15 thoughts on “Hello guys!”

  1. You don’t have to reveal all of what’s going to happen, just a hint that something is going to happen.  Shadows on the walls, a clanking of multiple foot falls coming toward the players, noises of awareness, that kind of stuff.  Depends on the situation, but work with your players.

  3. I use Discern as my way to insert new things into the fiction, outside of anything I might have planned (though I really plan very little for DW). 

    So don’t feel like you need to only add things that are about to happen in what you’ve already sussed out – instead add new things that make the adventure even more awesome.

  4. 1. Keep it very short term (the monster is about to…; you see a shadow detach from the wall and come towards you; for no reason the dust shifts slightly on that statue; etc)

    2. Remember that even though it’s ‘about to happen’ that doesn’t mean it has to (e.g. the middle of the floor looks it’s about to collapse; the Fighter is about to walk through a trip wire; etc.)

    3. What’s about to happen could be a party or character action action (e.g. if the Thief tries to pickpocket that guard she’s going to get you all in a whole lot of trouble; the small scrape by the right hand passage says that’s the way to go after your quarry; etc.).

  5. While you can feel as if you’re giving away to much, remember two things:

    One, the player risked rolling a 6 to make that move and so deserves a real answer or real information for their trouble. If they ask “What is about to happen?” and their characters are in a position to know, don’t short change the.

    Two, as with everything in DW, you’re playing to find out what happens. Sometimes that means finding out what the players do with this new information.

  6. Also, characters shouldn’t roll Discern Realities every time they examine a scene, only when there will be real consequences for success and failure results at the time .

    The rest of the time, simply tell them what they see and move the game on.  

    This avoids the problem of the game being driven by random Discern Realities rolls, rather than the more coherent fiction of your game.

  7. I disagree somewhat Michael D​. The players should roll Discern Realities whenever the move is triggered, just like any other move. But the move doesn’t trigger every time a character simply glances at something; they have to take time to study a situation.

  9. Christopher Stone-Bush I think we’re in general agreement here, it’s just a question of where you draw the line – and that may come down to personal GM style as much as anything.

    Sometimes an empty room is just an empty room.

    A recent example: a friend new to PbtA style gaming was GMing a game where the party was tracking some monsters that had come up through a large mine (one main tunnel with side corridors off at regular intervals), wreaked havoc (causing the workers to flee) and then gone back to their own territory under the mine. At every side branch the characters would search for tracks just in case the monsters had turned off down a side tunnel.  The GM was diligently getting them to roll Discern Realities every time they did this, but found the extra activity this created was slowing down the whole game and exhausting their ability to generate new ideas at each intersection.

    Yes, they were studying the entrance to each side-tunnel entrance to see if the monsters had gone that way.

    Was rolling Discern Realities every time they did this good for the game? My friend didn’t think so, and neither do I.

    In terms of the fiction of their game, it would have been better if my friend had hand waved the party past most of the side tunnels, and saved the Discern Realities rolls for when they made more sense in the fiction.

  10. Hi again and thanks for your feed back. I totally agree with most of you.

    Here is the thing, I have trained my players into rolling discern realities every time they get stuck in the adventure. Sometimes, it’s true I just ask them to stop rolling because their 6- cause more complications than fun, but I appreciate your ideas and have a more clear perspective. Tomorrow I am running DW at a local plaza at a mini-con. I will use the methods you suggest.

  12. Not a lot of DW experience myself yet, so grain of salt… “When everyone looks to you to find out what happens”, that’s when the GM makes a move, as opposed to the players making a discern realities check.

    If the players are simply rolling discern realities to determine “What is about to happen”, you should “Ask questions and use the answers.” The question I would ask is “How are you trying to determine that?” If they’re listening at the door, peering around at shadows, or sniffing air blowing from a side passage, that gives you a good way to answer the question, too. If the Wizard is using scrying magic, that also gives you a great way to “Reveal an unwelcome truth” – just like it isn’t necessarily all of what’s going to happen, it also doesn’t have to be something on hand. (Advance a different front to put them in a spot!)

    And, of course, a 6- doesn’t have to be an outright failure; you get to use any move you choose, so “reveal an unwelcome truth” (the necromancer has sent his minions after you, the dragon already knows you’re here, the orcs are prepared for battle, etc.) could be the success or failure outcome.

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