Dungeon World, yay or nay?

[unnamednpc]

There's a lot of gushing for this game it seems. Is it worth it? Is it worth it under the premise of looking for an accessible, quick'n'dirty dungeon crawler with enough meat to potentially last you and a group of strangers for a couple of sessions or even a short campaign?

[Mask_De_H]

There's a lot of gushing for this game it seems. Is it worth it? Is it worth it under the premise of looking for an accessible, quick'n'dirty dungeon crawler with enough meat to potentially last you and a group of strangers for a couple of sessions or even a short campaign?

Three questions:

1. Do you like Basic D&D?
2. Are you okay with a system where MTP is the determinant for mechanics?
3. Are you okay with a style of being Mister Cavern that is highly co-operative and relies on not having very much planned in advance?

If you answered no to two of those questions, try it anyway. It's one of the better storygame systems I've played and is really easy to hack.

The basic dice mechanic is 2d6+mods (-1 to +3 normally) TN 7, with granular degrees of success at TN 10 and (rarely) TN 12. This is what you roll for everything. Every character gets "moves"; there are basic moves which are a universal skill equivalent and class moves like casting spells and shit. Fighters don't get nice things, but they do get a signature weapon that ends up magical. Thieves are focused on traps, poison and backstab, bards kind of suck, wizards also kind of suck without downtime, paladins get a neat quest mechanic and druids get rapid (but not stat modifying) shapeshifting.

It's good for a dungeon crawl and it's good for the long haul if you can reconcile that the fiction (read: MTP) is prescriptive and descriptive in the rules.

[mean_liar]

My trouble with Apocalypse World was that it didn't have scaling difficulty, and the fact that you could cobble together +4s and occasionally +5s to tests (base +3 stat and then ask someone with one of the advice Moves to give you a +1) meant that you could really undermine some of that OMG EVERYTHING = SHIT theme they were going for.

In Dungeon World, I don't know if that matters, but I'd be worried that it does.

[Mask_De_H]

My trouble with Apocalypse World was that it didn't have scaling difficulty, and the fact that you could cobble together +4s and occasionally +5s to tests (base +3 stat and then ask someone with one of the advice Moves to give you a +1) meant that you could really undermine some of that OMG EVERYTHING = SHIT theme they were going for.

In Dungeon World, I don't know if that matters, but I'd be worried that it does.

Dungeon World doesn't use the everything = shit theme, no. It's D&D Fantasy Heartbreaker style, mostly culled from Basic but without your life being cheap and meaningless until level 3 or 5.

[zeruslord]

The DMing style that Dungeon World demands is very different from the default DMing style in D&D. The mechanics give players opportunities to inject their own ideas into the setting, and the DM advice section encourages asking them for input, even as part of the game's flow. When this goes well, it's great, but it means that you do a lot less prep and a lot more thinking on your feet. The DM side of the game is very rules-light: the only real mechanical bits that the monsters have are damage, armor, and HP, so going off the rails isn't as bad as it is in high-level 3e or the like.

There are a few things about it that need patching or are very strange if you're coming from a traditional RPG standpoint rather than a storygamey one.

• It drops a really thin veneer of basic D&D over what is fundamentally a storygame chassis, which results in a few awkward mechanics. A different scale for damage and HP would be pretty easy to do, and the only reason they changed them from the Apocalypse World setup was to make the aesthetics of play at the table look a bit more like D&D. I don't think this is really worth redoing stuff for, but I'd have preferred a lighter approach to it.
• The Wizard and The Cleric have an extra sheet for spells compared to all the other classes. There are a handful of alternatives that people have written up, but I would probably go with something more like Frank's beguiler/necromancer/fire mage/etc. setup with separate classes for different styles of magic. It's also a pretty big break from the AW playbook style, which I would rather have preserved.
• There's a huge asymmetry between the way the PCs work and the way the rest of the world works. This is mitigated by the fact that the game treats MTP as the primary thing going on, but some people find that pretty objectionable.
• The Looks and Names lists are pretty lame, and your players will probably object to them. The kinds of options on the Looks lists are interesting, but going off-list isn't at all a problem.

