Hi everyone! I just got exposed to my first Dungeon World game and it was a blast! 🙂 Right now I’m DMing my friends in a 4e D&D game, but I see some places where I can incorporate DW ideas, particularly with an upcoming “Infiltrate the Duke’s Estate to Steal a Magic Wolfskin” challenge. I need some interesting location moves that the Duke’s estate can make against the PCs when they fail a check. This would be the equivalent of getting 6 or less in DW, so think “hard fails that don’t stop the infiltration entirely.”
For example…the Duke’s estate makes one of these moves…
* Increases patrols, forcing the PCs to separate to avoid detection. Also, double the number of men-at-arms in any “soft fail” move from the random encounter table (which is used when the enter a new area or when needed to move the action).
* Captus that PC and throws them in the dungeon to be interrogated by a very unpleasant gaoler.
I’m still figuring out the distinction between “hard” and “soft” fails, so I would love some help figuring this out! read a beginner’s guide to DW by @Scrape on another site that was good) Might even get me warmed up to introduce DW to my group! Thanks!
This is talking about apocalypse world but the same things apply in DW about hard and soft moves.
http://mightyatom.blogspot.com/2011/05/apocalypse-world-guide-to-hard-moves.html?m=1
Thanks Tim, hard moves as follow through makes sense. Probably my challenge is coming from: (a) preparing in advance, and (b) adapting DW concepts to a D&D game.
I tried for a year or two to incorporate DW/AW style moves and narratives into my 4e game. It was… iffy. It was better than trying to use “Skill Challenges” (ugh) for non-combat stuff, but the 4e ruleset (with its heavily reliance on prep and encounter balance and its achingly long fights) got in the way of really using DW/AW style GMing techniques.
Like, in your example moves… if you say that a PC is captured and brought for interrogation on a missed roll, everything in the 4e ruleset is going to fight you on that. Like, imagine this exchage:
GM: “Oh, you blew your Stealth check? You get cornered by by 5 guards and they capture you, throw you in shackles and drag you down to the dungeon.”
Player: “Like hell. There are 5 of them? And they corner me in a hallway? I use Blinding Barrage when they close in on me. That’s a blast 5, so I target all of them. On a hit, they’re blinded, save ends and on a miss they’re blinded until the start of my next turn. You can’t take an opportunity attack against a target you can’t see, so I run past them. Then I’ll spend an Action Point to take an extra move. I’m gone!”
GM: “Um, well… Shit. OK.”
4e trains players to expect an enormous amount of reliable agency when violence starts (and thus trains them to resort to violence at the drop of a hat). If you take away their ability use their murder-tools, you’re going to (probably) get some grumbles from the players. It won’t be the game they signed up for.
Now don’t get me wrong: using the hard move/soft move concept is fine in 4e, but I think you have to fine tune how much narrative power you have as the DM. Like, the exchange above could be a pretty darn example of “put them in a spot” as a hard move. “You’re cornered by 5 guards, and they’re moving to restrain you!” (And in my example above, the rogue blew 2 daily resources to escape and probably just started a chace scene.) But you’ve got to give the PC the ability to react and leverage their resources before jumping straight to “capture someone.”
Coming from a 4e background myself, and I realize this doesn’t help with your questions, I can’t recommend converting your campaign to full-on DW strongly enough.
@Jeremy Strandberg Haha, we actually like the “murder agency” of the edition 😉 I should clarify the situation and why the PCs really would not want to do that: They’ve come on behalf of the King to secure the fealty of the Independent Duke who is being propositioned by a foreign magocracy to allow troops to move thru his lands in order to launch a ground invasion of the Kingdom. There is no other feasible staging ground for a ground invasion, and the Duke seems on the fence. The Duke agrees to swear fealty to the King if the PCs deal with his long-running Werewolf problem (inspired by the Beast of Gévaudan). The Duke’s Son, who lives on the ducal estate at the heart of the freehold, happens to have a suspicious Magic Wolfskin… See where this is going? The Duke is their potential ally. They really really don’t want to go around killing his men because that quickly will make him turn against them.
