So, on Bonds.  How many bonds can a character have?  DW doesn’t seem to give a limit and on a character sheet there…

So, on Bonds.  How many bonds can a character have?  DW doesn’t seem to give a limit and on a character sheet there…

So, on Bonds.  How many bonds can a character have?  DW doesn’t seem to give a limit and on a character sheet there is a varying amount. 

How Many would you do as a limit with another character as well?

Total? and Per Character?

15 thoughts on “So, on Bonds.  How many bonds can a character have?  DW doesn’t seem to give a limit and on a character sheet there…”

  1. Yeah, it’s character related. You can read about that in the “create a class” section (or something alike, I haven’t to book here). In short, very social class should have 5 or 6 bonds. Very closed class should have 3.

  2. Are there really limits? Given that you can write your own bonds, can’t you just have as many as you’d like?

    There are practical limits, of course. There’s no point in having more bonds than you can make relevant in play. And I think one character can only earn one XP per session for resolving bond(s), right?

  3. The rule as it is written is number of bonds are dependent on playbook. That’s the rule. That’s part of the balance of the game.

    You can ignore that, of course. You can ignore any rule. But that doesn’t mean its not there.

  4. Ah, Ha!  Thank you Andrea Parducci for pointing me to the correct section.  Here is the extract dealing with it under Advance Delving in creating a class, “Unless the class is particularly social or antisocial, write four bonds. If the class is very connected to others, add a bond; if they’re cloistered, remove one.”

    So we can extrapolate a scale here:

    Very Social: 5-6 bonds

    Standard: 4 bonds

    Less Social: 3 bonds

    As a starting character that is.  Ok, thanks for the help all.  This is a good baseline.

    This is for my Shadowrun Hack that I am putting together.  So here are my classes:

    Adept: 4 Bonds

    Decker: 3 Bonds

    Ex-Cop: 5 Bonds

    Face: 6 Bonds

    Mage: 4 Bonds

    Mercenary: 4 Bonds

    Rigger: 4 Bonds

    Shaman: 3 Bonds

    Street Doc: 5 Bonds

    Street Samurai: 4 Bonds.

  5. Bonds are also subject to change as the campaign proceeds. They are supposed to be resolved and changed. I think if I had a player who wanted more bonds than the class allowed, I would probably allow it, especially if it is a “flag” denoting adventure and complication.

    Just last night, my 3 players made new PCs. We tossed the bonds as written out the window because we had better, more specific to our setting, bonds that could be created. (If ye be curious, check out Intrigues of Parsantium).

  6. Yes, as the adventures progress, I am not going to limit it but at character creation, I needed a baseline.  As stated it matters little as you can only resolve 1 bond at the end of the session and can make up a new one with someone else at the same time.  But from a character creation stand point, where do you start?  I got that answer once I was looking in the correct location.  Thanks.

  7. Matrix Forby The number of bonds doesn’t matter when it comes to resolving bonds at the end of the session, but it does matter when it comes to the Aid or Interfere move, since you roll +bonds. If there’s no limit, players can pile on 8 different bonds with every other character and roll with +8.

    If you’re house-ruling the Aid or Interfere move (e.g. using Flags instead of Bonds and having Aid or Interfere roll +(appropriate stat) instead), then the limit would no longer matter.

  8. Robert Rendell Yes, I know.  For character creation is the first concern.  Then after that, the roll+bond is key, so far they have not had much rolling on aid another.  But I was thinking that no matter how many bonds they have the max that they can use on roll+bond is a roll+3, that will make the lowest that they can roll a 5 and still a slim chance of failure but the 7-9 variance becomes a actual roll of 4-6, which is a very good percentage of at least the 7-9 result.  for the 10+ result they would need only to roll a 7+.  So the limits of the Bond should be +3.  Really it is that high that starts to break the game.  for a roll+4 you might as well not even roll as you will only get the “failure” roll on snake eyes. and rolling double 3s or better will give you the 10+ result.

  9. Side note, the authors said that they put A LOT of bonds in the Bard, and gave no limits for the Aid / Interfere move, for a reason. While very slim, they want that kind if character capable of “auto aiding/interfering”. DW is not about balance. It’s about freaking good moves that let the players be real heroes, in a real story.

  10. PS remember that the starting bonds are the MAIN way to give a tone, and a rich background, to your campaign. Everytime I start a campaign, I think if there are bonds out of tone, or twist some into something different.

    If you start inserting bonds like “A friend of you was killed by a demon. You think ____ is involved.”, we’ll you are ready for a Warhammer Fantasy style campaign.

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