No thief/sneaker Playbook ?

Hit there! First post here. Ive acquired AW last year but only now got a chance to read it all and convince my groupe to try it.

Now, we are missing a very basic (in our views) character concept: the "thief", or the "stealth-based" archetype. Is this right? Or is this somehow built-in another playbook and we didnt noticed ?

If its purposeful, what tips do you guys can give for a nicely balanced stealth-based playbook?

thanks!


Oh, and by the way, is there any template or something for creating our own custom playbooks ?

Not an expert, but my feeling on the matter after having participated in some discussions and tried to do some myself that didn't quite gel is that playbooks work best when built on a really strong archetype rather than a play style or role.  

If you go through the other playbooks and look at the mechanics, you can find a wide variety of different mechanics used for specific moves, and different arrangements of moves to use as inspirations.  

EDIT: As usual, forgot to address the heart of the question.  You'd want to really sharpen the concept of the playbook first.  Is this someone who thrives by stealing from other survivors, like a sneak thief?  Or a sort of quasi-professional burglar who steals for themselves and hires themselves out to others for jingle?  Or just a sneaky, stealthy person who approaches everything from the ninja angle, whether or not it involves stealing?  I think you really have to decide this kind of thing early on before you start making moves.  For one thing, it might help you decide things like "This guy is like a Gunlugger, but with stealth instead of guns". 

That said, potential moves might include an improved, stealthy version of Act Under Fire, a move for Casing the Joint that allows the character on a successful roll to accumulate holds to be used later during an operation, and a version of Go Aggro specialized for ambushes where the target is unaware of the attacker. 

Another perspective: there are sensible sneaky stealer builds for Battlebabe, Operator, or Hoarder without much work. You might be able to make a sneaky Chopper or Brainer even.

If you want to go unofficial, my Feral Kid is a good thief, too.

Ad the Savvyhead move (don't have it in front of me) where they can show up for something with the appropriate tools. "Oh, just found it laying around."

Edit: I think its a bit harder to play a straight-up thief in AW, archetypes aside, because its simply not much of a "stuff" game. Characters' crap is so ephemeral it strikes me as a bit silly to have someone who acquires more than he needs by guile. I can see a big heist type thing but not so much picking pockets.

My current PC is a thief. He's a Battlebabe. So far he's not necessarily very sneaky, though he presumably can be when he wants to; generally speaking, sneaking around is going to be some variation on Act Under Fire, and battlebabes are crazy Cool. (The book includes Johnstone's 'stealth' custom move as an example, I believe, and it is based on Cool.)

An Operator is an obvious fit as well, with a 'thieving' gig or a more involved setup with a whole Crew that pulls off crazy jobs.

There are lots of good reasons to be sneaky in AW, but most of them involve a social or fictional role that is already covered by an existing playbook. But if somebody is like 'I gotta be the sneaky badass thief dude' the Battlebabe is the obvious fit.

EDIT: As usual, forgot to address the heart of the question.  You'd want to really sharpen the concept of the playbook first.  Is this someone who thrives by stealing from other survivors, like a sneak thief?  Or a sort of quasi-professional burglar who steals for themselves and hires themselves out to others for jingle?  Or just a sneaky, stealthy person who approaches everything from the ninja angle, whether or not it involves stealing?  I think you really have to decide this kind of thing early on before you start making moves.  For one thing, it might help you decide things like "This guy is like a Gunlugger, but with stealth instead of guns".

Dont really know, Danny. As Im new to the game, I dont have the least idea of what would work better with the game thamatically and mechanically. But all 3 ideas looks to me, really "fuseable" on a single rogue/sneaker archetype.

That said, potential moves might include an improved, stealthy version of Act Under Fire, a move for Casing the Joint that allows the character on a successful roll to accumulate holds to be used later during an operation, and a version of Go Aggro specialized for ambushes where the target is unaware of the attacker.  

That sounds awesome!

Edit: I think its a bit harder to play a straight-up thief in AW, archetypes aside, because its simply not much of a "stuff" game. Characters' crap is so ephemeral it strikes me as a bit silly to have someone who acquires more than he needs by guile. I can see a big heist type thing but not so much picking pockets.