@ Chris McGee There’s a lot I like about 4e, but it definitely has weaknesses that require tweaking. Appreciate the sentiment about DW.
But the example of…
*Youre cornered by 5 guards and they’re moving to restrain you
…is just the sort of “hard move” I’m looking for. Thanks! I’m still learning how to do those on the fly, so if I can come up with 3-5 in advance that the ducal estate can throw at them, that’s perfect.
Soft moves:
-You hear guards footsteps just around the corner coming your way, if you don’t do something quick they’ll see you.
-Each guard you see is carrying a horn by his waist. Above the castle you see a large bell you know to be used as an alarm.
-A young girl looks at you from the center of the hallway “You don’t belong here…” she says.
Hard moves:
-The guards round the corner and spot you. They both unsheathe their weapons and run towards you.
– From across the courtyard you hear a horn blast, then another behind you, then another to your right. Finally, the bell above the castle begins to gong. You’ve been spotted, and no less than fifty guards are moving to surround your position.
-The little girl smiles and whispers “Don’t worry, I won’t tell…” and walks away. Five minutes later the castle is swarming with guards.
Awesome, thanks Matt! That is a really helpful framework I can work with:
Soft Moves:
-Guards armed with crossbows scan the courtyards with hooded lanterns.
-The NPC you’re bluffing pauses and asks a really tough question with facts that contradict their cover story.
Hard moves
-The guards pincushion you with crossbow bolts until you get cover, then shout for the hounds to be sent to track you.
-The NPC’s eyes widen in shock and they begin screaming their head off “Intruders!”
When you try to avoid notice or suspicion, roll Bluff or Stealth as appropriate. If you hit the Moderate* DC, no one’s the wiser. If you get the Easy* DC but not the Moderate* DC, pick one:
– They sense something’s up and subject you to scrutiny
– No one’s the wiser, but the GM introduces a complication or a twist
*Increase to Hard and Moderate DCs for observant, suspicious, or alert NPCs.
When you give an NPC good reason to act/think/do as you want, roll Diplomacy, Intimidate, or Bluff as appropriate. If you beat the Moderate* DC, it works as well as can be expected. If you beat the Easy* DC but not the Moderate, the GM picks one:
– They question you/your motives; you’ve got to prove yourself first
– They ask for something (more) first
– They misunderstand and get it wrong/take it too far/expect too much
– It doesn’t last long and they quickly return to form
*Adjust the DCs to Moderate/Hard for someone who’s suspicious, stubborn, strong-willed, or otherwise hard to manipulate.
aaron infante Instead of/in addition to making a list of hard & soft moves, consider writing out some Grim Portents. What will happen if the PCs do nothing? What is the ultimate world-changing badness that will come out of it as a result?
Also, maybe come up with a series of Grim Portents related to the PCs infiltrating the place. Just spit-balling, but something along the lines of:
1) Some of the guards get suspicious and send word to the seneschal
2) The seneschal gets word that there’s an intruder and puts the guards on high alert
3) The palace goes on lock-down; the guards have orders to shoot to kill and the duke is rushed to the panic room
4) The duke and his family escape via the secret tunnels
+Jeremy Strandberg That’s a nice translation of DW mechanics to 4e! Instead of having it be outright failure it becomes “this could be failure, let’s see what you do first.”
And I’m with you on the Grim Portents thing; I’ve done timelines/escalation tracks/villain plans for a while now as a DM. It’s nice to see that employed as a default in DW! Your outline is close to what I’m thinking, but pretty much stopping at lockdown, since that ends the challenge.
What I think will work well (if I’m on top of my DM game) is to give the players choices about what their final victory/defeat state look like. For example, say they succeed brilliantly at the challenge. The default victory condition is “You getaway clean with the Wolfskin, plus choose two…”:
-You also get the dark ritual scroll.
-No servants are implicated or tortured for the theft.
-The Wolfskin does not exert a dark influence on one of the PCs.
So even in victory, there a interesting choices. The trick is to tie this into the choices they make during the challenge (and possibly adjust their final choices accordingly). I’m pretty sure it can be done.