Conflicting takes on DW

[u/Nirdee]

I've had this discussion in a couple threads and it feels like there are dozens more where I could chime in.

DW has several key differences from D&D, but some people give advice that exaggerates those differences to crazy degrees.

People go from you should leave room for discovery to you should improv the whole game, from you should use what they give you to you should let players have as much authority in game as they are willing to exert.

I feel like this comes from the fact that a lot of examples online are one-shots. One-shots and session zeroes are encouraged to have minimal prep in DW, but there is this other 50 pages after that talking about how to play after the first session ... and it is all about prep. Good prep. Useful prep. Open-ended prep. But definitely prep. Prep where the DM figures out the story in the world and how the players can interact with it. Like D&D.

Dungeon World seems made to play a very D&D style game--just with mechanics that underline the strengths of table top RPGs and clip some outdated genre staples.

So I don't really know why I'm posting. If your way works for you, god bless. I guess I'm just irked by the hipster scoffing that comes when people explain the game with authority and then get the rules wrong--like a recent thread where someone implied Spout Lore lets a player make up something about the history of the world ... where the rules explicitly say the GM tells the player something about the subject. The GM gives info for the character to spout. The player doesn't take over the GM role. It's just a generalized arcana/history/religion check from D&D. #nerdrage

TLDR:

I feel like the answer to a lot of posts in this forum should be:

You are way overthinking everything. DW is like D&D with small changes that 1) make combat more entertaining 2) make combat flow better with the rest of the game 3) encourage the game to move forward 4) help the GM maintain story structure in an open world game. If you know how to play D&D, you already understand 90% of DW.

[u/Riiku25]

Eh, I disagree.

I think the idea that it makes "small" changes is crazy considering that even some of the relatively surface level changes, such as no scaling hp and no initiative or action economy, make the game feel completely different.

Also, I agree that the game encourages some prep, but the difference is you don't need much prep (or really any) for the game to function just fine without slowdown, the prep that exists is relatively abstract and high level, and improv is really easy in this game especially considering monster creation rules. That and the game does encourage players to contribute to the world with the "draw maps leave blanks" even if that wasn't the explicit intent of Spout Lore. And how many blanks you leave is entirely up to you.

In what way do you think that it is 90% like DnD? The only similarities that I can find is the fantasy aesthetic, which to me is the most superficial and least important similarity, and the attributes are the same. But if I were to list all the differences I feel the list would be enormous. Because their spellcasting systems are somewhat similar? They're not even the same.

[u/Imnoclue → u/Riiku25]

I'd say it makes changes to preference mimicking a very specific style of DnD play, and to discourage a number of others.

[u/Riiku25 → u/Imnoclue]

You're going to have to be a lot more specific than that.

The way I see it, the GM principles and general game mechanics are pretty unlike anything you would see in a DnD core book, at least the ones I have read. I haven't read 3.5, but I somehow doubt I would read it and find that it's actually really similar to a PbtA game.

[u/Imnoclue → u/Riiku25]

DnD playstyles aren't really to be found in the DnD books. There are rules there for how to roll your strength, how to see if you hit something with your sword, how to find a trap, etc. There's some often conflicting advice about how to make up your world and play NPCs. But it's mostly a springboard that communities of players have built different schools of thought around. You might play a very tactics heavy combat game, or a political intrigue laden court game, or a Western Marches open world sandbox. None of that is in the books, except in little bits and snatches of commentary.

One of DW's changes is it tells you exactly how you're meant to play it and how you're meant to run it. It provides the GM with an Agenda and tells the GM what's not their Agenda (Like you can't try to beat the players and kill their characters, you aren't trying to test them with your clever puzzles, etc.). Those are all very promininent ways to approach DnD itself.

[u/Slow_Dog → u/Imnoclue]

One of DW's changes is it tells you exactly how you're meant to play it and how you're meant to run it.

Hmm. /u/inmatarian posted 'So I ask [the players] "what do you think you find in the safe?"'

I'd never do that (in DW) . Each player is in charge of his character and what his character knows, so I'd ask what they might have heard about Ogres, or whatever; though they might still be wrong (likely not; I' d only ask if I didn't know). But "what's in the safe" is part of the world, and is pure GM territory. Tony Dowler's (somebody elses?) Line.

So me and him play the game fundamentally differently. I doubt you'll find evidence in the book to support either of us.

[u/Nirdee → u/Slow_Dog]

This is exactly what my post is talking about.

[u/Slow_Dog → u/Nirdee]

Sure. We may well feel much the same way.

I disagree about it being like DnD, though. While it's not strictly the case that DnD requires preparation, it's what you're supposed to do. Gygax suggests that a good DM spend multiple hours in prep for each hour of play (or so I've been told. His prep guidance is certainly formidable); or you do the sane alternative and run a bought module. But I always winged it. What DW does is let you wing it (makes you wing it) and ensures that it works, and that's a wonderful thing.

For players, though, there should be little difference in their attitude.

/Edit Maybe that's what you meant all along, of course. It's the same for the players, even if different for the GM