I started MCing a new game of Apocalypse World today. A so-so start, but hopefully it’ll lead to bigger and better things.
How can I make it easier to start things off, especially with a new group? There wasn’t a lot of imbalance at the start apart from two PC relationships, and I didn’t want to start the game off by having those two guys shoot each other! Do I need to ask more questions? Find out who they deal with in their day-to-day and make trouble based on that? Have some established setting details for the players to build on? Was there another way I could have started things off?
You’ve got what I call the Ace playbooks, the other Ace is the Chopper (or maybe the Faceless if you’re using him), and these are the playbooks that are +Hard or combat-heavy. When faced with these characters it’s important to make the threats come at them from angles that can’t be taken care of with a bullet.
During the first session, you really should be hitting them with tough questions. Ask about family members: “Where are your parents?” “How is your sister doing?” “When did your cousin first move into town?” Ask about friends: “Who was the last person you partied with, or fucked?” “Bottleneck gave you free beer last night, why would he do that?” Ask about things tht you just make up o the spot: “Barbeque! When that biker gang, the Firebugs, were last in town, they strung you upside down from a tentpole, shot up Bottleneck’s bar, and killed Lamprey’s oldest son. What have you done since then to prepare the place in case the Firebugs come back?” Doing this can lead to a huge back and forth of questions and answer.
Don’t be afraid to ask impossible questions! One of my favorites is “Who was the last person you killed?” and then follow that up with “How did you kill them?” “Why?” “Who else is happy that they’re gone?” You’ll get lots of details about where that player sees their character’s morality, and pushing for answers (looking through crosshairs) will really give you lots of juicy ways of introducing new threats. Especially if they try to abjure responsibility “I killed him because he had the plague and I didn’t want it spreading.” BOOM! You have a new threat vector. The plague, and it’s contagious.
You don’t necessarily need to find their weaknesses, you just want to find things that make the game interesting. Is it interesting that a savage gang of bikers sometimes stop into town and kill somebody for fun? Is it interesting that the Battlebabe’s younger sister wants to take up whoring to get by? Is it interesting that people in town might already be infected with the plague? If the answer is “yes” to any of these, then you just bring those elements into the game and play to find out what happens.
The last game I MC’d started off with just a normal day. I established their morning routines, then fucked with those. I’m a big advocate of asking lots of questions, so the players can tell you how to mess with them. Although you’re keeping PVP on the table, that doesn’t mean you have to start with it. Sometimes starting with smaller stuff tells you more about the characters and the setting.
To give you an example: my Medic woke up and headed to their private bathroom for a little ‘me’ time before facing the rest of the world (player tells me all of this, I just asked what they did when they woke up). They open the door and come face to face with a big fucking snake. (my insertion). Not only did this provide an immediate opportunity for a fight (and possible comedy when rolls were failed), but then the players had to figure out where this invasion of snakes was coming from. Spoiler alert, it was the beginning of a front.
You mentioned you’re interested in the drama and setting up an unusual apocalypse. Let your players talk themselves into a bad spot. Let them give you ideas. You can def establish environment and weirdness in later games. It’s not necessary to establish a bunch of details at the beginning, and you don’t have to do it all yourself. 🙂
Yeah, I need to change the way I ask questions, at least some of the time. At the moment for the Hardholder it was like “What’s around your holding? Where do you get your water from?” instead of “What worries you most about your holding’s location? What’s wrong with the water supply?” For the Gunlugger, it was “So why are you in this town run by the guy who left you for dead? Do you have family here?” (giving him the opportunity to say “Well I’m just passing through, no I don’t have family here”) instead of “Why can’t you leave BBQ’s town? How do you get along with your sister?”
I see now that I need to shift gears and establish stuff through questions, not just fish for it. My players have mostly come from a D&D background, so they aren’t used to introducing fictional details into the setting, and aren’t in a mindset to put their characters in difficult situations if they can avoid it.
The thought of dropping stuff on people like “You see White coming toward you through the crowd and he looks pissed. What did you do to him?” with no prior establishment always rubbed my brain the wrong way, but now I can see the facility and effectiveness of it, so I’ll do my best to give it a shot next session.
Craig Judd It’s important to have questions that start with “Why” not just as for opening questions, but as follow-ups, especially if you establish details. The question “You see White coming toward you through the crowd and he looks pissed. What did you do to him?” can be better served with a “Why might he be pissed at you?”
“Why” questions not only force players to look for answers within their own character, the answers will sometimes open up new avenues for further questions or give you ideas for fronts.
Depending on your players your mileage may vary.