The 'Hood is Open for Business

My first properly published book is now available through Lulu: The 'Hood is an Apocalypse World supplement about ordinary people living on the fringes of law and society, looking for ways to make a buck no matter what it takes. It's suitable for games in the style of The Wire, The Shield, Breaking Bad and many others.

A big shout out to Tommy Rayburn, who's given his own free time to design the layout and made my words look good; also to Rhona Robson, Ben Cole, Helen Garvey and Nick Townsend for being willing guinea pigs.

I should be getting the printer friendly and tablet friendly versions of the hack up on Drivethru soon, but all the playbooks (plus some other support materials) can be downloaded for free here if you want to take a look.

The pdfs are ready: the package includes a landscape format pdf for home printing and a tablet friendly version of the actual book.

Are there/will there be any combo deals to get print + pdf?

Nothing on the cards at the moment I'm afraid.

Fair enough.  Not like either of them are that pricey.

I've been blogging about the development process of The 'Hood if anyone is interested. :D

Rules questions:
The 'Career Criminals' section says that you mark XP when you gain Heat.
It also says that 'Whenever experience reaches 5, reset it to zero and choose one [advancement option]'.

However, the character sheets agree that you mark XP when you gain Heat, but say that 'When ever your experience + heat reaches 5, reset experience to zero and choose one'. (i.e. that Heat effectively 'double dips' for XP purposes)

Which is correct?  The Stats section implies the latter, by stating 'you’ll learn faster when the heat is on', but it's unclear to me.

Secondly, what's the intent for 'make trouble'?  'The Heat is On' section strongly implies that if you have Heat, you're always making trouble, so you'd have to roll for it. 
a) Is it 'one roll determines all reactions', or 'one roll per NPC', or 'one roll per group of NPCs'?  So, say I go to my mother for help, and I roll a 10, is that it, no NPCs will help me until I lose some heat?  Or can I try a friend or colleague, but not another family member?  Or can I then go and ask my brother?  Obviously, narrative will inform some of these decisions, but what's the generic intent here?

b) Say there's a neighbour who's helped me lie low before, and the heat is on.  I want to use him to lie low again.  I have Heat, so clearly I'd be making trouble for them.  I roll, and get a 7-9.  I choose to mark them for payback so they don't turn their back on me, but 'As long as an NPC is still listed in your payback box, you can’t make use of them any further', so now I can't actually get them to help me Lie low?
My best guess is that Lie Low is a generally-applicable move, rather than 'asking one person specifically', so you don't roll to Make Trouble, you just roll to see if anyone will take you in, and if you owe payback, the MC will tell you who you owe.  Is that right?

Rules questions:
The 'Career Criminals' section says that you mark XP when you gain Heat.
It also says that 'Whenever experience reaches 5, reset it to zero and choose one [advancement option]'.

However, the character sheets agree that you mark XP when you gain Heat, but say that 'When ever your experience + heat reaches 5, reset experience to zero and choose one'. (i.e. that Heat effectively 'double dips' for XP purposes)

Which is correct?  The Stats section implies the latter, by stating 'you’ll learn faster when the heat is on', but it's unclear to me.

Sorry, I should have picked up on that: the rules regarding Heat & Experience were changed at a quite a late stage, after Tommy had designed the playbooks, and I completely missed that the old rule was still there.

To clarify: when you take heat, you mark experience and when experience alone reaches 5, reset it to zero and take an advance, just as with AW itself.

Secondly, what's the intent for 'make trouble'?  'The Heat is On' section strongly implies that if you have Heat, you're always making trouble, so you'd have to roll for it. 
a) Is it 'one roll determines all reactions', or 'one roll per NPC', or 'one roll per group of NPCs'?  So, say I go to my mother for help, and I roll a 10, is that it, no NPCs will help me until I lose some heat?  Or can I try a friend or colleague, but not another family member?  Or can I then go and ask my brother?  Obviously, narrative will inform some of these decisions, but what's the generic intent here?

