Critique of AW

I'll open with the main question I have:
Are we missing something, or are our play styles, philosophy, and what we want out of DW incompatible with the choices the designers made and the areas they chose to emphasize?

Also, I really have high hopes for this game.

Last night I ran my first DW game, with players who, while they had never played DW, had at least played AW once, if not dozens of times. In addition they have all played various editions of D&D in the past.

While we all had a great time, there were a few things which just didn't feel right. A few things about our (hastily) built setting.
A) The party was level 1 and had a fighter, cleric, and thief.
B) The setting became very urban intrigue, complete with an oppressive government and secret assassin guilds trying to kill a young boy for an unknown reason.

One of the things our fighter pointed out was that there are a decent amount of moves which are ripped almost word for word from AW. Not a bad thing, so long as they fit the theme of DW. What he felt the lack of, however, was GOING AGGRO. When they captured an assassin posing as a city guard, they all look at the basic moves, trying to figure out how they could beat the information they needed out of him, which doesn't exist (as far as we could tell) in DW.
The fighter had to resort to an inspired if slightly convoluted parlay in order to force the assassin to talk.

Another thing pointed out was that our average XP for the 3 hour session was 5 per player. Everyone felt a little bummed that they didn't level, especially those who were very used to the fast pace of advancement in AW. This feeling was compounded when we realized how much XP is needed for high level play.

I was being a little conservative in my calls on alignment XP. Should the DM be more liberal in handing these XP out, to speed up advancement?

Finally, why is there no human guard example monster? This isn't meant as a flip comment. Was this a choice to focus the game on dungeon crawling and killing monsters, rather than allow the game to head in the direction that we chose (intrigue), which it was not built for?

First off, thanks for posting. These thoughts are great to hear.

Beating information out of a captive sounds like Parley/Manipulate in both systems. In fact there's an example of just that on page 194 of AW. Using the threat of violence as leverage to get information is probably Manipulate, walking up to a guy, putting a knife to his back and saying "come with me" is Go Aggro.

If the fighter does actually start beating the guy to get information? That's not a move (unless he stops and says "tell me what I want to know or I keep going," that's leverage). That doesn't mean nothing happens! The GM plays it out according to agenda, principles, and moves. Is the guy really willing to die over this?



XP is probably the most adaptable part of the game. We're looking at some major changes to that, but for now consider the amount per level to be a guideline. Adapt as needed. For one-shot games 5 XP per level is fine.


There's no human guard because we chose to focus on monsters, plain and simple. That's partially because it feels like there's not much interesting to say about a generic human guard. If you want one, chop the moves off a goblin or something and write your own.

Now, the guards of a specific place, with special training, who are part of a notable order: those guys deserve stats, sure. But we can't do that bit for you. Monsters are interesting in the generic: they've got strange adaptations, fell magic, etc. A human guard in the abstract isn't very interesting. He's got 2 or 3 damage, 1 Armor, a few HP... and what else? What do human guard DO that makes them worth writing about?

I could see Cultist of the Spider Queen, Redmoon Tower Guard, and Night Sister Adept (for example) as human monsters in the book. They're maybe more specific than "goblin", but easily dropped into pretty much any DW game.

If the fighter does actually start beating the guy to get information? That's not a move (unless he stops and says "tell me what I want to know or I keep going," that's leverage). That doesn't mean nothing happens! The GM plays it out according to agenda, principles, and moves. Is the guy really willing to die over this?

Is he willing to  die for it? He's a hardened assassin, so I'd really want to let a move dictate that.

As for Parlay covering it: Yes you could argue that, and it's not much of a stretch. Manipulating with the threat of violence is a time honored tradition in my AW games. The Fighter, however, is not well equipped to do that by default, and has little mechanical incentive to do that if Str is highlighted.

A Gunnlugger, on the other hand, with Hard highlighted, can Go Aggro all day long to beat the tar out of someone for information (more or less). It was this discrepancy between AW and DW which caused the most questions.

As for XP, I appreciate that the team is looking into it, and yes, it is super easy to tweak that. The main question becomes, then:
Do we keep advancement (aka leveling) constant, like in AW, or do we make it multiplicative, as it is now. As is, it could take a considerable amount of time to advance at higher levels. May a hybrid system is called for, where it's (random numbers) 5 xp for levels 2-4, 10 xp for 5-7, and 15 for 8-10.

