#hardhold

[haveyouplayedthisttrpg]

Have you played APOCALYPSE WORLD ?

By Vincent & Meguey Baker

Something’s wrong with the world and I don’t know what it is.

It used to be better, of course it did. In the golden age of legend, when there was enough to eat and enough hope, when there was one nation under god and people could lift their eyes and see beyond the horizon, beyond the day. Children were born happy and grew up rich.

Now that’s not what we’ve got. Now we’ve got this. Hardholders stand against the screaming elements and all comers, keeping safe as many as they can. Angels and savvyheads run constant battle against there’s not enough and bullets fly and everything breaks. Hocuses gather people around them, and are they protectors, saviors, visionaries, or just wishful thinkers? Choppers, gunluggers, and battlebabes carve out what they can and defend it with blood and bullets. Drivers search and scavenge, looking for that opportunity, that one perfect chance. Skinners and the maestro d’ remember beauty, or invent beauty anew, cup it in their hands and whisper come and see, and don’t worry now what it will cost you. And brainers, oh, brainers see what none of the rest of us will: the world’s psychic maelstrom, the terrible desperation and hate pressing in at the edge of all perception, it is the world now.

And you, who are you? This is what we’ve got, yes. What are you going to make of it?

Apocalypse World is the award-winning and critically acclaimed game that launched the Powered by the Apocalypse school of rpg design.

[thydungeongal]

Brief list of games that blasted my mind with gleeblor:

Rolemaster. It was the first RPG I ever played so of course I had no preconceptions about RPGs, so it was all gleeblor to me.

Vampire: the Masquerade. Even though these days I recognize VtM for the ultimately structurally trad game that it is, at the time it was full of gleeblor like its codification of character psychology and morality.

Best Friends. You mean to tell me a game doesn't require dice?! And it can be just about some teen girls doing teen girl stuff instead of them going on an adventure!?

Monsterhearts. Much the same as above, but also the queer angle and genre emulation was extremely gleeblor. Also, the fact that it encouraged players to go at each other after so many co-operative games.

Apocalypse World. These gleeblors are working on multiple different levels! A Hardholder and a Battlebabe are operating on fundamentally different levels of gleeblor!!!

[townofcrosshollow]

Quoth the book:

Basically the cool sexy artist playbook. Also extremely queer. The game includes an extra gender presentation suggestion for this specific playbook that isn't in any others. Starting gear options include a cool long coat and ornate sword

I feel like you have the perfect vibes to play a Skinner in Apocalypse World

Elaborate

[indierpgnewsletter]

✨, 🌱, 💡?

✨ A game I wish more people were talking about

There aren't many indie games that are talked about enough as far as I concerned. So many great games have come out recently that deserve way more discussion and praise: Pasion de la Pasiones by Brandon Leon-Gambetta and Swords without Master by Epidiah Ravachol are at the top of my list.

Pasion de la Pasiones is a masterclass of PbtA design - in many ways, a true inheritor of Apocalypse World's inter-personal playstyle. A playbook like El Jefe (which I'm playing in a game right now) is such a beautiful piece of design. Another designer would have made that character the GM's responsibility, to be played as the villain. Like the hardholder in AW, Brandon Leon-Gambetta trusts the players to take on the roles required to play a cheesy, melodramatic telenovela. At the same time, it's not just up to the players - through excellent move design, it's easy to be an awesome player. Also by empowering players, Pasion de la Pasiones is designed to be fun for the GM as well. It serves up exactly what I cherish most - the ability for players to drive play. I know lots of folks might see the cover and think it's just not for them but I encourage them to give it a try and see the fun on offer.

Swords without Master is amazing for the same reasons. It's a game with a GM that completely trusts the players to make their own fun - to come up with fun questions and fun answers. For those who don't know, it's a sword and sorcery RPG that has a bunch of unique things - dice that decide tone, a motif mechanic, phases that feel like they swap between GMless and GM'd. It also represents that rare thing. Like PbtA, it's basically a whole new type of game, designed from the ground up. It hasn't been as influential but it could have been!

