Rules light but with enough options to differentiate characters

Wrong edition.

That's objectively the best edition.

Yeah. That's not the D&D edition we hate, i.e. the wrong edition in that context.

I really need to just start some PbtA threads rather than letting all the threads revolve around the imperfections of Dungeon World. DW is a tiny slice of the PbtA spectrum.

I like that DW is rules light, lets DMs collaborate with players in storytelling scenarios, and has an elegant resolution system of failure, partial success, success.

That said, it's dragged down by a lot of unnecessary D&D fetters that don't add much to the game. The same six stats and the funny experience system leaves me underwhelmed. I think Fellowship is somewhat of an improvement but not the bet PbtA game by any stretch.

That said, the section on DMing is probably the best how-to on running a game that I have ever read. If you do not care about the game, at least read that section. It will improve your DMing for whatever system that you want to run.

Total hyperbole, but here's my issue with all PbtA systems (despite owning both The Sprawl and Apocolypse World)
>all I have to do is roll a 7 on 2d6?
>I want to talk to the town guard
>8, he listens but is grumpy
>I want to convince the king to give me his private army for this quest
>10, the king not only sends his commander but makes him give you a blow job
>I want to open a door
>4, Lololol it stays shut and you sprain your hand

No thanks. And I know you can add +/-whatever to represent difficulty but at that point I'll play DnD.

I have one main criticism of Dungeon World
>The main combat move doesn't influence the situation
In other PbtA games all the moves, succeed or fail, change the situation the character are in in some clear way. This change prompts the next reaction from the players and gives the games a nice forward momentum. In Dungeon World the Hack & Slash move only changes the situation if it results in a killing blow, meaning that in combat you can wind up making the same roll repeatadly, so conflicts feel less dynamics than other PbtA games.

The rules are pretty clear that you only roll if the outcome is in question, that is if you failing makes no sense you don't roll, you just do and, and if you couldn't succeed then you can't roll and fail.

>AD&D
>rules light
In what strange world do you live in?

>dice an icosahedron
>match a row and a column
>compare two numbers
I never realized how complex that was!

>I really wanted to like Dungeon World because I like Adam
The only person I could see say this is Adam himself. He's a hack of a game designer, an obnoxious role player (see the RolePlay thread that shouldn't even exist) and a massive SJW, and the nicest opinion I've ever seen of him is "I don't know who he is."

It's not the most complex thing in the world, but its the most ass-backward and counter-intuitive implementation of the concepts I've ever seen in a non-parody game. You knew what he meant, and you still posted. Fuck you.

>Mistaking complexity for amount of rules
Nigga. Complexity and number of rules are two separate axis on the grid of systems.

I don't hate it. It's really good as a gateway, entry-level RPG for people who are new to the hobby entirely. This game is how I and my friends got into TTRPGs.

However, it does have some serious problems. The rules are light, which is good at first when your virgin PCs don't know anything, but then you really start to see the imbalances as the players become more experienced.

The main problems I found with the game when I GM'd are that the Fighter is ridiculously overpowered, most of the enemies are really weak, and the game provides virtually no guidance on balancing encounters with enemies or whatever, like D&D does with Challenge Ratings. Also, the way DW does combat, there's no actual initiative order. Enemies only attack or act if you roll a 9 or lower on the basic 2d6 attack roll (plus your mods), so unless the GM is really strictly enforcing some kind of turn order, enemies just stand around waiting to get hit like punching bags. All of these things, in my game, combined to have the Fighter just walking around and murdering everything he touched. His Strength score was so high that whenever he rolled 2d6 to attack, he always got the 10+, which allows him to deal his damage with no retaliation from the target enemy (which is one of the few ways the enemies get to act, absent GM fiat). Even when they did hit him, his armor was so high that it reduced incoming damage to a pittance, usually zero, because most enemy damage was like 1d6 or 1d8 or something like that. The biggest problem was that nobody else even came close to the Fighter's power, so any encounter I could think of that would stump the Fighter would absolutely destroy the other players. I wanted things to be fair and challenging for everyone, and this sheer power imbalance was a big problem.

Dungeon World has its niche, but if you already have experience with TTRPGs of any kind, you're already outside that niche and likely won't enjoy the game all too much.

