Is anyone else playing Dungeon World?

[Haladir]

My group has moved away from Pathfinder in favor of games that don't get so bogged down with game mechanics. We've settled on Dungeon World, which is a game that uses the Apocalypse World game engine to recreate the feel of old-school D&D.

We are totally having a blast with this system. After playing PFRPG for so long, the rules-light system really feels like a breath of fresh air.

Is anyone else out there playing DW? If so, I'd love to start comparing notes!

[Mythic Evil Lincoln]

I've long been curious about it, but my group is pretty deeply entrenched in DW's sister game, Torchbearer. They're both publishing under the Burning Wheel imprint now. I understand they both tackle similar themes but from totally different angles.

One thing that makes me sort of sad about these little indie games is that there really isn't the same kind of enthusiastic discussion forum available. I wish I could post as voluminously as I used to post about Pathfinder, but it's clear that there's a vastly smaller player base.

[Nohwear]

There is a G+ community.

[Irontruth]

I'm not playing currently, though I have a fair number of times. I'm definitely down to talk about it whenever someone wants.

There are a lot of PbtA games, which is why I consider it a good system to learn. If you like the basic rules structure, there are a dozen really good games out there to play.

Lincoln, you're right, the community is pretty small. I have the perception it's growing, but very, very slowly.

[Steve Geddes]

Mythic Evil Lincoln wrote:

I've long been curious about it, but my group is pretty deeply entrenched in DW's sister game, Torchbearer. They're both publishing under the Burning Wheel imprint now. I understand they both tackle similar themes but from totally different angles.

One thing that makes me sort of sad about these little indie games is that there really isn't the same kind of enthusiastic discussion forum available. I wish I could post as voluminously as I used to post about Pathfinder, but it's clear that there's a vastly smaller player base.

Me too. I'm also disappointed in the (relatively) small amount of support material - exacerbated by the fact that I don't do PDFs.

Torchbearer and Dungeon World both look good to me, but I suspect we'll never play them.

[Irontruth]

I highly recommend keeping Dungeon World handy, more than once it's been used as the "So, you guys want to hang out tonight? Sure... but what will we do?" kind of game. No planning or prep, characters made on the spot. Sometimes I'll randomly for which old TSR module is used as the jumping off point. Even more fun is to start at a random point within the module as well.

[Lee Hanna]

Played it twice, had a ball, then got too busy with other stuff to explore further. Like Irontruth, I've got an old mod stashed in my folder of character sheets, I think it's B3, just in case I can make something happen at a con or family gathering.

Aside:
I also invested in Night Witches, a variant Powered By The Apocalypse. It's for WW2, the lone all-female night-bomber regiment in the Soviet Ari Force. The players get to deal with sexism, Stalinism, supply shortages, and somehow defeat the Germans in wooden biplanes in the dark. Haven't played or run, but I'd like to use its core elements for some kind of fighter-squadron game someday.

Misdirected Mark podcast is a big fan of PbtA, they reference it almost every week.

[Irontruth]

Night Witches is excellent. The session I played in ended up crashing and burning... well, the planes did. The session was actually a lot of fun. We we're doing fine up until the actual bombing run. On my plane, we had something like 3-4 consecutive 6 or less results in a row and the GM just gave and was like "You two die." I think one plane limped back to base and crash landed.

World Wide Wrestling is great, even if you don't like pro-wrestling.

Epyllion is a lot of fun, you play dragons.

Velvet Gloves is in development, I haven't played it yet, but you play an all-girl street gang in the 1970's (think The Warriors).

Urban Shadows is good, but kind of generic. You get the whole gamut of World of Darkness types, plus a few more. I do like it, but it feels like trying to capture all aspects of urban fantasy/horror, without having any real focus.

Saga of the Icelanders you play 9th century settlers of Iceland, straight up. No magic, no mysticism, just hard people in a hard land.

I hear good things about Cartel, but I haven't played.

[Haladir]

My DW group has also dabbled with two other Apocalypse World-based games: the scifi game Uncharted Worlds and the Lovecraftian horror game Tremulus. Both worked pretty well.

[Zmar]

Umm... wasn't the Torchbearer based on Burning Wheel and not a DW sister at all? More like distant cousin, or perhaps a similar looking guy living in next city? :)

[Haladir]

If anyone is remotely interested, the GM of my Dungeon World campaign has been posting our Campaign Journal over at RPG.net.

[Mythic Evil Lincoln]

Zmar wrote:

Umm... wasn't the Torchbearer based on Burning Wheel and not a DW sister at all? More like distant cousin, or perhaps a similar looking guy living in next city? :)

Yes, but Burning Wheel HQ is officially distributing DW now.

So -- like step-sisters, I guess.

[hiiamtom]

Step-sisters with the only thing in common is Koebel and Crane being friends :p

DW is great, even if I don't prefer it (BRP is still my favorite core system). Vincent Baker is a genius GM and game designer and DW takes his major innovation and hacks it into an OSR mold. The biggest thing that is great about it is the GM conversation, which is built on the back of decades of combined experience put to paper.

I recommend Apocalypse World and the derivatives to anyone (especially a game that really highlights the strengths like Monster Hearts). I also recommend checking out Dogs in the Vineyard for a more mechanically satisfying narrative experience from Baker, especially if you like the idea of being paladins in a western. A lot of people also like the FFG Star Wars systems (like Edge of the Empire), but I don't like it all that much even though it has some real highlights.