New CC Idea: The Fading

Old adventurers never die, they just fade away.

Some of them just do so considerably earlier. Sometimes it’s a punishment, a particularly nasty curse of revenge or of warding. Sometimes it’s a sacrifice; a deal made with powers willing to perform miracles for the cost of your existence. Sometimes it’s just the universe being an arse. Why would something possessing anti-existential venom even exist!?


The Fading

When you begin to fade from existence, you may take the following two moves and one from the three below together when you next level up:

Falling Into Oblivion

When you find yourself fading into oblivion, roll +Fade. You may spend relationships to people or valued possessions 1-for-1 to lower your result. On a 10+, you will disappear forever. On a 7-9, you survive, but the ordeal leaves you in bad condition. Take a debility and half of your health as damage.

Do Not Go Gentle

When you stave off the void through the use of restorative magics or through creating and building relationships with others, roll with no modifier. On a 10+, remove 2-Fade. On a 7-9, remove 1-Fade. On a 6-, you’re no better for the attempt.

Afterward, you may take the rest of the following moves one at a time when you level up:

Like I Was Never There

When you fade from awareness, roll +Fade. On a hit, you are functionally invisible for a time. You can pick up objects, open doors, etc without notice. The absence or change of anything you pick up or manipulate will go similarly unremarked, at least until the effect ends. On a 10+, everything works out and you’re fine. You can take 1-Fade if you wish, but you don’t have to; and you’ll only ‘reappear’ when and where you want to. On a 7-9, there are a couple consequences. Choose 2:

    You’re sliding closer to oblivion. Take 1-Fade and 1 damage.

    People are forgetting about you. Somebody important to you won’t recognize you the next time you meet.

    You come ‘back’ in a bad place or at a bad time.


Nothing Can Get Through That

When you walk through any obstacles or defenses that stand in your way, roll +Fade. On a 10+, you get exactly where you want, nothing can stop you. On a 7-9, choose 1:

    You’re sliding closer to the void. Take 1-Fade.

    You come ‘back’ earlier than expected or hoped.

    Ouch! Should have been more careful about where you came ‘back’. Take 1d6 damage, and you leave traces of yourself in the surroundings.


Void Aegis

When blows meant for you hit nothing instead, roll +Fade. On a 10+ you completely avoid any harm of any sort; take 1-Fade. On a 7-9, you take half of the harm you attempted to avoid, from either the void or the original source of damage; as well as 1-Fade.


GM NOTE: Falling Into Oblivion is intended to be triggered by a hard move from the GM. Trigger it when the fiction is appropriate.


Any ideas or feedback?

Pretty sure existentialism is what destroyed magic forever. If I were a wizard, I'd for sure develop some venom to combat it directly.

More seriously:

1. What kind of GM is going to call for Falling Into Oblivion as a hard move? I think some more direction would be good, since as-is, it's dependent entirely on how hard the GM wants to push, which doesn't necessarily match up with how hard the player wants the GM to push. Right? I think some more explicit prompts for them to have that conversation and get on the same page would be beneficial.

2. I think if you start fading you should just get the two starting moves. Whether or not the player wants to pursue the advanced moves is up to them. The package deal, 3 for the price of 1, is weirdly complicated. Go with 2 for nothing, pay for the rest, I say.

3. The trigger for Do Not Go Gentle is vague and wishy-washy. It's like when you sorta do a thing that sorta means something. Like, it's okay if we have to talk about what a characters actions mean and how they feel about it and the intention and stuff in Monsterhearts, but I'd steer clear of that in DW.  At the same time I appreciate the attempt to make the trigger rather broad, like the basic moves, and not too specific that it doesn't get used.

If I were to use this in play (and I would consider it), I'd go with something like: When you make/cement a new relationship with a person, place, or thing, roll the move. Normally, I would say the 10+ should be 1-fade and the 7-9 should be a trade, remove 1-fade is you remove a thing from your life as well, but since it's roll+nothing, I'd say make the miss result the choice to lose both a fade and something else. Partly just so that something happens when you meet the trigger requirements that is related to the predicament.