🌱 An unreleased/not-yet-crowdfunding game I’m looking forward to

Oh, man, okay, I've got a couple for this:

Bloodclotte by Nick Duff: This is a hard game to describe but here's my best shot: You play doctors in a steampunk hospital dealing with the weirdest, most bizarre patients that you can conceive. It's less medical drama and more war comedy, a genre that is so rare that the only good example I know is the iconic 70s show, M*A*S*H. It's really good and I'm writing a playbook for it based on Ayurveda. There's a quick start available and I played a super fun playtest campaign of it. Recommended!

Da Xia by Tan Shao Han: Tan Shao Han is a Singaporean designer who is also a writer on Bloodclotte, like me. This game of his (which I have only heard the most delicious whispers about) is a Forged in the Dark game where you play Chinese folk heroes in Singapore during WW2 when it was under Japaneese occupation. I love the concept - it sounds challenging and ambitious work for a designer as well as a unique experience for players. Super excited to get my hands on a playtest draft.

💡 A game that inspired my own design or creative practice

I'm working on a series of card-based games I'm calling the Cardsharp Sonata. The first one is out and it's a sci-fi horror game called This Ship Is No Mother. The entire series is based on the wonderful, insightful Forged in the Dark game Crash//Cart by Galen Pejeau. Crash//Cart is one of the first games I ever wrote about the newsletter after a smash-hit of a one shot. It's about EMTs going out to save people and take them to hospitals in a nightmarish cyberpunk world. It's fast, fun and Galen's sharp design logic really inspired me to make more games.

[thegleampt2fromtheglowpt22001]

im baring my soul talking abt how hard it is for me not 2 b thee twink slave ov a big masked leather clad brutal heaving sweaty what was I talking about. right. apocalyptic mad max hardholder. nd ur out here talking abt star trek. this doesn't improve my material conditions at all

[intoloopin-archive]

can u put loopin in a zombie apocalypse and tell us how that would go?

GIO.

This might be a bit of a ???? answer because I took so many liberties here with this prompt, mostly because I’m very unfamiliar and uninterested in zombie media, BUT! I love post-apocalypse universes (Mad Max, Akira, Rio 2096…) and the sort of characters that come out of that, so here is a modest post-zombie apocalypse reimagining of this characters mostly trought Vibes Only.

All the archetypes and I used come from the 2nd edition playbooks of the RPG ‘Apocalypse World’!

THE ANGEL / SPIRITS MEDICT TAESONG.

Key Words: last second caretaker, death and gore averse, needs problems to be needed.

THE BRAINER / MAD MEN, SPAEMAN MINWOO.

Key Words: mind and body and soul controller, cult favorite, creep of musical heart.

THE BATTLEBABE / ALL TIME SHOOTER SEUNGSOO.

Key Words: dangerous when poked, deadly when left alone, the apocalyptic lover.

THE MAESTRO D / SEDATIVE SMOKE HARUKI.

Key Words: mysterious provider, adrenaline dealer, bearer of loud secrets.

THE DRIVER / HIGHWAY CHAMPION CHIHOON.

Key Word: perfect driver, nature neutral, the one with the eyes and stomach for what's left.

THE GUNLUGGER / COPPER DYNAMITE ZHIMING.

Key Words: quick and hard shooter, mind of hard steel and old copper, default protector.

THE HARDHOLDER / UNDERGROUND RULER GYUJIN.

Key Words: down dirty strategist, lookalike Messiah, with the wide shoulders to hold it all.

THE SAVVYHEAD / MASTER OF ALL MACHINES HANJAE.

Key Words: long time longer for all future, blessed and cursed with wire cutters for hands, barely feels human at all.

THE SKINNER / HIGH CLASS WHISPER JIAHANG.

Key Words: doom darling, disgustingly mortal under smooth gasoline skin, junk royalty.

THE CHOPPER / GUT RANGER HAEGON.

Key Words: concrete jungle animal, made for painful survival, on the lookout to fulfill general hunger.

