Understanding the Line

16 Feb 2024

In a 2010 blog post, John Harper argued that custom moves in Apocalypse World have a danger of “crossing the line” between player and MC roles. I’ve read it before, but only recently come to appreciate the actual implications of the division between the player roles. To quote the relevant passage from Apocalypse World itself (on page 109 of the first edition):

Apocalypse World divvies the conversation up in a strict and pretty traditional way. The players’ job is to say what their characters say and undertake to do, first and exclusively; to say what their characters think, feel and remember, also exclusively; and to answer your questions about their characters’ lives and surroundings. Your job as MC is to say everything else: everything about the world, and what everyone in the whole damned world says and does except the players’ characters.

This makes perfect sense. In fact, it makes so much sense that I sorta skipped reading it my first time through the game. What I understood was “players decide what their characters do, and the MC decides everything else”. And isn’t that how all games with referees work, more or less? After finding myself drawn to Apocalypse World’s social conflict rules, and disappointed by other games’, I found myself coming back to this division. The MC, and not the game rules, decide what all the NPCs say and do. How does that compose with the game’s social mechanics? Let’s take a look.

In Apocalypse World, you’d use the move “go aggro” when a character is threatening or intimidating someone. In the second edition it reads as follows:

When you go aggro on someone, roll+hard. On a 10+, they have to choose:

Force your hand and suck it up.

Cave and do what you want.

On a 7–9, they can choose 1 of the above, or 1 of the following:

Get the hell out of your way.

Barricade themselves securely in.

Give you something they think you want, or tell you what you want to hear.

Back off calmly, hands where you can see.

I was surprised that even on a 10+, your target doesn’t have to cave. Even more surprising is that on a 7-9, they can barricade themself safely away from you. After all, isn’t the pattern of moves in Apocalypse World that the player succeeds on any hit, and suffers no consequences on a 10+? From a certain point of view, this isn’t success (you didn’t get what you want). From another, it is: you succeeded at being aggressive and intimidating. How your target responds is still up to the player controlling them. Their options are very limited on a 10+, but a little broader on a 7-9.

Compare this to the Bully rules in Starfinder (the D&D I had nearest to hand, but similar rules exist in any rules-heavy D&D):

You can use Intimidate to bully a creature to temporarily change its attitude to helpful […] The DC of this check is equal to either 10 + your opponent’s total Intimidate skill bonus, or 15 + 1-1/2 × the opponent’s CR, whichever is greater. If you succeed, the creature gives you information it has that you want, takes actions that do not endanger it, or grants limited assistance that you request, but does so under duress. Such a change in attitude lasts for 1d6 × 10 minutes. At the end of this time, the creature’s attitude toward you becomes unfriendly. If you fail the check by 5 or more, the creature’s attitude becomes unfriendly, or hostile if it was already unfriendly. If the creature becomes unfriendly due to a failed check, it is likely to try to deceive you or otherwise hinder your goals.

Here the decision has been reduced entirely to a mathematical formula. The quality of the threat, the setting in which it is made, the relative standing of the two characters involved, or any other factors don’t come into play. Or maybe they do come into play, as modifiers to a d20 roll. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a table in the book somewhere for how status or weaponry should factor into social engagements. Either way, the result of the roll itself is truth: you get what you want if the sum of your modifier and roll are greater than the target number.

By contrast, Apocalypse World places factors like “how scary is this threat” outside the roll entirely. As we saw, a player’s result determines how the MC may respond, but not how they must. A failed roll puts the result totally in the hands of the MC; the target of the threat might retaliate, or escape, or even cooperate with their own agenda. Even on a 10+, the MC may call the player’s bluff if the character believes the threat to be particularly weak. The text constrains players’ choices, but doesn’t dictate the results. Because, as we established at the beginning, that’s the role of the players and MC. They say what their characters do.

For another example, we can look at “sway someone” from Apocalypse World: Burned Over:

When you try to sway someone to your side or your way of thinking, roll+Cool. On a 10+, they have to choose: set reserve and skepticism aside and go along with you, or else explain to you why they must refuse. On a 7–9, if they don’t want to go along with you or refuse, they can choose to ask you for evidence, time, a compromise, or some concrete assurance; they must go along with you if you provide it.

The move guides the conversation towards a decision without taking choice away from the players. If the MC finds your reasoning unconvincing, they have some options with how they respond. Each outcome propels the game forward: if a character refuses and offers a reason, that’s an implicit opportunity to change their mind or learn more about them. If they ask for an assurance, then you have to find or provide it. There’s no need to tinker with the probability when someone is especially weak-willed or closed-hearted. The die roll determines how cool the PC is, the move presents the options, and the MC decides what the world does in response.

This distinction seems to be lost in a lot of PbtA games I’ve played, which I think is a shame! Whatever rules I come up with for my next campaign will definitely ~~steal~~ be inspired by this pattern from Apocalypse World. Maybe in a future post I’d like to dive back into that opening quote about the players’ responsibility, specifically “to answer [the MC’s] questions about their characters’ lives and surroundings”.