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Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

QuantumNinja posted:

Is there a space opera / Firefly-esque hack?

the basic playbooks map fairly directly onto firefly characters

# ¿ Jul 15, 2015 18:12

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 05:06

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

tweekinator posted:

Does anyone know if there's a swashbuckling/pirates Apocalypse hack? I'm interested in getting my group to try the system, but haven't seen any that are pirate-based.

run default aw, set it in the equivalent of Kevin Costner's waterworks, make a conceit for everyone to have a small boat, better if a hardholder, driver, or chopper

Report back

# ¿ Jul 24, 2015 23:19

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Hummingbird James posted:

Hey, quick dumb question about World Wide Wrestling (and by extension other PbtA games): can you only take a specific advance once, or can you take it multiple times? Like, if I wanted to take +1 to a stat twice, would that be allowed? Sorry if this is explained in the book somewhere, as I can't find it whatsoever.

in AW proper you're allowed to take whichever advances are on your sheet. Sometimes this is e.g. +1 Hard and it is listed twice, then you are allowed to take it twice. If it's listed only once, you're allowed to take it only once.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2015 16:21

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

QuantumNinja posted:

For a Far weapon, it's AUF/DD to use it closer. Shooting someone with a sniper rifle if they're standing next to you really opens you up to some risk, just like shooting someone with a handgun in a fistfight. As for further away, AUF/DD may be appropriate, or you can always say, "yeah, there's no way you could pull that off from this distance".

yeah, AW doesn't really do "degrees of difficulty," but if the fiction suggests it, inserting an AUF roll is a solid way to make it happen.

# ¿ Aug 7, 2015 16:26

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Flavivirus posted:

Maybe a potential solution is to take a leaf from Borderlands and have a range of premade manufacturers, each of which applies their own tag to their manufactured equipment? So cheap brands like the Val-U-Ware Ventilator always come with the Unreliable tag, and expensive ones like the Schloss-Mikenburg Eliminator T5 always come with things like Armour-Piercing or Nanotech?

That or gate the number of positive tags a piece of gear can have behind how high-end the brand is, so cheap knockoffs have 1 or 2 and top-of-the-line stuff has 5-6.

(or simplest solution: branded is an extra tag you can have on gear that means it does something fancy, unique and desirable)

This is pretty much it, maybe have a few selections of more common weapons, but this allows you to generate any number of weapons with the various tags built in already, give it a brand name, and apply it to every single piece of gear in the game.

Also you could rebrand (pun intended) a lot of the moves. Your Gunlugger (or equivalent) isn't Insano like Drano, but he's got XyTek Threat Amplifier electrodes attached to his skull.

# ¿ Aug 13, 2015 15:35

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Cyphoderus posted:

There's an AW principle that reads, "give everyone a name, make everyone human."

Just add another one that says "give every object a name, make every object a product."

You don't need endless lists of equipment to evoke the gear-obsessed feeling, the same way you don't need endless lists of NPCs to evoke a community feeling. Just give your stuff a name, place it in the context of market. Maybe provide players and GM with a Big List o' Generic Brand/Model names.

I like this

I'm also the guy that ended up with a list of 100+ NPCs in my last game, though

e:158

edit2: this remains my favorite entry

Name: D-Day Sex: F Notes: LOVES EXPLOSIONS Killed By: D-Day Killed How: explosive yield too high

Captain Foo fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Aug 13, 2015

# ¿ Aug 13, 2015 17:10

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

spectralent posted:

Yeah, AW's thing about naming everyone seems wildly impractical to me for exactly that reason. Especially combined with "Also kill them off frequently".

you don't have to do it, but i just keep a quick google doc with everyone that gets named, and add notes as they come up: it looks like this

# ¿ Aug 13, 2015 17:15

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Loki_XLII posted:

Just don't make a new npc every time you need one. Reuse npcs frequently, it makes stronger triangles and makes their eventual death hit harder.