As for human's as monster. Human's can be far more interesting than monsters, in a different way. While a giant spider can tie you up in a cocoon, humans are cunning, brutal, emotional, horny, murderous, and all around crazy. Maybe a human guard can't use a poison stinger, or a flying dive attack, but you can bribe the, insult them, or lie to them. And if you must kill them then they need stats.

Do you see DW as capable of settings other than heavy on dungeon crawling?

Dungeon World can totally go beyond the dungeon! In fact, there are some moves and monsters that really don't belong in the dungeon at all.

I agree that there are interesting human guards, and John gave some examples of that. But so far there aren't monsters like that, with specific ties to implied setting, anywhere in DW. We'll totally think about adding them, but for now I would much rather have "Goblin Orkaster" or even just 'Goblin' than "Human Guard." As I said above: monster creation is super easy. If you need a human guard, you can probably make her on the fly.

That's a big part of why there's no human guard listed. Human guards are more likely to be named human people where their level Hp and armor are secondary to being a character. Goblins are, for the most part, glorified weapons hurled by evil things at the players. They need stats.

As far as the interrogation, there are moves for that, they're just not called Go Aggro, and yes, the fighter isn't the best at them. Parley comes into play, maybe, and if not that then the GM just plays according to their moves, which will still fill in pretty well. Maybe you reveal an unwelcome truth, or tell them the consequences and ask. That's still good entertaining play there.

That said, the fighter could totally have a move that says "When you Parley with threats of impending physical violence, you can use Str instead of Cha."

As for XP, I think I would prefer to level up after 10+Lvl XP.  Mostly because I like the faster advancement.

I'm the fighter of the game mentioned above. Yay fighting.

Initial caveat: For all my griping, I enjoyed the game. I want to play it again. But I want to try to fix it up a bit.

Some elaboration on events: The assassin was captured. I wanted to interrogate him. The Cleric had done all the Parleying so far, as he was the only one with a positive Charisma. My Strength and Constitution were highlighted. I was playing a dwarf, so I could have used Constitution to Parley if I had had a drink with the assassin. That...seemed weird. I had zero incentive to roll Parley with Charisma when I would likely fail at it, and when Charisma wasn't highlighted, so I wasn't going to try to do so when the Cleric could do so and likely succeed (and get the experience point to boot). The answer seemed to just be, "Let the Cleric do it," which was a wee bit boring because, as I said, the Cleric had done all the talking so far. A conundrum.

Until I came up with a ridiculous ploy to Parley him into dueling me. And if I won, he'd tell us everything. I rolled really well on the Parley, which was a total accident, and he agreed. I beat him, and he spilled. It was kinda cool, if roundabout and unnecessary, done purely because I'm an experience whore who wanted to roll Strength. If I had just gone straight into the Parley with that roll, I would've gotten what I wanted to know, without even having to go to the duel.

The point of relating this is to say that my decision was, in part, based on highlights. I didn't want to Parley. I wanted to get him to tell me what I wanted to know, using Strength or Constitution. Were I a gunlugger, I would have pointed a gun at him and said, "Tell me what I want to know or I shoot you in the face." I'm pretty sure that's a go aggro. I would've used Hard, which I interpret as the equivalent of Strength, with the gunlugger as the equivalent of a fighter. Instead, though, I did this roundabout dueling ploy. Ultimately, it worked out and was fun, but that's only true because of a fluke of the dice on my Parley roll.

If I could've rolled Strength, the cool scene with the duel likely would never have happened. But, if I hadn't rolled the fluke on the Charisma, then it similarly never would have happened, and I think I would've been discouraged from trying that kind of thing in the future.

A few things that occur to me upon reading/investigating more.

(1) I would kill for the move Sage suggests: "When you are attempting to Parley someone with the leverage of threat of violence, you can roll with +Str instead of +Cha." That would easily and immediately be the first improvement I take.

(2) XP systems...it seems like there's a lot of discussion here, and I happen to agree with what John Harper said somewhere, that highlighting stats feels odd. I think having Keys, like in Lady Blackbird or TSoY, and like the alignment XP generation thing already in place, would be cool.

