I got to experience DW as a player for the first time last night. After running the game for about 5 months it was nice to just sit back and play for a change.
I played a Ranger named Semper and my GM allowed me to take a Dire Wolf as my loyal animal, whom I named Fidelis.
I had a lot of fun pumping giant spiders full of arrows, and can’t wait to reach level 6 so I can take “Special Trick”. I’ll take the Druids “Eyes of the Tiger”, which will allow me to see through Fidelis’ eyes.
My favorite moment of the night was when I used Fidelis to help with a Parley roll (using the threat of Fidelis ripping the guy’s throat out as leverage). I rolled and added it’s cunning (+2) and my CHA (0) and STILL got a 6. My GM said “Bjorn chuckles and says ‘You think I’m scared of your beast? That’s not a Dire Wolf. THIS is a Dire Wolf!’ and whistles. A Dire Wolf the size of a grizzly bear comes around the corner and growls at you and Fidelis, then sprints towards you. What do you do?”
FUN TIMES!
GM’ing is always fun, no matter the system. But I find actually playing in DW much more satisfying then in most other games.
In DW the players have much more of a stake in world building and the fiction. Those are exactly the reasons I like to GM, so being able to do that as a player too is a hell of a lot of fun!
My group starts meeting for D&D after the holidays and we frequently till spring. This year I want to switch to Dungeon World. We will. I think it will be amazing and I can not wait to start playing. I described the game to one of my players like this…”if you made a rule system based on the best DM advise for Dungeons and Dragons.”. Isn’t that kind of how it seems? Idk. I have yet to play it. (Except once for two hours online)
Trevor Hirst, make sure everyone is on board with the total Narrative aspect of DW before you switch them over. I lost a player to Class Based Damage (which was incredibly jarring to me until I realized the whole beauty of the system), and almost lost a player to Adventuring Gear: “You mean you just say what’s in it and you get it? That’s STUPID!”.
Some people love the crunch of D&D, I prefer the streamlined, narrative nature of DW.
Brian Holland you are correct of course. I think they will be okay. We played pretty loose with the equipment rules…. Pretty much just assuming they had standard adventuring gear…. Rope, torches, tinderbox, spikes… The main worry I have is only using boring six sided dice.
Whenever I hold a d20 it is almost as if I can hear Iron Maiden playing somewhere in the distance.