Wednesday 19 June 2013

Apocalypse World: Sorting the MC Moves

I posted this on the G+ Powered by the Apocalypse group, and it seems to have met with general approval (or at least no negative feedback) so I thought it would be worth doing a blog post on!

Last night I was preparing for tonight's Apocalypse World game, and going over the events and decisions I'd made while running tremulus the night before.

I wasn't really happy with some of my choices of Keeper moves (the MC in tremulus). I find that during play, I have trouble holding all of the MC moves in my head at once, which interferes with my ability to make a decision at the table without always picking the most obvious thing or spending ages going down the list. 

So I sorted them into categories. With only seven broad things to remember, I'm hoping I can juggle them more efficiently during play.

Positioning - separate them, capture someone.
Portents - announce future or off-screen badness.
Harm - trade or inflict harm (as established).
Stuff - take away, make them buy, activate downsides.
Choices - spell out consequences, offer an opportunity, put someone in a spot.
Reversal - turn their move back on them.
Fronts - make a threat move.

Now I have a shorter list to look over, and I should be able to winnow the choices down more quickly by considering which categories are suited (or totally unsuited) to the current situation.

What do you think? Would you organise them differently? How do you remember the MC Moves and make your choices at the table?

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