My suggestion would be that each character has six (or so) such keys, perhaps directly attached to each of the stats. They don't have to be tied to stats, but if they were, as I suggest with my examples, they should be very loosely tied to the purpose and usages of those stats. So, my Strength Key could be: "Defeat an enemy stronger than myself without help," or it might be "Prove that I am stronger than my enemies and/or my allies." Dex could be "I will always flee from 3 enemies," or it could be "Learn how to use a bow." Con could be "Prevent Rook from being hurt at all in combat," or it could be "No one gets inside my house." (Those may not be the best examples; all are off the top of my head.)

Anyway, if you had six or so keys, then you could highlight Keys instead of stats. If I envisioned a Key of the Bodyguard transferred here, for instance, I might have "Gain XP whenever you protect Rook from harm by sacrificing yourself." But that's only activated when it's highlighted. This would probably be pretty intensive and difficult to generate, but it could be ridiculously rewarding, and I think it would lead to deeper, stronger play than simply highlighting Strength.

Regardless, in our game, I think decreasing the amount of XP needed to level and/or increasing the amount of XP earned would be a fix for me, at least.

(3) As a build off of (1), more special moves that shift basic moves around to other stats would solve a lot of this. They seem pretty rare in DW, and yet they're all over AW. I think they make a big difference. I wouldn't feel as disinclined to take certain actions if my highlighted Strength were used for more than just Hack & Slash and Bend Bars, Lift Gates.

(4) I wouldn't so acutely feel the desire for more XP and leveling up, if I didn't feel like I was significantly lacking in the capability to do certain things I really want to do. In AW, there are cool things I can't do, but want to do, but don't need to do. In DW, it seems like there are things I somehow feel to be more integral or necessary, but can't get until I level up. Example is below, with the Gladiator move.

(5) Another option for dealing with experience? Make it so that from levels 2-10, you choose from the first list, and for levels 10-20, you choose from the second. I haven't counted the exact number of options available on each list, but it does stand out to me that there are a lot of options, and you're only going to see, like, 5 of them.

When some of those options are cool, nicely flavorful, but ultimately really weak, why would you pick them? I'm thinking of Gladiator as an improvement for Fighter. It says, "When you fight before a crowd of spectators, get +1 damage." Now, I think that's awesome. I like the Gladiator flavor, I like the "When you fight before a crowd of spectators..." situation. I would take this move. In fact, if I could have, I would have picked this move to start with, because it makes a lot of sense for my character.

But! +1 damage? That's it? In a highly specific situation? Not useful when I'm in dungeons, or fighting in alleys, or anything except arenas? Uh...why would I waste one of my precious few improvements on this? Particularly when I can just get Merciless: "When you deal damage, deal +1 damage." Why would I ever get Gladiator, unless I already have Merciless? And Scent of Blood: "When you hack and slash an enemy, you take +1 damage forward against that enemy." Again, why would I spend an improvement on Gladiator instead of Scent of Blood? Scent seems so much more useful, and in the base game, I don't get many improvements, and I certainly don't get them often.

I'm really interested in experimenting with the Key based experience. I was thinking about converting my character into a Shadow of Yesterday character, and what I would gain and lose as a result. What stood out is that Keys (and Secrets, to some extent) were much more attractive to me, but the resolution system of TSoY appeals to me far less. So if we could get Keys and DW resolution, it'd be pretty sweet.

Then again, perhaps I am unfairly associating TSoY and DW. If DW is doing something utterly different from TSoY, and what I'm feeling is that I want DW to do more stuff like TSoY, then maybe the answer is that I'm just a fool who's playing the wrong game.

This connects to the question that my illustrious DMC (Dungeon Master of Ceremonies) raised above. Are we (or, am I) using the system to do something tonally or stylistically off? Is DW the type of game where Keys should or could exist?

Frankly, and I had never thought to hear myself saying this, I think you may want to rethink your approach to the game. If you're "disinclined to take action" because it won't reward you with XP to roll for a stat that's not highlighted, or because the roll might fail, then you're not playing your character like a real person. Real people don't get to know beforehand what actions will reward them or provide learning experience (okay, "go to college" is usually a pretty safe bet) and they sometimes try to do things when the odds are stacked against them or when it's unquestionably against their immediate best interests.

Keys are totally an option for DW, and one we've considered.

