I finally decided to sign up to roll20. Found a game I was interested in, but I never got a reply as to whether or not I could make do with just the srd.

Looking through it, it appears to be playable, outside the fact that it gives no xp values for monsters, though it does list a variety of other ways to get xp.

I'd really like to do this, and finally get to play a tabletop roleplaying game, but I can't find any games for the books I own. But I can find multiple games for systems I don't own. Yeah, spend $100 dollars on rpg books, and you can't use a single one of them. I mean, really, their choice of rpgs on there makes no sense. They list rpgs even I have never heard of, but they don't have a single game for BASH or mutants and masterminds or any single fantasy rpg I own. And no, I don't actually own any D&D books.

Anyway, I'm thinking I may need to hide the fact that I don't actually own a dungeon world book. Can I conceivably get away with that, or am I doomed to simply never get to do something I've been wanting to do for 10 years now. I don't even know if I'll actually enjoy it or not, for all I know I may finally get to do this only to find I've wasted 10 years of my life for nothing.

I think you can, especially if some of the other players are willing to lend a help. If you ever need "XP values" for the monsters, just assign them, but that's only if you're looking to run it, which I doubt you want to do.

Not sure how the 10 years or $100 figure into all of the above, but whatever the case, just apply and if you're accepted, have fun!

The SRD is the full game (perhaps minus a bit of extra explanatory fluff). You only get experience points when you fail a roll (a result of 6 or less on a move) and at the end of a session (by answering a few questions). Monsters don't have xp values.

As an aside re: monsters, don't be fooled by their seemingly low HD. Remember that AC is damage reduction and that their "moves" are only limited by the GM's creativity. Eg: a dragon can fly around to avoid getting hit, can set fire to entire environments, makes men and beasts flee in terror etc...

Quote from: Necrozius;928410The SRD is the full game (perhaps minus a bit of extra explanatory fluff). You only get experience points when you fail a roll (a result of 6 or less on a move) and at the end of a session (by answering a few questions). Monsters don't have xp values.

Yeah, but I think some GMs have come up with houserules. Something like "collect HP of the monster, when you reach 50, mark experience".
Admittedly, it's a houserule, and I don't even think it's a good houserule, but I guess that's what the OP is asking for?

So this post is not about Dungeon World?

Quote from: jux;928421So this post is not about Dungeon World?

If you're asking in relation to my post, I misunderstood it to mean some houserules for DW which I assumed to be popular.

Quote from: AsenRG;928417Yeah, but I think some GMs have come up with houserules. Something like "collect HP of the monster, when you reach 50, mark experience".
Admittedly, it's a houserule, and I don't even think it's a good houserule, but I guess that's what the OP is asking for?

Oh. Oops. I misunderstood the OP. Carry on, nevermind: I don't know of any house rules for DW, other than other published Off-Shoots by other authors.

Quote from: Necrozius;928453Oh. Oops. I misunderstood the OP. Carry on, nevermind: I don't know of any house rules for DW, other than other published Off-Shoots by other authors.

Actually, no, I think you were right:). On second thought, I doubt a houserule I might have seen once has gained all that much popularity, don't ask me why I thought that's what the OP was asking about.

Bottomline, monsters don't give you XP in DW;).

Quote from: Necrozius;928410The SRD is the full game (perhaps minus a bit of extra explanatory fluff). You only get experience points when you fail a roll (a result of 6 or less on a move) and at the end of a session (by answering a few questions). Monsters don't have xp values.

As an aside re: monsters, don't be fooled by their seemingly low HD. Remember that AC is damage reduction and that their "moves" are only limited by the GM's creativity. Eg: a dragon can fly around to avoid getting hit, can set fire to entire environments, makes men and beasts flee in terror etc...

I didn't notice the monster's hit points, what I did notice though is that you roll against a static value for your attack, with no mention of AC or anything of the sort. Yeah, armor gives a tiny amount of damage reduction, but really any character is just as likely to successfully land a hit against a highly trained combatant as a complete novice.

And just so we know, the game started without me getting a reply. And he added the 3 people that posted after me, when there was supposed to be 1 opening. Yeah. I take it nobody likes noobs, even if they label their game as open to new players.

You can play it with just the SRD, yes.  

I would disagree that any character hits as well as a novice. Hack and slash is a STR move, whereas Volley is a DEX move. So, the high STR is going to hit more than than high DEX char. Further, as damage is class-based, even if thiefy hits as much as fighter, fighter does more damage when she hits, due to a higher damage dice. I think that's cool. You can slam someone with your fighter fists and it does d10. Rockin'...