[d20 + ↓AC] >= [THAC0]
is mechanically identical to
[d20 + BAB] >= [↑AC]

c

>"Yeah guys, why don't you buy my- I mean my favorite RPG! It's flawless and really captures both the narrative beauty of games like Apocalypse World and FATE, but also the thrill of classic D&D! It's perfect in every way."

You're either willfully misinterpreting what others are saying or don't understand. Nobody is saying that THAC0 is difficult, but it is more complex than BAB, by design. It doesn't matter if the two are mechanically equivalent when BAB can be intuitively grasped and THAC0 cannot.

>but it is more complex than BAB, by design.
It's not just mechanically equivalent, it's the same number of steps.

And it's counter-intuitive. Your point?

>those 6 AC values that all take the same to-hit at a given level
I believe your post, but it doesn't fit with the tables you're showing me.

I don't hate it, but I didn't care much for Dungeon world.

Which at first I thought was odd, because I really like apocalypse world (minus strange and unnecessary class based sex powers).

But dungeon world doesn't capture any of my favorite things about Apocalypse world, drops some things like the threat charts and conflict resolution in order to incorporate dnd elements that, in my opinion, don't really work well.

I think you're better off looking into other light rules fantasy games if you're looking for that. Maybe FATE?

>the Fighter is ridiculously overpowered
He's easily countered.
>most of the enemies are really weak
They tend to have low HP, but people forget positioning (i.e. when to let your players damage them) which feeds into...
>enemies just stand around waiting to get hit like punching bags
Common problem. Enemies act without needing to roll. You (as a GM) will be going around the table player to player as interest demands, but you don't have to start a player's turn with their action. Hell, tell them that the enemy in front of them is attacking, and make them choose Defy or Hack. Some monsters, you can just open up with the monster's listed move. If a PC defeats a monster and things are a bit boring/easy, make a _dungeon_ move on them. Basically, fuck them over like this is paranoia.
>str so high always 10+, armour so high no damage
Take these away from the player, or feed him monsters who ignore armour and/or ordinary combat. Chase him with ghosts. That'll settle his hash.
Basically, DW doesn't satisfy crunchy gamist masochist play for players, unless you as a GM are a sadist. And you are allowed to be one if they like it.

Not same user,. but what?
Is really that how it works.?

>the same to-hit at a given level
20. On a d20.

Yes?
What is it you're confused about?

The XP thing

Can somebody post a PDF?

Sort of. DW gives XP for Bonds (which are semi-random or at least chosen blind for new players) and for low rolls.
So in a sense, it "encourages" you to fail (though it's more like a consolation prize) and doesn't link directly to what other players consciously want.
It's much like saying D&D XP doesn't encourage actions you'd like to see at table, and ignores what characters should believe. It's not untrue, but it is misleading.

My DW game is long over and I doubt I'll ever start it again. In any event, the player who did the Fighter is also just a huge power-gamer who purposely derails all games by just attacking anyone and everyone around him with the strongest character he can make. Every game with him just turns into a GTA-style rampage where he keeps massacring civilians and fighting until the death. No story, just mindless violence. It was fun at first, but I got bored of it very quickly. He refuses to play any other way or pay attention to the plot or do anything other than chaotic evil murderhoboing, so I try not to play with him any more.

It's in the OSRG trove. God knows why.

Good choice, user. May your games go smooth, and your players' plans explode in tears and flames.
dungeonworldsrd.com/

In Apocalypse World, you gain experience when you roll using a given stat: either one you choose yourself (you'll probably be good at it) or one someone else chooses (you'll probably be bad at it). This incentivizes both filling your role in the party and doing what other people at the table think is interesting.

In Dungeon World, you gain experience for getting a 6- result on a roll. This incentivizes rolling your worst stat to rack up experience when in a controlled situation.

End of session moves aside, which are just a drop in the ocean of increasing XP costs, the only way for you to get XP is failure.
That means the fastest way for you to become better at what you're doing is to completely ignore what you do best, instead tackling whatever problem you're least suited for.

Compare AW, where the group marks two stats (which, unlike in DW, represent distinct courses of action) for each character that give you experience when you roll them, meaning that you get rewarded for doing what the rest of the table wants to see you doing.

you get xp for failing at rolls, as such it incentivises characters doing things outside their area of expertise in order to advance

>either one you choose yourself
You never highlight stats yourself. The GM and the player of the character with whom you have the highest Hx each highlight one.

