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Messages - Borogove

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1
I really don't like the move presented as an example, because if you take definite hold of someone with a grapple, how can they just throw down the gun and run away? Why would they do that? Take definite hold and impress them? Maybe then you've leverage to talk them out of it if you didnt before... but really. It's VERY hard to stop someone belligerently trying to get someone else with violence without seriously hurting them.

The stakes weren't getting hold of Birdie, they were getting hold of the gun. PC chose "take definite hold of it" and "impress/dismay/frighten", so the resolution has to be that the PC has the gun and Birdie doesn't. Exchange of harm is mandatory because it's Seize By Force; if PC had chosen "suffer little harm" then maybe it would have been an elbow to the jaw instead of a gunshot in the flak vest.

2
Apocalypse World / Re: NPC Name Habit
« on: January 14, 2018, 11:05:35 AM »
Sam Kabo Ashwell's Apocalypse Fuel has a great name generator -- mostly list based, but with a little bit of procedural transformation and great combinations. A sample:

Urm
Rat
Bo Shotgun
Lupin
Dump Bounder
Velvet Lark
the Gorgon Lord
Granola
Wicked Lupin
Bomb Sev
New Sig
Dragon Basher
Autumn
Squicky Squicky
Bog Partner
Sinclair Trembly
Pleasure Boris
Saffron Mo
Badluck
the Crusher Madame

3
Apocalypse World / Re: The Contaminated
« on: December 15, 2017, 03:57:57 PM »
I don't think it's anywhere near as unavoidably potent as the water bearer or the rock'and'roller thing.

Okay, cool - both Waterbearer and Show seemed manageable to me.

4
Apocalypse World / Re: The Contaminated
« on: December 14, 2017, 03:18:58 PM »
It sounds like you were apprehensive about it having too much effectiveness and therefore, perhaps, taking up too much spotlight time.

I had the same concern when I read the playbook. I guess if all the players buy in to the Contaminated being the focus, everyone can share the spotlight based on how they interact with it?

5
Apocalypse World / Re: Seize by force - to kill
« on: November 25, 2017, 12:50:56 AM »
The other thing about going ahead and shooting Squiggy here while he's backing away with his hands up is that anyone in the room with you when you do it knows that's the kind of thing you're willing to do. You can't credibly do the Mal Reynolds "you'll be awake, you'll be facing me, and you'll be armed" thing after that. If you're good with that, fine, but depending on who you were before that, it might mean a permanent change to the status quo.

If Squiggy knew you were a bloodthirsty killer in the first place, he probably would have gone for "barricade himself", right? So whether it was Squiggy or the MC or the player himself who thought that backing off would keep him alive, well, someone learned an important lesson, something interesting happened.

6
Apocalypse World / Re: Seize by force - to kill
« on: November 21, 2017, 12:23:45 PM »
Ah, got it:

Quote from: AW1e
"So, what?" Keeler's player says. "I'm going aggro? I just put the shotgun to his head and pull the trigger. What's the move?"

"Well," I say. "If Bran were capable of reaction, yeah, you'd be going aggro, and what you'd want Bran to do is die in an explosion of brains. But he's helpless. You're just doing it, you aren't even making a move."

"Really?"

Bran's player: "Really?"

"Really really. How much harm does your shotgun do?"


-- 1st ed, p165-166, Harm & Debilities

I mean, if you contradict yourself, very well, you contradict yourself. The 2e revision of this passage (When Life Becomes Untenable, p207) appears mechanically identical, but using the "suckering" terminology instead of "go aggro doesn't apply, so no-move".

7
Apocalypse World / Re: Seize by force - to kill
« on: November 21, 2017, 12:18:00 PM »
Nope. In 1st Ed, you should have rolled to go aggro even if you couldn't miss. Attacking someone and expecting the MC to inflict harm on them for you isn't in the book

"When you attack someone and you can't miss, don't roll to go aggro. Instead, the MC inflicts harm on them as established" is a custom move.

This is going to be another one of those where I swear up and down it's in the book, and I'm going to search for it in the book, and it's not going to be in the book, and I'm going to feel like I understand AW less and less all the time, and also Berenstain/Berenstein.

8
Apocalypse World / Re: Opening Your Brain in a Solo RP?
« on: September 15, 2017, 12:10:29 AM »
I've tried using randomized pictures to simulate trying to make sense of the psychic maelstrom, but that tends to lead to me piecing them together to form the most obvious conclusion, which doesn't seem fitting.

