2nd Edition and Seize by Force (and similar moves)

Is it legit for me as MC to have a PC simply get shot after a 10+ on a Seize by Force roll? Or only on a miss? Or neither?

I think this question deserves its own, very direct, response.  This is my take:

The Seize By Force move explicitly prescribes an exchange of harm, so yes, if people are shooting, the "fiction" can include getting shot in the explanation for harm inflicted on the PC in that exchange.

Paul, my advice would be to get unstuck on your one hypothetical, the badass gunlugger who outclasses their enemy, and do the math on 5 other hypotheticals:
- The chopper leading their gang into action.
- The hardholder sending part of their gang into action, while the hardholder and the bulk of the gang stay back to defend the holding.
- The maestro d' defending their establishment from a gang.
- The hocus who's used frenzy to create a gang and is trying to seize the holding's marketplace from the hardholder, also a PC.
- The driver and battlebabe trying to punch through an enemy blockade. Be sure to use the rules for when vehicles take harm.

Do the math on each of these several times, with different assortments of weapons and armor and different sizes of gangs.

You'll find some combinations where choosing 1 instead of choosing 2 doesn't constitute a loss or a hard choice, as in the case of my badass gunlugger seizing the generator from Dremmer's little gang, and some combinations where it really, really does. Comparing them should clear your confusion right up.

Oh, and Apotheon is right. I know you were just choosing an example of a "hard move," but you happened to choose one where yes, not only may you, but you must. It's right in the text of the move.

-Vincent

Considering that the MC can use the fiction to make a dangerous or complicating move at any point, regardless of whether or not a particular seize by force roll hits or misses, means that you in fact can make a move that frustrates the scene any time they miss a seize by force roll. So doing so as a pattern of play is something that is perfectly within the scope of the rules. That basically eliminates the need for clarification. What it actually does is not remove something bad happening on a miss, it just removes the safe guard of something bad not happening after a hit.

My fear is that this breakdown of expectations between the player and MC might make for some bumpy waters in groups that have established certain patterns of play from the last iteration. If an MC feels like making a move that the fiction wants to make might feel like punishing a PC after a success, that's a problem. If the Player likewise read the rules and feels the MC is making something bad happen after they missed a roll as a double punishment, that's also a problem. Both of these can be rectified in conversation, or can be codified between the players of a given game though, so it's not a big deal in the long term, but this is a weaker / less defined position then before.

I do believe that this move is no longer very effective for creating tension, but that's a personal bias considering the context of play I've experienced in the past. I've always found the harm rules already to be overly forgiving and narratively destructive (PCs as demi-gods)--which is why my group all agreed to replace the entire thing in play with Paul's T Blood and Guts. We were fond of the element of danger and chaotic implications of making those moves.

Basically, when it comes down to it. The biggest change here is: If a combat oriented character can obliterate an enemy, that's now their right do so. If they want something, it's their right to have it. If a non combat character wants something, and they don't mind the harm, it's theirs. Harm may be spent to achieve goals. The more important question is about how they do it.

Vincent,

I'll look at the math, as you say. Perhaps I'll see something there which hasn't come up when we played. I suppose, for instance, that 1 point of harm when you're sending your gang out to do something can turn into a question of "how many men are you willing to lose for this?"

You're not willing to explain your reasoning behind this, though?

Also, how does that address my question about the flow of the conversation, and helping MCs play the game (as well as helping players develop correct expectations)?

As for the example of "getting shot", I suppose I should have expected such an obvious response. But it doesn't address my question at all - I was using "getting shot" as an example of a "hard move", separate from the action being described. I was hoping people would understand the thinking behind my question instead of playing "gotcha" with my particular example.

My original thought was that the fight wasn't taking place in circumstances where you might get shot at all (or, at least, not currently/normally).

