2nd Edition Kickstarter

The new playbook is a weird one.  It has a very cool premise and possibilities but there are also things that concern me and things I don't understand.

Crack Open the World is wicked: The open-endedness allows for some fuckery on MCs part but is also super powerful. I fear that in the worst case scenario the Show just gallops into scenes, strums their instrument and resolves it in one way or another. While the outcomes will certainly differ, this modus operandi repeating enough times is likely to get stale fast. Is it intended that the Show's rig limits this behaviour? Like, the Show needs to have their Apocalyuitar amplified in order to make sound of any kind or is this just up to players' discretion? I can see myself as MC taking away Show's stuff quite frequently just to mix it up a bit.

Then pandering to your audience. Does the cough up have to make sense? Can a single hobo  as an audience hand the leash-holder 10-barter just like that? If so, why would you ever go for anything but 10? Why are there even other options? If you can't tell, I'm a tad bit confused.

BONUS: While probably a non-issue in AW, I kinda like mechanisms in some other more dice rolling heavy RPGs which allow the GM to reward players for good role-playing. Is something similar even considered in the 2nd ed.?

Good questions!

I think you'll find that cracking open the world basically never resolves anything. It'll occasionally be useful in battle - not overpowered, just useful - but outside of battle, it'll usually only stir things up, not settle them. So no, I wouldn't take away the show's stuff any more often or prejudicially than anyone else's.

Coughing up doesn't have to make sense, no. It's the show's choice; if they want it to make sense, they can choose accordingly.

You'd choose 1- or 6-barter whenever you don't feel like giving the person who holds your leash 10-barter. The barter you generate by pandering to your audience doesn't benefit you directly at all, so you can use it as leverage over the person holding your leash.

-Vincent

Good questions!

I think you'll find that cracking open the world basically never resolves anything. It'll occasionally be useful in battle - not overpowered, just useful - but outside of battle, it'll usually only stir things up, not settle them. So no, I wouldn't take away the show's stuff any more often or prejudicially than anyone else's.

Coughing up doesn't have to make sense, no. It's the show's choice; if they want it to make sense, they can choose accordingly.

You'd choose 1- or 6-barter whenever you don't feel like giving the person who holds your leash 10-barter. The barter you generate by pandering to your audience doesn't benefit you directly at all, so you can use it as leverage over the person holding your leash.

-Vincent

Thank you for the clarifications! It is much appreciated.

It's amazing how often my concerns about some detail of this game are totally alleviated by Vincent saying "This works as intended; trust me."

The 7-9 on pander to your audience says "take -1weird to the next time you try to crack open the world"; does this mean something different than simply "take -1"?

It doesn't!

-Vincent

One thing I've noticed looking over the kickstarter preview is the changes to the battlebabe. Is it just me or is it just silly broken now? It was all ways a favorite of mine due to being an interesting mix of strengths and weakness, frail, but kick ass, depending on how the encounter goes.

W/r/t to the battlebabe, since Vx took a pass this round:

I'm a little confused as to why this has caused so much consternation. Gunlugger has always had a cool-for-hard stat swap, which got upgraded to all Cool battle moves in 2nd ed. That means that a starting Gunlugger can have...

*+3 Hard, which they use every time they would use Cool
*1 more gunlugger move
*a LOT of weapons

And a starting Battlebabe can have...

*+3 cool, which they use every time they would use Cool
*1 more battlebabe move
*Two weird/cool weapons

The Battlebabe can defininitely have a better overall statline, and the difference from 1e is bigger, but there's plenty of reasons to be either kind of badass.

Yeah, I was just looking over the sheets today and it's not AS bad as I had thought. Most of the characters are silly powerful, and I think that's just a part of the game (remember be a fan of the characters)

The only really "off" thing about it now is the stat lines, the gunlugger is going to have zero or negative in other areas, and so usually has interesting decisons to make when faced with a problem he can't just shoot at. The battlebabe has +1 to everything else, so is actually resonably competent when violence isn't needed. I know, I know, try not to focus on the stats too much, but it really influences how players react to situations. And the options when life becomes untennable are a bitter nicer, although as I've never seen a character go into that state once, let alone twice, it's a bit of a nitpick.

I still liked it better under "the battlebabe starts fight, the gunlugger finished them" way of thinking, and the battlebabe had to work around the fiction to get some cruel, crushing blows in, but it's much less of a problem than I first thought.

I always liked the image of the Gunlugger being the one who is really useful in battles, whereas the Battlebabe is more of a "James Bond" type - can get into the right place at the right time, and seduce or assassinate when necessary.

This change takes that away, making a Battlebabe tremendously competent in any violent arena. Takes away the Battlebabe's "soft spot". It's probably not game-breaking, but it does make the Battlebabe much less interesting mechanically, I think.

And if you don't take the "Ice Cold" move... then the Battlebabe is completely incompetent in violent situations. I appreciated the rather interesting middle ground the old "Ice Cold" move brought to the table.

Coughing up doesn't have to make sense, no. It's the show's choice; if they want it to make sense, they can choose accordingly.

Strange. I assumed that if they chose a higher barter amount than the crowd could reasonably have, they are basically forcing people to destitute themselves in order to cough up in a sort of frenzy of fandom. Like, handing over their only pair of boots, or the community's one gun, offering to give over their children, etc. The Show strikes me as very closely aligned with Johnstone's Four Horsemen playbooks, or an exploitatively-played Touchstone.

In any case that will be how I'll run it, if I ever have to MC someone picking the playbook (which, ugh, just not my thing.)

Quote from: lumpley on April 26, 2016, 07:55:30 AM

Coughing up doesn't have to make sense, no. It's the show's choice; if they want it to make sense, they can choose accordingly.

Strange. I assumed that if they chose a higher barter amount than the crowd could reasonably have, they are basically forcing people to destitute themselves in order to cough up in a sort of frenzy of fandom. Like, handing over their only pair of boots, or the community's one gun, offering to give over their children, etc. The Show strikes me as very closely aligned with Johnstone's Four Horsemen playbooks, or an exploitatively-played Touchstone.

In any case that will be how I'll run it, if I ever have to MC someone picking the playbook (which, ugh, just not my thing.)

I love this. Imagine, what measures a small audience giving 10-barter has to go!

Looking through the final preview now. One thing that I noticed: on page 75-76, in the section about introductions, the possibility of the other characters being part of the Operator's crew shows up, despite the operator not being in the game. Seems like an oversight that would be easily fixed.

Good catch. Thanks!

-Vincent

I've noticed there's inconsistency through the rules about the tags that SMGs and MGs currently have.  In the playbooks, they're listed as 'area', but on page 230-231, they're listed as 'autofire'.  Might be worthwhile to render those consistent.  The SMG is also listed as a 'SMF' on page 230.  Also worth noting that there's inconsistency between the wants created by a holding having a bustling market; the new playbook lists it as 'strangers' while the material on page 252 still lists it as 'idle' as per 1E, as does the example of holding creation.

So I wanna start this off by saying I'm not talking as a backer, just looking at the playbook previews on the site. I can't see the corebook as a whole until I can get it for money.

But the first thing I wanted to mention is that the Driver advances look off in the preview copy I saw. Offers a +1 cool advance, to a maximum of +2, when the Driver starts out as cool +2. Looks like that one's supposed to be the spot for sharp.

The second is that the Battlebabe's Ice Cold move doesn't let you use it on battle moves like in the kickstarter preview, just on go aggro like back in first edition. Was there an interesting behind-the-scenes process to the change? Or was it just something that was tried and didn't work?