Stat switching moves are possible, over the history of the game there's been more or less of them. The hard part is that they have to be clearly fictionally justified, which is harder to do with the D&D stats than it is with the AW stats. In AW you can, say, read a situation with weird and it makes sense. In fact I think most of the combinations of stat+move in AW make sense. Read a sitch with cool, maybe, or Go Aggro with weird. The D&D stats aren't as fleixble, so we have to be careful to only do substitutions that make sense. Str for Cha in some cases makes sense, the move I mentioned above is in the preview edition of the game we plan to have at GenCon.

As Tael mentions, your agenda isn't quite matching up with the game's. I added the "Parley with STR" move because it's fictionally appropriate, not because there's some obligation to balance or allowing everybody everything. Your fighter, with his low Cha, just isn't able to talk people into things as well.

In the case your mentioning, what you might do is aid the cleric. You play the tough thug, beating up the prisoner, while the cleric says "I could call him off at any minute, if you tell me what I want to know..."

Does DW need a Go Aggro move? I think not. I think the distinction between Go Aggro and Manipulate with the threat of violence is how present the threat of violence is (knife pressed in the back v. cracking your knuckles, for example). Remember that with Go Aggro they have the option of just sucking it up, which you have to be willing to dish out. That just doesn't feel that D&D to me. In D&D social interactions either fell to a Cha based skill or to GM fiat. Luckily we have agenda, principles and moves in place of fiat, but I'm alright with Cha governing how well you can bend a person to your will, no matter how you do it.

Thought of another way: I'm not sure a stronger person is a more intimidating person. AW gets around this due to the nature of its stats (Hard isn't a physical thing). In DW it seems to me that a wizard threatening with his spell shouldn't be any different than a fighter threatening with his sword, hence using Cha to do it.

Brendan, I would have to agree with what Sage and Tael are saying. It seems to me that what you want is a hybrid of three games (Lady Blackbird, AW, and D&D). And what are you asking for from the experience system is not a simple change, but instead a major overhaul to the system as a whole.

 The reason why the keys in Lady Blackbird works so well for that game, is specifically because all the characters are pre-gen. They have abilities and backstories (vague though they may be) that are already decided and provide a very specific sort of experience within the game. Tying experience to the highlighted stats and alignment is a proven system (as it is done in AW). And as far as changing the amount of Xp needed for lvling, it follows the progression of 3.5 and oldschool D&D. As it is, in my last game I don't believe that there was a character within the party that did not get 2nd level and then some in the first session (which was a 3.5 hour session). If you want better XP gains within your game I would suggest talking to your DM and explaining what it is that you are looking for (in the case of a fighter that would more likely than not be chances to whack people with your weapon of choice).

If you want custom moves that would allow you to change which stat you are using, in order to accomplish a goal by alternate means, I'd talk with my GM about it. Roleplaying in general has a long tradition of house-ruling and rules-drifting to cover for eventualities like the ones you are talking about. And as Sage says, it's hard to attach stats that come from D&D to some moves. I see this as an opportunity for the DM to exercise his right to interpret fiction and make a judgement call. However, as Tael says, if you are playing for a high XP total at the end of the session, you are not immersing yourself in the fiction. Act as your character would, and if you get more XP, awesome.


 I'm not entirely sure what you are asking for with Gladiator is something that is immediately necessary. It seems to me what you are wanting is an ability which gives you a combat advantage that I'm not sure is needed. Looking at Gladiator the way you are seems to be a rather narrow interpretation of the ability. If you can take the +1 to your damage and you wanted to loosely interpret the wording, then any time you are fighting and someone is watching the fight rather than joining in, you've got the bonus (so long as your DM agrees). Like you yourself said, the Gladiator ability it seems revolves around the fiction more than being bonus-centric.

And in response to your last question, I don't necessarily believe that you are playing the wrong game, but from what I understand of the system for TSoY they are built to do different things. In my experience at least, the DW system gave my group a rules light oldschool D&D-esque that was fairly fiction-centric. But please take my comments and opinions with a grain of salt, as they are based off of my own experience with this system and gaming in general.

Some very interesting food for thought here. Thanks for the comments!

If you're "disinclined to take action" because it won't reward you with XP to roll for a stat that's not highlighted, or because the roll might fail, then you're not playing your character like a real person. Real people don't get to know beforehand what actions will reward them or provide learning experience (okay, "go to college" is usually a pretty safe bet) and they sometimes try to do things when the odds are stacked against them or when it's unquestionably against their immediate best interests.

