Dungeon World and Dangerous DMing
Last night I ran the second and final session of Treasure Hunt with Dungeon World. It was a lot of fun, fast paced and action packed. My only regret was that the game probably should have had a third session, as there was a lot of material left barely touched on. I think adding 50% to my estimates of length for Dungeon World games is a good idea :)
At the end of the session, Marcus made an insightful observation. Unlike the first session, the PCs had a series of bad rolls at one point and things got very hard for them. Marcus commented that he felt like there were times that I was struggling to handle the series of bad rolls as the mechanics were beginning to lead the adventure down a different path. This was true, but it was not one that concerned me. In fact, it was actually one of things I liked the most about the session.
A series of bad rolls can be bad for the PCs in any game. But Dungeon World's explicit structure and GM Moves does more than most RPGs to encourage the bad stuff to be really bad. Its much harder for the GM to soften the bad stuff to steer towards a preferred story path. I personally find this is refreshing and makes being a GM more exciting. Its also a part of DW's "find out what happens through play" ethos and sees the GM truly improvising based on player actions.
The ability to truly improvise is something that I struggle to do. Over the years, I have found that as a GM in most RPGs I can pretty dictate the story path. Though I use this to good effect (my short Exalted seasons or my Kapcon scenarios), I have over the past few years striven to push myself out of this comfort zone. In particular, I find dramatic scenes (including combat) in this style of gaming to be dull unless it involves a difficult player (as opposed to PC) choice.
Many attempts to increase my GMing improvisation have been unsuccessful. As an experienced GM, I tend to be resistant to new ideas or mechanics influencing the way I GM. I also find that many RPGs that promote this do so too strongly and in an unforgiving manner to the GM. However, there has also been successes, mostly around RPGs with systems for conflict where the outcome is not predetermined (yeah, I know this is all old hat indie gaming theory :)). For example, one of the reasons that D&D4e appealed so much to me was the ability for the GM to confidently set down a challenge and then let the PC actions decide the outcome.
Returning to DW, one thing that appeals to me about it is that I find it easier to delve into dangerous situations as the PCs can get themselves out of it at cost, as detailed here: http://grandexperiment.livejournal.com/228331.html. However, from last night, I also realised that the mechanics of DW also push me as a GM into those dangerous situations if the PC actions dictate it. The result of this is that despite not planning for it, there was a sprawling action scene that got more and more dangerous to the point where the PCs were on the edge of being captured. Now, this was certainly a bit of a shock from where it started, but once I had overcome that shock and realised that the system wasn't trying to usurp my game but add to it, it became a lot of fun for me as GM.
It is true that in that scene that I made a few bad GMing calls. One thing I will say about DW is that it puts a lot of pressure on the GM to make good calls quickly. These were probably the times that Marcus noticed me struggling to deal with the calls the system was asking me to do. However, for the most part I think that I made good calls that built the scene up. The result was that through play DW transformed a somewhat statically presented important location where most of the action of the scenario was to take place (complete with places for me as a GM to elect to ramp up the tension (yawn)) into a place that was dynamic and dangerous mostly due to how the PCs acted in and interacted with it (complete with the tension being ramped up due to the PCs actions too). This is also one of the main reasons that DW lends itself to translating and improving the presentation in AD&D modules, as they are full of these.
I am not sure how obvious this process was to the players but it was pretty obvious to me as GM. I found that a huge part of the awesome was delivered to me, rather than me needing to create it in advance. Given that the session was only 2.5 hours, there were so many dramatic scenes (chases, standoffs, set pieces, parleys, cliff-hangers, one on one duels, tense negotiations...) and a variety of ways that they were resolved. I especially liked two later scenes in the catacombs that I wanted as a GM to resolve quickly. Rather than push it, the PCs themselves found quick solutions other than to hack the enemy to pieces. If I had cut them short as a GM, it would have reduced the tension and detracted from the players. Instead, both resolutions were great and felt earned by PC ingenuity.
I did come out of the session with a bunch of more lessons learned. I think I tend to hit slightly too hard on 7-9 results. Also, I learnt again that the most obvious GM call is often the best, even if its not the coolest thing to happen. In Against the Cult of the Reptile God, the scenario has a large dungeon set piece where the focus is not on getting through it (like in Treasure Hunt) but on exploring it. I don't think the rules need to change to handle this environment, but reducing the scope and scale of GM Moves given that environment may provide a better result.
