I’ve played a fair bit of DW, but never AW. I have a group who wants to play the Deadlands hack by Willow Palecek. They’ve never played any PBtA games. I’m looking for advice on how to start the game. What questions to ask, what situation to put the players in. Basically, advice on how to set up an AW game for new players and a new GM. Thanks.
I’ve played a fair bit of DW, but never AW.
I’ve played a fair bit of DW, but never AW.
Read the book, and you’ll be fine. The big thing for you to do before the 1st Session is to fill your mind with apocalyptic imagery. Then during the 1st Session, ask them for their apocalyptic imagery. Then use all the info you get from the 1st Session to write up the relationship web and the Fronts and Threats and so on.
Also, there should be some threads around here about good questions to ask. You can also visit the “barf forth apocalyptica” forum for more ideas and opinions.
Apocalypse West follows the same Agendas and Principles as the main game. Do that, ask questions of your players, and work together to figure out what your setting is. While very inspired by Deadlands, this is much more explicitly apocalyptic, keep that in mind,
Also, let me know how it goes!
Thanks, Willow. I certainly will!
Huh. How come I didn’t know there was a Deadlands hack for AW? Must go find.
Let me know if you have any questions! I’ve run AW a bunch.
Thanks, Todd Nicholas! I’m going to be running this for people down at Cosmic Comics who have no idea what AW is. Have you seen the playbooks for Apocalypse West? I’d love your opinion on how best to start the game for what will probably be a 1-2 session game.
I HAVE seen the Apoc. West playbooks (shout out to Willow Palecek). My main thought is this: for a 1-2 session game, start with the day in the life stuff, but push pretty hard. Give them conflicts right away. Also, set up those PC-NPC-PC triangles. For example, let’s say you’ve got a character who is a sort of tough guy. Have an NPC who is a bit more fragile come and make a request of them (i.e. “So-and-so stole something from me. They’re all big and tough and I’m not. Could you get it back for me?”). If so-and-so is a friend of one of the other PCs, perfect.
So, create interesting NPC’s who want something and create opportunities to screw with the players.
David Benson More or less. I’ve run short campaigns of AW a couple of times now, and I think it works best when you give players NPCs to care about, and then put those NPCs in the gunsights as soon as you get the chance. It’s why I think AW uses the engine better than DW, in that it really invites player vs. player and player vs. NPC conflict (not necessarily physical either, as AW is rock solid at handling social conflict).