head back up to the market, and on the way, Matilda tries to convince Kali that Shiva is a danger to her rule, but Kali deflects this onto Fearless and asks Matilda to get the dirt on both him and the kid who came into town. They end up in Doc’s office again, where they learn that the kid is sick with something, maybe serious, maybe contagious.

When Kali leaves, Hofner slaps together the radios real quick with the help of Ballpein, who’s just come back smelling a little like oil and says it’s because of a boy who works on machines at Edgee’s factory in the mountains who came down on a caravan today but only for a little while. Then she heads up to Doc’s to fix the iron lung and gets there for the tail end of the conversation about the sick kid.

Meanwhile, Paypal gets back to his booth to find that it is on fire. This makes Paypal very upset. There’s no serious damage, but nobody saw who did it—just that somebody threw a firebomb. Paypal gets up in arms and drags Stark over to the Station, which is the gang barracks. There, we meet Fearless, who is dumb as a post and really wants to sleep with Forty. Paypal gets Fearless to let him into the Station to talk to Forty by promising to hook him up with some flowers to give to Forty, but Stark has to wait outside. So Paypal goes and bitches to Forty that somebody threw a firebomb at his stall, and Forty is less than impressed that Paypal has caused enough trouble to get somebody to throw a bomb at him. She tries to intimidate him a little but he mouths off, so she whacks him in the face and tells Fearless to fuck him up proper. Paypal just barely keeps his teeth in his mouth by promising to hook Fearless up with a really impressive gift that will totally get him into Forty’s pants. So now he’s got to get those radios for Forty and something real special for Fearless, and neither will hesitate to fuck him up if he doesn’t! Delicious.

I totally did not push anybody to roll except once at the very end, and the result was we had maybe four rolls all session. The players seemed to be fine with that as a world-building exercise, but I’m definitely going to try to get some dynamics going next session!

Thanks for your input, everyone--I'm gonna take a final pass over the playbook, probably crib a bunch from all your ideas, and write up a version that we'll playtest sometime in the upcoming couple months.

How about something similar to the operator move "Eye on the door", like

Close to the land: when you get the fuck out of someone's or something's way before they see you, roll+sharp. On a hit, you're hidden, and they're right on top of you, if you move they'll catch you. On a 10+, you discover something neat--an unknown fact, a hidden trail, whatever, the MC will tell you. On a miss, you're caught vulnerable, half in and half out.

Kinda plays with the exploratory aspect of the playbook, I think.

Just looking for feedback, I guess!

(also, if anybody has a better name than Swapper, let it be known... please?)

---

introducing
THE SWAPPER
In Apocalypse World, the supermarkets are fallen. The department stores are stripped clean, the warehouses emptied, the factories gunned and shelled and burned.

In Apocalypse World, everybody wants a piece of what's left. Shame there isn't much to go around, but them's the breaks.

NAME
Marx, Fan, Standard, Keynes, Malthouse, Smith, Locke, Rockefeller, Corp Rit, or Margin.

Antoinette, Septer, Shaka, Chin She, Papal, Louis, Feudal, or Coronation.

LOOK
Man, woman, or concealed.

Luxe wear, display wear, casual wear, utility wear, or vintage wear.

Angular face, pudgy face, scarred face, handsome face, crooked face, round face, or guarded face.

Appraising eyes, shifty eyes, trusting eyes, guarded eyes, beady eyes, or cold eyes.

Fat body, full body, lanky body, twisted body, little body, long body, or hidden body.

STATS
Choose one set:
• Cool+1 Hard-1 Hot+1 Sharp+3 Weird-1
• Cool-1 Hard=0 Hot+1 Sharp+3 Weird=0
• Cool+1 Hard-2 Hot=0 Sharp+3 Weird+1
• Cool+2 Hard-1 Hot-1 Sharp+3 Weird=0

BASIC MOVES
You get all the basic moves (p72–74).

