OK, final question for the day (can you tell I have a new session coming up on Tuesday, and am doing prep? :-))
So, my Lizard Abbot already has the kidnapped NPC girl under mind control, and it seems logical to me that he will try to do the same thing to one or more of the player characters as well. So I am looking for a good Mind Control monster move — but have been surprisingly unsuccessful at finding anything online, and am therefore trying to come up with something myself. Jeremy Strandberg had some ideas for that in a previous discussion, but it’s still a struggle to distill a good Move out of it.
I was thinking of an ‘opening’ GM move (perhaps triggered as the result of a previous 6- on something?) along the lines of “The Abbot opens his third lizard eye and starts speaking to you in a low voice. What do you do?“, followed by:
“When you try to break away from the Abbot’s stare, roll +WIS. On a 10+, you are successful; on 7-9 you are successful but you also do not remember that he tried something; and on a 6- the GM will tell you which idea has been implanted in your head that you will now act upon as if it was your own.”
I like the ‘implant one idea’ concept, but I can’t imagine any player is ever going to voluntarily continue to listen to the Abbot (and if they did, the 6- result would presumably just happen anyway?), so the trigger seems a bit dodgy, and I’m not sure this move will really enable fun game play. I also have not been able to come up with a good idea for how the players could actually break the spell.
Any thoughts?
Defy danger to resist a direct command from the Abbot. Or, mark XP when the Abbot gives you a command and you do it.
I like the “You can mark XP if you follow the command” suggestion that’s been floated here a few times. Some players will want to play along with the miss anyway (just to help keep things interesting), but it doesn’t hurt to add a little bribe (incentive?) to encourage interesting consequences.
This is similar to how some of the other PbtA games deal with inter-player coercion, such as when trying to convince another PC to do something. DW is lighter on the social mechanics/currency side of things, but you can certainly hack it in occasionally for a bit of extra flavor.
Another common thing is to combine the mark XP mechanic with “take -1 forward while directly acting against the command” or some similar conditional -1 forward. So if he commands you “stop fighting” and you continue to try to attack him, you take -1 on your rolls that directly attack him. All of this is of course after giving a chance to avoid the control entirely with DD.
I hate PC mind control. It takes away choice from them.
When you lock eyes with the Abbot and he sends a psychic message, roll +WIS. On a 10+, you hear only unintelligible whispers. On a 7-9, his message is clear; if you do it, mark XP. On a 6-, the message is clear and strong; if you don’t do it, take -1 ongoing as long as you’re in his presence.
Check out Ep27 of the Gaintlet’s Discern Realities podcast. They talk in depth about how to handle mind control in DW and preserve player agency. gauntlet-rpg.com – Discern Realities
Aaron Griffin I have seen it mentioned many times in the discussions about Moves that the trigger should be something the player does, not something the monster/NPC does. Doesn’t your suggested move kinda ignore that?
Other than that, I see your point about mind control taking away PC agency, but it might also provide them with an additional hook for roleplaying, yesno? That’s what I’m trying to accomplish with the ‘implant one idea’ concept — the PCs wouldn’t become puppets of the NPC, they’d just have this one particular extra conviction in their heads that could they could then roleplay to the hilt.
Leo Breebaart
My take on it is that when you codify a ‘monster move’ like this, it’s basically just providing a template for a Defy Danger roll. You could just as well create this Defy Danger on the fly during play; it’s just sometimes easier to plan out the possible consequences in advance.
Leo Breebaart nah, the player has to lock eyes with the guy. The rest is just meant to invoke the idea thst he needs to be a conscious actor. If you want to rephrase it to be more clear:
When you look into the eyes of the Lizard Abbot when actively opposing him…. Or something. /Shrug
The main trigger is the player locking eyes with the Abbot.
I’ve written up a lot of thoughts on Mind Control moves here, including a reaction to/critque of the move presented in Discern Realities.
https://goo.gl/ZTZ4e4
Keep in mind that this whole document is a work in progress.
Jeremy Strandberg, when you use your ‘compelled to act’ Move, would you actually reveal the content of that move to the players in advance, or would you keep that information GM-only, just watching for the trigger in fiction and then telling the player to roll?
Definitely let the players see the text of the “compelled” move.
And I think they need to see the text of the “when you’re enchanted” move, too. After all, they need to know that they can get XP, and how close they are to breaking free, and so forth.
The only thing I’d is the bit about the GM getting a new move, but that’s only because it comes close to breaking the principal of “never speak your move’s name.”
In my Insanity move, on a fail, the GM gets to use the PC for one monster move. (The PC becomes an NPC for one move) This takes away the player’s agency, but only for a short, previously agreed upon time.
Which is fine.
(Players also lose agency when they are stunned, trapped, unconscious or dead; it is part of the game!)