...

>In Dungeon World, you gain experience for getting a 6- result on a roll. This incentivizes rolling your worst stat to rack up experience when in a controlled situation.
Is this really a thing? If I was DMing a player who did this, I'd run that bastard into the ground. Surely nobody gets away with deliberately failing rolls?

That's a rule in every system. And other systems allow you to increase the difficulty so you can say "well you can try but gooooood luuuuuuuck" instead of just "no" and being a wet blanket.

>If I was DMing a player who did this, I'd run that bastard into the ground.
Yes, that is the design intent. There is no 'failing in a controlled enviroment' because the GM can simple allow auto-success on riskless actions and make sure actions that are rolled and failed are punished accordingly.

Out of curiosity, have you tried Barbarians of Lemuria?

so what's the difference between rolling an impossible to hit difficulty and the GM just saying 'no you can't do that', the pleasure of rolling dice?

Precisely.

Id say thats more rules medium at best. If you really think that any edition of D&D is light you really need to get out and play more games. There are games like Small Towns where three numbers and one item make up your character.

>That's a rule in every system. And other systems allow you to increase the difficulty so you can say "well you can try but gooooood luuuuuuuck" instead of just "no" and being a wet blanket.
I think it's much more important in DW than other games to enforce when you can and can't roll at all. No comment on whether that's a good thing in other games or whatnot.

Theres more to the space than "impossible to fail", "could go either way', and "Impossible to succeed".

It's usually a matter of a GM hoping they'll just roll average to low and hoping the player wont ask questions if they roll high and still miss. Generally a really bad way to run things

if this is your mindset, pbta games are not for you

i get that some players think of tabletop games like numbers challenges, where you min-max your dude so he has the most experience and the biggest sword so he can kill the biggest things. that's the way DND teaches you to play

PBTA and DW are not about that. You actually, get this, roleplay a character. And that character has goals and niches and unique mechanical functions in the context of the group. The game is set up so you're moving a story along and fulfilling the mechanical functions of your class in interesting, creative, fun ways.

if you want to abuse those mechanical functions to make turn your character into a sheet of numbers and then make those numbers as high as possible, DW is not the system for you.

In DW, it's more about "make them roll to face all the different consequences" and "it's about a 60/40 shot, but if you lose you die" than naming a DC higher than 30.
The granular, simulationist difficulty thing is just not what's really going on with the game. I say this as a guy who likes GMing Unisystem which has much more granular rolling and graduated success/failure.

I think you meant to reply to the guy I replied to.

It doesnt need to be granular though, BoL just has difficulty of -1 through +3, and that works perfectly well. Having looked at the website, DW seems to be very philosophically split. Its a game with very little prescribed power level, but nothing but prescribed actions. Its much more like a boardgame than D&D in certain ways.

It's a compromise, it's a way to give a player a soft no without making them feel stripped of agency or the possibility of attempt. The failure is theirs and not thrust upon them.
If I wanted to be told no and not even allowed to try, I wouldn't be playing a ttrpg, I'd larp as a teenager still at home with my parents on a school night.

Shills.

Tension. I shouldnt have to explain that.

This fight again - sigh

but if it's impossible then their is no tension (or only false tension)

You don't need an arbitrarily high DC for that.
You can just wait until after the roll to say no.

Yes, but you could come up with a way to modify your chances. A wall may be impossible to climb, but with magic and ropes you may manage it yet. DW requires the GM to tell you if such a thing would be possible. Other systems allow you to come up with solutions of your own. Im not advocating for D&D mind you, I just dont think DW really solves may of its problems. I honestly think the optimal game would combine some of the good ideas DW has for moves with the popular skinner-box mechanics of D&D.

Thats not what was asked about though. A GM which tells a player something is impossible after they attempt it is worse than one who says it before, and one who doesnt tell them at all. He's being disingenuous.

And in PbtA games you achieve that granularity by breaking up impossible goals into smaller ones. So instead of asking the king to let you marry his daughter maybe first you show him you're a useful ally, then that you're a helpful adviser, then you convince him to give you a title, then you compete against other suitors and after however many rolls that's been then you can try and marry the princess.

