Author: Lester Ward

I’ve always been…uncomfortable?… with how the group and horde tags work. Philosophically, what they mean for a monster is “this individual monster is a member of a horde/group”, and the rules for creating monsters make group members weaker than solitary and make horde members weaker than group members. This approach makes sense, if you assume that tracking each member of a horde/group separately is desirable.

It seems to me, however, in a system that abstracts the way DW can, that this is not desirable. Maybe this is just too much time spent with Anima Prime talking, but it seems a lot more manageable to me if the monster was the group or horde as a whole, a single stat block for the collection, instead of one hit point track for each member. Then the group and horde tags actually change combat, both mechanically and fictionally.

Unfortunately, hacking the system to do this is a bit challenging, not because it is hard to see how to do it, but because you’d need to change a bunch of different stuff to make it work right. (In particular, it wouldn’t really sing until playbook moves allowed different character types to gain different advantages/disadvantages interacting with groups/hordes.)

Before I go down the road of actually doing this, has anyone played with this idea before?

Still thinking about flags (and, I’m still looking for more examples on this thread: https://plus.google.com/108131264929529993281/posts/hxoHY956qwb). Today’s question is about how else you might leverage flags in the game. Are there, for example, ways that a move might reference or use a flag? Can the GM hit them and what happens if she does? Could something (a magic item, say) force a flag onto someone and how would that work?

I’m imagining here some contexts in which flags appear in the game in a few other ways, not taking over the whole game. Much like bonds have a couple other jobs in the text other than the “gain xp” part.

Looking for some help with Rob Donoghue’s notion of flags to replace bonds (http://walkingmind.evilhat.com/2015/09/07/from-bonds-to-flags/). Creating these is harder than it sounds, as the idea is to have a player trigger an interesting choice in another player.

Here is a list I’ve come up with (including the suggestions from Rob, slightly modified). I’m interested in both feedback on and additions to this list. Bear in mind that flags take the form of instructions to other players and work best when they give you a choice to make. Often this is a choice between an ingrained personality/world view with a current situation.

– Accommodating: counter my proposal with a less attractive one I must accept to maintain harmony.

– Aspiring: make me an offer that threatens my social standing.

– Compassionate: offer me an easier solution that requires I exploit those weaker than me.

– Curious: convince me to try something I probably shouldn’t.

– Deceitful: believe and act on a lie I’ve told you.

– Devoted: offer me an easier solution that requires I compromise my relation with _____________. (Choices include: family or a family member, a particular organization, another party member, a lover, a friend, someone to whom you have sworn allegiance, etc.)

– Graceless: include me in a beneficial social interaction I must spoil with blunt observation or crass behavior.

– Greedy: offer me financial reward to undermine a friend.

– Gullible: tell me a lie I believe.

– Heroic: let me keep you from going first into danger so I can go myself

– Honest: involve me in a deception I must ruin.

– Irresponsible: convince me to shirk my duty.

– Peculiar: refuse my aid because I’m different.

– Righteous: offer me an easier solution that requires I violate my principle of _____________. (Choices include: ‘non-violence’, various religious beliefs, moral code, sworn vows, ‘chastity’, ‘might makes right’, entitlement, institutional prejudice, etc.)

– Sycophantic: insist I publicly compare the greatness of two people from whom I seek favor.

– Unsophisticated: exemplify a social convention or intricate concept I must misunderstand.

– Visionary: offer me an easier solution that interferes with my dream of _____________.

Some others that seem like they might work, but I couldn’t think of a decent conflict/choice they would generate:

– Decisive: Rob suggests “allow me to make a decision so you can criticize it”, but this isn’t really a choice or story conflict (other than player bickering).

– Gracious

– Hedonistic

– Humble

– Jovial/jockular (ruin the moment with humor)

– Judgemental

– Rebellious

– Trustworthy

– Vain

Bonds don’t work for our group. I’m thinking about replacing them with something a bit like the connections to icons from 13th Age. Anyone tried something similar? How did it go?

Grah. Help me out here. A few days ago, someone posted a document that listed the abilities most used by the specialties in Class Warfare. I thought it was in this community, but maybe not. Anyone know where to find it?