I get this, and I agree with it, to a point. Here's my take, using AW as a base.

If I want to get something done in AW, I generally have multiple ways to do so. If I want somebody to tell me something, I can go aggro on him, if I'm willing to potentially hurt him. I can manipulate him, if I've got something he wants (like cash, or an offer of sex) or something with which to threaten him. I can read him, and ask, "How could I get your character to tell me what I want to know?" That's three options any character has, always, to get information out of somebody.

Even if I want someone dead, I can either be all sneaky and shoot them with a sniper rifle or stab them from behind (go aggro), or I can take them on, face to face, in a major shootout (seize by force). Normally, they both use the same stat, but they offer different possible results, and there are things that can switch go aggro onto other stats, so the choice is important.

So, I would play my character like a real person. He's a gruff, rough and tumble guy. He's prone to slitting throats. He wants info from Daff. Looks like a go aggro, right? He's willing to kill Daff, even if it means losing the info permanently, so yeah, let's go for it. He's got other options, but go aggro is the one that fits both with what he's best at, and with what he's like. The two go very strongly hand in hand in AW.

But! Someone highlighted my guy's Hot at the beginning of the session. It's a big fat -2, so normally, I'd steer clear of it as a player, and the character would steer clear of it because he knows he's not great at seducing or manipulating. Makes sense, right? He'll manipulate when absolutely necessary to get what he wants, but generally he finds he's much better with the whole "I will kill you if you don't do what I want" approach. But in this case, I choose to have my guy manipulate, purely because someone highlighted my Hot. This means both that I have an incentive to do it (a purely out of character incentive, by the way), and that another player at the table thought, "Hey, it'd be cool if Brendan's guy manipulated or seduced more often this session, instead of knifing people," giving me yet another (OOC) incentive to do it.

In other words, I just made a decision about how my character would react, entirely based on the highlighting. I don't think I just did anything wrong or against the agenda of the game, there. In fact, this is the only purpose I can see behind highlighting. To say, "Hey, do this more often, please!" If players aren't going to try to use highlighted stats more often over non-highlighted stats, then why use highlighting at all? Simply so that you periodically get an XP for what you would've done, anyway?

Okay, but in this case, because of the way DW works, I don't have options. I either talk to the guy using Parley, or I don't talk to the guy at all. I can't read him, I can't go aggro on him, I just have to Parley with him. So, I either use Charisma, or I don't do anything. My Charisma isn't highlighted, so the force of the highlight, which might've tipped me over as a player into using my poor Charisma, isn't there.

So then I default to the question, "Well, what would my character do here to get him to talk?" I know the answer is, "Break his kneecaps, then ankles, then elbows, until he starts talking." Which, I guess, is a Parley? So, I would Parley. But my character also knows that the cleric, bless him, is a great talker. Gets people to do what he wants all the time. And the whole leg breaking thing, well, that works pretty infrequently for Annika (my character), for the out-of-fiction reason that I've got a low Charisma. So, isn't it entirely reasonable for my somewhat amoral, pragmatic character to step to the side, let the cleric do the talking?

Which is great! That's something the cleric made himself good at! He should be rewarded for it. I didn't give myself a high Charisma, it's my own damn fault. Plus, he's got his Charisma highlighted! Even more incentive for him to do it, and for me to let him do it. It all seems good.

Where it starts to bug me is that any time the cleric is around and our agendas align, Annika would always step aside to let him do the talking, with the exception of when my stat is highlighted. Because then, I would specifically say, "Well, I want the XP, so, 'Get out of my way, Cleric-boy! I need to do some leg-breaking!'" (Also, in relation to this, are you saying that if my Charisma was highlighted, and I've established that Annika normally defaults to the cleric doing the talking, then I should still choose not to roll Charisma based on that precedent, instead of choosing to roll it because I want the XP? That doesn't seem terribly fun to me.)

Answers there are: (1) Disharmony: Our agendas should align less often. (2) Separation: The cleric and Annika shouldn't always be together. (3) Just do it: I should try to talk and Parley anyway, even if the cleric is around and my stat isn't highlighted.

(3) just doesn't jibe with me. Doesn't seem to make any sense, either as a player or as a character. (2) would be fine, and (1) would be awesome.

