One thing the Apocalypse World rules are lacking is some way of determining languages that are understood. There are two options: character can just get languages throughout play, or start with additional languages based on their Sharp (+1 = 1 extra language, +2 = 2 extra). Or I was thinking I could make it a roll: every time a character is confronted by a language in-game they could roll+sharp and on a miss they don’t understand anything, on a 7-9 they know a few words but conversation is stilted and slow, and on a 10+ they know enough to converse. 13+ they are fluent. You can only roll for each language once, unless you advance the move. Thoughts? Criticism? Better ideas?
One thing the Apocalypse World rules are lacking is some way of determining languages that are understood.
One thing the Apocalypse World rules are lacking is some way of determining languages that are understood.
why does language need to be a mechanic?
I think the question would be: How big/dramatic of a deal is it whether or not the characters understand different languages?
If the differences and (not) understanding of languages is central to the drama and relationships between the characters, then a move like yours might be warranted.
Another approach would be to have a Hard Move that deals with language somehow. Maybe the character accidentally say/do something wrong during a Manipulate/Seduce roll and the NPC is greatly offended.
The point is that there should never really be a situation that nothing happens. Move snowball and whatnot.
Elias Mulhall So like a Babel Effect? I like that idea, each community being struck with the inability to effectively/easily communicate with the other.
Though to the main question, I will echo the question of “Is this important to the world/drama you want to see?” or is this just adding more detail/book keeping
In my humble opinion language, in Apocalypse World, is not an interesting topic to explore. Different languages are a barrier to relations, and Apocalypse World is all about relations. On game purposes the characters can “mechanically” understand each other: that is not the deal. The deal is: can the characters trust each other?
Introducing languages puts a gap we must superate to arrive to the trust thing which is the core of the game. That’s why languages shouldn’t have a custom move in Apocalypse World.
In a game we had a race of predator-like aliens that didn’t speak the same language. That didn’t stop the savvyhead to successfully manipulate them and obtain a truce. We didn’t feel the need for a language move, although I made a custom move to specifically deal with them
I think language would work best as a custom move for a particular Front / Threat. If a tribe is difficult to communicate with, then it demands certain moves (you need to read the people before trying to do something involving communication for instance) or has certain conditions (if you try to communicate before you’ve spent enough time with them, you have to do so non-verbally, anything requiring complex information sharing just isn’t going to happen).
It is just a generalization of having weighty cultural taboos / traditions (heck you could even make the language barrier a full on threat on a front dealing with a different group of people).
I personally think language systems would be against some of the principles of AW, primarily ‘play to find out’, ‘make character’s lives interesting’, and ‘ask provocative answers and build on the answers’. The last I think is the most direct. Here’s 2 examples:
MC: A short man with tanned skin comes into town shouting in a foreign language. Dusk, do you speak Chinese?
Dusk: Yes I do.
Now the MC and Dusk figure out why Dusk learned that language.
Here’s another example:
MC: A short man with tanned skin comes into town shouting in a foreign language. Dusk, do you speak Chinese?
Dusk: No I do not.
MC: You have no way of understanding what the man is trying to say, what do you do?
Dusk: I am mistrustful of outsiders. This man could be caring some horrible disease that makes him mad. I shoot him in the head and burn his body.
Now Dusk and the MC can explore the character’s xenophobia and paranoia over disease.
In both of these examples, the player takes control over that aspect of his character and opens up new paths to develop who Dusk is as a character.
The idea of making custom moves around language is really cool. That would be interesting to see indeed. Patrick Henry Downs, you’re most of the way to a custom move already. I’d even snag Dave Bozarth’s Babel Effect name for a move that lets you maybe know other languages.
Part of the question here is the scope of the game – if you’re playing with a wide scope, with aliens and folks from various backgrounds, sure, language barriers could be a thing. If you’re in a narrower scope, just fighting over the same three square miles with Dremmer’s gang from over by the river and TumTum’s lot of miscreants from the old town dump, it’s not going to figure in as much.
Language is totally a reasonable thing to write custom moves around, either for your particular AW campaign or for a hack where language plays an important role.
Here’s a custom move, off the top of my head! (and it could be a lot better with a little more time and work)
When you try to talk with folks and you don’t share a common way of speaking or doing business, roll+STAT (for AW, probably Sharp, maybe Hot). On a hit, choose options. On a 10+, choose 3. On a 7-9, choose 2. On a 6-, choose one but they’re not happy with you.
* you can make yourself understood
* you can understand more-or-less what they want
* you don’t come off looking like a fool or an asshole
* you catch that part they didn’t intend you to understand
* one of them takes a shine to you, despite all this
In a campaign of AW I ran, New York City was filled with tribes and the underground tribes had language that was not understood by the surface-dwellers. There was a custom move for communicating with the folk from the subway tunnels.
Thanks Jonathan Walton and Judd Karlman – good examples!
Jonathan Walton , I like your custom language move because of one part of it. “When you try to talk with folks you don’t share a common way of speaking or doing business ” To me this preserves the abillity to have players decide what languages they speak and why while also allowing for a move tha makes langauge important. I really like the balance of it.
