My Monday night group gathered last night for our first session of Apocalypse World! The heat was ghastly so quickly before everyone got there I cranked up the AC and sealed the gaming area shut. I also made some salsa, because nothing says apocalypse like salsa.

We have two Matt W's in the game so if I need to specify I'll call them Matt1 and Matt2. Matt2 posts on this very board and is hacking AW, so you know him. Matt1 I've gamed with at conventions before and digs BW and various indie games. Also in the group is Carly who is my girlfriend and has a little experience roleplaying - mainly college D&D and a few games we've played together like Breaking the Ice, Maid, and The Final Girl. Joe is a friend Carly introduced me to who is a huge Doctor Who fan and whose prior experience with gaming seems to be exclusively with D&D, WoD, Call of Cthulhu, etc. I think he'll do fine.

Matt1 is playing Ozair the Savvyhead. Covered in robes and goggles and tools. He has a workshop on the edge of Longneck that's a converted mobile home.

Matt2 is Proust the Operator. He has some surveilance, infiltration, and scavenging gigs going on, and is a wheeler and dealer.

Joe is Sorrow the Hocus. His followers are a cult who believe him to be a god-prophet, and depend on him completely.

Carly is Iris the Brainer. She lives in an old train tunnel dug into the cliffs that sit at Longneck's back. She had a twin who died when she was younger, and has been in touch with the maelstrom for a decade. Maybe more.

We only got a chance to go round the table for a handful of scenes once we were done with character creation. Ozair's young assistant, Lemma, let him know that she was thirsty and that the town's water supply had gone to shit. It was a stream that burst from the wall of the cave and had it's source above the cliffs. He wanted to make a filtration system, but would need someone to climb upstream and find what the source of the pollution was, and bring back a pure sample so he could develop a method of chemical separation. He went to Proust to see if someone in his crew could help.

Proust was at White's, who is Longneck's primary poultry provider. They negotiated getting one of Proust's crew up the cliffs. Proust nominated Jesus, one of his crew.

When they weighed the dangers, Proust got reluctant to send Jesus after all. The trip would probably be a day out and a day back, and Jesus was ill-equipped. But Jesus wanted to anyway. Not having water to drink is a big deal.

On the other side of Longneck, Sorrow woke up to the supplications of Tumtum. Apparently, the followers were starting to get sick and Gnarly had started puking and shitting all over himself. Nobody knew what to do and they needed Sorrow to guide them.

Meanwhile, Iris climbed out of her cave and tried to get a read on what's going on in the town. Reading the situation, she saw that the town was already getting antsy, and she knew that White had some stores of water for his chickens and their preparation. He was sitting on either a big opportunity or a pile of dynamite.

And that was it. I wish we could have gotten further, but at the same time I was relieved to have the opportunity to take what I had and do some prep. A lot of things got hinted at that I could develop, and the players gave me a ton of material. I only wish I had gotten some more scenes with Iris - I got a bit of ribbing after the game since she only got two minutes of screen time.

I'm excited about putting fronts together and getting things motoring next game. The characters are already pretty damn cool. Oh, and Iris has metal pasties.

Shit head is my favorite name in any of the playbooks. I hope someday to play my own Shit head the Chopper, but in the meantime I am glad it is getting some use.

I'm trying to think of moves that would make the Scrapper really hot shit, and the only other thing I could think of is something where they can basically go into no-man's-land. They're the people who know the exact right places to step when walking through the Bonemelt Marsh, how to go into a cave full of fangbirds without getting ripped to shreds, etc. Which is more importantly places that are safe for them and deadly for other people. That thing you see all the time in movies where they're getting chased by bad guys so go into the Deathmurder Zone, and the bad guys either try to chase them and die terribly, or back off and shout, "This isn't the end! Curse you and your donkey!"

Stats look good.

I think the special is great, personally.

The Scavenge move will be great on a miss. You can totally get into some shit with bandits or critters or environmental hazards.

Jerry-rigged is really cool.

For 'I think I saw that somewhere' on a miss I'd also say, "You remember where you saw it and it was somewhere you said you'd never go back to." Or you sold it to Rolfball. ;)

I don't know why but I really want my scrapper to have a donkey.

I like this one, and I think it and the Swapper can peacefully co-exist. If I wanted them both in my game, I think I would make the Scrapper more about scavenging crap and wasteland survival so she could also function as a guide. Like, if you're looking to raid for a fight you'd want a Gunlugger or a Chopper. If you're looking to go out into the wasteland and come back alive, you want a Scrapper.

Some feedback - I love the idea of a barter-focused playbook. I think this could use some work, though.

