Looking at the new combat moves. Why would anyone ever choose Single Combat, if they had an option to Seize By Force? (Or assault a secure position)
Both are roll+hard, both allow you to inflict terrible, or take less harm, but SBF gives you 3 hold on 10+ instead of effectively 2, and 2 hold on 7-9 instead of only one. SBF also gives you 1 hold on a miss while Single Combat gives 1 hold to your opponent! The extra free hold could be used to seize someone’s weapon, or them, or gain some positional advantage.
Basically I don’t see any reason anyone would ever voluntarily choose Single Combat if they could somehow finagle the situation into a SBF move, and there are plenty of reasons to want to avoid doing Single Combat like the plague.
Edit: Single Combat also explicitly traps you in a conflict to the death unless you both simultaneously back down. None of the other moves put you in such a position. Basically if you asked me to read the rules for Single Combat and name that move, I’d call it something like ‘when you’re caught off guard in a deadly ambush by an enemy in a superior position, with no tactical options’.
Because you shouldn’t be choosing your move first and then describing? You should be describing and then seeing if a move fits.
I get the impression Single Combat is definitely non-ideal, but that doesn’t mean you can choose to avoid it – when you’re chucked in the thunder dome with some hulking guy it’s a much less ideal situation than being able to choose your own approach in open combat. Sometimes you’re forced into single combat, or doing so gets you kudos explicitly due to you putting yourself in a bad situation. Obviously not Vincent so don’t know if this is intended, but it seems like it could be a cool interaction.
Aaron Griffin of course, but looking at the moves it’s clear you want to be describing your actions in such a way as to avoid them being interpreted as Single Combat at all costs.
James Iles so in the Thunder Dome you’d try and Seize your opponent in a hold, or grab his weapon, or basically do anything you can think of except directly attack with the pure intention of doing harm, because that puts you in the worst position possible.
But maybe that’s intentional? Perhaps it’s a deliberate attempt to phrase the rules in such a way as to encourage creative moves in combat other than direct attacks?
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My reading of it is that, once you’re in single combat, the single combat move applies whether you want it to or not. You can’t just decide to seize something by force instead. If you’re in the Thunderdome, you’re in single combat and that’s that. So yeah – avoid one-on-one fights at all costs, unless you’re confident you can win (I guess that really ought to go without saying).
I must admit though, I find it odd that on a Seize by Force result of a weak hit or miss, you come off better than if you were in single combat. That doesn’t feel right. It means Single Combat is much deadlier than regular fighting, and I’m not sure why that would be the case.
Joshua Fox “the single combat move applies whether you want it to or not”
I think you can always try and phrase your character’s actions in such a way as to avoid that though, and will always want to. Seize By Force could be invoked to get a wrestling hold on an opponent or take their weapon from them. Go Agro can be invoked to try and knock them back or over. Even defend something you hold could be used by saying you’re standing your ground. these moves are just as effective as SC, have additional bonus effects on top, and don’t hose you on a miss in fact they still give you benefits.
“It means Single Combat is much deadlier than regular fighting, and I’m not sure why that would be the case.”
Exactly. A direct attack is always the weaker option and also takes away tactical options by locking you into a death struggle. It explicitly stops you from choosing any other moves until the combat is over. This is madness.
I guess my reading would be that Seize by Force only makes sense if there’s something you really care about getting hold of AND there’s someone you have to fight to get it. In a thunderdome situation you might want to get a hold of their weapon, sure, but that’s SO you can fight the person. In one situation fighting the person and grabbing their stuff is two separate goals, and in another it’s your goal and your means to achieve it, respectively.
Basically, if it’d be possible or if you’d be ok with getting their weapon and leaving the enemy undefeated (maybe it’s a special weapon to you) that’s Seize by Force; if your only goal is to defeat the person that’s Single Combat – part of the contract of using Seize by Force is that you care about the state of the thing being seized independently of the state of your opposition.
Maybe triggers need to be tightened up if this is the correct reading, but that’s by 2 cents.
Simon Hibbs “describe your actions to avoid single combat” is totally not in the spirit of the game. Apocalypse World doesn’t work if you want to munchkin the fuck out of it.
If you’re in single combat, you’re in single combat. If you want to avoid single combat, travel in groups.
James Iles what’s to stop me taking their weapon, then deciding to beat them to death with it?