For instance, let's say I'm trying to escape from my captors. I use a sharp stone to slit my bonds, and I run out into the courtyard. I bump into a guard; he's got a pistol in a holster, and he's standing in front of the door (the exit). He hardly has time to react, except to bring his arms up to hold me back. I charge at him, head down and fists swinging. We decide this is me Seizing by Force - I want to get to the door, to "fight my way free".

When is it legit for you, as MC, to say that I'm not quick enough, and that the guard manages to draw his weapon and shoot me?

It's possible that this was not at all what you intended, Vincent, but by "popular interpretation", at least (judging by my experiences playing the game as well as online dialogue), in 1st Edition you'd likely get shot on a miss. On a hit, you might get shot anyway, but the default assumption seems to be that you'd have a chance to react, first. (For instance, maybe you get past the guard and are rushing out of the place when he draws and fires - and here you'd get a chance to try to avoid that, if circumstances allowed that.) There's the idea of soft moves setting up hard moves, and a missed roll being an opportunity to "play" a hard move without setting it up beforehand.

I'm not sure how this works now, with this kind of formulation. Do I MC differently, depending on the roll? Or do I apply moves and Principles the same way, whether on a 10+ or a miss?

NOTE: Cross-posted with Ebok, above. I think we're in agreement. It seems like the intent here is to make "Seizing by Force" not an uncertain, risky action, but something you weigh against the cost (in harm/damage/casualties) instead. Is that the design goal here?

Paul, I said it already: I changed seizing by force in order to put it into position at the head of the new battle moves. This requires it to put more of its consequences off into the snowball than it did in 1st Ed, to make the opening for the other moves to lead and follow it.

Ebok, "moves snowball" has always included the possibility of disruptive, frustrating, arguably unfair moves on a hit. That's not a change from 1st Ed.

Both of you, you know how you've been doing it before now?

Doing it that way has always been allowed by the rules, and still is. It's never been required by the rules, and still isn't. If you want to keep doing it that way, awesome! Now you know that you didn't have to do it that way, but you certainly still can!

-Vincent

You're not willing to explain your reasoning behind this, though?

I think he's trying to explain it, but he speaks so consistently within the jargon of the game book that when there are differences of understanding it becomes difficult to pick out exactly what he means, sometimes.

As for the example of "getting shot", I suppose I should have expected such an obvious response. But it doesn't address my question at all - I was using "getting shot" as an example of a "hard move", separate from the action being described. I was hoping people would understand the thinking behind my question instead of playing "gotcha" with my particular example.

I'm not sure whether that's aimed at me or at Vincent.  If me, I should point out that I did not mean it as a "gotcha", but as a genuine explanation of how it's meant to be played.  In just a moment, I'm going to explain what might happen if you don't get shot, using your own example, as I understand (and use) the rules.

For instance, let's say I'm trying to escape from my captors. I use a sharp stone to slit my bonds, and I run out into the courtyard. I bump into a guard; he's got a pistol in a holster, and he's standing in front of the door (the exit). He hardly has time to react, except to bring his arms up to hold me back. I charge at him, head down and fists swinging. We decide this is me Seizing by Force - I want to get to the door, to "fight my way free".

When is it legit for you, as MC, to say that I'm not quick enough, and that the guard manages to draw his weapon and shoot me?

Let's make three sub-examples out of your example here.  In both of them, you're unarmored (because of course they removed your armor when they captured you) and you're a gunlugger with the Not To Be Fucked With move, and you're using the "fight your way free" variant of the Seize By Force move.

