19 thoughts on “Going to run my first AW game tonight.”

  1. For many first-time MCs, there’s this moment where you wonder if you’re saying the right things. The trick is to always say things that you personally find cool, for real. Ask questions where you’re genuinely curious what the player will answer. Don’t bother saying things or asking things that you personally find boring.

    Your job is to make the characters’ lives interesting to you, so that’s how you know if you’re saying the right things.

  2. Thanks for the reply, Vincent! I will take this advice to heart. Luckily the players are all close friends and we have very similar tastes, so saying things I find cool will likely coincide with what they find cool. 

    I will make their lives interesting!

  3. Draw maps. 

    Like seriously draw them. Even if they suck.

    Having some representation of the hardhold will give you a lot of cool things to say. 

    I suck at making maps but i really like to make them in AW now. 

  5. This game can be exhausting to MC if you’re used to games where you can plan future events. Be prepared to have literally no idea what’s going to happen in the session. Don’t be afraid to call for breaks.

  6. Adam McConnaughey I’m actually looking forward to not being forced to plan ahead. I’m not a huge fan of improv, but luckily I’m playing with friends (and it’s their first AW experience, too).

  8. PC-NPC-PC triangles. Those things are what will create the tangled web from which great stories are told. Failing that PC-NPC-NPC-PC quadrilaterals. Anything that sets PCs at crossed paths.

  10. Something that I think most first-timers don’t do but in my experience makes PbtA games better is “everbody declares; everybody revises; everybody rolls”. This is for those situations where everybody wants to do something all at once. Since the game doesn’t have an initiative system, my instinct (and I think most people’s) is to resolve actions one at a time in whatever order they are shouted out in, or whatever order seems reasonable.

    Instead, find out what everyone is doing. Once they have all heard what everyone else is doing, let them revise a bit if they need to. Then figure out from the action descriptions if anybody is making a move. Then everyone who is making a move all roll at more or less the same time.

  13. For me, it’s all about the questions. Any time its my turn to say something and I draw a blank, I respond by turning the question back on them. “Oh that’s Cheech – what’s Cheech like? You and Cheech had a thing once right? Why did that fall apart?”. You can introduce and then ask, or just ask: “So what’s been making getting access to the city a problem recently?” or  “So there’s this brainer cult that has been making getting into and out of the city difficult recently. Rufus, what happened last time you had a run in with them?” Jump on things that seem assumed “Hold on, how DO you get food for your cult? Mushroom farming? Okay, definitely. So what’s been going wrong with that recently?”

  14. Jamil Vallis-Walker That sounds great. I wrote a little list of non-sequitur questions for if i draw a blank like,

    “Who or what lives in The Bellowing Hills?” or maybe more leading like “That thing that lives in the Bellowing Hills, describe the noise it makes every night”

     I’m going to prefer to have seeds like that come from PCs, but if there’s a stale moment and they need some prodding I’ll draw from those. 

  18. Well that was the most fun I’ve had in a while! Many questions were asked, much story was created, lives have been created (some destroyed) and spurred into action, landscapes have been wrought, relationships set on tilts. Hell, we even had a fight!

    Thanks to everyone for your tips! They went a long way.

    And in case anyone is wondering, the sound that comes out of the Hills is a low and bassy, barely-audible, quasi-Lynchian rumbling rounded out with hints of metallic squealing. We’ll play to find out what the hell it is. 🙂

    My players and I thank you roundly, Vincent Baker

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