This was the point of doing it this way. People get mentioned offhandedly, and you keep track of that information. The full list of mine included their loyalties and their stomping grounds, so as the game went on if I needed an NPC for this or that, I could use one that already existed. Makes the game feel more alive, to me.

# ¿ Aug 13, 2015 18:57

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

I've effortposted on this before, so here's what I've had to say about it:

Captain Foo posted:

This is definitely a Go Aggro situation.
Keeler draws, implying give me what I want or I'll shoot.
OR
Keeler draws and fires, implying die or I'll kill you.

Oddly, the two sides of the Go Aggro coin can be the same thing, as Kaja says.

In the situation you've presented:
Keeler approaches. Bulldog draws and fires. Keeler says gently caress off and fires back (and rolls Seize by Force). In my opinion, if you're seizing by force you're conceding the fact that it's going to hurt.

Captain Foo posted:

Well, any specific situations that come up you should direct to me ( ) but given what you said - if you were to say "hey rear end in a top hat," draw and fire, that's Seize By Force. If you were to say "hey rear end in a top hat," draw and not fire, that's Go Aggro.

That being said, sniping in AW always reads a little different to me. Not that there's anything about a sniper rifle, but the whole act of committing violence on an unsuspecting person from a distance where they're unlikely to know you're already there. In that case you'd always Go Aggro. You're not SBFing while sniping unless there's already some sort of pitched battle going on (in which case NOT TO BE hosed WITH would trigger also). That's just my GM's take on it, and every situation is different.

Things are only too aggro to Go Aggro if and only if there's actual violence going on RIGHT NOW.

Captain Foo posted:

Scrape, so in your understanding of the moves, my example of "gently caress you" draws and fires doesn't provide enough information to actually determine which move it is? Reason hadn't failed per se, it wasn't even attempted.

Thought: the Go Aggro non-dichotomy of suck it up (getting shot) or forcing their hand (to get shot) stops making sense, when put the way you have. In fact, that's not the choice even presented.

What do you want?
For them to stop being a threat.
Suck it up -> They bail out / Force your hand -> violence (Go Aggro)

What do you want?
For them to die now.
-> Seize Life by Force

Seems like unless your end goal is 100%, no questions asked, to loving hurt them, you're always Going Aggro. Even if you'd probably RATHER shoot them than not, unless you're flat out going to, you're Going Aggro.

e- in case it wasn't clear, I wasn't saying that your conception is wrong because (or even though) it violates the book-given example of the get-shot/get-shot (non-)choice.

Captain Foo posted:

I definitely like what you're saying (and your other posts too), but I still want to go through this line of thinking. Isn't Go Aggro "I want something OR I will hurt you?" Manipulate with violence as leverage is "I want something, and I could hurt you if I don't get it." Seize is "I want something AND I am hurting you to get it."

I know the move isn't called Kill a Guy, and I agree that makes it a lot more useful. I definitely need to start asking "what are you really trying to get" when people want to kill a guy.

Do we agree that my propositions are appropriate framework statements of intent for each move?

tl;dr

Go Aggro is "I want something OR I will hurt you." Manipulate with violence as leverage is "I want something, and I could hurt you if I don't get it." Seize is "I want something AND I am hurting you to get it."

# ¿ Sep 9, 2015 22:09

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

double post but I wanna be clear that I am not trying to shut down this discussion! It's an important one to have.

# ¿ Sep 9, 2015 22:14

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Another way to see SBF is "I want something, and I am hurting myself in order to get it."

# ¿ Sep 10, 2015 00:49

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Hugoon Chavez posted:

I'm running AW this weekend and I think I had a cool idea for the setting:

It�s based around the golden gate bridge, although they don�t know it yet. San Francisco is in ruins, the BloodGate bridge is populated by a powerful warlord and his lackeys (having built a shanty town that extends to the bottom of the bridge) and there�s a precarious network of roads built on top of big metal spikes crossing over the water, a pirate stronghold amongst said roads that resists BloodGate, and a bunch of settlements around the bay that pay tribute to one or the other.