• You roll 7-9: You suffer little harm.  You take definite and undeniable control of it (or, in this case, you definitely and undeniably fight your way free).  You charge the guard and get to him before he has time to draw his gun, a .38 revolver (harm 2), so you manage to shove him aside so he lands on his back, incidentally taking an elbow to the ribs on your way out, suffering one harm that gets absorbed by the fact you count as a small gang versus a single individual (+1 armor).  Rather than stick around and pick up his gun or beat him to death, you rush out the door and escape around the corner of the building before he can gather himself enough to exit the building and shoot you in the back, and before reinforcements arrive.
• You roll a miss: You suffer little harm, and that's the only outcome option you can have.  You charge the guard and get to him before he has time to draw his gun, a .38 revolver (harm 2), so you manage to shove him aside so staggers away from the door, incidentally taking an elbow to the ribs on your way out, suffering one harm that gets absorbed by the fact you count as a small gang versus a single individual (+1 armor).  Because you do not take definite and undeniable control of it (or, in this case, definitely and undeniably fight your way free), he doesn't take as long to get himself together and gets to take a shot at you before you get around the building.  You now need to Act Under Fire to get away.  Maybe a 7-9 "flinch, hesitate, or stall" means you take a shot in the back, but still get away for the moment; maybe a miss means more of the gang shows up.  Alternatively, maybe a 7-9 means you get around the corner, but he saw which way you went; then, maybe a miss (prepare for the worst) means he shoots you in the back.  The MC should play these consequences as things fit the "fiction".
• You roll a miss: You take definite and undeniable control of it (or, in this case, you definitely and undeniably fight your way free).  The guard gets his .38 clear of the holster just as you slam into him, and reflexively pulls the trigger, shooting you in the leg, then he falls on his back and his gun flies across the room.  Two harm, minus one for Not To Be Fucked With, applies.  You still manage to rush through the door and around the corner before he can see where you go or reinforcements arrive.

On a hit, you might get shot anyway, but the default assumption seems to be that you'd have a chance to react, first. (For instance, maybe you get past the guard and are rushing out of the place when he draws and fires - and here you'd get a chance to try to avoid that, if circumstances allowed that.)

The way it works now, I'd say, is that your roll determines how many advantages you get to choose, and whether you get to the guard before he can get his hand on his gun is one of those potential advantages.  Another is how far you manage to get when you fight your way free before the MC throws another move at you.  Another is whether you kill the guy when his head hits the concrete floor so he can't call for help.  Another is whether you impress, dismay, or frighten him so he just doesn't come after you at all once you're past him.  The consequences are the player's to choose; the MC just describes them, really.

NOTE: Cross-posted with Ebok, above. I think we're in agreement. It seems like the intent here is to make "Seizing by Force" not an uncertain, risky action, but something you weigh against the cost (in harm/damage/casualties) instead. Is that the design goal here?

Keep in mind that every time harm is done you have to roll your harm move.  What happens to your escape if you lose your footing when you get elbowed in the ribs, even if the harm total is zero?  What if you miss something important, and the MC thinks up some consequence that will surprise you as a result (like another guard outside, an alarm of some kind that you trip on the way out, a lookout or sniper on a neighboring building, or someone following you discreetly to find out where your friends are hiding with the loot you stole from the gang who captured you for the sake of interrogating you for that information)?  Every time there's an exchange of harm, right there in the description of the move you choose to use, consider that something might go awry when you roll your harm move as well.

I forgot to mention something kinda important in my last long post, and I had something in mind to mention in this long post that I've forgotten as well.  I don't recall either at the moment, so maybe I'll remember to share both at some later time.

Preface: I fully understand how and why things read the way they do now. I'm on board and can work with this.

lumply: Yeah, I thought I said that in my last post. Soon as I realized my position was not about whether I had been "hacking" or not, it was much easier to co-exist with what others have argued for. Both ways to read it were justified even though seize by force is not the same tool I hoped it was.

I have enjoyed the expectation that the snowball comes soonish on a hit, but immediately on a miss.
That has worked out well for me, and I may I choose to keep doing it that way.

Where I diverged was allowing NPC's to suffer less harm on a Player's miss. This ability to boost the gang size of the NPCs above what was anticipated allowed for a level of danger that isn't there without. The other battle moves / different pacing will compensate, sure, if we use them.

apotheon, I get what you're trying to say; but I think perhaps your example is not a very powerful one. Seizing something by force,  demands that the repercussions and fiction fall in line with the narrative scope claimed by the word "something". If a Gunlugger has no weapons and no armor, and that guy is in the room. His hands can still end up counting as a 3 harm weapon, and even in armor the guy is as good as dead. He's not even a threat. Why seize "your escape from the room" by force in this instance? That's dumb. At the very least don't leave your shit behind.