I suppose if we’re saying that opponents can always escape free and clear at any time from any move other than Single Combat, then that gives Single Combat a role. It’s for when you make an all out attack surrendering any chance for escaping yourself to ensure your opponent goes down. It’s for suicide attacks. But that’s not what I’d expect from a move called Single Combat.
Ive been thinking about the locked-in nature of Single Combat. INHO that part of it makes no sense either except possibly in hand to hand combat. If you’re in a firefight say in a shanty town, it doesn’t make sense to say there is no way out except death or defeat for one side or the other. There should always be an option to get the hell out of there Gunlugger style.
Simon Hibbs I’m saying, the moment you enter single combat the Single Combat move applies. Therefore you make that move immediately. And, the move specifies that once made, it must be repeated until the single combat is over.
So, even if you happened to do something that would normally trigger the Seize By Force move, if you’re in single combat, it doesn’t trigger. In effect you resolve the entire combat as a series of SC rolls, skipping over any other moves that might have applied.
Admittedly this isn’t entirely clear from what’s been released, but then it is just a one-pager. They’ll probably clarify this stuff in the book. Probably.
Joshua Fox “So, even if you happened to do something that would normally trigger the Seize By Force move, if you’re in single combat, it doesn’t trigger. In effect you resolve the entire combat as a series of SC rolls, skipping over any other moves that might have applied.”
That interpretation reduces many Apocalypse World fights down to classic D&D style option-less, tactics free hit point attrition grinds, yet it’s a reasonable interpretation of the move as written.
It has to change, surely.
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Simon Hibbs though that’s only the case for fights which a) have only 2 participants, and b) have as their only goal the dealing of harm to another. The moment someone else gets involved, one of the combatants finds something extra they want to do, or one of the combatants wants to stop fighting, other moves get involved. It’s a very narrow slice of combat as I understand the move – specifically for single combats, maybe in the gladiatorial style or maybe as a duel.
Essentially it’s a very basic move for very basic combats. If your fight has more going on in the fiction than just ‘let’s see which of these two can kill/maim the other first’ you use a more complex move.
James Iles I believe Vincent Baker has said that single combat can include gang fights, treating gangs as weapons. The problem I have is that as soon as the combat goes beyond a very artificially restricted pit fight type scenario, I don’t see how the inherent disadvantages and restrictions on Single Combat make sense. Frankly I don’t see how they ever make sense.
Edit. It’s not just that Single Combat says the only thing going on in the fiction is a fight to the end, on unfavourable terms to the PC, it’s also that it says that is the only thing that can be going on in the fiction through to the bitter end.
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There are various situations in various Apocalypse World where multiple moves could apply to a situation, but you nevertheless go forward with the move that describes your situation most specifically. Defy Danger/Act Under Fire/Hold Steady is a good example: we could (and often do) roll them in a wide diversity of situations, but instead we go to more specific moves first.
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Fair enough. If I run the game before seeing more MC advice I’d keep Single Combat as a move solely for one-on-one slugfests and use the more appropriate moves for other situations. And, well, at least it’s not the Seize By Force/Go Aggro argument all over again!
James Iles ok so I’m a player in your game playing the Gun Lugger. I’m in a shootout with some goon in a derelict town and you call Single Combat. I decide to bug out and call F*@k This Shit. Except I can’t because Single Combat as written doesn’t allow that ‘…you must make the move again’. Unless my opponent surrenders or dies, all I can do is go to Single Combat again. I can’t even Act Under Pressure to dive for a shack where I’ve stashed some weapons, or do anything other than shoot, kill or throw myself at his mercy and hope he happens to do the same at the same time. How would you rule it?
No need even for Fuck This Shit to come into play – the Single Combat move allows one participant to flee after any round (fiction permitting), and they might not even need to do that if the other fighter’s also had enough. Even if that weren’t the case, I’d say specific rules trump general ones in exception-based rulesets like AW, so the gunlugger would still get to make their move. After one round of Single Combat, still, because you can’t step back the fictional positioning that lead to that move being triggered.
As for SBF giving you more hold to spend, I think that’s because SBF holds three things in tension – keeping yourself safe, hurting them, and seizing the thing. With single combat the only tension is hurting them vs staying safe, so it makes sense the number of picks goes down. Basically, SBF is only mechanically preferable to Single Combat when you don’t care about the thing you’re seizing, at which point it’s not the right move for the situation.