[patchofvoid]

Day 25 - Hardholder (aw) Urchin Githyanki (dnd)

Rules with an iron fist

[gorgonarcher]

19th Game - Apocalypse World

Well, in honor of the ongoing Maguey Baker vs Cancer bundle, linked below:

I think it is time to do a gorgon archer in the original Powered by the Apocalypse game. Or at the very least the 2nd edition of it.

This is a game put out by the Bakers, Meguey and her husband Vincent, and it revolves around characters surviving in a post-apocalyptic world with the general feel of Mad Max, Last of Us, the Walking Dead, or Horizon Zero Dawn.

It's a game I've played exactly once as run by one Rich Rogers of the Gauntlet in which I played a derivation of my woman with no name who had slight snake-like mutations and was a Gunlugger with elements of the Angel thrown in.

Now, I've been stretching the bounds of "archer" in this blog as regards what I go with for "gorgon archer" and in a lot of cases I basically just give the character a bow and say "yup, she's an archer, see?"

Guess what... I'm doing that again.

First - Choose a Playbook

Okay, so I want to do something a little bit different here and have this character be the person in charge of a small settlement in the wasteland. The leader who has the responsibility of taking care of a number of souls.

Our lady is a Hard Holder

And yes, she's going to be a right proper gorgon with snakes for hair, (though likely not the petrifying gaze) and using narrative goodness to supply that. Apocalypse World especially is zoomed out a bit more than Thirsty Sword Lesbians or Monster of the Week are but is a bit more zoomed in than Uncharted Worlds. By which I mean that TSL and MotW focuses more on detailed action than Apocalypse World does and Uncharted Worlds is more broadly focused on summarizing entire scenes. As such, there's not as much need for a precise definition of physical capabilities.

Now each playbook gives the steps for statting characters of that playbook out, in most cases they're the same, but I left it to here to list steps because sometimes playbooks get a bit off the standard and as we'll have to create our Holding, this is one of those playbooks.

Name

Stats

Gear

Moves

Holding

History

Step One - Name

This isn't a mechanical choice, but a good name does come with a lot of character to it. Hardholders are often given titles that give them an air of authority. In a lot of cases they try to appeal to a sense of family, law, or religious position (though the Hocus is more appropriate for that last). In this case, I'm going to make an oblique reference to a Chinese folk tail and I'm going to go with the name "Sister Violet Python".

Step Two - Stats

For stats, we choose one out of a set of 4 lines. There are five stats:

Cool - Keeping your head, cool under fire

Hard - Hard-headed, strong-willed, violent, aggressive

Hot - Attractive, inspiring, interesting

Sharp - Sharp-witted, alert, smart, perspective

Weird - psychic, genius, weird, strange

In all cases, the Hard Holder is ... Hard. So it comes down to looking at some of the other options and I'm going to go ahead and go for the one line that gives a bit higher Weird. Giving her these stats.

Cool +0

Hard +2

Hot +1

Sharp -1

Weird +1

So she's a bit weird and a bit inspiring, but she's not the best for coming up with plans and she's only middling good at keeping her head on straight.

Step Three - Gear

Now. There are no stats for a longbow in this game. There are crossbows however. Also the Hard Holder's gear is a bit unusual. Most playbooks have a list of gear to choose, but the Hard Holder instead says:

"In addition to your holding, detail your personal fashion. You can have, for your personal use, with the MC's approval, a few pieces of non-specialized gear or weapons from an character playbook.

If you'd like to start play with a vehicle or a prosthetic, get with the MC."

I don't want a prosthetic or vehicle right now. But I will take a bow. There are no stats for it, but I think I will base it a bit on the crossbow which is (2 Harm Close Slow). Instead I will do the following:

Longbow - 2 Harm Far Reload

As for her fashion, since I'm referring to Princess White Snake, she has a bit of a Apocalypse Wu Xia flare with a flowing, long-tailed jacket and silk trousers that combine to give an impression of Wu Xia movie style robes.

I'm not sure what other non-specific gear she would have, so I leave it here.

Step Four - Moves

Unusual for PbtA playbooks, the Hard Holder doesn't get a menu of moves to select from. They get two moves and all Hard Holders get them.

