The MC should not be looking at PCs through cross-hairs; the AW rule book pointedly fails to tell the MC to do this, and indirectly tells the MC not to do this. A player looking at another player's character this way, therefore, is on his own.

DWierd, how many successful, cascading moves directly dedicated to the murder of another PC does it take to kill that PC? I'm saying that non-direct murder shouldn't be any easier than direct murder, from the way I'm reading AW rules. For perspective, you can see how 5 6-harm stabs to the eye won't quite kill a PC, can you?

Also, DWierd, past rolls can have traction without granting the auto-kill, as my previous example showed. Looking at your latest example, I myself wouldn't have declared your character to be in stasis in the sack. If you wanted out, I'd have asked, "How? Muscle your way out? Cut your way out? Try to wrestle the sack's holder?" and gone from there, all the while envisioning what it means to fight your way out of a sack when some angry dudes want you to stay in it. On the other hand, if I wanted one hard move to trap you for awhile, I'd have described something more constraining than merely being stuffed into a man sized sack.

Charles

In Apocalypse World, there is no move that allows you to say, "I have you helpless now; I can keep  doing harm to you until you die, and there is nothing you can do about it." In stories, furthermore, when Fifi is lying there in a drugged stupor, and Rouge looks at him with murderous intent and then gets ready to stab him in the eye with his own knife, dramatic tension almost always goes up, not down, and an auto-kill  with already established murderous intent means no dramatic tension whatsoever. So, neither by fiction nor by rules is an auto-kill supported.

Now, in the Going Aggro example, on a 10+, the choices are suck it up or cave. All well and good, these. If the result is 7-9, though, we see the payoff of Rouge having maneuvered Fifi into position. The additional options, at least in theory, that are available to Fifi in such a case are:
• get the hell out of Rouge's way
• barricade himself securely in
• give Rouge something he thinks she wanta
• back off calmly, hands where Rouge can see
• tell Rouge what she wants to know (or what she wants to hear)
Fifi's problem is that to do any of these, he has to, you know, do it. How is Fifi gonna do any of these, drugged and unconscious as he is? So, he's back to sucking it up (if he wants to live) or caving (if he wants to die).
Assuming he takes the damage and lives, I would, as the MC, turn to his player and say, "I'm thinking you want to defend yourself here. So, to do anything except take Rouge's next stab, you'll have to act under fire, and the fire is that drugged stupor you're in," and go from there.

As for the realism of knife to brain, assuming it went in as planned, there have been people who have made full recoveries from having chunks of their brains knocked out, so one stab through the eye isn't necessarily the end.

Charles

Actually, an NPC with 2 or more harm might live, if helped in time. Taking definite hold of such an NPC's life would seem to mean being able to make sure the NPC lives long enough to get help, or dies too soon for it.

Charles

Tommi, I had pulled some inspiration from your take on Amber MCing. Thank you for posting it.

In my take on this, threats are grouped together into factions, each of which is based around a core ambition, each of which is associated with a type of person:
creation
revenge
might
position
pleasure
security
rule
influence
destruction
favor

The twist here is that a player character can create a faction of his own, complete with countdowns and custom moves, framing himself as a type of threat and adding other threats to it. If, for example, a PC seeks the throne of Amber, the player should create a faction suited to do it and go from there.

Charles

Nice job on the Blur.

So, where's the pimp?

Charles

My take on MCing Amber is as follows. This is intended for an Amber hack using the AW system, but I see no problem using this with Amber Diceless Roleplaying Game

Replace "There is no status quo" with "The status quo can always be threatened".
Replace "There is never enough" with "Someone always wants what you have".

The MC's Agenda is ...

Make the Amber multiverse seem real
Make the player characters' lives not boring
Play to find out what happens

Always Say ...

What the principles demand
What the rules demand
What prep demands
What honesty demands

The Principles are ...

Make Amber seem real on top of being Real, solid and constant
Make Chaos seem Real yet mutable, solid yet chaotic
Make Shadow seem real yet ephemeral, vivid and varied
Address yourself to the characters, not the players
Make your move, but misdirect
Make your move, but never speak its name
Look at shadow and the things from shadow with an eye toward their eventual destruction
Name everyone, make everyone a person
Ask provocative questions and build on the answers
Respond with frequent contrariness and interference, and with intermittent blessings
Remember that threats are threats, but that threats are not all they are
Be a fan of the player characters
Think offscreen as well
Sometimes, disclaim decision making
Unless a specific move allows it, never allow a player's subsequent move to be the same as that player's previous move.

The MC's Moves are ...

Separate someone from others
Capture someone
Put someone in a spot
Announce off screen trouble
Announce future trouble
Inflict harm as established
Separate someone from his valuables
Make them expend Respect
Make them expend material wealth
Activate the downside of valuable objects and places
Reveal the possible consequences and ask
Offer an opportunity, with or without a cost
Turn the move back on the player
Make a threat move (from one of the factions)

After every move, ask, "What do you do?"

Threat are as in AW. They are gathered into Factions, each based around a fundamental ambition: creation; destruction; favor; influence; might; pleasure; position; revenge; rule; security;

The threats are as follows.

