Defy Danger: Is it avoiding a threat or acting despite a threat?

I get the impression that Defy Danger will be a very frequent move in play. The GM is constantly threatening with Impending Doom (be it an Ogre's club descending upon you or a gas trap slowly filling a room) and you're responding. My question is, do you use Defy Danger when you're trying to carry out and a different action or only to avoid the danger? The ogre's club is descending, what do you do? If you're willing to, God forbid, take the blow so that you can finish the last words of the ritual, is that a Defy Danger? Or is that just a Golden Opportunity: GM deals out damage or any other hard move, but you finish the ritual. Or is attempting to finish the ritual Defying Danger, so roll the move?

Make sense?

Edit for another example: Same ogre, club arcing down. Fighter what do you? "I run my sword through his gut and steel myself for the impact!" So what did he just do? Did he just give the GM his golden opportunity by ignoring the threat while simultaneously taking the Hack and Slash move? Or does he actually need to make the Defy Danger move (to act despite a threat) before he even gets to Hack and Slash?

I'm not the most experienced GM out there, but I'd like to take a crack at this in case someone can help me refine my thoughts:

You're Defying Danger if you ignore the threat and do something else. Defying Danger can also be avoiding calamity (on par with a saving throw). "Avoiding calamity" has some broad implications and sounds like a catch-all for a threat that springs itself on the PCs as opposed to the GM taking a soft move to set up the danger ("the ogre raises its great club high over its head and gets ready to bring it down on you").

By my understanding, if you take fictional action that "resolves" the danger (whether or not those actions result in a move themselves) - say, getting out of the way of the ogre's club (not a move) - then it's not Defying Danger because you did what followed. If you instead chose to swing your sword at him, you'd be Defying Danger to do a Hack & Slash.

I think one of the key things to remember here is that Defy Danger is not a skill check or a dodge/defense roll.

(Am I right, community?)

Okay, cool. That's the way I read it too. Defy Danger is not avoiding danger. I guess to avoid danger you just do it and the GM decides whether it works or not if there's no move triggered.

Defy Danger is specifically for taking some action DESPITE the danger at hand. Defy the Danger and then proceed with your action.

Okay, to continue to the examination while keeping in mind that its all about the fiction. I suppose if the Fighter says "I roll to the side and come up behind him.", and stops there waiting for you input...that's just narration and he escaped the blow. Now its back to the GM to make a move.

However, if the Fighter had responded with "I roll to the side, coming up behind and hack into his spine!", that's actually Defying Danger. He's narrated beyond just trying to escape, which triggered nothing. He's attempted to narrate himself into action, which triggers Hack and Slash. So that's acting despite a threat and deserves a Defy Danger?

Without taking the whole scene into account, it's hard to discuss in the hypothetical; however, here's how I'd do it. The soft move threat I put out there (the ogre's club in motion) is resolved by the fiction. The fighter's rolling to the side and coming up behind him isn't Defy Danger. There's an ogre there, sure, but by this point, he's picking his great club up out of the dust and broken stone that used to be the floor and turning to face the fighter. There's no overt threat anymore - the fighter did what followed. The fighter pokes him with his sword - Hack & Slash. If he weak hits, I'll soft move again to set up another threat. If he flubs it and gives me a golden opportunity, I'll exact a toll with a hard move.

If the fighter rolls to the side and comes up behind him and says nothing else, I guess that'd be a way for you to set up another threat by way of a soft move under the auspices of "when everyone looks at you to see what happens," but I'd probably just ask another character to chime in with an action of their own and take it from there.

Got ya. Thanks iserith.

No problema. Though I'm hoping someone with more DW chops will jump in and confirm or correct what I said as this is something my group and I have been discussing at length.

You know, I was just rereading Golden Opportunity and reminded myself it's applicable when a character ignores a threat. This throws some of my assumptions in doubt, I think.

What is "ignoring a threat?" In this example, the fighter didn't ignore the ogre's club - he rolled around to the back of the ogre and preps to stab him in the jacksey. So it's not a Golden Opportunity.

