Last AW session I found the Angel’s “Healing Touch” move results to be designed strangely.
The roll results read as follows:
On a 10+, heal 1 segment. On a 7–9, heal 1 segment, but you’re also opening your brain, so roll that move next. On a miss: first, you don’t heal them. Second, you’ve opened both your brain and theirs to the world’s psychic maelstrom, without protection or preparation. For you, and for your patient if your patient’s a fellow player’s character, treat it as though you’ve made that move and missed the roll.
The usual goal for this move is healing and the different results reflect that well. The 6- result is fine too, because in addition to failing to heal, the MC can make a unpleasant move.
What I found strange is the complication on 7-9 very possibly isn’t a complication. Especially if the Angel has weird highlighted and gets a hit on the opening your brain move. Instead of just healing 1 segment the Angel gets an additional XP point (because the character actually makes the move instead of “treat it as though”, like with the 6- result) and receives “new and interesting information”.
In short: the 7-9 “Healing Touch” result is way better than the 10+ result unless the player misses the open your brain move.
That does not feel right to me. Do I miss something in the move’s design? If you agree, how do you solve this issue narratively or mechanically? I would like to reserve psi-harm for misses (would get boring in the long run anyway) and handing out wrong information doesn’t work forever too.
Any feedback is gladly appreciated!