Doom

Compulsion (impulse: to assert obedience)
Construct (impulse: to assert its nature and function)
Curse (impulse: to make the accursed suffer)
Delusion (impulse: to dominate people's choices and actions)
Disaster (impulse: to cause grief)
Legend (impulse: to eclipse history)
Plague (impulse: to afflict and to spread)
Rumor (impulse: to be believed)

Threat moves for dooms

Conceal a truth from some or from all
Reveal a truth to some or to all
Press someone physically, according to its nature
Press someone psychically, according to its nature
Cause a fortuitious event to happen, according to its nature
Cause an unfortuitious event to happen, according to its nature
Strengthen someone, according to its nature
Weaken someone, according to its nature
Grant or withhold shelter, comfort, or solace

Item

Item of Power (impulse: to have been used to its utmost)
Keepsake (impulse: to be cherished)
Monstrous Item (impulse: to behave like a monster)
Stolen Item (impulse: to be restored to its rightful place)
Thinking Item (impulse: to behave like a person)
Tool (impulse: to be needed)
Treasure (impulse: to be coveted)

Threat moves for items

The item is lost
The item is found by someone
The item is noticed by someone
The item is revealed to all
The item is used against someone
The item is used to help someone
The item changes hands
The item causes a problem
A problem happens that the item could solve
The item makes a threat move according to its desired behavior, if any

Monster

Beast (impulse: to survive and be dominant)
Breeder (impulse: to bring more of its kind into existence)
Collector (impulse: to amass precious things and/or people)
Creature of Legend (impulse: to be an object of wariness for those who have never seen it)
Demon (impulse: to gain power and recognition)
Devourer (impulse: to consume and destroy)
Doppelganger (impulse: to share someone else's reputation)
Parasite (impulse: to drain vitality)
Thinker (impulst: to behave like a person)

Threat moves for monsters

Reveal the true nature of its world
Reveal the contents of its heart
Attack someone indirectly: from behind, by stealth, or otherwise
Attack someone directly, without warning
Insult, affront, offend or provoke someone
Offer something of value or a valuable service to someone, with strings attached
Put it in someone's path, part of someone's day or life
Threaten someone, expressly or by implication
Steal something from someone
Take and hold something or someone
Ruin something: befoul, rot, desecrate, corrupt, adulter it
Make a threat move according to its desired behavior, if any

Person

Architect (impulse: to remake the world / ambition: creation)
Avenger (impulse: to see the object of his hate suffer or be destroyed / ambition: revenge)
Follower (impulse: to serve someone powerful / ambition: position)
Libertine (impulse: to enjoy things and people thoroughly / ambition: pleasure)
Loyalist (impulse: to uphold and protect his own / ambition: security)
Mendicant (impulse: to have his needs met by others)
Monstrous Person (impulse: to behave like a monster)
Pretender (impulse: to become and to remain a potentate / ambition: rule)
Puppeteer (impulse: to control events behind the scenes / ambition: influence)
Reaver (impulse: to pillage and destroy / ambition: destruction)
Slave (impulse: to behave like an item)
Sycophant (impulse: to be well regarded by the powerful / ambition: favor)
Warlord (impulse: to have a warband and to be dominant within it / ambition: might)

Threat moves for people

Outmaneuver someone
Attack someone directly, committing resources to the attack
Attack someone cautiously, holding back reserves
Seize something or someone, for indirect gain
Make a show of power, authority or solidarity
Negotiate for concessions or for obedience
Stake a claim to territory by blockading it, assaulting it or occupying it
Subvert someone's allies by threatening them or by buying them out
Analyze where someone is weak and attack him there
Make a well planned attack against a clear objective
Inflict violence chaotically, without a clear objective
Rigidly follow, or else defy, authority or reason
Tell stories: true or false, allegorical or otherwise
Demand consideration or indulgence
Ask for someone's help or participation
Make a threat move according to its desired behavior, if any

Place

Hell (impulse: to be a place of torment)
Home (impulse: to provide shelter and comfort to its rightful residents)
Paradise (impulse: to be desired and sought after)
Place of Legend (impulse: to be known beyond its bounds)
Place of Power (impulse: to be at the center of important events)
Prison (impulse: to frustrate potential escapees)
Treasure Trove (impulse: to draw treasure to it)

Threat moves for places

Reveal something to someone
Display something for all to see
Conceal something or someone from others
Bar the way to some or to all
Open the way to some or to all
Provide a way in, out, or through to some or to all
Shift, move or rearrange things and people within its bounds
Offer up a guide
Present a guardian
Send something or someone elsewhere
Take something away, rendering it lost, used up, or destroyed

A place is a location within a shadow, a shadow, or an amalgamation of any number of locations and shadows. A person subsumes all those who serve that person and who aren't distinct threats of their own. Monsters are inhuman; at least one thing about a monster must make it unsettling to most humans. Items are objects that do not, or would not, normally have a personality. A doom can be concrete or abstract, as physical as Ghostwheel or the Black Road, as insubstantial as a death curse, as abstract as an idea.

Charles