Agree. At the same time though, the Brainer relies on a lot of tools for increasing his psych mojo. A thief/sneaker/infiltrator playbook could rely on similar tools. On the other hand, the missing of such tools could prove an important impact on such playbooks. (maybe a move for limiting temporarily other playbooks from using crap-based moves? )

Also, what about abstracting picking pockets as simply a way to increasing barter ? (dont know if it makes sense, though)

An Operator is an obvious fit as well, with a 'thieving' gig or a more involved setup with a whole Crew that pulls off crazy jobs.

I like this idea. Giving the thief a whole crew or at least connections in the trade.

Have you played the game yet?

Not yet. Will play it this week, if all goes as planned.

First, a key point or two:

Also, what about abstracting picking pockets as simply a way to increasing barter ? (dont know if it makes sense, though)

Barter is what it costs to live and eat for a month. If your game has a trade medium (gold, bottle caps etc) it might be possible for someone to be carrying 1-barter and not notice it being stolen. Mostly, though, I tend to assume that's at least a good armload of crap. I guess you could pickpocket guns but that's really just Acting Under Fire.

The Brainer doesn't so much rely on tools as the tools either give him a noticeable advantage when using his powers and/or aren't usable by others.

Now, as to a straight out new Thief playbook, I realized a while ago why this wasn't sitting right with me. Let's take your basic D&D classes, just the real bare bones:
Fighter/the violent guy - Designed strictly for hitting and getting hit. As they level you can specialize them for sword and shield, two handed, archery etc etc.
Thief/sneaky guy - uses stealth and wits to solve problems. Has tons and tons of skills and can either be OK at all of them or good at about half. Can sneak, bluff, climb walls, pick locks, pick pockets, attack from surprise etc etc.
Priest/healer guy - Let's just say that the Hocus covers the religion and the Angel covers the healing for now.
Mage/Smart magic guy - has tons upon tons of spells. May or may not focus on one particular school. Can do lots of things really well (buff, debuff, direct attack) but takes some time to get it done.

You'll notice that all of these are so general that none of them makes an appropriate AW class. Sure, Gunlugges and Facelesses are Fighters but they're very specific, very distinct types of fighters. Arguably, Choppers, Hardholders and even Touchstones are Fighter based, too. However, all of them have a much narrower focus. They have one hook, so to speak, and go from there. The gunlugger has a big fraggin' gun. The Faceless is an unstoppable psycho killer.

So sure, start from sneaky wits using guy. But then narrow it down. What's this playbook's one gimmick. Are they so cool its a weapon? That's a battlebabe. Do they do jobs for the Guild? That's an Operator. Are they specifically focused on catching people unawares and killing them? THAT's a concept that could probably be fleshed out to fit AW. It might be a fighter or a thief in the D&D paradigm but that doesn't much matter. What matters is that they've got enough focus to merit a capitalized title, The Wraith maybe.

TL;DR - AW playbooks are more like prestige classes than basic D&D classes. Pick a specific hook or gimmick and go with it.

For what it's worth, this is how I addressed the notional theif in AW.  Though I haven't played it.

Not yet. Will play it this week, if all goes as planned.

I'd recommend playing the game as written for awhile before deciding whether to change it :)

When you choose someone's pocket to pick, the GM will name them and tell you what you know about their life. Roll+cool, on a 10+ you got it. The GM will tell you what it is. On a 7-9 pick three.
.it is something of value and immediate use.
.they do not notice it is missing until you are out of there.
.no one notice your theft.
.it is not something anyone would recognize.

Just for fun :)

I am working on trying to figure out a stealing move for my hoarder. The player rolled hunger for his hoard and it decided it wanted the town sheriffs 3 foot long crescent wrench she uses for a weapon and calls "Johnson". so my hoarder says can I just sneak up and grab it off of her back? He decided would attract too much attention so instead the Driver tried to seduce her in an alley and the hoarder then hit her with a narco-stab he traded the angel for and took the wrench for his hoard.

She has now started stalking the characters trying to get "Johnson" back...but that is for another session.

But in the future I can see he is going to want to pull the walk up and take the knife the chopper is eating with, without him noticing.

Any good ideas other than just act under fire?

I really think Act Under Fire is fine for stealing something reasonable without being noticed. I mean, sure, you can do a custom move where on a 7-9 they pick from options like "you get it", "you avoid notice" etc. but the basic move covers it. Pulling a three foot wrench off of someone's back is going to be noticeable no matter what you do. Probably the same for stealing a knife out of someones hand. For something like that you'd probably want a +weird move where the character also steals the memory of the item.