So maybe the answer is that we just need to play more. We need to get more (1) and more (2), so that (3) stops coming up and bugging me. From what I gather, the more you play, the more (1) there is, and in turn, the more (2) there is.


To Sage:

Didn't even think of the difficulties in the more defined D&D stats. I guess there's a part of me that wants to pull the silly move of saying, "Well, you can define them liberally! Strength can mean strength of character, too! Dexterity can mean verbal dexterity! Constitution can mean you're stoic and tough to affect, socially!" But that feels a bit silly, and definitely out of character for D&D. So I get what you're saying, and that makes a lot of sense. The move-switching business may not work as well for DW, except where fictionally appropriate.

That said, I do think I uncovered a bit more of what bothered me in my above response. In AW, I often have 3 or 4 ways of approaching any goal. I don't think I have those options clearly described through moves in DW. If I want someone to tell me something, I have one option in the moves: Parley.

(Side note: Unless the Spout Lore questions can be interpreted more openly? I didn't think this was appropriate, particularly when I was dealing with an assassin of an order I'd never met until that day. But, can I just say, "Aha, I recognize them!", establish that as truth, and then Spout Lore to ask of the assassin, "How can I make it tell me what I want to know?" Is that acceptable?)

So, while my Gunlugger can approach the issue of obtaining information a bunch of ways in the basic moves, my Fighter can't. Admittedly, there are other options outside of the basic moves that I'm not including, such as bribery, or obtaining a truth potion, or whatever. And those are good ideas that I should keep in mind. But when I'm interrogating and threatening a bound assassin, whom I wouldn't bribe, then I'm only going to Parley with him by the moves. I have no incentive to do that as a character because I know I'm not good at convincing people of stuff and the cleric is better at it (after all, I fail at doing it all the time, even when I'm threatening with my badass gigantic bloody hammer named Pain), and as a player because it's not highlighted.

Thought of another way: I'm not sure a stronger person is a more intimidating person. AW gets around this due to the nature of its stats (Hard isn't a physical thing). In DW it seems to me that a wizard threatening with his spell shouldn't be any different than a fighter threatening with his sword, hence using Cha to do it.

That's a very good point, about the fighter and the wizard. Makes a lot of sense. I'm not sure the notion of sloughing responsibility onto Charisma sits well with me, however.

I think, based on a lot of what you said, DW is way more heavily entrenched in D&D tradition than I had expected. And I think what I may be picking up on is that I'm not really that interested in D&D tradition.


To Tristanasaurus-Rex:

We definitely had much less experience in our first session than you describe, and that may be something we just have to talk about/work on. As I said, my Str and Con were highlighted, and we had a single, relatively short fight, so I got a total of 4 xp, I think.

I still don't entirely agree with what you say about XPs. XPs are OOC incentives. I guess the D&D model is more like, "Ah, you killed the monster! Good job! Here's some XP!", and less like, "Well, this game is about killing monsters, so you only earn XPs for that, so go kill monsters if you want XP, which you should!" In other words, more reward than incentive. But I see AW highlighting as being incentive based. So either highlighting works differently for DW, and it should be more reward based (do whatever you would do anyway, and if the right stats are highlighted you'll get a reward), or it's still like AW and is incentive based (you as a player should favor doing these particular things because your stat is highlighted). If it's the former, then that definitely is a shift from AW and my current point of view.

I see what you're saying with Gladiator and interpreting it broadly, but to be honest, it feels a wee bit odd to me to interpret as, "Well, a single person is an audience, right?" I guess it's accurate, but it feels against the spirit of the idea. I mean, it's about being a gladiator! In an arena! Lots of cheering! Noise! Some dude giving you a thumbs up or down! Pennants! Giant foam fingers!

