DMing for normies

What isn't conventional about DW?

Serious question.

>is DW really a good introduction to how RPGing works
If you want to introduce the players to a terribly convoluted ruleset, sure.

DW is perfect, I've introduced many-a-normie to RPG's with it.
They get all the fun of playing the fantastical characters they want and telling a story together. If your players have any interest in theater, improv or some other creative hobby, they'll even enjoy it more.

Honestly, the only problems I've ever experienced with DW is in a non-normie group. They have a very high tendency to emulate vidya/animu, complain about their bad-ass characters fumbling rolls and buying lots of junk goblets and special dice while they still have no clue how to actually role-play.

Depending on your groups preferred setting you can try one of the other world-games. Apocalypse world is quite good if you want to sex things up a little in a somewhat tasteful matter.

Veeky Forums, we really, REALLY need to talk about the recent surge in popularity of "Dungeon World" and its sister systems around here, especially the trend of recommending it as a good system for "introducing" players to our hobby.

I understand that there is an obsession with being subversive and finding the most super specialest alternative to D&D possible, but having finally taken the time to read into Dungeon World and the reasons why this game has caught on around here and other forums I feel the need to be frank: this NEEDS to stop. I try as hard as I can not to be a "badwrongfun" style curmudgeon, but this is not a role playing game. Full stop. This is not a role playing game, and this disingenuous promotion of it as such is legitimately dangerous to this hobby. This is an exercise in self-congratulatory free form group storytelling.

This is a "game" where the danger of literally any challenge is by design arbitrary, not just from encounter to encounter, but from action to action. There's no actual combat or tactics at play, everyone takes turns basically describing a "cool fantasy battle" and resolve everything through "dodge danger" and "hack and slash" rolls triggered at the GM's whim. This is a game proud of being anti-structure, where the goal is to explain to the GM how many cool things your players do instead of actively overcoming any challenges in your way.

It's chaos. Consequences of certain failures are decided collaboratively. The GM is encouraged to be more of an antagonistic player than an actual referee of any rules. At Veeky Forums's suggestion I watched a few videos of people playing this. At one point the *GM* asked the *PLAYERS* what rumors they had heard in town.

I get that the people involved in this game by admission shill it everywhere, but please stop pushing this as a system for beginners. It's dangerous to our hobby and the behaviors it promotes encourages entitled players with disruptive expectations for how parties are meant to work.

Stop.

Try Fatal, will make for a fun session.

>This is a "game" where the danger of literally any challenge is by design arbitrary, not just from encounter to encounter, but from action to action. There's no actual combat or tactics at play, everyone takes turns basically describing a "cool fantasy battle" and resolve everything through "dodge danger" and "hack and slash" rolls triggered at the GM's whim. This is a game proud of being anti-structure, where the goal is to explain to the GM how many cool things your players do instead of actively overcoming any challenges in your way.
>It's chaos. Consequences of certain failures are decided collaboratively. The GM is encouraged to be more of an antagonistic player than an actual referee of any rules. At Veeky Forums's suggestion I watched a few videos of people playing this. At one point the *GM* asked the *PLAYERS* what rumors they had heard in town.
So?

>DW defense force

>dangerous to our hobby
Everyone playing is aware of the mechanics at play and how it's different from other RPG's. Those are actually also clearly stated in the guide.
It's a different approach. Many people like this approach. We're not going to stop.
Have fun trying to change people opinions through internet rants.

>At one point the *GM* asked the *PLAYERS* what rumors they had heard in town.
AKA: "So what shit do you want to do?"

I'm really not. haven't even read any of the books. All I'm reading is you beingmad that DW is close to freeform and therefor RUINED!

So I ask you again? What's the problem? I mean, you will probably just reply with soem more greentext and reaction images, but maybe you actually have a point.

>It's chaos. Consequences of certain failures are decided collaboratively. The GM is encouraged to be more of an antagonistic player than an actual referee of any rules.

>it promotes encourages entitled players with disruptive expectations for how parties are meant to work.

Its literally right there. It makes mongoloid players want to do stupid shit like "cartwheel over a dragon and backstab him in the anus" without taking the proper feats etc. It just creates chaos and disruption in the hobby as a whole.

I wish players would be less entitled, because the only thing they are entitled to are tears and a dead character.

>without taking the proper feats etc.
Spot the threeaboo everyone.

Why can't we ever just talk about the system we like without having to defend it? Fuck you.

