When you get ready to do it, do it...

Honestly, I wish Spout Lore was more like Open Your Brain. You just know or don't know. Interacting with it has little to do with it.

And, Discern Realities was the Read a Person/Sitch move, where you need to be there, examining, observing and interacting with it.

Now that we've actually started playing, I have to say I agree with this, or something pretty like it.

Quick question: For spout lore, is it assumed that whatever the answers to the questions are that you have just said it out loud? 

The name (spout lore) implies that whenever the move is made, you have just said whatever the DM tells you.  However, I could see cases where people want to know the answer but then want to keep it to themselves.  Is it OK to act on whatever the DM answers in response to another player's spout lore, even if you don't play out them telling you?

Originally, yes, it was out loud. That's still reflected in the moves discussion, but I think we might drop it.

That was Tony's original fictional difference: Spout Lore is talking about what you know, Discern is just studying.

That was Tony's original fictional difference: Spout Lore is talking about what you know, Discern is just studying.

Which is weird, because you can't really talk about it, until you know about it, but you can't know about it until the move gives you the information, but the move doesn't give the information until you trigger it, which is talking about it. ;)

In defense of the original structure, it's similar to Hack and Slash:

"I stab up into the ogre's belly!" / "I tell everyone what I know about how the ogre can be defeated."
"I rolled a 5, crap!"
"The ogre blocks your attack with his club and your blade gets stuck."/"You kind of blather about ogre dung for a bit, nothing very useful, and it's loud enough that the ogre knows you're here now."

A lot of moves have some measure of intent. You start an action and the move finishes it. It doesn't negate that you started it, it just plays out the effect.

So you start a sword swing, the move says you don't actually get them. You start talking about ogres, but you can't remember any pertinent details.

That said, I agree that the move could be better. Comparing it to Open Your Mind is rather brilliant, Adam and I are talking now.

At PAX last year, Sage, we talked about the Lore move as Open Your Brain.

It's still a good idea. :)

Which is weird, because you can't really talk about it, until you know about it, but you can't know about it until the move gives you the information, but the move doesn't give the information until you trigger it, which is talking about it. ;)

This is my current frustration.  I'll start to say something, then announce the move, roll, ask my question, listen to the answer, and then... what?  Do I repeat the info in character?  Is it assumed they know?  Personally, I'd prefer it stays verbal so that play can continue straight off with the GM having just told everyone what you said.  Now if only you didn't have to commit to telling them something before the move, cause then what happens if you roll a 6-, do you just sort of trail off?  My bard is gonna end up hella flakey if so.

I'd say Spout Lore could be done remotely. Allowing for planning and preparation. Discern Realities is done in the now. As you see and interact with something. 

A few times in the games we ran here we used the Open Your Brain for the Lore move. The tables were modified depending on where the PCs were.

Moves don't always have to have "when..." triggers that are rooted in the fiction, right?  Sometimes they are player-to-player triggers. In AW, there are plenty of examples ("at the start of the session..." or "when there's significant downtime...").  None in the basic moves do that, sure, but...

So maybe:

Spout Lore: when you ask the GM what you know about something, roll +Int.  On a 10+, you can ask 3 of the questions below.  On a 7-9, ask 1. 
...

The downside of this approach, as I see it, is that the hard move on a failure isn't clear.  Since there's no fictional action being taken, it makes it hard for the GM to respond with something irrevocable.

Yeah, the thing about the moves you mention is that they use a table cue (the start of a session) to represent something in the fiction (some time has passed). In my experience, those moves get tossed out if, for example, you end a session with a cliffhanger.

As you pointed out, for the consequences to work, a move really needs to be rooted in the fiction.

I ran into this during the first session I ran. Luckily, there is something wrong with the folks in our group, and one of the players acted on the information even though he knew it was false. I still gave him a +1 bonus.

I'm thinking of providing some sort of incentive, such as bonus dice, for players who do this.

I ran into this during the first session I ran. Luckily, there is something wrong with the folks in our group, and one of the players acted on the information even though he knew it was false. I still gave him a +1 bonus.

I'm thinking of providing some sort of incentive, such as bonus dice, for players who do this.

I'd suggest telling them to mark a pip of XP.  If your player does something cool that advances the story at the expense of a mechanical advantage... XP.

Yeah, mark XP like a Parley, or just +1 forward when acting on the information.  There's a precedent for that.

Perhaps for Spout Lore and Discern Realities a clause could be added wherein "on a miss the GM will spin untruth, mark XP if you act on that information."  That would help tie a missed roll back to the fiction be requiring the GM to give you some information and incentivize you to move forward with it.