But was the fictional action of the fighter's tumbling despite the threat or because of it? If it's the latter, then it's not Defy Danger - the fighter did what followed in the fiction and "resolved" the threat (he's not longer in the way of the club's arc).

Let's say the fighter wants to hold his ground and Hack & Slash the ogre when the club is swinging down. Is that both a Defy Danger AND a Golden Opportunity? He's acting despite an imminent threat and ignoring it. Kind of a double-dip situation here, no?

The mind boggles.

Damn you iserith!! You've just turned it back into my original question! And here I thought I was free and clear.

Yeah, its the Golden Opportunity of having a threat ignored thats tripping me up when I try to put it all together with Defy Danger.

I know, right? I just iserith'ed this up good. I think I may have not fully appreciated your question earlier because I didn't remember the specific definition of "golden opportunity." Ignorance was definitely bliss, but now I'll not be able to sleep tonight.

Same here probably. You go ahead and take first watch though in case I punk out and fall asleep anyway.

(I wrote this post earlier today, before all the other replies. I'm going to post it, then go back and read the thread and see how it fits in :) )

I think it comes down to the fictional circumstances: is the ritual in danger of failing due to the club?

If we're talking about an ogre with a club that can knock you off your feet and the ritual requires complex movements and perfect enunciation, then yeah, sounds like Defy Danger.

If the ritual is just a few words spoken with meaning, or if the attack is something smaller, then probably not Defy Danger.

For me "defying" in this case comes down to "does the ritual still work?" If that's in question, use the move.

From the new "moves explanation" chapter: (if i'm overstepping my bounds posting this, let me know and I'll take it down)

"You Defy Danger when you do something in the face of impending peril. That may seem like a catch-all. It is! Defy Danger is for those times when it seems like you clearly should be rolling but no other move applies.
Defy Danger also applies when you make another move despite danger not covered by that move. For example, Hack and Slash assumes that's you're trading blows in battle—you don't need to Defy Danger because of the monster you're fighting unless there's some specific danger that wouldn't be part of your normal attack.
On the other hand, if you're trying to Hack and Slash while spikes shoot from hidden traps in the walls, you're ignoring a clear and present threat and need to Defy Danger."

Basically, whenever there is danger and you narrate yourself defying it, you Defy Danger.

I should probably update the last sentence of that to "You need to Defy Danger or suck it up and take the damage."

Basically you Defy Danger when either you don't want to be effected by the bad thing or you want to keep on doing what you're doing despite a bad thing. Both are valid uses, and both follow from the fiction.

Okay,thanks for the hand holding everyone I think I'm cleared up now. If I'm reading you right Sage, to my original question in the heading...its both. Or can be both. And my assumption about ignoring a threat can be possible too. If we all agreed that it was possible in teh fiction to take the blow but simultaneously finish the ritual then no need for a Deny Danger roll if the wizard chooses that route (thought he's probably paste, tough sacrifice!).

If I can mine this thread a bit further I think I've actually had a breakthru moment too, thanks to the post by Aaron. As I read through the Basic and sort of thought ahead about potential hicccups, I was sort of imagining that there's a lot of stuff that could be just left up to GM fiat since no moves would be tied to it. For example, most of the thiefy stuff that you think about from D&D like sneaking up on people, hiding, climbing, etc. At first blush I thought, hmmm, I guess all that stuff is just handled narratively.

But now, thanks to Aaron's quoted passage, I think most of this stuff is probably going to fall under a Defy Danger situation right? If the thief is sneaking to get the drop on someone, there's actually danger there right? Being detected is the danger. So we roll for that. Same for climbing or even just trying to hide from something. Being spotted is the danger I guess, so we roll for that.

These were all situations that in my mind I was thinking, man, would be nice if there was a roll for that. That passage clears that up. There is a roll for it. Defy Danger. Thanks guys, this has been enormously helpful.