Any exchange of harm with that NPC means he is dead. Any weapons / armor held by that NPC are now basically the Gunlugger's. If he is the only thing that stands between the Gunlugger and escape, then the Gunlugger simply kills him, full-stop, no roll. Dude's a goner. This is Sucker someone, or maybe Go Aggro if we said he had his gun out already and probably only seize by force if he's waiting gun up and isn't surprised. Now... If the exchange doesnt always / probably kill the NPC things change dramatically. If we suggest that the Gunlugger either has +1 harm or counts as a gang and the dude has 1-armor, then maybe the player has to consider instead: To seize that gun by force. A miss in this case is a great example of it being better to inflict more then seize definite hold. That way you don't get shot again, and he's not still in your way, and and also the guns yours (though maybe not in your hands yet). If the guy's in 2-armor instead, it also spikes the threat ...(assuming a 2-harm unarmed gunlugger), but rewards going for his weapon and afterwards his armor. ( btw this is a good example to consider the effects that a simple +1 can have on the narrative, what's allowed by seizing depends on how quickly you can overwhelm the fight, and if you cant... that changes everything)

The real question was never: "Does the Gunlugger escape the room"? It's: "How many other people in the vicinity are involved in this action?"

So back to the Gunlugger seizing his escape from the location. The guy in front of him? Dead. If there's a guy just outside the door? He's dead too. Two more in the hallway? Also dead, there's no increase in threat here numerically. Add another five in, and alright, now we're talking. Basically until the group classify as a gang they're the same as it being just one guy. (unless you do like me and say that multiple people are a size-0 gang, then they soak harm differently, they're still mostly dead but not all dead). They're not seperate rolls, the scope here is escape, we'll include anything between him and the exit.

Instead, let's look at this differently. The gunlugger Suckers the first guy, but he's still in the middle of say... the medium sized gang. He can grab the dudes gun and maybe take the time to get armored. Probably does, cause the Gunlugger with 1+1 armor and a now 3+1 harm gun can probably waste the entire compound with a medium sized gang inside. Let's seize the entire place by force shall we? (My shit is here somewhere...). There is no question here either, He does it. The only question here is, what happens next and what position is he in health-wise. (he's maybe fine, +3 hard seize by force means on average he counts as a medium sized gang and can take on 20 without any major upsets, though that's starting to push some riskier addition, and probably wont handle a second round well if they're got a good leader) This math changes if the Gunlugger is already mostly dead.

You example might hold true if the dude was just a scrawny unarmed Savvyhead though. In such a case, a seize by force roll to escape, means: Always seize the escape, because any other option means you're not out yet and you'll have to roll again to get that far, thusly taking more harm and making any choice to suffer less meaningless (at least in this circumstance). Also remember, a harm roll wont contradict the choose-1 seize absolutely no matter how bad it might've been, so any harm roll will have to be put into perspective. Even if the extra harm kills you, you died after you seized your escape, not instead of it.

Miss: You get out but suffer two harm.
Partial: You get out but suffer one harm. Or suffer 2 harm but you also killed that bastard. Or 2 harm and [*below]
Hit: You get out and suffer one harm, and you took the guy hostage with you so no one else fired a shot that would risk his death. impress /dismay etc)

There's still something wrong though. The scope of the above assumes he was the only thing between you and escape, thus the only one involved in the harm exchange (or part of a small number of peeps who collectively didn't bump the harm level). That's not quite right if we've said there is a medium sized gang here.

This is a better way to scope that situation: You're escaping the entire compound by force you say? Okay. There are twenty guys in that place armed with mostly light weapons and some light armor. So if we're going to skip to you getting out (we essentially do if he can tell us how he does it) You'll be looking at well 4 harm to escape, because size by force means an exchange and their guns are loud. So ... you'll possibly risking up to 5 harm with the harm rolls and any complications after. "Oh." He says, and thinks about that again. "Maybe I'll do this differently."

tdlr: Seize by Force is saying: how hard /well did you fight to get the thing you just claimed?