I found it very enjoyable, but it's not necessarily everyone's taste.

[unnamednpc]

So I bought the pdf. From what I skimmed so far, and from what I get from your replies, I get the impression that ideally, DW would play like the D&D episode of Community.
I guess I could be down with that.

[Chamomile]

The basic game is actually free. I dunno what's in the .pdf that the link doesn't have, but I'd be interested in finding out.

[Ted the Flayer]

... huh, thought this was something else. I remember a D20 supplement called dungeon World. It was ass.

[Prak]

I think you're remembering X Crawl, actually, Ted. Was it like a shittily thought out dungeon-themed Running Man thing?

Anyway, on the subject of Apocalypse World... do the characters really just go around having lots and lots of sex? I looked into after hearing the Brilliant Gameologists mention that it was more sex-focused than other games, it really seems like it is.

[wotmaniac]

Anyway, on the subject of Apocalypse World... do the characters really just go around having lots and lots of sex? I looked into after hearing the Brilliant Gameologists mention that it was more sex-focused than other games, it really seems like it is.

Dude -- right smack in the middle of the character sheet is a big block dedicated to your sex-move, and you level-up by using your sex-move on other players.
"More sex-focused" is a bit of an understatement -- AW is orgy-foreplay.

[Prak]

I... really need to find a different group, and get them to try AW.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

I am sure that this sounds odd coming from me, but I game to forget that sex exists (or at least follows rules that aren't utterly incomprehensible to me yet so natural to everyone else that I am openly mocked).

[Mask_De_H]

That is because you are a weird motherfucker, Count.

And AW is sadly, not orgy foreplay. Sex is a big part simply due to its inclusion, however. Also stripper class.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

That is because you are a weird motherfucker, Count.

The world seems weird and motherfucking to me.

[mean_liar]

My own experience with Apocalypse World is that the sex moves were irrelevant. They only came up once or twice, and otherwise simply didn't seem to matter.

Then again, I went to the game's forum to do a post-mortem and was told that we'd played the game with an intent and tone profoundly different from what it had been designed for.

[wotmaniac]

My own experience with Apocalypse World is that the sex moves were irrelevant. They only came up once or twice, and otherwise simply didn't seem to matter.

Then again, I went to the game's forum to do a post-mortem and was told that we'd played the game with an intent and tone profoundly different from what it had been designed for.

Let me guess -- you guys went in to it playing a dystopic survival game, right?
At first glance, that's what I thought too; and was like "cool". Upon further inspection, and copious reading of Vincent Baker (not only just the game's site, but quite a bit of Forge stuff too), I realized that it was indeed an excuse for a bunch of people to sit around and play-fuck each other.
Baker makes sure to point out every chance he gets that AW is about "relationships", and goes out of his way to stress how important sex is when talking about relationships. Basically, all the other stuff going on in the game is just a set-up for the sex.
To make a (rather weak) analogy .... have you ever seen the movie Brown Bunny? It was an "art-house" film by Vince Gallow, and the entirety of the movie was nothing more than a soul-crushing set-up for the final scene where the chick gets double-teamed; and the movie shows full penetration -- but because it was "artsy", it wasn't considered "porn".

/2cents

[mean_liar]

"Relationships" definitely came up. Lots of references to triangles: PC-NPC-PC.

I am honored and relieved to have missed the implications.

[Prak]

I want Frank to review Apocalypse World now, and compare it to BoEF

[Ted the Flayer]

Upon further inspection, and copious reading of Vincent Baker (not only just the game's site, but quite a bit of Forge stuff too), I realized that it was indeed an excuse for a bunch of people to sit around and play-fuck each other.

If you're going to do that, why not just actual fuck each other? I've never had a partner that was willing, but I've heard roleplaying can really add some spice to coitus. The only problem I have with consenting adults having orgies during RPGs is if they forgot to invite me...

