I have a few questions regarding take down.
If I’m an energy controller (fire bender and stuff like that), attacking with fire blasts and other energy attacks would roll with Smash? The way the book puts it is like if smash could only be used as a physical strenght-based action.
If I’m a psychic, a mind blast would roll with Strength? Maneuvre? Or even Influence? I don’t know exactly how to deal with Psychics and their psyonic attacks.
And about Investigate – how should I use it to seize control or take down? Every time someone narrates as if they are planning carefully an attack, it just seems to me that they should roll with Meaneuvre, and not Investigate.
Could someone answer me?
If you check out page 82, you’ll find descriptions of the stats and when to use them. Smash is for forceful, direct actions, strength-based or otherwise.
You don’t use stats to trigger the moves you want to have happen – you do things in the fiction and the things you do sometimes trigger moves. Seize Control triggers when a PC and another character struggle over a contested goal or objective. Take Down triggers when a PC attempts to subdue an immediate threat. If what happens in the fiction matches the appropriate trigger description, the move happens and you usually roll dice. When you roll the dice you’ll add a stat to that roll and you choose what makes sense for what is happening in the fiction at that time.
If the PC is being forceful and direct, I’d have them roll Smash. If the PC was trying to change or sway another character’s mind I’d have them roll Influence. If the PC was trying to physically to weaken their position, set them up for another PC, and so on, I’d have them roll Maneuver.
If you and the other players are spending too much time figuring out what stat should be applied to the roll have the PC who triggered the move proposition what stat they think it should be based on the situation. If it makes sense for the fiction, accept it and move on. The moves are way more important to keep the fiction moving in new and interesting ways than the stats that flavor the fiction that has already been told (if it hasn’t been told yet, the move hasn’t triggered yet so have the player describe exactly what they’re doing in the fiction. 99% of the time the stat that should be rolled ends up being obvious one the fiction is clarified).
That’s how I’ve benn thinking about it. Basically, it is similar to the Approaches in FAE:
. Forceful = Smash;
. Sneaky, Quick = Maneuver;
. Clever, Careful = Investigate
Then we have protect and Influence.
I think Influence could be paired with “Flashy”, but it really is something else.
And protect is the most bizarre one. I think one could protect with smash and maneuver easily.
Overall, I don’t know if I like this or not. In Apocalypse World, the stats were more hard-linked to the moves. So, if you have “Hard”, you will deal a lot of pain on people. Even in DW, you’d use Str or Dex to attack, and only special moves (like magic) would use other stats.
I like it how you can use different stats for different moves, but I’ve been having those few issues. I might hack it to be more similar to AW, something like this:
. Bravery: Use it to Take down (similar to Hard)
. Discipline: Use it to Defy Danger (similar to cool)
. Cunning: Use it to investigate (similar to Sharp)
. Empathy: Use it to manipulate (similar to Hot)
Protect someone would maybe use Empathy or Cunning. The only move that would be more open ended is Seize Control – since, depending on the situation, you can seize it on a variety of ways.
What you folks think?
I like the stats the way they are in the book (they have a comic feel), though I must admit I’ve had some trouble adjudicating Protect.
You could change it so that any one move can only use one stat, it just wasn’t our design goal. We wanted characters without any Brawn or Bravery to be able to Impose Conditions and help take down enemies by doing whatever they wanted. We wanted players to worry more about what they’re doing in the fiction than what stat they’re using to do it and this way they can use whatever stat they want to be effective.
I understand the design choices, but it’s been a lil bit problematic some times. So, at least to my group, linking specific moves to specific stats have been working better
I’d like to say that I loved the rpg. It is amazing. I loved the idea of explaining the game in a comic book manner. I’ve been searching for actual plays of Wip, but I’ve found none that was really interesting.
Yeah, I’d like to get some actual plays up sometime once I’ve got free time!