The stats are a bit off the charts. I'd consider bringing the +3 Sharp down to +2 to be more in line with the other playbooks and balance the stats according.

The Laissez-Faire move is neat too, but maybe give it its own stat like the Hocus and Hardholder have. Make it +biz or something to represent your operations and have it give you barter/gear. I like the sticky situation on a miss - having things stolen or getting held up or having a warlord demand that you acquire something for her.

I know what you need is perfect.

Marketeer is a good idea, something that lets you tap into the bustling market, but I don't like it negating the consequences of a miss. Maybe have something where on a 10+ it costs 1-barter less than you expect (to a minimum of 1-barter).

Spread the Wealth is perfect I think.

Connections would work just as well as a generic +1 for barter moves I think, otherwise you'd never want it until after you've picked up your two moves from other playbooks.

Trading partners is cool too.

Another I'd consider:

I have just the thing! When you need a specific piece of gear, roll +biz. On a 10+ you have it in your stock! On a 7-9, you have it but MC choose 1:
- you were relying on it for trade. Pay its regular cost in barter.
- it's non-functional. You're gonna need to get it repaired.
- it's dulled or cracked. If it's a weapon it does -1 harm, if it's armor it's -1-armor.
On a miss you just sold it to Rolfball.

And just to be clear I love this idea. I'm miffed I didn't think of it since I love playing merchant characters.

I thought you knew it was me this whole time!

I would be tentatively willing to do that. Though I am virtually neurotic about playing games by-the-book, no hacks, etc. on my very first ever campaign of something.

Master Luo Chen is dead, and his school is burning. You don't know how many of the other students escaped with you, but you saw so many you recognized, dead, on your flight out. There's just a handful of you, watching the smoke and cinders fly in the distance.

After the shock of your Master's death, of your home being set aflame, of your friends and rivals being cut down in front of you, comes the shock of seeing the banner of Luo Chen's greatest student flying over the soldiers who mill about the ruins - the banner of the Emperor.

Now you must decide what comes next. Do you start new lives? Do you seek out Master Luo Chen's senior students to perhaps warn them or continue your studies under them? All you have are the clothes you are wearing, and the lessons that Luo Chen left you with while you studied under him.

They will be enough.

Attributes

Wisdom - Use in a challenge to outwit someone, to provoke an emotional response, or to avoid harm, to see through someone's motives or lies, or to teach someone knowledge.

Strength - Use in a challenge to defeat someone in combat, to intimidate and awe a crowd, to teach someone how to defend themselves.

Elegance - To distract someone with your beauty, to manipulate someone, to attract someone's attention, to impress someone with your dance or artistic performance, to politic or manipulate bureaucracy, or to teach someone manners.

Strategy - Use to plan a large scale attack or defense, to set traps, to engineer devices, to perform sorcery, or to teach someone the arts of war.

Dao - Communicate with ancestors, to reach out to nature spirits, to know the story of a mystical creature, to be in the right place at the right time, or to teach someone about the spiritual.

Mark experience when you roll a highlighted stat, or when fail an instructional contest.

Creating a Student

Choose a name:

Surname: Bao, Cheng, Deng, Gao, Hsia, Kwong, Liang, Mao, Pan, Shen, Tan, Wang, Xu, Zheng

Given name: An, Chao, Jiang, Le, Ming, Ning, Park, Qiao, Rong, Shan, Tai, Wei, Xi-wang, Yi min, Zhi

Look:

Man, woman, or ambiguous

Peasant wear, robes, martial arts uniform, military wear, noble wear.

Kind face, weathered face, tired face, pretty face, lively face, rugged face, sharp face, plump face.

Quick eyes, hard eyes, caring eyes, bright eyes, laughing eyes, clear eyes, calculating eyes, frosty eyes.

Short body, tall body, stocky body, skinny body, muscular body.

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Notes on things I haven't written up yet: I'm thinking that what the students are like determine who Master Luo Chen was. Are they all studying kung fu? Then he was the greatest martial artist in the world. Are they studying strategy and politics? Then he was the previous emperor's right hand - advisor and general. Etc. This also effects what the emperor is like as he will be pretty much an evil version of Luo Chen and his greatest student.

Characters will start with very basic moves and then be able to study their way up trees. I originally meant for this to be a kung fu hack but as it's spooling out in my brain it could be about warfare, courtly intrigue, or spiritual journeys to talk to the gods themselves

Experience will be gained through flashbacks with Luo Chen, and finding new teachers who you have missed rolls against. Like say you fight bandits and miss your kung fu roll to fight them. Turns out one of them is one of Master Luo Chen's old students and beats your ass!