[unnamednpc]

Wow, that went some interesting places...
Right now, my problem with DW is that I can't read it. I mean, I can recongize the letters, and I know the words they form, but when I put them in sequence, it feels like they were explicitly optimized to not engage me.
I uses way too many words to say very little, only to then introduce idiosyncratic terminology without expounding on it. And it does so in a sort of smug tone, the sort of tone you'd use on a cognitively impaired child, if you were incapable of empathy, and really hated that kid.
And the pdf clocks in at over 400 pages. That is a lot of pages to slog through only to nibble on some ideas for formalized free-form GMing.
So, for now, that probably puts me in the "not for me" category?

Which kind of segues into the topic of sexual roleplay, because that is something I also don't seem to understand. I always made a point of getting into sexual relationships with people I found at least interesting enough to not actively wish they were somebody else, if only for the duration we thrusted our various grotesque appendages and crevices against each other, even if it were something generic and kind of socio-economically troubling as "a hot maid", or "that hot but kind of racist overseer at the vineyard that always gives me those wistful looks but I don't dare looking back because she is also the owner's daughter and married to the cruel sherrif, but then one day she orders me to her office and accuses me of stealing and I can't prove my innocence because I don't speak any English and suddenly I find myself wearing her father's boots and coat while we're doing it reverse cowgirl style in the backseat of her Pinto".
Given that, I don't see myself sitting down with a bunch of people to have awkward magical tea party sextalk.
I guess what I'm saying is I'm old-fashioned. Which is why I'll now be taking Dungeonslayers for a test drive, because, while that looks a little boring-yet-practical in its mechanics, it at least seems to take the beer&preztl hack&slay attitude, and run with it.
I'll let you know how that goes.
If anyone should be interested.

[mean_liar]

RE: length. Most of that is monster writeups.

It's too bad you're not interested; among those that play it, Dungeon World is pretty much held up as the "old school game old school games wish they could be". That's the same crowd that loves their prose more than their mechanics when it comes to game design, though. Personally I just want to hear from someone that has actually played it that isn't already in the Apocalypse World fan club.

Once it's understood, I presume that much like Apocalypse World the whole game comes down to something like a two-page summary of Moves for players, and a two-page summary of Fronts and Moves for the GM.

[unnamednpc]

To qualify, I'm not not interested. DW sounds like it'd be fun to play. I'd be interested in playing DW. Heck, I'd be game for playing DW right now (ok, maybe after fixing dinner) if I'd find a Hangout game somewhere.
But, at least for now, I wouldn't want to run it. I don't want to read all that obnoxious prose, parse it, and parse it enough that I can relate it to someone else. Not when I can grab something with a lower entrance barrier and run a "yes and/no, but" type game instead, and handle all the MTP the old fashioned style, by filling up on Glenfiddich.

[Mask_De_H]

It's too bad you're not interested; among those that play it, Dungeon World is pretty much held up as the "old school game old school games wish they could be". That's the same crowd that loves their prose more than their mechanics when it comes to game design, though. Personally I just want to hear from someone that has actually played it that isn't already in the Apocalypse World fan club.

Haven't you gotten that in this very thread?

Once it's understood, I presume that much like Apocalypse World the whole game comes down to something like a two-page summary of Moves for players, and a two-page summary of Fronts and Moves for the GM.

You'd need monster moves in abstract to make up for the fact that fronts/portents are more amorphous and place focused as opposed to AW's personal threats and fronts.

[Orion]

I've played apocalypse world a few times. The first time it devolved into farce almost immediately, but in a kind of awesome way. The players dicked each other over so enthusiastically that the MC didn't really even need to introduce any plot. Probably 80% of our problems in that game were self-inflicted. Still, I did get to do more character development than during most games--my doctor was evolving into some kind of scary desert norn, and it was kind of neat. The second time, I was MC, and I had to actually throw some problems in here and there to keep life interesting. As a hot young person, I can confirm that the hot young people of today totally do sit around talking about imaginary sex. It's pretty weird. Then again, people my age were 13 during the great era of lemon fanfic. Many of them have been talking to strangers about imaginary sex for ten or more years.

We've never played out a sex "scene" per se, but my doctor did one pose as a prostitute so she could get a man alone and mindblast him into unconsciousness, so she could pop his soul out and use him as a puppet for her ghost brother. Good times.

[OgreBattle]

I'm not familiar with AW so how exactly is it gameplay wise about sex and "sex moves"