>Yes, but you could come up with a way to modify your chances.
You can do the same in DW. If you present a situation where the previously impossible task becomes possible, it's now possible and can therefore be rolled.

>He's being disingenuous.
So is the one setting the impossible DC.

>Its much more like a boardgame than D&D in certain ways.
I agree. Basically, like most boardgames, it's aggressively non-simulationist. It's almost a pacing system for a conversation about dungeoncrawling. I sometimes wonder if the win/lose mechanics like hitpoints could be stripped out and you could end up with a D&D themed madlibs sort of game.
I also wonder what the point of that would be, but you see where I'm going.

Yes, but thats only if it can be made possible by a single measure, and even then its at the GM's discretion. Compared to a game with established means and numbers where you can make use of multiple factors to make the impossible possible collectively. Its not something I enjoy, but some people like fishing for bonuses to make things work by attrition. Its pretty much what Shadowrun is entirely powered by. Im not making a judgement of quality, just stating that its a blindspot of DW.

oh yeah, i did

>A wall may be impossible to climb, but with magic and ropes you may manage it yet. DW requires the GM to tell you if such a thing would be possible. Other systems allow you to come up with solutions of your own.
I don't quite understand your logic here. Why in DW can't you go
>can I climb this wall?
>no that's impossible
>what if I use the climbing equipment in my adventuring pack
>ok, sure
has the player still not come up with that soltion on their own?

>I just dont think DW really solves may of its problems
neither do I, I don't really like DW, I just don't think the specific thing you're talking about is an issue

Only if its unreasonable.

What you're thinking of is Mouseguard, which is literally adventure madlibs. Its better than DW in my estimation because its at once broader in its scope and clearer in its themes and tone.

Yes, but at the GM's discretion. The difference is that in crunchier games unless the GM makes a task obviously and overwhelmingly impossible there's usually a workaround, and the GM cant stop you from using it.

If they'd try to stop you doing something you reasonably could just because then they're a bad GM and you shouldn't be playing with them regardless of system

>Yes, but thats only if it can be made possible by a single measure
Where do you pull that from?

...

>Only if its unreasonable.
Same for the GM saying no.

Sure, again, not a quality judgement, just a statement of fact about the way each game performs.

Perhaps not only, but a GM is more likely to accept a single measure than multiple. If I had a wall I needed to scale you're more likely to agree I could do so if I presented a ladder of adequate height rather than a series of boxes made of various materials of various sizes. I was speaking in absolutes, that was my mistake.

Well, there may be a missmatch in reasoning. Thats what crunch is for.

DCs are also wholly dependent on the GM's potentially mismatched reasoning, except for the very few cases explicitly spelled out in the rulebook.
And if we're talking impossible DCs, they're extremely unlikely to be spelled out.

Im not sure what you're saying. Are you implying that there are no impossible DCs given in the average D&D text? Because Im pretty sure thats not true. Recall, for example, that even a 25 is beyond most starting characters.

>Perhaps not only, but a GM is more likely to accept a single measure than multiple.
No, why would they? Multiple complementary measures are more likely to succeed than just a single one. That's just common sense.

Speaking of complementary
>a series of boxes made of various materials of various sizes
What kind of stupid example is that?

No, I'm saying DCs as arbitrary as a simple "no" and therefore just as likely to be subject to a mismatch in reasoning.

>Perhaps not only, but a GM is more likely to accept a single measure than multiple. If I had a wall I needed to scale you're more likely to agree I could do so if I presented a ladder of adequate height rather than a series of boxes made of various materials of various sizes. I was speaking in absolutes, that was my mistake.
"Tell them the requirements and ask," my dude.
If I find myself in this situation, I have a quick think (sometimes switching action over to another player to buy time) and think of three things the players will need. If necessary one or all of them will be time-consuming enough to kick the issue down the road so I have even more time to reorient myself. Example:
>"Can I climb this steep and dangerous cliff?"
>"No, for it is too steep and dangerous."
>"What would I need to get up there?"
>DungoenMasterx64.exe is not responding
>End Now ->Wait"You will need a climbing harness of exceptional make, a rope of spider silk, and harpy ichor to ward off the cliff serpents, lest they sever your lines or devour you.
>"Shit, that sounds pretty challenging, but I'm sure there's cool stuff up there. I'll keep an eye out for those things."
>DM writes these out as loot/lure options, makes notes.

