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Originally Posted by Vicky's StackExchange link
Apocalypse World, Dungeon World, and their derivatives instruct and require the GM to play to find out what happens, and to not plan ahead too far (the system fights you if you try). They support improvisation and exploration in the moment without having to define things thoroughly ahead of time.
Vicky's StackExchange link |
"Play to find out what happens" and "not to plan too far ahead" sound like pretty standard GM advice regardless of system, in particular suggestions to avoid railroading, keeping the "game" in RPG by not giving the plot too much dictatorial weight, or avoiding wasted effort when players are players and their PCs do something wacky and unexpected. Those are all useful points to keep in mind for any game system I've tried. Other than a 100% pure simulationist sandbox, where the question can't arise because even the GM doesn't know what's going on, it seems like always good advice. One of the really meta narrative systems regularly shifts the GM into the role of player while some other player becomes GM with whatever their plot control resource system is, so the GM doesn't know that bit of whatever story the other GM is doing. But that's not an anti-railroad measure; the degenerate case is just two railroad engines pulling each other back and forth, or just headed for a train wreck because they're running in different directions on the same track.
But my experience doesn't, alas, include AW/DW.
The mechanically relevant bit seems to be "the system fights you if you try". Anyone have AW/DW experience that would care to explain a bit more about exactly how this works in terms of game mechanics? How does the game even know that the GM has "planned to far ahead" in order to punish them for doing so? Presumably they don't think worldbuilding or jotting down plot seeds earns Bad Karma points that absorb any later attempt to make a GM ruling. So what do they mean?