In all honesty that's absolutely what the medium (if you can call it that) needs. How many times have I played D&D and wished I could do cool shit like that without reading 5 splat books and building a character specifically designed to do that one trick? And it's not just D&D, it's close to every conventional RPG.

So I guess thanks for making me check out DW. Faggots like you are the best marketing it could get.

Anti-DW attack force

OP what you want is
Dungeon World

It's pretty much objectively one of the best currently out there. It has fast easy to use mechsnics and is perfect for beginners, it's a lot cheaper than most of these other rules bloated systems that cost fifty dollars. There is no reason for extra rules when it is he role playing that matters. Dungeon World is fast and innovative and still feels exactly like the spirit of ADND before DnD 3.5 destroyed the hobby and ruined a generation of role players.

In my last Dungeon World session my human fighter wrapped a vampire in a bear hug and wrestled him out a window. This is real roleplaying we are talking about here, not baby 3.5 shit. You can't do that in D&D or Savage Worlds without passing a shitton of grappling checks and have to have specialized in grappling since level one.

In Dungeon World? You just get 7-9 or 10+ on 2d6, and the GM narrates the results. Simple as pie, and a HELL of a lot better than these other overly restrictive "games" that serve simply to make you suck the developers' cocks.

>aggravating other games in order to promote DW
Are you daft?

Don't listen to the lies. Ignore Get 3.5 or Pathfinder instead. They are superior in every way. Perfect games.

>In my last Dungeon World session my human fighter wrapped a vampire in a bear hug and wrestled him out a window. This is real roleplaying we are talking about here, not baby 3.5 shit. You can't do that in D&D or Savage Worlds without passing a shitton of grappling checks and have to have specialized in grappling since level one.
>In Dungeon World? You just get 7-9 or 10+ on 2d6, and the GM narrates the results. Simple as pie, and a HELL of a lot better than these other overly restrictive "games" that serve simply to make you suck the developers' cocks.

So its essentially "make shit up". Thats not a fucking game, its storytime for babbies. Jesus Christ these DWCucks

>It makes mongoloid players want to do stupid shit like "cartwheel over a dragon and backstab him in the anus"

You could have left it right there.

Let me say this once and only once:

That stupid shit you want to do, is not cool.

It's funny, but it's fucking stupid. it would be like if Harry Potter killed Voldemort with a massive ass-fart, it's fucking gay and retarded. i am sick of players who want to play literal sentient jet fighters in my campaigns. I have cancelled entire campaigns over this bullshit.

Fucking Dungeon World enables this bullshit but really the worst part is just how fucking boring it is. There is nothing interesting or unique about it.

And all the DW fans can do to promote it is strawman D&D () and ()

Oh and by the way faggot, that's not true in "every conventional RPG" hell even read Savage Worlds fuckhead, you don't need feats to do combat tricks and they are pretty easy to pull off.

Why should I not aggravate them? They are inferior games based on a restrictive, simulationist mindset. Dungeon World is not for baby restrictive follow-my-rules shit. It is for real creative roleplaying.

Stabbing dragon anuses and farting people to death is real creative babbi boi

...

Daym son, dat smackdown

Googel "Five-Room Dungeon." Its a design process for making basic adventures. Hell, I'm combining it with a random encoutner table, some extra set monsters, a few sidequests, and using it for a more classic dungeon-crawl game.

And you even took the bait.

Is it really bait when there are people right now in this thread that believe that shit?

>Veeky Forums getting this baited by copypasta
>people unironically defending a copypasta

I thought you were better than this. No XP this session, as you clearly haven't learned anything.

>implying its not the poster that's defending the pasta

Just look at the IP to post ratio bruh
Inb4 this is "bait" too

Nobody said DW is beter than any other game. I don't think DW is beter than any other game, because it's a different approach for different people.
That's the whole point, thinking one way of playing is better or "more true to the genre" is sincerely dumb.

I actually agree, but its fun to trigger the autists

>My gf and her normie friends
>MY GF AND HER NORMIE FRIENDS

Don't.

Why post a copypasta if you're going to defend it? The point of copypasta is that they're usually shitty jokes and posts, and we're using them to fill in for the usual shitposting.

Besides, you can't be telling me that people are going into a thread to talk about a game that other people play that they don't like, are you? Why would someone be so mad about something that doesn't affect them?

What's next, you gonna tell me people go on the internet and tell lies?

>fun to trigger the autists
Well fuck you. I can never have a nice thread about the game I enjoy because it always devolves into a shitstorm of people attacking DW and people not smart enough to ignore it.
It's actually quite depressing and I've given up any expectations.