…though that isn’t to say that I wouldn’t appreciate some insight into how other moves and other characters can interact with the Single Combat. Are you stuck resolving it until the fight’s over? Do you have to wait until you’re at your opponent’s mercy (or vice versa) before you can try to Manipulate them? Does it create a rules-impermeable bubble around the combatants until the fight’s done? Would be good to read the book’s advice on the move…
James Iles “the Single Combat move allows one participant to flee after any round (fiction permitting”
But if the other guy doesn’t also back down at the same time, there is no way out and you’re at his mercy. You lose.
There’s no reason to suppose any move has primacy over any other, except Single Combat’s explicit declaration that you can’t do anything else.
Also it isn’t just that Single Combat gives you fewer options as you say, look at the moves, it gives you worse options. In terms of purely inflicting terrible and suffering less harm a 10+ at Single Combat is the equivalent of a 7-9 in any of Seize By Force, Assault a Secure Position or Defend Something you Hold. So if you do something interpretable as Single Combat, that’s equivalent of voluntarily taking a -3 on your combat roll. It’s worse than that actually because on a miss not only do you not get 1 choice as in Seize By Force, Assault a Secure Position or Defend Something you Hold, your opponent gets the choice instead. So a miss on Single Combat is actually two steps worse than a miss on those other moves.
Pavel Berlin I’ve addressed this point previously. Basically my advice to you is don’t ever narrate an action by your character that could possibly be interpreted as Single Combat, because it’s a death trap move. If you just try to kill the other guy, the game system will actively and severely punish you. that doesn’t seem right.
Here is SC’s exact wording:
“If both of you prefer to end the fight now, it ends. If both of you prefer to fight on, it continues, and you must make the move again. If one of you prefers to end the fight, though, and the other to fight on, then the FORMER (emphasis mine) must either flee OR (emphasis mine) else submit to the latter‘s mercy.”
That “FORMER” and “OR” are pretty resounding in my book. It clearly gives decision preference to the one deciding to end SC, not the one deciding to continue. Also, I think the part about submitting to your opponent’s mercy is almost tongue in cheek. It is pointing out, that once you get into SC, your options become limited. You can’t be sneaky and describe something that triggers act under fire so you can maneuver into a better position to use a different move. Ditto for rolling a “better” battle move like SBF once you are doing SC. Your only “real” option is to flee. Now, if I was ruling this in a PC vs. NPC fight and a PC tried to flee, I may or may not require act under fire (or even multiple iterations of it) to escape and/or escape unharmed, contingent on the fiction. And obviously, the gunlugger’s escape move would trump that. If it was an NPC trying to run from a PC, I would be inclined to give the PC a go aggro/sucker someone (no chance to miss), again depending on the surrounding fiction.
I also read “flee” in relative terms. You have to break off the immediate engagement, but it doesn’t mean you have flee 100 miles away. In your shoot out example, you could absolutely flee the fight and go for some stashed weapons…as long as they were physically separate from you. If they were right next to you, and you wanted to use them, the MC should just adjudicate whether or not you can apply the new weapon to the next SC roll. Heck, the MC might even have you make the act under fire move to do that. There is nothing saying that other moves can’t apply during SC, you just can’t use them to circumvent SC. I would be perfectly fine with a character using Read a Sitch before the 3rd SC roll as long as the fiction supported it.
You could also flee the engagement, circle back around and fight again. Which, if its literally just PC vs. goon in an empty ghost town with no context to the fight other than these two dudes trying to kill each other, is probably your best bet. In fact, one should probably avoid rolling any battle moves in this scenario (see below for why). However, that scenario is probably pretty rare. Usually violence has some larger context, and if the PC flees, that gives the MC an opportunity, one might even say a golden opportunity, to make a move with the NPC. Without the PC there opposing the NPC, the NPC could get into all kinds of mischief.
But, this debate is missing a huge piece of the new moves structure…what I see as the intended tiered nature of the 2ED moves and violence. See the act under fire move:
“When you do something under fire , or dig in to endure fire, roll+cool. On a 10+, you do it. On a 7–9, you flinch, hesitate, or stall: the MC can offer you a worse outcome, a hard bargain, or an ugly choice. In either case, if you want to fight back, now you’re doing battle with them. On a miss, be prepared for the worst.”