They're not though. Im no D&D fan, but even I know most DCs are fairly well benchmarked.

Its a perfectly good example of one clear solution vs. a stack of mediocre ones. In crunchier systems both are identical. You can have a +1 racial, +1 equipment, +1 circumstance, +1 magical, +1 alchemical, and +1 skill bonus to a task and its identical to a +6 from a single source.

I love how you villainized everyone who hates your game by claiming they were obviously rollplayers.

The issue with your argument is that there are two games that do what DW does, and do it better and more interestingly. DW is a mess of stupid ideas that were cribbed from a bunch of other sources than then thrown together without any thought put into it. It's as simple as that. The system is absolutely wretched. Considering that my favorite TTRPGs ARE rules-lite games that focus on role-playing over rollplaying, your argument that I hate DW based solely that I like to min max and win at everything is absolutely worthless. Hell, that's not even counting that DW is the game you want to play if you DO want to succeed at everything forever, because it's a babby RPG that feels bad whenever players don't win.

You're right, which is why I outlined how thats different here: Its a difference between player-dictated solutions and GM dictated solutions. There will be a dialog either way, but in one instance the GM decides what will work, and in another the system decides and the players use it. Each has its place, and most games do a little of both to allow for more collaborative play.

hey bb don be mad is just internet

if you hate DW that's cool, just don't play it. i've been DMing a campaign for a year and I like it and my players like it

i agree that there are problems with DW; namely that hitting a bandit is as easy as hitting a swordmaster, and that ranging the bonuses from +1 to +3 makes it hard to come up with loot and progression long-term

my original point, however, and I think it's still salient: if you look at DW and think "Sweet I can just deliberately fail lots so I can level up and then murder everything in the game!!!" then you fundamentally do not understand what DW is about

like, in literally every RPG ever published, you will always find ways to "beat" the game and "beat" the GM. this is hardly a unique aspect of DW.

I think I already asked you this, but have you tried Barbarians of Lemuria? Its pretty much a less prescriptive DW with slightly more granularity.

>most DCs are fairly well benchmarked
Yes, so is a "no". The details are entirely up to the DM.

>Its a perfectly good example of one clear solution vs. a stack of mediocre ones.
No, it's a perfectly good example of one clear solution vs. one extremely wobbly and convoluted solution.
What kind of mentally deficient DM would count each box (which all serve the same function) as a separate bonus?

>what kind of GM beancounts bonuses
One who's stuck playing D&D...

also i don't really know how to respond when you say "it sucks and it's a mess and it's wretched and it's worthless and you're making fun of me or something"

now, if you said "character creation is too limited and does not allow for customization" then we could have an actual conversation, and I could respond with things like "you should take a look at class warfare, which really opens up what you can do with your character"

or if you said "loot sucks" I could say "it's true that you can't just add to hit bonuses because it breaks the game; but that just encourages you to use fictional tags. I find that it's much more interesting when I need to think up shit like a key that opens the door to someone's soul as a loot, instead of just lazily telling someone that it does more damage to ghosts"

or maybe if you said "the difficulty is fucked and it's an auto-win game" I could respond "well, the intent of the game is not to be a player meatgrinder; however, at the end of the day, difficulty is really in the hands of the GM. if you want to challenge your players, you can, either by pumping monsters full of HP and damage dice (lazy) or giving them interesting and creative tags that you can use to turn combat into an action scene rather than a series of dice rolls trading hit points"

No but it sounds cool, I'll check it out.

>hitting a bandit is as easy as hitting a swordmaster
No it isn't.
*sigh* If the bandit is a credible threat and worth rolling against, then the swordmaster should be immune to Hack and Slash unless the player can create an opening with another Move. Immediately the swordmaster is prompting twice as many rolls and is twice as dangerous (approx).
Alternatively, if the swordmaster is a credible threat, the bandit should be a non-issue unless he and twenty four mates form a pike block.

Give it a look, but be sure to ignore all the setting and history stuff. The book is like 50 pages without setting, and 300 with. Thats pretty much its only weakness.

Fine, a bandit is just as easy to hit as the bandit leader. You can move the benchmarks all you want, but there will always be a lack of differentiation.