4. What's with the HP damage? What is this supposed to achieve? It looks like a weird pacing thing or a consequence that is supposed to feel sort of like it has teeth? Because 1 damage really doesn't, although losing half your HP (what is "health"?) will definitely cut a fight short, one way or another. Which doesn't seem like an interesting consequence, really. Maybe there's something here I'm just not seeing?

5. "When blows meant for you hit nothing instead" is what triggers this move? Cause it looks like that' supposed to be the result.

6. Last comment is one that's more of an AW thing, and perhaps less of a big deal in DW, but the options for those moves are things the player picks, not things the character picks. It's fine to play that way if you like it, but DW does ask you to play your character from your character's perspective, and every time you choose what happens to your character instead of choosing what your character does, thinks, feels, reacts, or remembers, you're taken out of that mode.

Definitely like the idea, though.

All right, I've taken your advice into account. Here is the revised CC:

Old adventurers never die, they just fade away.

Some of them just do so considerably earlier. Sometimes it’s a punishment, a particularly nasty curse of revenge or of warding. Sometimes it’s a sacrifice; a deal made with powers willing to perform miracles for the cost of your existence. Sometimes it’s just the universe being an arse. Why would something possessing anti-existential venom even exist!?


The Fading

When you begin to fade from existence, you may take the following two moves and one from the three below together when you next level up:

Falling Into Oblivion

When you miss the roll for a Fade move, lose a tie to existence, or gain more than 3-Fade, roll +Fade. You may spend relationships to people or valued possessions 1-for-1 to lower your result. On a 10+, you will disappear forever. On a 7-9, you survive, but the ordeal leaves you in bad condition. Take a debility.

Do Not Go Gentle

When you stave off the void through the use of restorative magics or through creating or building a relationship with another, roll with no modifier. On a 10+, remove 2-Fade. On a 7-9, remove 1-Fade. On a 6-, you’re no better for the attempt.

Afterward, you may take the rest of the following moves one at a time when you level up:

Like I Was Never There

When you fade from awareness into the void, roll +Fade. On a hit, you are functionally invisible for a time. You can pick up objects, open doors, etc without notice. The absence or change of anything you pick up or manipulate will go similarly unremarked, at least until the effect ends. On a 10+, everything works out and you’re fine. You can take 1-Fade if you wish, and you’ll only reappear when and where you want to. On a 7-9, there are a couple consequences. Choose 1:

    You avoid sliding deeper into oblivion. You do not take 1-Fade.

    Nobody important to you will lose their memories of you.

    You come back at a safe place and time.


Nothing Can Get Through That

When you walk through any obstacles or defenses that stand in your way with one foot in the void, roll +Fade. On a 10+, you get exactly where you want, nothing can stop you. You can take 1-Fade if you wish. On a 7-9, choose 1:

    You avoid sliding deeper into oblivion. You do not take 1-Fade.

    You don’t come back earlier than expected.

    You don’t come back while sharing space with anything solid.


Void Aegis

When you step into the void to avoid a blow, roll +Fade. On a 10+ you completely avoid any harm of any sort; take 1-Fade. On a 7-9, you take half of the harm you attempted to avoid (rounded down), from either the void or the original source of damage; as well as 1-Fade.

Oh, sorry, I didn't mean you should change the options like that. Now you are just picking which bad thing the GM doesn't get to do to you instead of picking a thing that happens. It's usually more productive to the action if you pick a thing that happens (and then one thing leads into another pretty smoothly).

What I mean by picking from the character's perspective would be something like this maybe:
* You manage to hold on to the fading, but take +1 Fade.
* You let the fading leak out onto other people and they start to forget you.
* You hold on to the fading so tightly you lose track of when and where you are.

And then the GM isn't thinking "okay, I can't do the one they picked as a consequence so what do I do instead, if anything?" Does that make sense?

For the Void Aegis trigger I might even make it something like "when you flinch from a blow" so that if you decide your character flinches involuntarily, without thinking about the fade, you still roll for the move, because it has become ingrained. It's still the player's choice, but maybe adds some nuance to the character's situation?