It's meant for one roll per interaction, whether that's a single NPC or a group and it isn't necessarily just when you ask them for a favour, but for when your actions impact them directly, i.e. you invite someone into your family home that they don't want there. Deal with it situationally, so one roll whether its a single NPC you're making trouble for a or a group of them; on a 10+, they turn their back on you until the situation changes, which is part of the conversation between the PCs and MC.

This should have also been listed under the moves the MC can make: it's largely intended as a hard move they can make against you after a miss in applicable situations, e.g. you've tried to argue the toss with them and they've turned your offer down flat, so now you check to see if they're prepared to deal with you at all.

b) Say there's a neighbour who's helped me lie low before, and the heat is on.  I want to use him to lie low again.  I have Heat, so clearly I'd be making trouble for them.  I roll, and get a 7-9.  I choose to mark them for payback so they don't turn their back on me, but 'As long as an NPC is still listed in your payback box, you can’t make use of them any further', so now I can't actually get them to help me Lie low?
My best guess is that Lie Low is a generally-applicable move, rather than 'asking one person specifically', so you don't roll to Make Trouble, you just roll to see if anyone will take you in, and if you owe payback, the MC will tell you who you owe.  Is that right?

No, when you lie low, you establish in the fiction how you are doing so, so you need to clearly state whose help you are getting and how; having heat won't effect this and won't require you to make trouble before you can try to lie low, but if you miss on the lie low move, then the MC might ask you to roll to see if this refusal makes trouble for you.

I hope that's been of help. :-)

Sorry, I should have picked up on that: the rules regarding Heat & Experience were changed at a quite a late stage, after Tommy had designed the playbooks, and I completely missed that the old rule was still there.

To clarify: when you take heat, you mark experience and when experience alone reaches 5, reset it to zero and take an advance, just as with AW itself.

Thanks, that's clear now.

It's meant for one roll per interaction, whether that's a single NPC or a group and it isn't necessarily just when you ask them for a favour, but for when your actions impact them directly, i.e. you invite someone into your family home that they don't want there. Deal with it situationally, so one roll whether its a single NPC you're making trouble for a or a group of them; on a 10+, they turn their back on you until the situation changes, which is part of the conversation between the PCs and MC.

This should have also been listed under the moves the MC can make: it's largely intended as a hard move they can make against you after a miss in applicable situations, e.g. you've tried to argue the toss with them and they've turned your offer down flat, so now you check to see if they're prepared to deal with you at all.

Thanks, that's helpful, the bolded part especially.

No, when you lie low, you establish in the fiction how you are doing so, so you need to clearly state whose help you are getting and how; having heat won't effect this and won't require you to make trouble before you can try to lie low, but if you miss on the lie low move, then the MC might ask you to roll to see if this refusal makes trouble for you.

I hope that's been of help. :-)

Again, much clearer now, thanks. 

Further question: that Heat & XP thing is clearly errata.  I know you can update a pdf on drivethru to correct that, but can you do the same with Lulu, since it's PoD?  If so, do you intend to?

I'll collect all the errata that get reported to me for the next month, then collate those with any other changes or additions I feel need to be made and consult with Tommy, who made the pdf from my raw text, to see about the feasability of updating them book and pdf.

Thanks for the feedback, I hope you enjoy the game. :-D

Sorry for the necromancy, but did you ever manage to apply the errata?  I was going to wait for that before ordering, and you never clarified.

Secondly, what's happening in the narrative with the Pimp's 'Weekend Promotion'?  It clears payback to your hoes, and generates +1 Heat, and I'm having difficulty linking the name with the mechanics with the narration.

We're still looking at the best way to publish the corrected version, as there are very few changes to be made, plus there will be some additional chapters of material collecting & expanding the blog posts I've made about the game. There are also 10 new playbooks, so we're looking at the either a deluxe edition of the original book and/or an expansion in the form of a book or pdf.

The idea with Weekend Promotion is that you actively push your business, drumming up customer from visitors, tourists and people just out for a night out; as a result, your hoes make more money so they get paid off, but all that extra activity draws more heat to you.

Ah, cool.  I'll wait for that, then, in whatever form it may take.

And thanks for the clarification.  That makes more sense, now.