Sage LaTorra Adam Koebel
When was the decision made to not make exchange harm for harm a standard outcome of Hack & Slash, something that always happened?
In AW, if two groups open fire at each other, they both deal harm to one another. If my Fighter triggers H&S with a monster, I only take damage if I roll 9 or below, assuming I do not opt for that extra d6 damage on a 10+.
I’m just wondering why. What was the reasoning not to follow the paradigm in AW to always exchange harm for harm, when it made sense that is?
I’d be interested to know the reasoning behind this as well. As you can avoid harm by getting 10+ on Hack & Slash, combat in Dungeon World feels different from combat in, say Monster of the Week (where you always take damage regardless of the result). I suspect this has to do with making DW feel like D&D, but I could be way off.
Christopher Stone-Bush I suspect you are right, but I nevertheless want to hear the reason. It might be something different than we expect, after all.
I’m guessing DnD = binary combat roll results and DW is a homage.
Isn’t combat in aw more lethal than DW? It’s a difference in theme from heroic fantasy and gritty, scrabbling in the ash to live one more day apocalyptic fiction.
Well I remember the very first iteration of the rules (by tony dowler if I’m not mistaken) had this thing.
I’d say they changed it probably because violence and harm mean very different things in dw.
Violence in dungeon world is a much less scary thing, or at least, it is less a foregone conclusion. We wanted to give the GM more room to inflict non-harm consequences.
Yep, violence is a different beast in DW.
Didn’t it come up much during playtesting?
Didn’t what come up much?
I mean, you didn’t start out with a H&S move that resembled a more AW-like structure and then subsequently change it?
The original H&S by Tony is in the book:
When you wade into combat, attacking your enemies, deal damage to the enemy you’re attacking, take that enemy’s damage, and roll+Str. ✴On a 10+, choose 2. ✴On a 7–9 choose 1.
-Prevent one ally from taking damage this round
-Kill one enemy of lower level than you or deal max damage to otherwise
-Put an enemy right where you want them (drive them off, prevent them from fleeing, etc.)
-Divide your damage amongst any number of targets you can reach with your weapon
There are a number of things there that are not applicable anymore (rounds, monster levels), but the biggest problem was the move did so much that it could easily stretch the fiction pretty far. Consider putting a dragon right where you want them, for example.
As far as the “why not always keep damage” we saw in playtesting that the ability to neutralize some damage was a big deal, that was more of why you were rolling. So we built that into the flow of the move. In this version, so much damage exchange is guaranteed that fights can be reduced to number crunching to some degree.
Sage LaTorra Great answer! Thanks 🙂