Tag: Alex Norris

I’m working on a new class playbook which uses these, but in the meantime I am sufficiently happy with these moves and they work well enough as standalones that I figured I’d post them:

Contract Killer

When you have downtime and put out word that you’re looking to take on a contract, roll +Int. On a hit, someone approaches you with a job – they’ll give you a name and maybe a description. Roll 2d6: that’s what the job is worth to them, in tens of coins; take it or leave it. On a 7-9, the job has strings attached – they want you to kill the target in a specific way or place, by a specific time, etc. If you fail to complete a contract, take -1 ongoing to Contract Killer until you prove your worth again.

Ill Repute

When you put out word that you’re looking to take on a contract and get offered a job, their offer is double your roll.

The Professional

Replaces: Ill Repute

When you put out word that you’re looking to take on a contract and get offered a job, name your price. If they can afford it, they’ll pay.

In retrospect, this seemed obvious:

The City Thief

The following changes represent a slightly different type of Thief – one perhaps involved in… darker projects.

Starting moves:

Replace Poisoner with:

Avoid the Light

When you stand in shadows or darkness without talking or moving, NPCs will never notice you as long as they haven’t already spotted you. If you’re more than a few feet away from them, they won’t see you even if you move or attack and even if they know you’re there.

Advanced moves 2-5:

Add: 

Mechanical Eye

You have a mechanical replacement for one of your eyes. You can see without difficulty in total darkness and its increased visual acuity gives you +1 to hit targets at range, but sudden exposure to bright light disorients you.

Replace Brewer with: 

Contortionist

You’re adept at bending your body in ways it was seemingly not designed to bend. You can fit into uncomfortably small places, and when you Defy Danger by dramatically dodging out of the way, take +1.

Replace Poison Master with:

Thieves’ Highway

When you use the city’s secret paths to travel to your destination or escape pursuit, roll+Dex. On a 10+, choose 2; on a 7-9, choose 1:

– you get there unseen or lose your pursuers

– you get there in half the time it would normally take 

– you leave nothing that could be traced back to you or your friends

(This is actually from my Assassin playbook, but, well, the only reason it’s there is because it wasn’t in the Thief playbook already.)

Advanced moves 6-10:

Add:

Without Being Heard

You’re preternaturally silent, and will never make any noise unless you want to. You never need to Defy Danger to move about quietly.

Replace Alchemist with:

Thief-Acrobat

You never lose your balance, and you always land on your feet. When you fall from any height, as long as you can find a way to break or cushion your fall, you take no damage. 

New equipment:

Blackjack (hand, nonlethal, 10 coins, 1 weight): this small club has a lead-filled leather pouch for a head. It is specially designed to knock victims out, as thieves have generally found it easier to rob people when they aren’t able to protest.

Flash bombs (3 uses, 20 coins, 1 weight): these glass bulbs contain two carefully-separated alchemical substance which, when they come in contact with each other (when the glass is thrown with enough force to break it, for example), emit a very bright flash of light. Anyone who was looking in towards a flash bomb at the moment of impact will end up blinded by the flash for a few seconds – good for making a quick getaway.

Moss arrow (1 use, 20 coins, 0 weight): this arrow’s glass tip contains fast-growing moss spores. When fired against a hard surface, the tip shatters and releases the spores. Over a few seconds, these will grow into enough moss to cover a couple of square feet. The moss is so thick that walking on it won’t make any noise, no matter the underlying surface.

Water arrow (1 use, 5 coins, 0 weight): this arrow’s glass tip contains an alchemical payload designed to snuff out your average torch, lantern or camp fire (despite the name, do not try drinking it). Just shoot it at a hard surface close to the open fire you’re trying to extinguish and gravity will do the rest.

Fire arrow (1 use, dangerous, 50 coins, 0 weight): this arrow’s glass tip contains two highly volatile chemical substances kept carefully separated, much like flash bombs. Unlike flash bombs, when the glass breaks and the two substances mix, the resulting reaction is somewhat… explosive. Anyone within a few feet of a fire arrow’s impact point takes 2d8 damage (forceful, messy, ignores armour).

Gas arrow (1 use, nonlethal, 50 coins, 0 weight): this arrow is tipped with a carefully-designed slow-release mechanism for varenech seed gas. When the tip of the arrow hits something solid, the mechanism starts pumping gas into the surrounding area. Anyone who breathes in even a little bit of this gas takes 4d6 nonlethal damage.

New weapon tag:

Nonlethal: it’s designed to knock people unconscious, not deal real damage. If you reduce them to 0 HP with this, they just get knocked out for a few hours.

