Category: Powered by the Apocalypse

I have a question for those who run Apocalypse World by Play by Post (PbP). Mostly I’m wondering about working on your Threat Map. The book says to work on it after the first session, since you’ll want time to consider what kind of Threats each person or group is, and space to think about their backstory and motivations. But with the way I’m doing it for the game I’m running, we had characters made and then I got a thread going during my own time. (We didn’t start right away)

They had given me large numbers of NPCs that could be easily and quickly listed in their threat category, and sometimes I have ideas for moves or countdowns. What I’m wondering is if it would be acceptable to use the free time between writing posts to dwell on the Threats even if the session is still technically ongoing. In face to face tabletop playing, you’d have a few hours and then meet next week. Here, I write what’s happening and over the course of the new few days the players will say what they’re doing and I say what happens as a result, etc. etc. But there’s far more time to think and plan then if we were doing this live.

The basic question: Would it be acceptable to have written out some Threats, maybe even a clock or two, during the constant downtime I have to unleash in the first session? Or should I just stick to the book rules and avoid having any of that until the second session? Do the first sessions where everyone is playing live tend to be shorter due to character creation? If so I might end it a bit sooner then planned.

Thanks for any advice you have.