Leadership - Used to command gangs

Wealth - You have lots of resources.

Step Five - Holding

This is where a Hardholder gets to chance to be a bit more unique and also add something substantial to the world building of the setting.

There are a number of default assumptions and then we will modify those with four positive or neutral traits and two downsides. So, I was looking for a farm upgrade, but it doesn't look like that's an option. So let's see what we got after I've picked options.

Holding

Size: 200-300 souls

Gigs: hunting, crude farming, scavenging, bustling market

Compound is Deep, Tall, and Mighty, of Stone and Iron.

Shitty garage of 4 vehicles only 2 of them suitable for battle

Barter: 3

Want: Disease, Strangers

Gang

Small gang of 10-20 violent, but disciplined, bastards

Harm 2-Harm (Makeshift, scavanged weapons)

Armor 1 armor (3 armor when defending the compound)

So, what we've got is a heavily civilian population with stable food supplies and a well-regarded market place protected by a small number of disciplined warriors using makeshift weaponry. They have some form of stronghold that provides a strong defensive position.

I'm going to name this place Alabaster River Sanctuary. Which is kinda weak for Wu Xia naming.

As a note, you'll see the term "Want" there. These are things that cause worries for the settlement. In this case, there's a large number of people, so disease has a way of spreading quickly and the market brings in a lot of strangers, who may cause problems.

Step Six - History

The final point would come with how the character interacts with the other players' characters. Now for this, I'm going to create four other characters:

Sister Ebony Viper - A Gunlugger, badass warrior type

Winward Phoenix - A Savvyhead, a techie person

Karen - A Maestro D' who runs an establishment in the Holding

Each playbook gets a set of questions to ask other players about to set their "Hx" rating with each other character. For the Hardholder it is these.

Which one of you has been with me since before? (get Hx+2 with that character)

Which one of you has betrayed or stolen from me? (get Hx +3 with that character)

She can choose to ask one or both, I'm going to build a more or less close-knit group, so I'm going to only ask the one question for each playbook and focus on pleasant connections.

I'm going to say she'll ask the "which of you has been with me since before" and say it is Sister Ebony Viper getting Hx +2 with them.

Now the other's ask some questions as well, and as I said, doing one per playbook.

Sister Ebony Viper: Which of you is the prettiest and/or smartest? And the person who answers is going to be Winward Phoenix.

Winward Phoenix: Which of you is the biggest potential problem? And this is absolutely going to be Karen.

Karen: Which of you do I find the most attractive? And we're going to go around to calling this Sister Violet Python.

And now we write down the finished character. As I said, the snake hair never really ended up getting into the stats, but I'm imagining that has something to do with her Hard and Weird stats.

Sister Violet Python - The Hardholder

Stats

Cool +0

Hard +2

Hot +1

Sharp -1

Weird +1

Moves

Leadership

Wealth

Holding - Alabaster River Sanctuary

Large Population

Barter 3

Tall, deep, mighty compound (+2 Armor)

Terrible garage, 4 vehicles (2 suitable for battle)

Gigs: Hunting, crude farming, scavenging, bustling market

Wants: Disease, Strangers

Gang

Small: 10-20

Disciplined

2-Harm, Armor 1

History

She's been with Sister Ebony Viper for a long time. Hx +2

Karen finds her attractive. Hx +1

Winward Phoenix Hx +1

[signalhill-if]

Main cast as Apocalypse World playbooks:

Doc: Angel

Yasmin: Skinner

Yvette: Maestro D

KC: Hardholder

Levi: Hocus

Aldrich: Brainer

Main cast as dnd races and classes? I need the rpg hyperfixations to combine

I don't play D&D so this might be inaccurate but that just means y'all can correct me 🥰 I don't know much about the races so I'm just gonna do class and I'll throw in alignment too

Doc: Cleric/Ranger multiclass, chaotic good

Yvette: Slut Bard, lawful evil

Yasmin: Sorcerer, lawful good

KC: Rogue, chaotic neutral

Levi: Warlock, true neutral

[hairxlgroningen-blog]