New starting gear section:

Your load is 9+Str. You start with adventuring gear (5 uses, 1 weight), leather armor (1 armour, 1 weight), flash bombs (3 uses, 1 weight) and 10 coins.

Choose your arms:

– Blackjack (hand, nonlethal, 1 weight) and short sword (close, 1 weight)

– Dagger (hand, 1 weight) and rapier (close, precise, 1 weight)

Choose a ranged weapon:

– Shortbow (near, 1 weight) and quiver of arrows (3 ammo, 1 weight)

– Throwing knives (thrown, near, 3 ammo, 1 weight)

Choose one:

– Dungeon rations (5 uses, 1 weight) and one healing potion (0 weight)

– 2 water arrows (0 weight) and 2 moss arrows (0 weight)

I’ve been doing some thinking about multiclassing in DW (spurred by a couple of questions about it that I see asked frequently):

1) when you take a MC move and grab a starting move that requires other moves to function (e.g. Cast A Spell), you’re meant to get the other moves as well. This is sort of tucked away in the main rulebook rather than made explicit, so for clarity’s sake a lot of custom playbooks have to write “when you take X via an MC move, you also get Y and Z” somewhere in them. 

2) you are specifically supposed to be able to take MC moves with MC moves. This means that being able to MC to Fighter (or any class with MC Dabbler) means being able to MC to any class at all. This isn’t mentioned in the rules and was clarified by Sage and Adam.

3) sometimes, imposing some restrictions on MCing is flavourful and thematic, and can help define the class’ fiction and identity. The Druid can only MC to Ranger, for example, or the v1 Shaman can only MC to the Ranger or Druid – this is because all three are “primal”/nature archetype classes.

4) some classes just plain can’t MC, or can’t MC outside of a couple of specific classes. A lot of times this is just a very arbitrary restriction and doesn’t actually serve flavour particularly well. Why can’t my Thief also be able to cast illusion spells, or have a pet ape, or be charming and open? All of these things are cool ideas that make for fun and memorable characters.

5) MCing is fun! Yes, niche protection is fairly important, but that’s already enforced via limiting play to a single copy of each class. Letting players pick moves from other classes to make their character mechanics fit their character fiction doesn’t significantly impact niche protection in most cases.

6) MCing restrictions make existing classes incompatible with newer ones. To take the example of my v1 Shaman again, although it can MC to the Druid or Ranger, the Druid or Ranger can’t MC to the Shaman. The intent of the restriction is obviously thematic, so it’s weird that it doesn’t work both ways RAW. Of course, the only reason it doesn’t work both ways RAW is that the Druid and Ranger are official classes published in the main book and the Shaman came out afterwards.

7) it’s just confusing, as evidenced by the fact that not everyone finds the relevant section on getting prerequisite moves and that we had to ask for authorial clarification on MCing into MC moves!

Basically, the way MC rules work in Dungeon World is fairly pants.

As such, I think multiclassing would work much better if instead of being a per-playbook move, it were part and parcel of the Level Up move, like such:

Level Up

When you have downtime (hours or days) and XP equal to (or greater than) your current level+7, you can reflect on your experiences and hone your skills.

• Subtract your current level+7 from your XP.

• Increase your level by 1.

• Either choose a new advanced move from one of your playbook’s favoured classes, or choose a new move from any other class as if you were one level lower. If you pick a starting move that requires another starting move to function (like the Cleric’s Cast A Spell move, which requires Commune) you get that move too.

• If you are the wizard, you also get to add a new spell to your spellbook.

• Choose one of your stats and increase it by 1 (this may change your modifier). Changing your Constitution increases your maximum and current HP. Ability scores can’t go higher than 18.

You then pair this with a favoured class system: each playbook lists the classes which are most thematically appropriate to MC into. The Druid’s list would read “Ranger or any other class with a strong connection to nature,” for example; the Fighter’s might read “any class with a strong martial bent” which would let it treat, say, the Barbarian or a future Warlord playbook as favoured classes.

The end result of this is that:

A) you can have thematic restriction that creates a stronger fictional identity without stopping your players from going for character concepts that you, the class author, didn’t think of. Illusionist Thief and warrior-Shaman are now possible RAW.

B) every class, official or third party, can now MC into every class, past and present.

C) no more confusion about MCing into an MC move (or about prerequisite moves).

D) you’ve freed up space for additional flavourful advanced moves in any class that previously had MC moves!

Obviously, RAW isn’t everything, yada yada yada, but that doesn’t mean RAW shouldn’t be designed to avoid the necessity for houserules as much as possible. 🙂