Question about Small Holdings

When a character gains a small holding as an advance and the Wealth move, would you rule that they also gain the Hardholder feature that the holding covers their day to day living expenses?  That feature isn't mentioned as part of the Wealth move, but it might logically follow as a perk of even the smallest holdings that don't produce any actual barter as surplus.  What do people think?

Fair question. You could reasonably go either way on the matter, but I for one would always go with No. Just because it's a thing on a side, not the thing that defines them. They're welcomed to advance into a Hardholder though if that changes.

To me, it sounds like a good opportunity to establish how and why this is the case.

A Hardholder has - as a part of their description - already done so.

How will your character do so? Will they make promises to someone? Bribe someone? Threaten someone?

It seems like fertile ground to explore: how did this situation (being in charge and not having to worry about your day-to-day expenses) come to be?

Well, the player in the game I'm running who's grabbing a small holding as an advance is a Chopper who already has a base of operations in the ruins of Vicks on the River.  A lot of scavs go through Vicks looking for what hasn't already been picked over, and the Chopper already has a relationship of vague protection/extortion with the scavs in Vicks.  What we discussed happening is a semi-permanent encampment around the old movie theater his gang hangs out in, where the scavs know they can camp in relative safety, cut-rate liquor tents and fleshpits can set up, and generally serve as a gathering place for the bonepickers of the past outside of the somewhat more civilised town of Mayflower the Hardholder is running.  Having this permanent camp in place provides an easy one-stop place for routine protection operations by the Chopper, without the trouble of heading out and doing actual raiding.

Personally, I think anyone who gets Wealth should no longer have to spend for basic living expenses, otherwise getting Wealth is actually actively bad on a mechanical level.

I mean, Wealth as a Move gives you a little Barter some sessions (which explicitly doesn't ever accumulate) and has a real chance of screwing basically everyone in the PC group (plus all the NPCs) every session. And sure, it's great flavor, but mechanically? That makes it actually a net downgrade in many ways taken on its own. At least if you no longer pay lifestyle expenses there's some benefit. And I'm a firm believer that if you take an improvement you should receive actual advantages from doing so, not just penalties.

I mean, look at Marie's sample Hold on p. 254. It has a surplus of 0 Barter and want: savagery. That's a straight downgrade mechanically unless she at least gets the 'no living expenses' thing, since it never provides Barter and can cause savagery. By any interpretation that doesn't give her at least her own needs met by it, she's actively worse off for having taken it...and that doesn't sound like being a fan of her.

It depends why Marie has this responsibility. It depends what those people were doing before she ended up in charge. Maybe Marie is a huge bad-ass with lots of Barter from other sources, and this new Hold used to be a group of diseased refugees -- maybe the story right now is about the trade-off Marie is having to make to try and support this new 'Hold, to try and make it profitable. Maybe Marie is naive about what it means to have responsibility for people, and so is not doing the things a real Hardholder would have to do to make this work. In all these circumstances, and dozens of others, 'being a fan' means being honest about the consequences of Marie's actions and seeing what happens as a result -- it doesn't mean worrying about whether Marie's mechanical advance is 'worth it' on a mechanical level.

I mean, almost nobody adopts a Hardhold because they want barter -- and when they do, it should be obvious and there should be a reason it makes sense. But usually they do it for some other reason -- some thing it makes possible in the fiction, some expansion of their reach and also their obligations in the community. I understand that lifestyle-barter is a bigger thing in AW2 (don't ask me why), so maybe one should be generous for that reason -- but most people are not born Hardholders, and most Hardholds are not functional producers of wealth. It's the apocalypse, after all.

'Most hardholds are not functional producers of wealth.  It's the apocalypse, after all.'  This was actually what gelled things in my mind to settle on allowing a person with a small holding to at least extract enough surplus for a 1-barter lifestyle by default, because my assumptions for the apocalypse I'm running are actually quite different.  Agriculture continues and there's a trade network up and down the River that binds together a widely-spread civilisation of tiny settlements.  Things are rough and poor by pre-End standards, but my apocalypse actually has no danger of humanity going extinct, and in fact is in the slow process of rebuilding larger alliances and kingdoms in the shattered aftermath of the old world.  Previous high technology is slowly breaking down with no replacement, but new cotton cloth, iron stoves for new dwellings that have been manufactured up-River, new gas refined by the oil barons out west, and new crops every year have been seen in the setting.  Humanity at the very least is surviving, whatever the brutality of many people.

i just want to comment on the mechanical side for a sec, since most of the posts here on the narrative, I agree with. If you pick up a holding and wealth, that is essentially automatic barter with strings. It is always worth it. You can still do your gigs outlined by your playbook to get more barter (note: the hard holder and MaestroD with automatic-wealth lack these). And on top of that at the start of every session you might get more from this holding, maybe that completely covers your barter for the session and your gigs are pure profit rather then half spent on staying alive. But as all things that give you stuff in the apocalypse world, it gives your trouble and story too. (Which in my opinion is actually more interesting then the barter)

So you roll a 10+ and you get all the goodies from your wealth and your gigs. That's like what, 2-5 barter in total? Damn. Best find stuff to spend it on!

So you roll a 7-9, you get whatever barter you set the holding up with, maybe immediately spend that on your session's living expenses. You worked your gigs too so you've got 3-barter there-abouts more now in your pocket. And your holding even gives you another narrative prompt, a problem to solve, a apocalyptic event from which to spring board or ignore and watch fester like an open wound. Sounds pretty awesome to me.

So you roll a Miss, your gigs now go to living with only a little left over. Maybe everything's going to shit. The holding is certainly not in a good way and needs to be helped now if it's going to survive. Your character's narrative attachment to this holding is now being tested, does it survive? do you? Seems to me like this provides so many awesome opportunities that even if you missed the roll EVERY SINGLE SESSION, it would just mean your life is really not boreing. This is the apocalypse world, it's suppose to be like this.

Sounds to me like the holding gives your story, narrative, sometimes covers your living expenses, sometimes it does more then that, sometimes it instead gives you immediate pressing goals. Super cool.

Honestly, I'd be a little shocked if a PC with a Hold has anything resembling time to do a Gig every session. Heck, in my experience, few people without a Holding have time for that.

That's why Gigs give you several sessions worth of living expenses, so you don't have to do them every single session, and any session where you get a 9 or less on Wealth, the person with the Holding also has to deal with the consequences of that, which probably take at least as much time and effort as most paying gigs (and often more, depending).

And nothing prevents a Hardholder or Maestro'D from doing gigs, they just need to find something someone'll pay them enough for that they feel it's worth their time.

That's the point. A minor holding, Is Not, as dominating as a Hardholders holding unless you narratively make it that way. I've seen this advanced used many times, and it was often about building something in the world, a peice of infrastructure or something else that helped with the characters current plans and objectives, it was a step towards something they had been giging towards, but it was absolutely not the destination.

A Hardholder could gig, but they rarely have the time. A Gunlugger will gig all the time, because thats what they do. You read 3-barter as several sessions worth. I read 3-barter as 1 session's worth, it depends entirely on how much characters use barter in your narrative to achieve their ends. If barter is a distraction, then sure, let wealth wipe out it's need. But in my case that's never been the case. Barter is a tool that is actively sought not just to pay for downtime, but to actively push agendas. In this latter case, it's quite easy for a busy gunlugger to be at war with someone, raking in the barter by giging, while at the same time his little holding is trucking away piping the oil out of the sands that allow the gunlugger to expand his reach, to cover and personally influence a much larger area.

It can all happen off scene, just as easy as none of it happens.