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[deathhairball]

Thanks to eternal inspiration @jaala.musik for helping me start getting back in the swing (check them tf out) tattoos by the magical @veronica_grace_brett || #jaala #wondercoreisland #joonyaspirit #hardhold #sketchbook #sketchy #sketch #bodyhorror ? #portraits #debatable #practice #practicemakeslesstrash #tattoos #queerartists #māoriartists #hashtags #justwannabesearchablelol #help #ink #biro #ballpoint #pen #claimingbiroasanidentitymarker #punseverywhere #queerpuns #ampanromanticthosocantreallyclaimdammit #foiled #hashtagdialogue #bonuscontent #alwayshappens #adhd #deathhairballtries (at Dunedin, New Zealand) https://www.instagram.com/p/BtoGOiyFYY2/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=2l2sk7ceps0f

[omgcpausandstuff]

When Sergeant Adam Birkholtz went into the cryo chamber he never really expected to wake up. He wasn’t entirely convinced that it wouldn’t just kill him, but he was dying anyway and the world was ending and Dr. Oulransi didn’t have the time to fix him up. “Don’t worry Sergeant Birkholtz.” he said, “I’ll come back for you when we get this all sorted out.”

When Adam opened his eyes again, he was convinced that the old doctor had kept his word somehow. But no. This was Justin “Ransom” Oulransi, Dr. Oulransi’s great grandson. Still a doctor though, or, well, everyone else calls him their “Angel”. Adam thinks he certainly looks the part, but he’s keeping that to himself for now. Too much else to worry about, because...

The world really did end.

Shits fucked.  In the quiet moments he can feel something watching him, whispering to him. He tries not to listen, thinking that something must have happened to him in his long sleep; but Ransom tells him that everyone has that now. They call it the psychic maelstrom. It hungers, and some people worship it, but not everything that it says is a lie; after all, it lead Ransom to Adam.

Other problems are more prosaic. Nobody has enough, and they’ve got to fight to defend what they’ve got. That’s why the folks camping in the ruins that were once Samwell used the last of their medical supplies to patch him up. They need him to bypass security at his old base so they can get military grade weapons to defend themselves from raiders encroaching raiders.

Adam has visions of himself leading them down there, and training them all to fight like Marines, saving the town. He could be a hero. But he knows that if they go down there they’ll figure out what that base was really for. They’ll know that Adam was a part - a small part, but a part nonetheless - of what made the world the way it is now.

Adam doesn’t think he could stand for Ransom to look at him with hatred in his eyes.

But he also knows that the alternative is to let Ransom and everyone else at Samwell be killed or enslaved.

He knows what he has to do.

[cartridgeconverter]

Anna is a Hardholder (basically the leader/warlord of a settlement). He’s her boytoy

Instead of writing fanfiction or actually GMing I just read RPG sourcebooks and assign all the characters in shows I like classes

[florafaunaandeldritchhorrors]

anyway somebody scream at me to finish my homework instead of thinking about how to hack apocalypse world to run the originals

[townofcrosshollow]

So I'm relatively set on my stats, but not super set on them.

There's a piece of TTRPG design advice that I try to follow when it comes to player-facing mechanics likes stats and moves in games- your moves and stats should represent what you want your players to spend most of their time doing.

So in a dungeon crawling fantasy action game, like D&D, they have three stats for fighting and action (STR, DEX, CON), two for figuring out traps and using magic (INT, WIS), and one lone stat for talking to people (CHA). A literal heirarchy of importance. Whereas in a teen drama game where you're all teenage monsters, like Monsterhearts, they have skills equally split between social drama related skills (Hot and Cold) and spooky monster related skills (Volatile and Dark). A game like Lasers and Feelings makes it even more apparent- at all times you should either be using lasers, or using your feelings.

The names themselves also tell you something about the game and what you're meant to do in it- the old school functional vibes of D&D's stat names vs the new school evocative vibes of MH's stat names vs the comedic and lighthearted vibes of L&F's stat names.