David Rothfeder Yeah, I mean, you still want to ground moves in making judgment calls about the fiction. There are plenty of different communication-based situations that might come up in which language is important, but you probably always want to leave room for the players to decide whether to invoke the move or not, rather than having it be automatic. If you’re just saying a dude’s name (“Keller!!!”), maybe not. If you’re bringing them the head of an outlaw and just want to say “Now we’re even” (using a great prop) maybe not. If you don’t share a language but have worked with these folks multiple times before, maybe not. But in other situations, yeah, you might need a move.
Cool. I knew my move wasn’t very good, I wrote it when I first woke up and before I had coffee. But this is something I’ve been thinking about for the last week so I wanted to throw the idea out there as soon as I joined this community. I plan on doing an island exploration campaign and I want the natives to have different languages that are, at first, not understood very well. Good point Elias Mulhall , and I think I might use or modify that custom move of yours Jonathan Walton . Thanks!
No worries. I’m not trying to assert my move is better or anything. There’s are any number of ways you might write a move, based on what you want it to achieve. I was mainly trying to agree with you that, sure, language is a great thing to write moves about.
Language learning is another cool point. Maybe you could add a choice to the list that’s like: “You made progress in your grasp of the language! Start a countdown clock and/or fill in a piece of an existing one.”
Oh hey, that would be a neat use for a count-down clock!
It also means that you’d make progress in language learning mostly by making mistakes, since you’d be picking that option rather than, say, being more successful at communicating.
That’s a brilliant idea!
You could even use progress on the countdown clock to help judge the fiction, seeing when you needed to make the move.
PLAYER: “So, I tell them that if they attack from the front, we’ll come at Keller from behind.”
GM: “How many pie pieces of their language do you have?”
PLAYER: “Uh… 2.”
GM: “Okay, you can get that across, no problem, but if you want to talk more advanced tactics, you’re going to need to roll.”
This is pretty much all Jonathan Walton ‘s work, but I’ve modded it a little for the game I’m running.
When you try to talk with the natives, roll+moxie (it’s the same as +sharp). On a 10+, choose 2. On a 7-9, choose 1.
* fill in 1 segment of your language clock
* you make yourself understood
* you can understand more-or-less what they’re saying
* you don’t come off looking like a fool
On a miss, choose 1 but you’ve done something to offend them.
And then I have a language clock for each tribe (the PCs will be exploring an island with multiple native tribes, or factions) which has no real mechanical benefit until it fills to 9o’clock. At 9:00 there’s a +1 to the language roll, at 10:00 it’s +2, at 11:00 it’s +3, and at midnight they’ve learned the language and rolls are no longer necessary (for that character). Having at least 1 segment in the clock means that the PCs can communicate simple ideas like “where is food?” and “can I sleep here?” but complex ideas like “can you help me ambush Keeler?” need a roll.
That’s cool. Here’s my thinking on why it’s better to use the clocks to judge when to make a language roll rather than having high-level clocks give you bonuses to the move:
1. It involves making judgments based on the fiction, which in AW hacks is almost always better.
2. If you want to keep advancing your clock, you have to keep trying harder things involving the language. If you can get by with 3-4 pie pieces and never push for things that are really difficult (understanding the contemporary political implications of a bard reciting a particular epic poem), you never get to roll the move and, thus, never have a chance to improve your language ability. Currently, you roll it every time and, on a hit, can consistently improve even if you’re just trying simple stuff over and over.
Ah! Now here’s where I might disagree with you about advancement. I think the players will naturally want complex things, and the more involved they are with a particular group the more complex those things will become. “Can you help us scout this mountain?” quickly becomes “We should form a more permanent alliance against the White Ape Clan.” which then snowballs into “My friend wants to fuck your sister.”
I want to have a system as a guide for when one player decides that he or she wants to knuckle down and learn the language so they can stop pissing off the locals every time they want to trade goods. But in essence I want a little bit of interaction to allow simple communication. You’ll notice there’s no roll required after 1 segment gets filled into the clock. I just trust that my players want to complicate things by asking for more.
I think you make a good point about the bonuses though. As I learned Spanish there were some things I just didn’t get and it seemed like I would never be fluent, despite the fact that I could talk about tons of mundane things like food and drink and attractive women.
Perhaps I’ll get rid of the bonuses and make the last 3 segments something that just doesn’t fill in unless you spend the time to study the language.
Cool. Well all I can say is give it a try and see if it does what you want.
I haven’t read all the way through the comments, but how about:
When you try to communicate with somebody that doesn’t speak your language, roll+sharp. On a 10+ hold 3, on a 7-9, hold 1, on a miss the MC holds 1. You spend your hold 1-for-1 to communicate one word or concept to the person: noun, verb, maybe predicate or some shit. The MC spends his hold 1-for-1 to communicate a word that you didn’t mean. Multiple PCs can add their hold together, but the MC gets 1 hold for each “helper.”
Obviously on a 6 you assume you understand, but your translation is completely fucked.
The other way to cover this is to simply ask the player, “Does X speak the mutant cannibal language? How’d you learn it?”