I’m working on a DW hack wherein the players are pre-Xmen mutants in the year 1943, air-dropped into Germany, fighting the Nazis; imagine Wolverine and Mystique wearing stolen German uniforms, working together to infiltrate Castle Wolfenstein.
One thing I wanted to do was to increase the usefulness of bonds, because it seemed a very Xmen thing to do. I also wanted to reduce the supernatural element of Dungeon World. So here’s a pair of moves to replace Last Breath… what do you think?
FALLING IN BATTLE
When you reach zero hit points, you have fallen in battle. It’s unclear whether you’re dead or dying, but you can’t survive unless an ally comes and saves you.
SAVE A FALLEN ALLY
When you Save A Fallen Ally roll 2d6 + the number of bonds you have with that ally. On a 6-, they’re dead. On a 7-9, they suffer a permanent injury (randomly pick a stat, reduce it by one permanently, describe how this happens). On a 10+, they’re unconscious and badly hurt, but can be completely healed in time.
Wow. That’s an amazing concept for a hack.
As to the move, three questions:
1. Do you want to add a “Nobody is Ever Really Dead” escape valve to this set of moves, given the source material?
2. How would a hero with a “healing factor” change this move?
3. What about dramatic disappearances? “I went to check on him, or at least recover the dog tags, but the body was gone!”
Just reading it myself, I can see how this could make for near-invulnerable characters, so I’ll need to limit the number of bonds a character has. I’m thinking start with two bonds, maybe an advanced move where you get a third.
Adam D
1. Not quite – I didn’t want to go full Marvel, but I did want to reduce the lethality. People will die, just more rarely.
2. Good question… I suppose that heroes with healing factor will probably never be able to go below zero hit points. They could be “killed” (by filling them with liquid metal then cooling it, for example), but they can’t be taken out just by HP damage.
3. This is an interesting option, that might be the result of a 6- roll while someone is fallen in battle.
Thanks for the feedback, some really interesting thoughts there… the source material is ridiculous and awesome, hopefully the game will be, too 🙂
Sub.
I love the concept and would play it right now.
The move itself does have the slightly weird side effect of making who comes to save you matter. So if Wolverine falls in battle and Mystique comes to drag him out he might be in better shape than if Cyclops did. I think connections keeping you alive makes sense, but having the exact person who saves you matter doesn’t fit the genre as much.
Maybe it counts everybody’s bonds with that person? Depending on the size of the group that could be pretty powerful, but it feels more genre appropriate. “Wolverine can’t die, everybody loves him!” To get around the group scaling, maybe “roll and take +1 for each person who has more bonds with you than anyone else”? That way it scales a little better with groups, and encourages people to have more bonds with one person.
I dig the idea for more group-involved bonds affecting the roll… plus it keeps the desired side-effect of getting players to write those goddamn bonds. My instinct says it would halt action down for a minute while everyone in turn announces whether or not they’re majority-bonded with the fallen player; but slowing things down when a PC hits the dirt isn’t a bad thing. You could just stick an artificial cap on the bonus, regardless of how many players are in the game – maybe 3?
On the other hand… I kind of wanted to encourage Mystique to go save Wolverine, rather than Cyclops. If two characters have so many bonds together, it makes for a nice scene when one rescues the other. Also, when Cyclops either chooses to (or has to) save Wolverine, it’s unlikely and rare, and therefore maybe more dramatic.
It’s a tough call…
Thanks for the feedback! I’ll let you know when I get a Roll20 game going 😀
Best RPG Elevator Pitch Ever.
I’d (highly) recommend reading Ian Tregillis’ Milkweed Triptych, as it shares much of your (awesome) premise.
Joseph Madigan are you familiar with The Regiment? If not, give it a look. I’ve never had a chance to play, but a lot of the stuff in there about bonds and helping your allies and seeing them fall is gorgeous.
http://mightyatom.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-regiment-alpha-21-playtest-kit.html
Thanks fellas! Looks like I’ve got some reading to do…
(Oh, also: this sounds awesome.)
I think the move works if capped at +3, assuming bonds are neither super easy or super hard to get. Downside, it might make two bonded characters spend even more time together for safety, instead of getting screen time with other characters and spreading bonds around?
(Also, yes, cool concept.)
Certainly there’s room for exploitation and pitfalls… besides discouraging folks to write bonds with multiple people, the group could agree to write a bunch of bonds with one person, then send that person in as a “meat shield” in any given scenario.
I think it can work if I just tell the players the intention – write bonds first, ones that make sense and are fun, and don’t usually write more than 2 bonds with any one character – then worry about getting a leg up on the combat system.
Possible implementation of Sage’s idea:
New Stat: Connection. Connection is equal to the number of characters who have more bonds with you than anyone else. Connection cannot be higher than three.
FALL IN BATTLE
When you reach zero hit points, you have fallen in battle, having dramatically succumbed to your injuries, and can no longer fight. It’s unclear whether you’re dead or dying, but you won’t survive unless someone comes and saves you. When one of your allies rescues you, roll 2d6+connection. On a 6-, you’re dead. On a 7-9, you’re unconscious and have one hit point, but have also suffered a permanent injury (pick a stat, reduce it by one permanently, describe how this happens). On a 10+, you’re unconscious and have 1 hit point, but no permanent injuries.
(Also, I think it’s fair to let the players choose which stat gets reduced. If they want to roleplay a head injury and intelligence loss, I want to let them do that. Plus, some people get butthurt about loss of character power, and this might mitigate that.)
“Connection is equal to the number of characters who have more bonds with you than anyone else” seems unnecessarily complex.
Yeah, there’s got to be a better way to do it. I think I’m gonna move on to the Big Fun List of Mutations, put this death business on the back burner… Thanks for the feedback and encouragement!