At the end of the session, Marcus made an insightful observation. Unlike the first session, the PCs had a series of bad rolls at one point and things got very hard for them. Marcus commented that he felt like there were times that I was struggling to handle the series of bad rolls as the mechanics were beginning to lead the adventure down a different path. This was true, but it was not one that concerned me. In fact, it was actually one of things I liked the most about the session.
A series of bad rolls can be bad for the PCs in any game. But Dungeon World's explicit structure and GM Moves does more than most RPGs to encourage the bad stuff to be really bad. Its much harder for the GM to soften the bad stuff to steer towards a preferred story path. I personally find this is refreshing and makes being a GM more exciting. Its also a part of DW's "find out what happens through play" ethos and sees the GM truly improvising based on player actions.
The ability to truly improvise is something that I struggle to do. Over the years, I have found that as a GM in most RPGs I can pretty dictate the story path. Though I use this to good effect (my short Exalted seasons or my Kapcon scenarios), I have over the past few years striven to push myself out of this comfort zone. In particular, I find dramatic scenes (including combat) in this style of gaming to be dull unless it involves a difficult player (as opposed to PC) choice.
Many attempts to increase my GMing improvisation have been unsuccessful. As an experienced GM, I tend to be resistant to new ideas or mechanics influencing the way I GM. I also find that many RPGs that promote this do so too strongly and in an unforgiving manner to the GM. However, there has also been successes, mostly around RPGs with systems for conflict where the outcome is not predetermined (yeah, I know this is all old hat indie gaming theory :)). For example, one of the reasons that D&D4e appealed so much to me was the ability for the GM to confidently set down a challenge and then let the PC actions decide the outcome.
Returning to DW, one thing that appeals to me about it is that I find it easier to delve into dangerous situations as the PCs can get themselves out of it at cost, as detailed here: http://grandexperiment.livejournal.com/228331.html. However, from last night, I also realised that the mechanics of DW also push me as a GM into those dangerous situations if the PC actions dictate it. The result of this is that despite not planning for it, there was a sprawling action scene that got more and more dangerous to the point where the PCs were on the edge of being captured. Now, this was certainly a bit of a shock from where it started, but once I had overcome that shock and realised that the system wasn't trying to usurp my game but add to it, it became a lot of fun for me as GM.
It is true that in that scene that I made a few bad GMing calls. One thing I will say about DW is that it puts a lot of pressure on the GM to make good calls quickly. These were probably the times that Marcus noticed me struggling to deal with the calls the system was asking me to do. However, for the most part I think that I made good calls that built the scene up. The result was that through play DW transformed a somewhat statically presented important location where most of the action of the scenario was to take place (complete with places for me as a GM to elect to ramp up the tension (yawn)) into a place that was dynamic and dangerous mostly due to how the PCs acted in and interacted with it (complete with the tension being ramped up due to the PCs actions too). This is also one of the main reasons that DW lends itself to translating and improving the presentation in AD&D modules, as they are full of these.
I am not sure how obvious this process was to the players but it was pretty obvious to me as GM. I found that a huge part of the awesome was delivered to me, rather than me needing to create it in advance. Given that the session was only 2.5 hours, there were so many dramatic scenes (chases, standoffs, set pieces, parleys, cliff-hangers, one on one duels, tense negotiations...) and a variety of ways that they were resolved. I especially liked two later scenes in the catacombs that I wanted as a GM to resolve quickly. Rather than push it, the PCs themselves found quick solutions other than to hack the enemy to pieces. If I had cut them short as a GM, it would have reduced the tension and detracted from the players. Instead, both resolutions were great and felt earned by PC ingenuity.
I did come out of the session with a bunch of more lessons learned. I think I tend to hit slightly too hard on 7-9 results. Also, I learnt again that the most obvious GM call is often the best, even if its not the coolest thing to happen. In Against the Cult of the Reptile God, the scenario has a large dungeon set piece where the focus is not on getting through it (like in Treasure Hunt) but on exploring it. I don't think the rules need to change to handle this environment, but reducing the scope and scale of GM Moves given that environment may provide a better result.