Friday, August 19, 2016

Tavern Moves in Dungeon World

Someone suggested that NPCs don't make moves in the comments of my Tavern Characters Post but p. 18 doesn't corroborate this
The GM’s monsters, NPCs, and other assorted beasties also have moves, but they work differently.
In any case, I mentioned that I would write a new post on Tavern Moves. Partly to alleviate their concerns, but also partly because I've been thinking about other expectations players tend to have about tavern interactions. The two biggest expectations of taverns in fantasy settings are wenches and brawls. They will be addressed in that order.

Wenching
The aforementioned commenter suggested also that players do stuff that triggers moves. I gave the Wench a move called Sexual Healin', which allows the wench to treat patrons as if they had either taken Make Camp or Recover without actually resting long enough to do either. In that playbook, it was written as a Wench Move. Here it will be presented as a special move framed as if the PC is not the wench.
Special moves are moves that come up less often or in more specific situations. They’re still the basis of what characters do in Dungeon World—particularly what they do between dungeon crawls and high-flying adventures.
When you pay for a night’s “companionship”, roll +CON. *On a 10+, you heal as if you took a Recover action without the required amount of rest. *On a 7-9, you heal as if you chose to Make Camp instead. *On a miss,gain a Debility of the GM's choice

Brawling
One of the mainstays of a tavern brawl is the use of fists to deal nonlethal damage to your opponent(s). This often happens because you missed (6-) on Carouse or Parley. Pulling out a real weapon is a major faux pas in a brawl. 

Whenever you tear it up in a tavern, roll +STR. *On a 10+ you deal your normal damage as Stun Damage. If you have moves relating to dirty fighting, tavern settings, or unarmed combat that modify damage numbers they apply to your dealt stun damage. *On 7-9 you deal your damage as stun damage, and choose one of the following:
  • When the brawl is over, you are hit up for tavern repairs worth 2d6-CHA coins.
  • When the brawl is over, you must roll for Outstanding Warrants.
  • Someone cut you with a bottle, or real weapon. take 1d6 damage

On a miss you choose two, and don't deal damage. The brawl is over when the party outnumbers their opponents, or when all the party members have either been knocked unconscious or suffer the stunned debility as outlined below.

Stun Damage
Stun damage is non-lethal damage. A PC who takes stun damage is defying danger to do anything at all, the danger being “you’re stunned.” 
Dungeon World isn't particularly clear on this, but digging up debilities I find:
Stunned (INT): That last knock to the head shook something loose. Brain not work so good.
Stun Damage also states:
This lasts as long as makes sense in the fiction—you’re stunned until you can get a chance to clear your head or fix whatever stunned you.
It is weird to me that there are two different rules for the same thing. I prefer the debility rules:
Debilities are harder to heal than HP. Some high level magic can do it, sure, but your best bet is getting somewhere safe and spending a few days in a soft, warm bed (with recover, it's 3, or 2 with a healer BUT you can go Wenching to reduce the time using these rules). Of course, debilities are both descriptive and prescriptive: if something happens that would remove a debility, that debility is gone.
If a character manages to not become stunned, or take a debility they will be knocked unconscious when their HP would be driven to 0 by stun damage. This applies to GM characters too, because the default ruling doesn't make sense.


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