Seize by Force is not a matter of, did the dashing hero escape? It's a matter of, do I have the harm / armor to tackle this challenge and win? Interestingly enough, now seize by force basically describes any PC fighting as hard as a gang a size step up from them. +1 harm +1 armor? Yay I can fight like a small gang! Gunlugger? I can fight 20 no 30 people and be on equal footing size wise! (and the gunlugger can probably fight way more with a better gun, at least 1 alternate source of armor, and some any harm focus ).

postscript: I have provided a half dozen little examples that show this move works even without guaranteed a hard roll after... I didn't expect that. It was just a matter of changing the Did you? to a oh, how'd that work out? Good practice. I am still utterly underwhelmed by this game's particular approach to manpower. I like risk, but I also like having deep and meaningful encounters (even the violent sort) that don't always end up with me fishing around for more population to get killed, or giving up on all mass violence just cause a certain PC is scary.

Unfortunately, most battle characters are "never" without their best armor and best gear in practice. After seeing the impact of each +1, some players might find combat boring, especially if their isn't enough fodder around to let them sweat in a fight. This definitely limits tension. An interesting side effect of this is, that the higher harm/armor any one PC can bring to bear, the more populated the area will become to compensate. Thusly, having an alpha wolf attracts people who think he'll kill danger, until so many have come that he's back under strain again.

The biggest fault of the current seize by force is that it assumes any character no matter how weak, can quite reliably fight his way out of a situation without an overwhelming scope. This makes me as an MC want to put more pressure on the HOW they do it and only accept that if that's something they could reasonably do (based on the fiction). Maybe that's okay? Maybe's it easier to make a Act under fire then Seize by force if you're captured, dunno. I'll have to play to find out.

I think this question deserves its own, very direct, response.  This is my take:

The Seize By Force move explicitly prescribes an exchange of harm, so yes, if people are shooting, the "fiction" can include getting shot in the explanation for harm inflicted on the PC in that exchange.

Yes, you can get shot whether you roll a 10+ or a Miss. You can take hold of the thing whether you roll +10 or a Miss too. And the MC can shoot you after the move whether you roll a +10 or a Miss.

@apotheon, I think Paul is struggling with the fact that if he's got, say 2 armor and "not to be fucked with," he might not care very much if they shoot or not.

Yeah, I think the fixation on the case of the 2 armour Gunlugger is kind of skewing the perspective, here -- especially since they're not missing the roll anyways, because they're the frickin' Gunlugger? I thought apotheon's appeal to the Be a Fan principle was spot on, for that example in particular.

It is fair to point to that example. Out of every single one of these games I've ever had the pleasure to run or play in, there was always a Gunlugger. That may be odd, but really? No it's not. 2-armor isn't so hard to get, a Hardholder gets the same numbers pretty easily (although healing is easier then getting more loyal troops perhaps). If a player wants 2-armor they can probably get it. Pretty much anyone that wants bloody conflict can see the advantage of taking not to be fucked with as a move from another playbook. You can replicate these numbers with almost any playbook.

These aren't rare occurrences, but perhaps the focus on them is pointing to a different concern in the game, rather then then seize by force itself. Considering both me and Paul T have hacked away the feeling of invincibility regularly now, either one of us might to continue to do so even if that means altering this combat move in play. It's not "wrong" to believe that having the chance to miss, and that miss utterly ruining you (bullet to the face?), makes rolling a hit feel all the more elevating and worthwhile, even for a Tanky Gunlugger.

I have to say rolling snake eyes and then getting the thing I wanted while the bullet creases my helmet feels weird to me.

Vincent,

As always, thank you for the answers. This topic boggles me a little, because I generally feel like I have a very good handle on the way AW operates, but here it seems like I'm missing some basic information to even engage in the discussion. I'm not sure why that's the case.