Oh, and the water bursts into loving flames every nightfall. There�s something weird going on that causes the highly gasoline-polluted water to start burning every night.

These are the questions I�m going to ask my players, and I was wondering if Goons could think of more questions to add to the list.

-What inhabits the ruins of the nearby city that make settling in a lethal idea?
-Who�s Bloodgate�s leader? what�s he/she like?
-What�s the external threat that worries the min-ds of the Firewater Bay settlers?
-What�s the internal threat that grows, hidden, in Firewater Bay?
-What�s the barter system in the Bay like?

awww yeeeah

# ¿ Sep 17, 2015 17:01

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Error 404 posted:

Sure. I was talking about btech, because that's all the mecha I know.

Battletech supremacy

# ¿ Oct 18, 2015 19:15

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Error 404 posted:

Ftfy

Dirty clanner!

# ¿ Oct 18, 2015 19:20

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

thefakenews posted:

Pretty much all of this to some extent, although investigation and monster slaying are at the forefront. I'm not looking to go too deeply philosophical with this game bu,t given the setting puts the player either in the middle of, or emerging from, the War of Religion, I definitely want to make the conflict between characters' beliefs a part of the game (although more as a source of tension between PCs, and between PCs and human NPCs - the characters should be generally united in the goal of confronting the Darkness). I'm going for something mostly an action RPG, rather than anything particularly metaphorical. Likewise, at this point, I'm thinking more in terms of professions for playbooks, rather than any clever metaphors.

I am still grappling with how to define Innocents and Abominations, and whether it will be static or dependent on the character. That's going to end up being fairly important.

The partial draft rules are here, if you want to peek.

IMO you should really focus on trying to emulate one of them well - that's when the apocalypse engine really shines. You'll probably get the ability to do other styles with it as the moves develop, but trying to build a framework to support every aspect of the broader genre will not be as effective of a game.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2015 16:06

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

AW is 100% not for cooperative party play, and 100% reliant on cooperative group play (but the latter basically goes for everything, natch). That being said, it's not a great idea to start your players with opposed agendas, because again, the system admittedly doesn't handle PvP as well as it does PvMC. It still works fairly well, but what I've found, even in the pseudonymous PbP games on the forums that I've run, most people don't want to come into direct conflict. So don't set that up. Run your PCs at cross purposes, not opposed ones. Don't be afraid to have your PCs running at parallel purposes, either. I understand totally the drive to push PCs together, but sometimes that's not what makes sense for the characters, so don't force it.

I also will always remember this: I had an extremely strong AW game going until I pushed the PCs all on the same side with the same overall agenda and effectively into a party. The game fell apart and died rapidly after that, since the system simply didn't support that scenario the same engaging way that multiple fronts and multiple agendas are.

# ¿ Jan 21, 2016 21:42

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

This is one of the great strengths of AW as a PbP system - it's no problem to have a player isolated from the rest of the group for up to an entire session, if that's where the narrative is taken them. Sure, it's probably good to get them on track to cross paths with another PC at the start of the next session, but it's certainly not a killer to let people stay apart.

# ¿ Jan 22, 2016 16:32

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Doodmons posted:

words

a very strong post.

# ¿ Jan 22, 2016 18:03

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Error 404 posted:

Oh hey, vince is talking about AW2.0 being ready for kickstarter soon.

# ¿ Jan 25, 2016 03:57

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

Evil Mastermind posted:

I can't imagine what kinds of stretch goals he could do, apart from maybe a hardcover (which I'd love).

e: I mean, hell, Dungeon World still hasn't delivered all its stretch goals and that funded in 2012.

Hardcover would be very good and cool

# ¿ Feb 2, 2016 21:50

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 05:06

Captain Foo: May 11, 2004; we vibin'
we slidin'
we breathin'
we dyin'

All I know is that the AW MC guidelines are the best general purpose guidelines for running any sort of game I've ever read.

# ¿ Feb 11, 2016 18:23

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