Extra base move for a Farscape-esque game I’ll be running using dungeon world as a base (even the one human character can use it as his biology is weird compared to the local aliens):
When your bizzare alien biology might give you an edge while dealing with a physical problem, roll +CON. On a 10+ some feature of your biology will help you out in this situation. On a 7-9, it still helps you out, but the GM gets 1 hold. On a miss, it’s no help, and the GM gets 1 hold. The GM’s hold is be spent to make unexpected and generally trivial things problematic for you due to your alien biology.
some examples in use: human reckons the stun-blaster the lizardmen shoot him with doesn’t work on humans and then rolls a 7-9. He’s quite right, it doesn’t… unfortunately, the GM takes 1 hold which he might spend later when the human eats the lizardmen’s rations, at which point it becomes apparent that while the rest of the party love Lizard Chocolate, humans find it repulsive and slightly toxic.
Have you read Adventures on Dungeon Planet by Johnstone Metzger ? There’s a class in there called the Mutant with the move: Advantageous Mutations that lets you pick three monster moves that reflect the advantages your mutations give you. When you employ an advantageous mutation, you defy danger to make it work properly.
Jarrah James Your example could work, but different biological features can be extremely different. What if it’s greatly improved motor/reflexive skills — that wouldn’t be so much roll+CON as roll+DEX (which is why Advantageous Mutations works great by using defy danger as the way to resolve it).
On top of that, the Mutant also has the move: Exposure to Gamma Rays.
When you use your mutations to do something the other players and the GM agree is particularly clever or entertaining, gain 1 hold for unstable mutations. Your group should use this move to tell you how much crazy mutant action they want to see.
It’s incredibly fun.
You can look at the Dungeon Planet character sheets before you buy, too:
http://redboxvancouver.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/dungeon_planet_sheets.pdf
Misha Polonsky indeed I have read the Dungeon Planet classes. The Earthling will be the core of the campaign in many ways.
The idea with this move is it’s all about weird little things. To take examples from Farscape, one character has a stinger-tongue but has this weird thing where his blood can become poisonous to him when exposed to air and is allergic to some weird things, another character photosynthesizes but also can find certain wavelengths of radiation debilitatingly… pleasurable. One character farts helium. Most of the time they’re pretty human in their abilities, but occasionally they have strange capabilities or reactions to things.
That’s actually a really cool idea.
Each of the things I listed above only actually get mentioned by the characters when they’re relevant (much to the shock of the one human protagonist). This move is rather like that. If one of the alien PCs decides he wants a stinger tongue in the middle of a combat, he rolls this move. If he gets a hit it just so happens that he does (although he might have some other down-side waiting to rear its head for later, like a propensity for blood-poisoning, if he rolls 7-9). On a miss… yeah turns out Krazons don’t have stinger tongues. And they still have problems. So it’s kind of a fun gamble on the part of the player that slowly fills in weird details about the alien species in the setting.
Yeah, that’s what is cool about it! You are defining the character’s biology as you play, and it’s not all in your control — the dice and the GM will throw in some twists, and you just have to improvise and deal.
Jarrah James Cool, I get what you’re saying. Yeah, that does make it different from what the Mutant move does. It definitely adds a lot of fun, RP flavor. And like Johnstone Metzger said, the fact that it’s not fully in your control is pretty great. Your biological make up is just plain weird. It can act up at any moment. And sometimes when you want it to act up, it doesn’t. I like it.
It’s a little bit of a weird move, in that the character doesn’t really do anything to initiate it, but rather the player asks to retroactively create a bit of fiction that would useful right now.
On that note, the GM can also have some fun randomly asking a player to roll for the move – like the bizarre, biological quirk just all of a sudden acts up. This would be especially useful as a GM move following a miss on a character’s normal move.