Note the phrase “if you want to fight back, now you’re doing battle with them.” That wording is entirely new to this edition. To me, it reinforces a simple truth…you don’t want to roll any battle move…EVER. I’ll repeat that, all of the battle moves SUCK! You’re asking the wrong question. You shouldn’t be asking “Which battle move is best,” but “How do I never roll a battle move?” All of the battle moves requires exchange of harm. When you fight, you want to sucker someone (with no chance of miss), and failing that, go aggro on them. You want to be in (fictional) position where THEY can’t fight back. You want to be a (fictional) position where you can inflict unilateral harm.
Now, its the apocalypse, so, fat chance of that all the time. You might be on the way to set up an ambush for Dremmer and his boys, but they had the same idea for you. So, you run into them on the road, and now what? Sure, you can just go at them. Roll a battle move (more situational info would be needed for the exact one). But again, that’s a suckers game, especially when you go straight at them and it turns out some o’ them boys was on your flank, and you suffer harm as established for walking right into their trap (see PbtA games can be tactical, don’t walk in a file down the middle of road without scouts and screens). I digress…you want to maneuver. You want to try and get into a position where they are at such a disadvantage you get to go aggro/sucker them. You want to be where YOU get to inflict unilateral harm. I think that’s why act under fire expressly tells you when you have to stop do all them fancy smancy tactics. It says, you can try to get into a good position, but good luck.
There is nothing saying you can’t apply that same logic to SC. Think of the Anakin/Obi-won Duel. I would say it was a few iterations of SC (Anakin arrogantly thought he could win straight on), and then Obi-won tried to break things off. He moved to a superior position. He baited a trap, and then tried to manipulate Anakin into backing down. He rolled a 12 on the first, and 2 on the second one. Or maybe Anakin was a stubborn PC. Either way, (-) three limbs, (+) terrible snoring problem and James Earl Jone’s larynx.
I do agree that SC is the mechanically inferior battle move, and that, if one could, one would describe something else. Not sure why it is the only one where a miss gives the opponent 1 choose against you, but I have some thoughts. My suspicion is that its meant to 1) drive the narrative forward, and 2) act as a proxy for the GM’s hard move on a miss. In other words, SC doesn’t seem to want people to keep rolling it. If a PC misses and so not only do they not do extra harm, or prevent harm to themselves, but their opponent’s position also relatively improves (either hurting the PC more, or taking less damage), that will shift the PC’s decision towards fleeing. Breaking off SC shifts the narrative space. Moves like SBF and ASP do this automatically because the inevitable result is the PC either seizing something, or failing to seize something. Either way, the battle narrative must adjust. The second thing is, when you have something going on in a conflict other than two people trying to kill each other (i.e. external goals, multiple people, etc) the options for MC moves are easier to come by. When a PC fails SBF or ASP, the PC might get to choose 1, but I am definitely making a hard move as well. “Oh, you took the position? Great for Dremmer, since he booby trapped it. Your best friend Cal’s guts splatter across your face as he steps on a mine. Take 3 harm from the shrapnel. You’ll be acting under fire if you want to do anything productive in the next few moments as you try to get over the shock of his loss.” In SC, I’m more inclined to just let that harm as established +1 ride. Or maybe not, either way, its semi-ridiculous to compare the “balance” of moves based on their miss conditions, since a miss is a golden opportunity for the GM to lay down a serious hard move.
Even so, the superiority of SBF can be deceptive. The most obvious reason is the default Apocalypse World setting is not melee focused. Thus, there will be relatively few opportunities to “break” the move by calling a weapon “something valuable” with the sole intent of using the mechanically superior move. In a scenario where SBF might even be triggered, it still has to make sense in the fiction. You can’t just go around declaring you are seizing the gun of every dude shooting at you, unless you also have teleportation. So, if that option is out, and you still want to “game” the move, the only other options are to maneuver to avoid SC or find something actually valuable you do want to seize, and trigger the move. In either case, the game works just as intended, and fits with the fiction. The same goes for any of the other battle moves. On a battlefield with multiple moving pieces, if there are tactical objectives worth achieving that are not solely focused on killing opponents, it will almost certainly make the most fictional sense to try to achieve those objectives while also killing the enemy. In this case, there is no disconnect between the moves and fiction. So, I think the actual times thiswill come up are exceptions, rather than the rule.