I have found that if you defend the pasta, it usually riles people even more, because they think its real or more real.

Sorry

No, he is a troll.

A shitty troll.

...

So I guess yeah, he's daft.

If DW allows me to swing on a chandelier while firing a crossbow I'm fucking playing this shit. I like cruchier games, but some narrativist stuff sounds like a nice diversion.

Your rage only makes it more appealing.

>This is a "game" where the danger of literally any challenge is by design arbitrary, not just from encounter to encounter, but from action to action. There's no actual combat or tactics at play, everyone takes turns basically describing a "cool fantasy battle" and resolve everything through "dodge danger" and "hack and slash" rolls triggered at the GM's whim.
But I mean, a lot of that's true for other games too. It's the GM's decision to decide when to call for skill checks and shit in D&D, isn't it? Or have I been playing every edition I've ever played of that wrong?

>It makes mongoloid players want to do stupid shit like "cartwheel over a dragon and backstab him in the anus" without taking the proper feats etc.
So what exactly are the "proper feats" for "cartwheeling over a dragon and backstabbing him in the anus"? I have a build to make.

>swing on a chandelier while firing a crossbow
This one thing, this fucking chandelier thing, destroys any and all enthusiasm I have for crunchy systems that spend 20 books telling you what you can do, rather than a system of a few pages telling you what you can't do.

If that means players get colorful with describing what a roll represents, so what. Immersion is good. The only GMs worried about this are the types who want to put a leash on player agency. Does that indicate control freak behavior? Maybe. If you find yourself saying "this is my game" rather than "this is our game" congratulations, you're that guy. Less is more.

Depends OP. What genres are they into? How many of them do things like theater or improv? Do any of them freeze up or have social anxiety? When they're given a task do they prefer specific, concrete steps or relaxed, generalized rules? How you run this will dpend a lot on your players.

If they seem like the types that might enjoy it, Danger Patrol is free and very easy.

Combat expertise, dodge, mobility, skill focus: acrobatics, carthwheel, improved cartwheel, greater cartwheel, anus stabber, improved anus stabber, greater anus stabber, draconic anatomy I

I may be missing some of the prereqs.

How do these players feel about zombie movies/games OP? If they're fans you could make an easy five room dungeon in a modern post zombie apocalypse with stupidly simple mechanics.

Also 17 ranks in jump and tumble.

Or you can take a level in wizard and use "Power Word: Cartwheeloveradragonandstabitintheanus"

Now let's be fair, there's probably a skill trick+martial maneuver that you could take if you didn't mind being a weeaboo faggot with immersion breaking cooldown powers holy shit just play 4e already you fucking faggot

You don't want Dungeon World OP. Speaking from experience, unless you have mad improv skills among your gf and her normie friends, the wide open style of dungeon world is just going to get them sitting there awkwardly.

Normies can't just leap into playing pretend like we can, it's something we've learned to do.

You're going to want to bait them into it with the mechanics, something like a normal board game they'd be familiar with.

So go Savage Worlds. It's pulpy, character creation is fun and simple, and the dice exploding mechanic, while contentious here, is beloved among those who don't care about probability and just want to have fun.

I was actually in the same shoes at you at one point

They wanted to play a Star Wars campaign so we all went with Star Wars d20. The result? Absolute disaster, the system was way too much and they didn't even know ANYTHING about the Star Wars universe, they only knew the main characters at face value and only watched 1-3. That might have been fine if they actually remembered anything like the SETTING, but they literally only cared about lightsaber battles. Literally, I'm not exaggerating, that's all they knew, and Anakin's name.

End result? We ran a homebrew sci-fi rules-lite game set in the Milky Way. Easy to grasp for normies, and really surprisingly got them to actually start paying attention to settings in media and actually being competent enough to end up playing SWd20 after all.

IMO, don't go with anything that is even remotely complex to someone who isn't used to games, and don't try to make them learn a setting that's established. Genuine honest recommendation.

A pasta for the ages, it's to see it's steel alive.

>Five-Room Dungeon
oh shit this is going to help out my next session or two

While this user may be a bit aggressive about it, I have to agree with them. Without there being risk to their reward, players tend to not be invested in the campaign or their characters as much and are more willing to drop the entire thing, finding it too boring. Something that is annoying when you spent however much time world building.

Play something that runs on BRP.

Rune Quest or Call of Ch'thulhu.