SWAPPER MOVES
You get this one:

Lassie fare: at the beginning of the session, roll+barter spent (max +3). On a 10+, you get your spent barter back, plus that much barter again (if you spent 0-b, then you get 1-b). On a 7-9, you get your spent barter back plus 1-b, and somebody wants a favor, a promise, or a hookup. On a miss, you get none of it back, and you start the session in a sticky situation that needs to be dealt with.

Then choose one:

I know what you need: when you manipulate somebody, roll+sharp instead of roll+hot.

Marketeer: when you go into a holding's bustling market, if you roll 7-9, you choose one instead of the MC. If you miss, you just can't find it, nothing bad happens.

Spread the wealth: when you give 1-barter to a PC with strings attached, you gain +1Hx with them.

Connections: whenever you roll for a barter move not from this playbook, add +1 to that roll.

Ear to the ground: you can ask your contacts for advice to gain the benefits of insight.

Trading partners: when you help or interfere with someone, if you've given them barter in the past, take +1 forward.

GEAR
You get:
• 1 handy little weapon
• oddments worth 3-barter
• fashion suitable to your look (you detail)

Handy little weapons (choose 1):
• .38 revolver (2-harm close reload loud)
• 9mm (2-harm close loud)
• big knife (2-harm hand)
• sleeve pistol (2-harm close reload loud)
• a club, like a baseball bat or crowbar (2-harm hand messy)

CONTACTS
Your contacts, you should have at least three of them, can consist entirely of the other players’ characters, with their agreement, or entirely of NPCs, or any mix. If it includes any NPCs, sketch them out - names and 1-line descriptions - with the MC. Then, answer these questions:
Out of your contacts, who...
• owes you big?
• do you owe big?
• wants in on your trade?

HX
Everyone introduces their characters by name, look and outlook. Take your turn.

List the other characters’ names.

Go around again for Hx. On your turn:
• Tell everyone Hx+1. You're up front about what you want and need.

On the others’ turns, choose 1 or both:
• One of them, you've been supplying person for ages. Whatever number they tell you, ignore it - write down Hx+3 instead.
• One of them burned you on a deal once. Whatever number they tell you, give it -1 and write it next to their character's name.
Everyone else, whatever number they tell you, give it +1 and write it next to their character’s name. You make it your business to know how the people around you work.

At the end, find the character with the highest Hx on your sheet. Ask that player which of your stats is most interesting, and highlight it. The MC will have you highlight a second stat too.

SWAPPER SPECIAL
If you and another character have sex, they can give you gifts worth 1-b, at no cost to them.

SWAPPER IMPROVEMENT
Whenever you roll a highlighted stat, and whenever you reset your Hx with someone, mark an experience circle. When you mark the 5th, improve and erase.

Each time you improve, choose one of the following. Check it off; you can’t choose it again.
__ get +1hard (max hard+2)
__ get +1hot (max hot+2)
__ get +1weird (max weird+2)
__ get a new swapper move
__ get a new swapper move
__ add a new contact
__ get 2 gigs (detail) and moonlighting
__ get a workspace (detail) and crew
__ get a move from another playbook
__ get a move from another playbook

BARTER
If you’re charging someone wealthy for your services, 1-barter is the going rate for: one good deal brokered; one high-quality or rare item obtained for them.1-barter will cover a month’s living expenses, if your tastes aren’t too grand. As a one-time expenditure, and very subject to availability, 1-barter might count for: restoration of a damaged or neglected vehicle to working order, a month’s maintenance of a hi-performance vehicle well-used but not damaged; a night in high luxury & company; any weapon, gear or fashion not valuable or hi-tech; repair of a piece of hi-tech gear by a savvyhead; a week’s hire of the protective companionship of a battlebabe or gunlugger; a year’s tribute to a warlord; bribes, fees and gifts sufficient to get you into almost anyone’s presence.

For better stuff, you should expect to make particular arrangements. You can’t just wander around the commons of some hardhold with oddments ajangle and expect to find hi-tech or luxe eternal.