Paul, I said it already: I changed seizing by force in order to put it into position at the head of the new battle moves. This requires it to put more of its consequences off into the snowball than it did in 1st Ed, to make the opening for the other moves to lead and follow it.

Ebok, "moves snowball" has always included the possibility of disruptive, frustrating, arguably unfair moves on a hit. That's not a change from 1st Ed.

Both of you, you know how you've been doing it before now?

Doing it that way has always been allowed by the rules, and still is. It's never been required by the rules, and still isn't. If you want to keep doing it that way, awesome! Now you know that you didn't have to do it that way, but you certainly still can!

-Vincent

Here's what I don't understand (and I believe I asked this from the start):

How does this change affect the game? Does play "feel" different? Does it change the characters' actions or possible actions and consequences?

Ebok is getting at some of those potential changes, but it doesn't seem like s/he (Ebok) is talking from a place of experience. I'd love to hear from someone who has played with both sets of rules and is aware of the differences (including Vincent, of course).

Your first sentence suggests that this is a meaningful difference. What does it mean to "put off consequences into the snowball" when designing (or re-designing) a move? What does this look like, how does it affect play? This is a really interesting aspect of AW's game design I haven't heard described before, and I'm not entirely sure I understand it.

"This requires it to put more of its consequences off into the snowball than it did in 1st Ed, to make the opening for the other moves to lead and follow it."

I'm not sure how changing the way its miss clause operates changes how other moves might lead into a Seize by Force. What about following?
I'm looking at the Battle Moves, and the only one I can see engaging immediately after a Seize by Force (and directly because of its outcome) is Single Combat. I'm not entirely sure how that would happen, but I can probably imagine a few rare cases where that would happen, if I get creative.

So, presumably defining the miss clause and giving the MC a chance to forgo making a move improves the flow of battle somehow. Is that the idea?

In what way is it significant to make "basic moves" open-ended on a miss, but not other types of moves? I've always assumed that moves received "standard" or "spelled out" miss clauses either because a) they were narrow enough in context (unlike basic moves) that they didn't need that flexibility (e.g. "Shoulder another vehicle"), b) to help MCs who might struggle with coming up with a new "miss" result each time, c) (related to b) when a move doesn't have a really clear or obvious "miss" based on context (e.g. 'in-brain puppet strings', 'dangerous & sexy;), or d) to make a move less "punishing", to fulfill genre expectations (e.g. 'artful & gracious').

Playbooks moves, for instance, seem to follow these guidelines (or something similar). Many/most do not "spell out" what happens on a miss except in such cases.

In the 2nd Edition, all non-basic moves (but not playbook moves) seem to be spelling out their miss results. Since "Seize by force" is no longer a basic move (a decision I like - as a headline "battle move" it connects the various parts of the system nicely), it has also received this treatment. Does this mean that we're supposed to be using or applying it differently in play than we did before?

The opening of your post suggests that, yes, we should be. But how? I have no idea. I also don't know how this will improve play.

At the end of your post, however, you say that, no, we can keep doing it exactly as we have been. I know how to do that, of course. But I have no idea how that might be - conversely - harming or holding back my play.

This is what I'm trying to get at.

More generally:

While I appreciate the advice to "do it however you want!", it really doesn't help me (or other readers/players) figure out what to do with our previous expectations for misses serving as a "silver platter" for hard moves. What's the new guideline? Or is it left entirely to our "MC instincts"?

That's the first issue: how does this affect the conversation of play?

Currently, I feel like I'm being told to throw away a very useful tool, with no clear sense of what replaces that tool in play.

The second issue is one of risk/predictability, as Ebok and noclue suggest. Is something gained by allowing this kind of predictability in play? If so, what?

I can understand the value in a game which gives "guarantees" to its players when they make certain moves. That can be used to hammer certainly moral decisions or make statements about the nature of the "game world" ("your insights into the subject matter"). But this doesn't seem to be the case with most other moves in AW - is there something particular about Seize by Force which indicates this being an important change?