Are you reaching conclusions you wouldn't have come to without the pictures, or no? If you want the result of Open Your Brain to be a surprise, maybe try answering the question before looking at randomized pictures, then look at the pictures and then require yourself to come to a different conclusion than the initial one.


9
Apocalypse World / Re: Available In Print Again!
« on: August 01, 2017, 10:36:03 PM »
Applause

10
Apocalypse World / Re: The Landfall Marine
« on: July 30, 2017, 08:44:06 PM »
Really the only way this makes sense to play, IMO, is if all the other playbooks are cetaceans. Gunwhaler. Orcababe. Narwhal Skinner.

12
Apocalypse World / Re: Optimal number of players?
« on: July 19, 2017, 01:34:35 PM »
MC+2 or MC+4 works, too, of course, but for me MC+3 is the sweet spot.

I find MC+3 doesn't give quite enough social complexity and tension. MC+4 seems ideal to me.

13
All the other playbooks strike me as very clear in how they have power in the world: The Hardholder, The Chopper and the Hocus has power because they can order people around. The Gunlugger and Faceless has the power of violence. The Battlebabe has the power of starting any shit they like and come out on top. The Brainer can mind control. The Driver can go places. The Savvyhead can make anything they like, basically. Etc. From the very start, all these things provide pretty clear and direct a) motivation and direction b) ways to influence the world c) threats that ties into their stuff and/or motivations.

I don't see that to same extent with the Skinner. The Skinner instead has the indirect power to get other people to do something for them.

Same with the Chopper and Hardholder; they can get their gang to do violence for them or they can threaten someone with that violence to get someone else to do something.

The difference is, when the Skinner uses their power, the person they're using it on is, more often than not, happy about it.



Quote
Another way I can see for the Skinner to work is if the MC ask the player "What do you have that is so beautiful that everyone wants it? Your music, your voice, your body, the tattoos that you make?" And then make it a truth in the world that this is one of the few unspoilt things of true beauty, that everyone wants. So it's a leverage on basically everyone when rolling to seduce/manipulate.

It's far more interesting for only some of the NPCs to appreciate the Skinner's art.

Quote
2) What are your experiences when playing as a Skinner. In what moments did you feel powerful and cool? In what moments didn't you? Did you feel like your Skinner needed to be sexy? Do the Skinner have to have something that's unspoilt beauty (see above) or can it just be that "sex sells", even if it's as broken and hollow as everything else?

I'm playing Skinner for the first time in a PbP game right now. In the game, a Hardholder (PC who dropped out of the game) just got killed by one of his lieutenants, and the remaining players are thinking about trying to neutralize that lieutenant and get control of the Hardholder's former gang. First thing I did was get some "time and solitude" for the Hypnotic move with one of the other lieutenants who we believed felt loyalty to the old Hardholder. So now we have a spy on the inside who is likely to take our side when the time comes. The mechanics and the fiction of that worked very nicely together. My character was a little flirtatious but explicitly did not have sex with the guy, just had a deep and meaningful conversation. (Under other circumstances she might use sex to get what she needed, but it wasn't necessary here.) Her chosen art is singing, but she hasn't yet done it in-game.

14
The Angel says to the hardholder "You got me covered, right? After all, I'm staying in your fort, helping your people out"

Hardholder says "Sure, I got your living expenses covered"

Now, does the Hardholder pay the barter for the Angel's lifestyle, or does the hold provide it by itself?

Based on your answers, I'd say the latter.

My read of Jonatan's answer is the opposite. The Hardholder's wealth roll gives him access to X barter for the session; she can spend one of those barter to pay the Angel's lifestyle cost. If the Wealth roll fails, and the hold is in want, she can't support the Angel without playing things out.

15
Apocalypse World / Re: Disciplined Engagement - Quarantine
« on: March 18, 2017, 07:58:15 PM »
Pinky, 1-harm? Really? 1-harm is massive damage, 2-harm is lethal damage, 3-harm is they're already dead damage. Shooting someones pinky off might hurt, but it's never going to kill them (or halfway kill them). Sounds more like a shocking, extremely painful 0-harm to me. Take their whole hand? Foot? Knee? Okay. 1-harm.

p210, 2nd ed, When an NPC suffers harm:
1-harm: cosmetic damage, pain, concussion, fear if the NPC’s likely to be afraid of pain.

That seems right in line with someone shooting off your finger to me.

2-harm: wounds, unconsciousness, bad pain, broken bones, shock. Likely fatal, occasionally immediately fatal.

This seems more like hand or foot shot off, or kneecapping, though in a cinematic setting that might not rise to the "likely fatal, occasionally immediately fatal" level.

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