If that loose interpretation is the intent, then Gladiator makes a bit more sense, but it still seems like situations in which one person is specifically watching, and not participating, wouldn't be terribly common. I guess my real problem here is quite simply that the fiction makes me want to take the move, but making my character mechanically awesome makes me want to avoid this move. If you're telling me that I should follow the fiction, then I should take this move...but the fiction also follows the mechanics, and I think that if I want my character to be awesome, then mechanically, I'd be better off with other moves. Even though I love the idea of emphasizing the fact that Annika is an expert pit fighter, she's just as much of an expert pit fighter, mechanically, if she's Merciless. Plus, that'll help her elsewhere, too. Maybe I need to be more willing to say, "I don't need to maximize the character's mechanical efficacy; I should follow the fiction." But this both seems out of character for a D&D style game, and for AW, too.
(Like I said before, if Gladiator were an option at the character's start, instead of, say, Underestimated, then I might feel differently about it. Or if every class got a couple "Background" move possibilities, like "Gladiator," "Mercenary," "Guard," and "Thug" for Fighter, and "Monk," "Preacher," "Wanderer," and "Adviser," for Cleric, just as potential examples, then I could see Gladiator fitting in really well.)


I will be taking into account everything I've been told going forward. Hopefully, we'll (and by we will I mean I will) figure this game out a bit more, get it a bit more in line with its intent, and it'll sing like it has for so many others. I still have a lot of hope. I adored a lot of things in this game (like bonds, for one, and my unique weapon, for another). I do still want to play a lot, and I just wanted to make that clear. Thank you for all the hard work, Sir Sage; it is very much appreciated, despite my whining.

Brendan: I totally agree with you about the basic moves in AW not being the same as those in DW. In AW, everyone uses pretty much all the basic moves, a lot. That's just not true in DW (which is the main reason why highlighted stats isn't the best XP system for DW).

I changed the highlighted stats yesterday to be:

The person you have the highest Bond with highlights one.

Then, you highlight one.

----

I found the XP gained improved a lot. This may be something you might try.

It seemed to work better for DW too than me as the GM highlighting one of the stats. The player actually gets to say, "What do I want to see my character doing?" Maybe they're going into town (Cha might be more important!), or know they're going to face some high level threats (Con baby!).

A lot of times it was the highest stat, but surprisingly, a couple players chose something else. Our Paladin with a +2 Cha decided to highlight his +0 Str, and his high Bond player chose his +1 Con.

It worked out pretty well, and took a lot of burden off me as the GM to make sure I was being "fair" about it.

So then I default to the question, "Well, what would my character do here to get him to talk?" I know the answer is, "Break his kneecaps, then ankles, then elbows, until he starts talking." Which, I guess, is a Parley? So, I would Parley. But my character also knows that the cleric, bless him, is a great talker. Gets people to do what he wants all the time. And the whole leg breaking thing, well, that works pretty infrequently for the out-of-fiction reason that I've got a low Charisma. So, isn't it entirely reasonable for my somewhat amoral, pragmatic character to step to the side, let the cleric do the talking?

Where it starts to bug me is that any time the cleric is around and our agendas align, Annika would always step aside to let him do the talking, with the exception of when my stat is highlighted.

G'day Brendan, I think I get some of your troubles in coming to terms with DW. Great discourse by the way!

I just wanted to add to the discussion that I like to add Alignment into this heady mix. You get rewarded for acting with your alignment, so despite not being particularly good at the generalist 'parley', your low CHA fighter may just be a mean son-of-a-bitch that taps into his evil nature to drag info out of NPCS. That's his Xp carrot (not the CHA highlighted stat)He just does it. No need to roll. The DM can then offer you an opportunity with or without a cost or somesuch.

I have to often remind myself not to 'hunt' for moves. If the fighter has the capacity and will to torture someone for information, what's stopping him? where's the question mark that requires a roll? Just let him do it. The question is whether or not the victim will give up the goods. Maybe then its a +1 forward to his (or the clerics) parley. Maybe not.

In my mind its getting rather specific into the realms of brutal interrogation. He may just need a custom advanced move based on the fiction that he can take at the next advance. 'When Annika applies his vicious torture to reveal information, he can roll 'Discern Realities' using strength and ask the questions of his victim. Failure means the DM gets a hard move as usual.

I've found with DW, since I'm playing mainly with non-gamers, the urge to 'metagame' is almost non-exisitant and yet the experience is full, deep and rewarding. We make a move if it sounds like we are making one of the moves. If not, then we just describe what is happeneing and go with the fiction. Lately though, it appears characters are making a move they don't have access to, and that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish! Instant adventure in the making!

Please keep posting your thoughts and problems with the game, its rather enlightening!

Oh and Sage, I'm sorry I haven't been posting for a while, I've been away. But I have been playing! and hope to start a PvSkype soon. Woo! I'll get some AP's up once started. :)