The arena example is the most obvious exception. So, taking that, I think SBF on the other dude’s weapon is fine…but wait a minute. Is it so great? I hope you have advanced the battle moves and roll a 10+, cause if you want the move to work for you mechanically, you need choose 4 in order to get both +/- harm, while also getting an unbroken weapon. Regardless, the move basically works once. If you don’t get the weapon, you don’t get the weapon. You don’t get to keep spamming SBF until you get the weapon. Also, brace for that hard move if you didn’t get it because of a miss. If you got the weapon and its broke, I guess he got your weapon, or pulled a unbroken back-up weapon. In this case, you can do SBF again to try and get the new better weapon (which again, makes sense in the fiction, so you’re hardly breaking it), but you also just put yourself at a disadvantage by having a broken weapon. If you win through, get the weapon, its unbroken and you still need to fight, how are you going to game this again? Claim you are trying to seize his really cool earring? SBF is not as clearly advantageous as you paint it.
Point is, and I haven’t exhaustively playtested this, but I would be willing to bet, if you describe tactically sound and context appropriate fictional actions, the moves will trigger to your benefit.
Richard McNutt yep I’ve been reading the escape clause wrong, but you’re still unable to do any other moves than Single Combat unless you run away. Thanks for clearing that up. I still don’t like the move though, it’s punishingly biased against the PC.
So do you think Obi Wan had to flee from Single Combat and then come back to try his alternate moves as you describe?
I answered on the Kickstarter page, I’ll copy it here:
Single combat is for when two enemies meet head-on on neutral ground, with no purpose other than to harm one another, with no acceptable outcome other than injuries and death. If either enemy has any other interest or any tactical advantage, use a more suitable move.
When you DO use single combat, don’t expect a long slog. It should be over in 1 round, sometimes 2, very rarely 3. (The punishing miss is to serve this.) Even between two heavily-armored, high-hard PCs, by the end of round 2 they’ll see which way the wind is blowing and one of them will be looking for a way out.
For PCs, read “flee” generously, depending on the situation. If a PC wants to break off the fight, get a little distance to catch their breath, and then re-engage on more tactical terms, you might have them act under fire to do it, but you wouldn’t tell them that no, they have to run blindly instead. For NPCs, though, be stricter: fleeing means abandoning the fight for real and trying to get to safety.
But when it comes to it, meeting an enemy in single combat is really strange behavior, tactically bizarre, counterproductive, and most PCs will never do it. It’s perfectly possible, if you don’t have single combat-prone PCs, that you’ll play Apocalypse World for years and never see the move in action.
…And I’ll add that for gang fights, same thing: if the gangs meet at an arranged time on neutral ground with no other purpose than to inflict harm on one another, real Gangs of New York stuff, only then do you use single combat.
Replied on Kickstarter, thanks.
No worries on the escape clause. Glad it helped. It sounds like Vincent and I are on roughly the same page re: the use of SC. Good to know that the NPC is supposed actually flee flee. Although, if I was playing the Fallen Empires version, one might expect an epic sword duel situation with a PC’s nemesis. Depending on how the combat played out, I might give the NPC a chance to circle around if I thought it would up the drama/tension.
Regarding Obi-won vs. Anakin, in the fiction, once swords crossed they were face to face, swinging swords at each other the whole time until Obi-won broke off. So, I would definitely say that he did “flee” the fight in that sense. Whether or not he “HAD” to, depends on what you mean. He may very well have fled not because he knew he would lose, but because he knew he would win, but would have to kill Anakin in order to do so, and wanted to give Anakin one last chance. Or, maybe he was going to lose, so he wanted to place himself in a better position tactically. Or, maybe something I am not considering. Either way, he might have fled, or broke contact, in military parlance, as conscious tactical move not born of desperation.
That is how I would describe it using the current moves structure of AW2E. I think its totally possible to adjudicate the O vs. A duel with other PbtA moves structures that don’t include the SC endless loop. In fact, without that piece of the pie, I probably would not have described Obi-won taking the higher ground as “fleeing.” I would have called it maneuvering. However, I think its semantics, and the current moves accomplish the fiction well, while reinforcing what Vincent says about not wanting to be in SC. So, I like them.