Author: Alex Wilson

Modified Mage Black Magic spell

Modified Mage Black Magic spell

Modified Mage Black Magic spell

I love the flavour of the Mage (which is awesome, so glad I bought the Alternate Playbooks) over the Wizard, but it seemed a little over-powered (caveat: based only on one play).  Here’s a tweak of the attack spell I’m thinking of using to replace Black Magic

—

When you weave a spell to inflict pain, roll +INT.  The spell’s base damage is your damage, and its base range is Close (or Reach if you are using a wand or some other arcane focus). On a 10+, choose 4.  On a 7+, choose 2:

-Add extra 1d4 damage

-Add a tag (can be taken multiple times)

-Increase range (Close to Reach, Reach to Near, Near to Far; can be taken multiple times for further range increase)

-Do not become muddled (-1 ongoing to INT until you have a few minutes to clear your head or you cast another spell with a 10+ result)

Available tags:

-Elemental (choose 1)

-Subtle (does not attract unwanted attention)

-Piercing 1

-Two Targets (-1 damage each)

-Forceful

-Debilitating (-1 damage)

—

It ups the potential damage a smidge (from 1d8 to 2d4), but makes  the base damage lower and the range increments a bit more of a trade-off between the damage and other effects.

I think I like the idea of a 10+ clearing the the ongoing muddled effect, as I think picking the muddled option then becomes a more viable option for the player, as they might be able to shake it off with their next spell.

Thoughts?  

*editted above to be a little more powerful. Making it “10+ choose 3, 7-9 choose 1” if you want a bigger nerf, or drop the base range to Hand.

Two questions/uncertainties from my first game, and I’d love to hear how the other DW GMs have been dealing with…

Two questions/uncertainties from my first game, and I’d love to hear how the other DW GMs have been dealing with…

Two questions/uncertainties from my first game, and I’d love to hear how the other DW GMs have been dealing with these:

First:  Do you ask for a roll if there’s a situation that isn’t strictly meeting the trigger condition of a move, yet has the obvious potential for either good or bad outcomes?  

A stealth-type check is an example that came up in our game, as the Dashing Hero tried to sneak in the horse paddock while the orcs were eating by the fire.  It doesn’t meet the strict “by getting out of the way or acting fast” qualification of Defy Danger, but a roll+Dex was a pretty obvious choice.  Would you have done a roll in this case?  Defy Danger?  Or make something up and narrate based on the roll?  Or spell out a new move?

Second: Is it fair to take “When the players give you a golden opportunity” as license to make a move as part of a 7-9 result?  Specifically, there were a few situations where a 7-9 result came up, and the move description allowed for the players to choose something very little effective downside, no true “complications or trouble”, just a slightly less-than-optimal result.  Is a karmic soft-move in order, or do you let it go?

First DW session last night!

First DW session last night!

First DW session last night!

Only had 2 players available, but we forged ahead.  I gave them a quick overview of the move mechanic, and let them pick character sheets.  Ended up with an elven Mage (from the alternate playbook) and a human Dashing Hero (using the preview version, now to be purchased).

We played for about 4 hours, and had a great time.  Character gen and 3 combat encounters definitely showed how fast DW can go compared to our usual D&D 3.5e sessions.  When we ended the Mage hit second level, and the Dashing Hero was 1 XP shy.

Things I’ll make sure to do next time when running a session to introduce the rest of my players to DW (hopefully this helps other soon-to-be-running-GMs):

– Go over tags (especially the weapon and range tags) more specifically

– Have a second copy of the character sheets so I can reference the the moves the players are using would save them from reading me the moves

-Have a few monsters ready (not picked before the session, but I wish I thought to put some sticky notes on the orc pages as they into the forest seeking the orc’s camp), as I had to stall things for a minute as the first combat got rolling.

The was a lot to love about DW, most of it has been said before.  I loved not preparing the setting and encounters ahead of the session.  I think that once the players figured out the weren’t constrained by the D&D-type tactical battle system and could be creative in their actions, they really started to see how DW shines.

I think the biggest “complaint” from the players was a lack of a canned stealth move, which is probably more from me not emphasizing that roll+stat works just fine in place of a more specific move.

My only irks so far are the alignment and class-race constraints seems more limiting than useful.  I like the magic casting flavour of the Mage and Priest over the Vancian Wizard/Clerics, so I expect to stick to the alternate classes unless a player has a really strong preference.  The bond system seems great, but is really weak with just two players.