If a villain is about to attack a PC, do they have a specific chance to block or dodge via check? If so, how is that peformed? Are they allowed to use a power to do so? And again, if so, does it have to be in their currently available powers?
I’d appreciate an example used with whatever the answer is.
In Worlds in Peril there is no initiative, or rolls for blocking or dodging in particular, or skill checks. There are only moves and the fiction surrounding them. What that means is that how the players react, or if they have the chance to block or dodge something that’s about to happen to them depends on you, the EIC (GM) and what you’ve narrated in the game so far (among other things).
Typically, you’re going to want to give warning before something drastic happens or a PC has the chance to get harmed, but it really depends on the fiction. You’ll want to read the section on soft and hard moves and look at the list of EIC moves.
So, more specifically: Does a PC have a chance to block or dodge an attack? If you give them the chance, then yes. Should you give them the chance? Depends on you. For best practices though I’d say set things up with a soft move so an attack doesn’t feel contrived in the fiction.
If you give them a chance to block or dodge, what does that look like? Well, it probably means you’ll let them Defy Danger if they do something in the fiction to trigger that move, which they likely will if you give them the chance.
PCs are always allowed to use their powers (it should be on their Powers Summary) to do whatever they want, anytime. The difference is that if it’s on their Powers Profile then they don’t have to roll a different move, called Push. If it’s not on their Powers Profile then they will have to.
Example 1
EIC: The ground starts to rumble a little and you start to feel a bit nauseous as it splits apart and you see the blackness yawning out below. What’s even more strange is that the blackness is oozing up and outward and moving like it’s a living thing, moving toward you, too. Your spider-sense suddenly goes off though. Something bad is about to happen, what do you do?
Player playing Spider-Man: Well, I don’t want to fall down and get caught in a cave-in or anything. I’m going to just use my powers to stick to the ceiling above.
EIC: Ok, cool. So you jump up and plant yourself on the ceiling and you feel stable but you feel a stab of pain and surge of adrenaline as your spider-sense kicks into over drive and the black ooze splatters all over you. It immediately starts forming all over you. Encasing and constricting all over you. What do you do?
Example 2
EIC: The ground starts to rumble a little and you start to feel a bit nauseous as it splits apart and you see the blackness yawning out below. What’s even more strange is that the blackness is oozing up and outward and moving like it’s a living thing, moving toward you, too. Your spider-sense suddenly goes off though. Something bad is about to happen, what do you do?
Player playing Spider-Man: Oh man, it’s going to be that creepy black goo for sure. I’m going to jump out of the way and shoot some webs down to keep it away from me I think.
EIC: Haha, you’re right! Alright, well as soon as you move away from it, your spider-sense intensifies and you see strands all across the ground spray up towards you. What do you do?
Player playing Spider-Man: Dang, that sounds like a lot, but I’m going to try for a crazy spidey moment where I dodge them all at once with some crazy acrobatics. Can I do that?
EIC: Definitely, why don’t you roll Defy Danger for me, with the danger being that you maybe can’t avoid all the strands.
It all depends on what the players tell you they are trying to do. For your example, a villain is about to attack a PC… let’s say Johnny Snow is about to fire his Ice Beam gun at the hero.
The EIC doesn’t have to roll to hit. You’ve used a soft move to set up that Johnny Snow is about to fire his weapon at the PC. If they don’t do anything, they’ll get hit, and take a condition, but they’ll probably want to avoid that so it all depends on what they say they do.
If the PC says something like, “I dive for cover” then they get to roll Defy Danger. If they succeed, they dodge out of the way.
If they say instead, “I use my elastic arms to stretch out and snag the Ice Beam gun out of his hands” they’re triggering a Seize Control move.
Maybe they have some kind of sonic blast power and want to blow out the ceiling to create a barrier of rubble in between them, that would trigger Use Environment.
Of course, whether or not they have a relevant power doesn’t matter in terms of being able to trigger any of the moves. You can dive for cover with super-speed, or just like a normal person. You can Seize Control with stretchy limbs or mundane brawling. You can put a barrier between you by sonic-blasting the ceiling or by pushing over a desk. The powers come in to describing what success or failure looks like, and for determining what conditions to apply for failure.
A character who gets hit with that Ice Beam could reasonably be encased in a block of ice as a condition. But if the character can absorb energy as a simple level power, this makes less sense, and so maybe an energy absorber who failed to Defy Danger would end up radiating cold and unintentionally freezing and shattering everything they touch, including the floor they’re standing on…