The style I'm aiming for with the stats in this game is specific, evocative, and slangy. Specific- if they don't work at all outside the context of this setting, then they add even more to the setting. Evocative- I want the names to imply what kind of person would have this skill, rather than a generic "strong" or "smart" designation. Slangy- I'm very inspired by how Apocalypse World uses words like Hardholder and Angel, which feel like things that people in the setting might actually say.

The two I'm 100% set on are Glam and Signal. I'll get into Signal at some point, but rest assured that it fulfills all of those requirements. Glam isn't just charisma- it's about having a presence. You aren't necessarily better at convincing people, but you're better at making people like you. It's a combination of charisma, style, and hotness.

I'm also set on having a physical skill, something for fighting and intimidating. I just can't find a name for it. I need something that conveys both ability with weapons and a person who shouldn't be messed with. If you have any suggestions, please let me know.

My fourth skill... I'm not sure. Originally it was going to be Wit, something that combines persuasion and intelligence but without being inherently likeable like Glam. But I worry that's falling into the trap of having your skills reflect INT, STR, DEX, and CHA. Maybe something about resourcefulnes instead?

[ialpiriel]

Wicked Clarity The Hardholder

Name: Wicked Clarity Looks: Woman / junta wear / gorgeous face / commanding eyes / massive body

Stats: Cool+1, Hard+2, Hot+1, Sharp+1, Weird-2 Moves: All Basic, Leadership, Wealth

Gear: shotgun (3-harm close messy), fashion (ragged fraying cowboy hat with a badge, fatigues shirt, jeans with leather kneepads, cowboy boots, a bandolier belt)

Holding: 75-100 souls, hunting/farming/scavenging (surplus: 1-barter, want: hungry), makeshift compund of concrete steel and rebar (+1armor in tis defense), an armory of makeshift and scavenged weapons, garage of 4 utility and 4 battle vehicles, gang of about 40 violent bastards (2-harm gang medium unruly 1-armor) + your compound is tall, deep and mighty, of stone and iron. Your gang gets +2 armor when fighting in its defense + for gigs, add protection tribute. Surplus: +1barter, want: +obligation. + your garage includes 7 battle vehicles, plus a couple more utility vehicles if you want them + for gigs, add a bustling, widely-known market commons. Surplus: +1barter, want: +strangers - your population is filthy and unwell. Want: +disease - your gang is a pack of fucking hyenas. Want: +savagery.

Vehicles:

Utility:

Pickup (massive=2 +rugged +off-road -slow, Look: hardworked, +2 handling)

Pickup (massive=2 +Fast +Uncomplaining -cramped, Look: vintage, +2 speed)

Farm Tractor (massive=2 +workhorse + easily repaired -slow, Look: hardworked, +1massive +1armor)

Construction (massive=3 +rugged +uncomplaining -guzzler, Looks: muscular, +1handling +1armor)

Buggy (massive=1 +fast +responsive -rabbity, Looks: garish, +1 speed +1 handling)

Battle:

Buggy (massive=1 +fast +tight -rabbity, Look: powerful, +2speed, +1speed +Mounted machine guns (3-harm close/far area messy))

Buggy (massive=1 +easily-repaired +responsive -tempermental, Look: pretty, +2handling, +1speed +Mounted machine guns (3-harm close/far area messy))

Pickup (massive=2 +rugged +aggressive -cramped, Look: spikes & plates, +2armor, +1handling +Ram or ramming spikes (vehicle inflicts +1harm))

Pickup (massive=2 +off-road +responsive -slow, Look: muscular, +1armor +1handling, +1massive +Mounted 50cal mg (5-harm far area messy))

Bus (massive=3 +capacious +aggressive -guzzler, Look: cobbled-together, +2handling, +1massive+mounted grenade launcher (4-harm close area messy))

Semi (massive=3 +rugged +workhorse -loud Look: hardworked,  +2armor, +1handling +mounted machine guns (3-harm close/far area messy))

Bike (massive=0  +fast +uncomplaining -cramped, Look: sleek, +1speed, +1speed +mounted boarding platform/harness)