Reflections After First Session

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Reflections After First Session
« on: November 13, 2015, 08:22:22 PM »
A question has come up after my first session. While trying to keep in mind that Go Aggro is when you care what the target does and Seize by Force is when you care what they have, I had some difficulty determining what the players wanted. When the Quarantine stuck a pistol in a thug's face and ordered him to surrender, that was obviously Going Aggro. The player hit an 8, so I had the thug jump for cover instead. However, when the Skinner came around the corner as backup and chucked a knife at the thug, since she had a better view, I was stumped for a second. I ended up just asking for a Seize by Force, but now I wonder if Going Aggro was better in that situation.

What should I do to determine what move fits best? Often asking the players what their goal is gets me the answer, "I want to hurt them" which doesn't help narrow down the move much. Seize by Force has the possibility of doing greater harm, but I then run into the issue of what is being seized.

Re: Reflections After First Session
« Reply #1 on: November 14, 2015, 07:40:59 AM »
You can always ask why they want to hurt the character to get more detailed motive. But intentions aren't necessarily the nominator, even though they could work as such.

Ask yourself the question if the npc is going to fight back. If yes, it's a fight. If it's a fight, it's seizing by force. If no, it's either going aggro, manipulation (if the intent isn't real) or suckering someone.

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Ebok

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Re: Reflections After First Session
« Reply #2 on: November 14, 2015, 05:04:54 PM »
I broke it down into this:

GO AGGRO: is threatening someone with violence, blackmail, brutality, or leaving the threat entirely unsaid but understood. To threaten them with violence is an entirely different matter then promising them violence. If you aren't going to pistol whip the fucker if he doesn't play along, then you're not being hard enough for this move. When the character will do something bad to someone unless... its going aggro. On a partial hit, if they don't cave, you actually do try to good on your threat, but, you hesitated, flinched, were distracted, or just a hair too slow to pull it off. You don't deliver, they dont either, but they're forced into one of those other choices. We actually used this a few times for political moves were the go aggro acted on a larger time scale of an entire day where someone attempted to blackmail a hardholder.

SEIZE BY FORCE: is when you want to inflict harm or seize ground, there are many situations where this comes into play. I always try to tell people that "take definite hold of it" is the tactics. So if you wanted to bash a guy with a gun, taking definitely hold doesnt mean you definitely made contact, hitting meant that. Taking definite hold might be you hit them and cut off their escape, or knocked something out of their hands, or forced them out of their position. etc.

The thing is, if the guy wasnt ready to avoid the attack, or would cave no matter what, you dont have to ask your players to roll. They just do it. If that guy was sitting down and you pulled out your gun and thee was -no chance- for him ot notice something was amiss, or otherwise could not avoid the attack, you just blow their brains out. Roll only when the consequences of the action arent obvious, or need to be determined through the arbitration of the dice.

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Ebok

  • 415
Re: Reflections After First Session
« Reply #3 on: November 14, 2015, 05:55:11 PM »
One last thought: When you snowball from someone's move, the situation should change to such an extent that attempting to do the move again just like that shouldn't be possible. In your example, if the Skinner was going to help end the guy, he shouldve been rolling aid another to help ensure the harm befalls the sucker. This does mean that he needed to decide to be involved and helping prior to the first guys hard roll.

AW isnt turn based, its everyone is acting at the same time, hear what everyone wants or expects to do, then let everyone roll. The fiction comes out of the collective results. (two guys roll two seperate Seize by forces to inflict harm on some guy, one miss the other kills it. the guy that misses had some bad shit fall his way meanwhile, hell maybe the guy he was killing instead shot him half a dozen times to the chest with inflict more; and then the other two exchange harm normally to kill the npc.)

Basically, resolve actions  (with or without rolls) simultaneously when you have people interacting with the same field.

Re: Reflections After First Session
« Reply #4 on: November 15, 2015, 10:44:17 AM »
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Basically, resolve actions  (with or without rolls) simultaneously when you have people interacting with the same field

I'll add that to my principles list. Thanks!