Simple system, modular as fug; COC is great for murder mystery and horror of all stripes, and Rune Quest can enthuse simply on the premise that your character and others can become permanently maimed from standard combat, which if your crew is a jocular manly bunch should provide some degree of levity.

>Get 3.5 or Pathfinder instead

wew

I'm afraid that Savage Worlds is gonna be too complex and gimmicky for them, Dungeon World would maybe be too open and old dnd too basic. Fuck.
Thanks mate will do

>people are playing glorified pretend in ways i don't like!!
oh boo fucking hoo

I've wound up running games for curious normies on a few occasions and Everyone is John is really good for it. Simple but fun concept with straightforward rules, emphasis on creative thinking and roleplay, you can set it anywhere and it's competitive if you're with people who are into that sort of thing.

I don't think it's "dangerous" per se, but to say everyone playing is aware of the mechanical differences is a bit much. Folks experienced in other systems would be aware of the differences, but people being newly introduced to the hobby likely wouldn't, which is user's problem, I think. Dungeon World is probably okay if you're coming into it with enough experience not to let it give you unrealistic expectations of most other systems.

Yeah, I'm confused as to why everyone is pushing for more complex games rather than something simpler and easier to understand.
Hell, I ran Little Fears at a sorority for three months before finals put an end to that game and everybody had a blast.

I GM'd for this exact combination of people. It was awful. Two sessions. It took me forever to get them to make characters. I gave them a week in advance, and sat down to go through it with each. The only person who actually got into it was my girlfriend. They flaked after the second session. Hell, they didn't even have the excuse of being too busy, since we lived in the same house and I could walk into their rooms and see them watching tv. 0/10 never again

Maybe Fantasy Craft? Might be simpler.

Have they expressly said they don't want anything complicated? I probably wouldn't drop them into Shadowrun, but a bit of complexity isn't necessarily bad. That aside, Everyone is John is quite good.

Are you looking for something with that traditional "roll up a character and lets save a village" feel, or are things like Big Motherfuckin' Crab Truckers and Princess Pillow Fight on the table?

That's a pasta. It mocks the anti-DW folks as though they don't know what they're talking about. Don't agree with it, it makes you look bad, dude.
(There was even a hilarious vocaroo of it once, but it expired, sadly.)

Don't expect "normies" to make their character in their own free time. People who aren't mega-nerds don't like it when they're assigned homework that has to be turned in before they can play a game with you. Besides, making characters in a vacuum is a bad idea anyway, and leads to poor party composition and thematic clash. Don't do that shit.
Instead, make characters at the first session. Sit around the table, talk to them about the game and the world you'd all like to see, show them their character options, let them pick something and go. (Dungeon World works great for this, and was basically designed for introducing normal folks who don't want to have to learn a bunch of rules to roleplaying dungeon crawls.)

Honest suggestion OP: try playing Everyone is John, rules explained within a minute , plus normies usually like getting a bit edgy so they'll prolly find it entertaining. Furthermore it's a great way of finding out if they even want to play pnp for real; if they find John boring they'll most likely think the same or worse of more elaborate games.

I did the mistake of making a huge custom campaign and setting for an identical situation and it ended up being a waste of time bc the normies decided it wasn't their cup of tea after one session.

Test them out with some one page game before you set up a proper campaign for them.

Oh hey Virt.

That pasta predates Virt, actually. Some of the first posts of his I saw were him agreeing with that stupid shit.

Sry for not noticing another Johnsayer, I couldn't be arsed to scroll through the whole thread.

>has gf
>calls others normies
REEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

>It's funny, but it's fucking stupid. it would be like if Harry Potter killed Voldemort with a massive ass-fart, it's fucking gay and retarded. i am sick of players who want to play literal sentient jet fighters in my campaigns. I have cancelled entire campaigns over this bullshit.

This is a feature, not a bug.
Also there's literally nothing preventing you from fluffing an attack roll in DnD the same way.

If players want to play a serious game of grimdark stabbing, they will describe their actions as grimdark stabbing.
If players want to play a goofy game of cartwheeling farts, they will describe themselves with cartwheeling farts.

This is a good thing. It only becomes a bad thing if some players want one tone and some want another.

And all of the above applies to 90% of RPGs.

>I need to DM for my gf and her normie friends
>DM for my gf and her normie friends
>my gf and her normie friends
>normie friends
>normie
don't

>Furthermore it's a great way of finding out if they even want to play pnp for real; if they find John boring they'll most likely think the same or worse of more elaborate games.
This is a very good point.