From what I understand about the "genre" of Apocalypse World, if anything, I'd expect "go aggro" to carry a more predictable "payoff" move than Seize by Force, if anything, not the other way around. What makes them different, instead, as this new version indicates?

What is the design thought behind this change, in other words?

Was it a recurring problem, for instance, that PCs engaging in Seize by Force felt it was too risky and punishing, and a decision was made to "soft-pedal" the misses? (If that was the case, I never saw it in my games, but perhaps I'm the outlier here, and that's why it feels funny to me.) In every example I can remember you (Vincent) wrote up of a miss on a Seize by Force (e.g. in the book itself, and also in forum examples), the outcome was far more punishing than "choose 1" suggests to me. (For instance, in an online example, you suggested having the MC choose 3 options against the PC, which, clearly, is a far more desperate outcome for the player.)

I would love to hear that playing AW often led to situations which were undesirable or suboptimal because of the way the move worked, and this improves that. If so, what are they, and how? I would love to hear that this is a conscious decision to change some dynamic of play, so I can (at the very least) make my own conscious decision to use it or go back to the 1st edition playstyle.

Saying that you can do either, as you like, isn't really helpful to anyone who's wondering about this (which is several people, at least, as this thread demonstrates)... until we have a sense of why we might choose one over the other, and what the advantages or disadvantages of doing so might be.

I suspect the response might answer other questions people have had about the other battle moves, many of which share this sort of "generous" miss clause. (Or tend to engage a calculation of harm as a balancing mechanism instead of fictional priorities, like "Single Combat". That's a tendency I've seen in many of your design notes and other game drafts, Vincent, so I suspect there's some underlying thought to it! I'd love to hear more about that.)

Thanks, again, for engaging in this conversation. I think it's pretty important for playing running and playing AW, and I also think it's very interesting for any designer or hacker of AW.

If you have the desire or energy to start a thread about this in "Roleplaying theory, hardcore" or "blood & guts", I'm sure lots of people would find it fascinating, too!

(It also occurs to me that a design goal here might be as simple as making battle *more deterministic in general*, to move the focus away from "how does the battle go" and bring it back to "which fight do you choose"? Some of the Battle Moves suggest a shift in this direction. That's a possible, and very sensible, explanation. [Based on a suggestion from another poster.])

Paul, before I try to answer your questions, I need you to just confirm for me:

In both editions, the basic moves don't specify miss effects, but ALL the non-basic moves - all the peripheral moves, battle moves, and character moves - do.

In both editions, the rule for making your moves as MC is: When it's your turn to talk, choose a move and make it. Choose one that could apparently follow from fictional causes, and don't say which move you're choosing.

In both editions, the guideline is: generally, use your moves to set up future action, but when the players give you an opportunity, including when they miss a move, make your moves as hard and direct as you want. This in no way contradicts any part of the rule for making your moves above.

So between the 1st Edition and the 2nd Edition there are some technical changes to some moves, including the whole new set of battle moves and this particular change to seizing by force, but there's absolutely no such thing as "the 1st Edition playstyle," in contrast with the 2nd Edition.

With me?

-Vincent

In both editions, the guideline is: generally, use your moves to set up future action, but when the players give you an opportunity, including when they miss a move, make your moves as hard and direct as you want. This in no way contradicts any part of the rule for making your moves above.

This pretty much clinches for me the idea that the real substantive difference between a miss on SBF under 1st ed vs 2nd ed is that the PC gets to pick one. I'm still going to treat this as a "golden opportunity." Why? Because the rules don't tell me not to, and the results of the moves that I (as MC) make in response to those golden opportunities are what give impetus (gravity?) to the snowball.

Stripped to its bare bones, the ability to always pick at least one means that if you put your mind to inflicting violence, a PC can always get what he or she wants in the moment, but boy-howdy it might cost them in the long run.

I'm cool with that.