When to reveal the custom moves?

If any of my players is reading this, please go read something else instead.


Ok, so in my game clean water is a big issue, and the entire economy of the nomads and rovers is based on water-purification tablets: 1-barter is the going rate for a large handful.

One of my threats is a crooked warlord who attempts to make some easy money by inserting fake tablets into the circulation. He does this through a local goods broker who is on friendly terms with the PCs, so I gave him the following custom move:

When you trade for tablets with Petrarch, roll +sharp. On a 10+, the pay is kosher. On a 7-9, your pay includes a couple of fake tablets, but most of it is fine.

When do I reveal the move to the player? I guess my prep demands that when they trade some goods for tablets I'll say something like "you probably don't know it yet, but some fake tablets have entered the circulation". But should I present them with the move at the beginning of the session, the first time they trade with Petrarch or only after they concluded their trade with Petrarch? Or maybe the custom move is phrased wrong, and there's a better way to do it?

How does the trading, and more importantly -- the noticing fake tablets, take place?  What's that look like?

I think your move is fine if the falseness is something that the players can detect by eye, but it takes scrutiny and there isn't a lot of time during the trade.  So they get back to wherever and go through the tablets and have to weed out the bad ones.

If they simply can't ever tell, then do you need a move?  Just use your regular MC move opportunities to introduce impure water as a complication and let that lead them back to the source, if and when you want to.

And another option would be to set the move up so they roll when drinking water purified with Petrarch's tabs, if that's more interesting.

"When you trade for tablets with Petrarch, roll +sharp. On a 10+, the pay is kosher. On a 7-9, your pay includes a couple of fake tablets, but most of it is fine."

The way this move works is not entirely clear.

They are rolling Sharp, so does that mean on a 10+, there is fake tablets but they don't notice?

If it's supposed to be whether or not Petrarch likes them enough that he gives them all actually good tablets, why is this not a Hot roll?

I see two different possibilities to clear this up:

Change the roll to +hot to reflect whether Petrarch is giving them good tablets or bad tablets and just tell the player when they get sick that the water purification tablets must not have worked... Maybe after a while (or right away) they start getting curious and go to Petrarch.

Or,

Keep the roll +sharp, and Petrarch is always giving them bad tablets mixed in there. Allow the roll to notice that the pills are actually fake on a 10+, and maybe they just get weird vibes on a 7-9, and allow them to roll to read a person or whatever.

I like the Hot, because you can always announce future badness and allow the player to roll to read a sitch and ask "What should I be on the lookout for?" and you can tell them, "the tablets without the little symbol" or whatever.

Okay, how about this then:

When you drink water purified with tablets bought from Petrarch, roll +weird. On 10+, the water's fine. On a 7-9, either you or someone else drink contaminated water.

Weird is the stat to use for general luck, right? or should I use sharp instead?


And again, how should I declare the move? Should I say it outright, or wait for them to score 9 or lower to declare that fake tablets have entered the circulation? Should I read to them the entire move, or only the part about roll+weird?

Okay, how about this then:

When you drink water purified with tablets bought from Petrarch, roll +weird. On 10+, the water's fine. On a 7-9, either you or someone else drink contaminated water.

Well, the move shouldn't determine if the water is fine. You, as the MC, should using your principles, prep and agenda, right? Then, depending on whether the PC uses a "good" purification tablet or not we can discern whether there is an effect or not.

I think I know what you're trying to get at with this, but I think you're wording these moves in a way that doesn't reflect what's actually happening in the fiction.

So, in the example above, you might say, "On a 10+, you can discern whether the water is purified or not" instead of "the water's fine".

See the difference? In one case, the water is either fine or not and the player is gathering information about it. In the latter (your original), the move is determining the fiction based on... what? Nothing really.

So, your moves need to be grounded in, and attached to the fiction and the PC's actions in the game.

As far as when to reveal the details of the specific move, I think that's up to each individual MC and each individual move. Sometimes you may want to just throw it right out there (and I think that'd fall under "tell possible consequences and ask"). "If you drink it, you'll need to make this move... *showing them the move* You sure you want to do that?"

Or, maybe not. Maybe you just announce future badness. "When you lean in to cup the water in your hands, there's a strange odor. Do you drink it anyways? Great. Roll+sharp for me." And, then just tell them the effects of what they scored.

For some moves, like if they are using Sharp to detect something they shouldn't know, keeping the move hidden may be best.

And again, how should I declare the move?

Regardless of how you eventually decide to implement the move -- and to be honest, I think you should strongly consider Christopher's suggestion that there may not even be a move here at all -- my suggested method is:

When they do the thing that triggers the move, pull out your notebook or reference your index card or whatever and make an 'aha!' face and read the description of the move (the part in bold) that corresponds to whatever action they just took. That's always exciting -- you found a custom move! awesome!

Then just have them roll and tell them what happens. If they have to choose something, give them their choices. Reveal as much of the move as is necessary to do this.

Once they've triggered the move a few times -- or they've found out that Petrarch is doing the water tablet thing -- then show them the whole move if they're curious.

--

Of the versions of the moves given so far, I like the ones where things actually happen on a 10+. If it's just a matter of 'you get lucky or you don't', then it shouldn't be a move -- you should just wait until you get an opportunity to make a hard MC move and use that to establish that their water is contaminated, and people are getting sick.

After all, they are drinking water constantly, this isn't like a 'if you go in to the dangerous place, are you attacked or not?' -- they are always under threat.

It feels like you want a harm-like move, except with +barter instead of +harm. But contextually it should be rolled right away.

Having played with Daniel as MC, I endorse his method. Having only partial knowledge of a custom move, gleaned from experiencing it, creates a curiosity about the move and by extension the setting. Especially if somebody triggers a custom move and rolls a 10+, players want to find out what happens on a miss, they just want somebody else's player to find out for them.