The Skinner move “arresting skinner”
An arresting skinner: when you remove a piece of clothing, your own or someone else’s, no one who can see you can do anything but watch. You command their absolute attention. If you choose, you can exempt individual people, by name.
Could a Skinner use this to freeze a gang, release one of their allies from the command, and that ally slit the throats of everyone in that gang?
I’d ask the players more questions but probably say no to all three. Any one of those, sure.
I’d imagine slitting the first throat would remove the skinner’s power over them
On the other hand, the notion that your dude is so compelling and sexy that people would rather die than stop watching him take off his jacket is pretty fun. And word gets around, and people like that need to be thrown in holes, naked, forever.
Yes, Yes and Yes.
I have some thoughts, but this thread pretty much sums it all up
http://apocalypse-world.com/forums/index.php?topic=1167.msg32330#msg32330
specially John Harper’s post there
apocalypse-world.com – How do you limit An Arresting Skinner?
Personally I dislike this move because I don’t think it promotes especially fun game play. However, by default I would allow all the things you describe. If you want it to work differently, just talk to your group about it and agree on a different understanding, or even just remove it from the game.
“Arresting Skinner is magic” Philipp Neitzel
We had a similar situation in our game, but I had it established, that even an unerotic removal of a ring triggers the move. Setting a precedence is really important with this move.
I used the move by removing one of my gloves to freeze his whole gang. Then I hold the trigger by removing the clothes of his gang members, while being in a region with an upcoming snowstorm to harm his gangers and give my some time to escape his wrath.
Sadly there wasn’t any showdown between the two anymore after this.
I’m playing a Skinner now, and I’ve deliberately avoided the move because it creates non-fun conversations around situations with high stakes. The version of the move in Fallen Empires is much much better, because it articulates what the move looks like fictionally, has a natural limit to how long it can last for, and requires the Skinner’s (here The Nightshade) full attention. If I were to MC an AW game, I’d sub this move in for Arresting Skinner.
Radiant passion: when you make a show and display of passion—anguish, desire, fury, any—no one who can see you can do anything but watch. You command their absolute attention. If you choose, you can exempt individual people, by name.
I think that’s OK, because it’s supposed to be freaky. Just make sure you have enough threats on the table to make up for it. Not all problems can be solved with violence.
Yes, yes and yes.
Also, whenever anyone reads a situation and asks who’s in control here, I always turn first to the skinner and ask them if they are. If they want to be, there’s nothing I can do to stop them.
I say yes to all three. But, if the Skinner hasn’t told the ally to be really careful not to break the Skinner’s eye contact with any frozen person, it can set off a chain of interesting events.
I guess it comes down to how many pieces of clothing does the skinner have left to remove
I guess, but I would make it depend on the fiction. If it is something that makes any sense whatsoever. If you establish that the Skinner is magic like Sascha Müller did, I guess there really is nothing you can do about it. Otherwise it seems even weirder.
I am not sure why it has to be this way and what it adds for this move to be magic without cost or hard choices.
I guess after you do it once your Skinner is now more about scary witchcraft than the Brainer.