I meant who you're fighting against makes no difference in how likely you are to hit them. Every character always has the same chance to land a hit no matter who their opponent is. So if a fighter is, well, fighting someone, it doen't matter what their level is relative to his, or even their dexterity, nothing has any effect on how likely he is to land a blow. For him, everyone's AC is effectively 7, no matter what level they are, what armor they're wearing, or even what their stats are. Its the same for everyone. I find that completely nonsensical.

Naw, you're just expecting the rules to be doing something they don't.

The DW hack & slash move is only for melee, not combat generally.  DW combat is mostly freeform (you'll have noticed there's no initiative rules). The GM is making a constant stream of rulings about whether what's happening in combat right now is melee, defying danger, or whatever else.  If you attack a squirrel, or a groggy goblin guard, it's probably not melee.  If you're attacking a dragon or a balrog, it's probably not melee either (any more than if you were trying to spear an armored helicopter with flamethrowers on it) unless it's been established that you've somehow closed the distance and you've squared off with weapons.

The GM has to adjudicate opponent skill (or their difficulty in general, from whatever source). For example, if you attack Inigo Montoya, it may not be melee either, just a suicidal gauntlet of Defy Danger rolls as you try to keep your weapon in your hands and your hands attached to your arms.

The other way opponent deadliness creeps in aside from damage, which has been mentioned) is monster moves.  The Otyugh, for instance, has a 'fling someone or something' which might get triggered when you miss or roll 7-9 on your melee, which makes it a lot more dangerous if you're in a bad place to get thrown around.

One technique for handling difficult actions in combat or otherwise is to ask the player how they go about it; if the player is doing something insanely hard (e.g. fighting from from a swinging chandelier), their description will usually offer a number of points where something might go wrong (e.g. trying to hang onto the swinging chandelier in the first place).

Having said all this, I do (personally) find the lack of numerical difficulty levels inconvenient, because it takes a lot of energy to do this sort of characterization for every roll.  Because of that, I find I'm less consistent as my energy and attention to the present moment varies naturally over the course of the session.  It's really handy to say, 'this is a difficulty 5 jump' at times.

I suspect that this lack of difficulty made more sense in the original Apocalypse World. In fantasy, you've got tiny pixies with pins for arrows, room-sized sloths, village guardsmen, famous duellists and balrogs all in the mix, it's a huge range of combat skills.

In AW's take on post-apoc, life is cheap and any asshole with a shotgun is a mortal threat, so it seems to me there's less work to do to stretch the mechanics across a huge range of difficulty levels.

Quote from: BlackHeart;928502I meant who you're fighting against makes no difference in how likely you are to hit them. Every character always has the same chance to land a hit no matter who their opponent is. So if a fighter is, well, fighting someone, it doen't matter what their level is relative to his, or even their dexterity, nothing has any effect on how likely he is to land a blow. For him, everyone's AC is effectively 7, no matter what level they are, what armor they're wearing, or even what their stats are. Its the same for everyone. I find that completely nonsensical.

Remember, though, that not all targets can be approached equally. Charging into melee combat against a goblin vs the terrasque has very different risks. Positioning your character into melee proximity of certain targets triggers Defy Danger moves like crazy. A Warrior might not even get a chance to make an attack roll.

For example, I ran a fight involving a giant Octopus. The warrior charged in, but first had to roll to avoid getting tripped or entangled by tentacles. He failed and couldn't get close enough to even attempt a melee strike. Next he had to roll to resist having his weapons torn out of his grasp. And then the OTHER characters had to roll to save him vs getting eaten alive.

That's very specific, but again, the GM is empowered like CRAZY to pull all sorts of dangerous consequences for approaching different dangers. Charging a goblin means little consequence for a melee attack; charging Medusa will trigger a save to avoid getting petrified before they can even lift their sword to strike.

This isn't D&D. It's a different beast and comparing the two games' methodologies doesn't work, even if the words/terms for certain things are similar.

Then I take it dungeon world will give me no idea on how most other tabletop rpgs function? Its the only game I can find on there that I actually have access to...

I'm thinking I need to just give up.

Quote from: BlackHeart;928559Then I take it dungeon world will give me no idea on how most other tabletop rpgs function? Its the only game I can find on there that I actually have access to...

I'm thinking I need to just give up.

Dungeon World would give you an idea of how Powered by Apocalypse games function, but no single game, D&D included, can give you an idea how all games function.

You want an idea how ordinary games function? Download and read the free Atomic Higheway RPG, and pay special attention to the comic in the beginning, the rules examples, and the GMing chapter. For that matter, feel free to read the adventure, too, it's a good example, and I've never seen any Referee actually using it;)!

If you still have questions, just PM me here, and I might meet you at Skype and run you a one-shot while I'm still in sick leave.

Last but not least, there are literally hundreds if not thousands of free games, so feel free to peruse them all:D!