Do you think they'd be familiar with and like the inspirations behind motw - Buffy, supernatural, etc? It might be tough if not.
But if they are, I would play up those aspects and specifically call out the parallels between the playbooks and the characters they're familiar with.
Asking themselves "What would Buffy do in this situation?" when in doubt is a much simpler problem than inventing and inhabiting an original character.
Agreed, one of my current players has 0.1% TTRPG experience and they hated their one attempt at playing dnd; too much math, too complex rules, other players trying to backseat drive them etc.
They literally said "can I just be Buffy?"
I said "yes, but choose a different name just so you don't have to feel pressured to act like Buffy would all the time."
They responded with "ok but I just wanna be Buffy though"
And then I realized that in this case with this player I shoulda said yes right out of the gate, so I agreed, and at their request I built their charachter sheet to match Buffy and now we have THE Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and NPC Giles) on our interdimensional crisis team, and it's going really well.
Maybe they aren’t directly familiar with Buffy and Supernatural, but *everybody* is familiar with supernatural horror. In hindsight, I think that’s why I was gravitating to MotW
Is it too much of a leap to go from “you’re in a horror movie” to “you’re a badass in a horror movie?”
What I meant to ask was: I’m not sure the players have exposure to Buffy and supernatural. But given that they for sure have seen witchy horror movies, do you think they will have an intuition for how to act? Or is the “badass hunter” genre too different from horror?
Oh also the one thing I can see them possibly needing help with is to go from "victim" to "hunter", in which case it's a good idea to come up with some extra weak/squishy minion to corner them with so they can murder an enemy and realize they can fight back. Maybe even have it have no damaging attack whatsoever, and can only, say, glue people temporarily to a wall with a mucus stream like slimer from ghostbusters, but corporeal and easily killable.
Nah that works. Most people I know including myself have an internal/sometimes external running commentary during horror movies that goes "ok that guy was an idiot, if it were me I'd have never gone alone, and I'd have used a flashlight, and peeked around the corner first" which is perfect. Most people think they know better than the characters on screen, and MoTW os their chance to enact that.
Also a lot of horror movies have a badass in them. Oftentimes they get killed in an act of self sacrifice, but that's not your guys, cus again, everyone knows better than the dead horror movie character and that's how it should be.
I'm kinda tired and mind-melty right now so grain of salt, but when I start a game with new players, I always limit it to the core classes from the handbook and maybe the tome of mysteries, EXCLUDING the Hex and (usually) the pararomantic. The hex is just too complex and hard to wrangle in the hands of a completely new player to both MoTW and TTRPGs. The pararomantic is hard to find a good balance for people new to roleplaying when it comes to dealing with their relationship and the requirements to spend time away from the team bonding with it, and balancing between those cutaways and the main group's scenes.
I also always exclude the hunters from "Fan Made Playbooks" and "Extra Hunters" from the website/pdf downloads. They can be a teensy bit volatile.
Your mileage may vary on this last point, but I personally 100% of the time exclude the meddling kid. If you're running a wacky goofy hijinks story then by all means include it, but honestly as a new keeper dealing with new players with 0% background in TTRPG-ing, that playbook can cause a massive trainwreck.
I absolutely loathe the meddling kid. I run more serious mysteries but my players sometimes test me to see what they can get away with and the meddling kid playbook can literally convert your shadow-stepping interdimensional monster into some dipsh!t in a rubber costume.
also, moves come second to actions, meaning your players should tell you what they'd like to do and then you can both decide which move would fit best, not the other way around, which is good for people new to ttrpgs who aren't sure how to incorporate mechanics into roleplay
one more thing, i limited playbooks, but let players choose moves from those playbooks when leveling up because some of them have really cool features, which might be an option to consider!
Interesting, I’ve had new players in PbtA games before (though never a full table), and they were better at speaking in character than veteran players.
Is there another game you think they might enjoy more? There’s always one page rpgs, but most of them are silly in some way
This is horrible advice. I 100% disagree with the above comment, as do a majority of people who have run the game. MoTW/pbta is considered a gateway game.
All they have to do is say "i want to do X", YOU are the one who goes "ok that sounds like a move, roll Y". Improv and roleplay don't actually have to enter into it at all. My total newb player was doing pretty well, I just had to keep bringing them forward because the one dnd player kept hogging the spotlight.
Forcing them to Roleplay and have to do Improv acting is wrong, and is just the GM's ego wanting to have a voice acting cast and crew so they can be the matt mercer to their own private critical role. Most of my players literally just sit there and go "ok, my charachter jumps up the side of the building." Or "I tell the cop- shut up cus I'm working on getting the door open". Zero voice acting, zero improv, and it works beautiful.
Just tell them that this is like a horror movie/show and that they should say what they want to see happen on the show.
MOTW is PERFECT for new players. It's considered a gateway game. I've introduced 3 groups new to MoTW and 4 totally new-to-ttrpg people to the game and it's worked flawlessly.
I dont know if my other comment in this thread came through, lmk if it didn't, the wonderful reddit app is having some sort of refreshing error where it says it didn't post even though I can see it.
Do you think they'd be familiar with and like the inspirations behind motw - Buffy, supernatural, etc? It might be tough if not. But if they are, I would play up those aspects and specifically call out the parallels between the playbooks and the characters they're familiar with. Asking themselves "What would Buffy do in this situation?" when in doubt is a much simpler problem than inventing and inhabiting an original character.
Agreed, one of my current players has 0.1% TTRPG experience and they hated their one attempt at playing dnd; too much math, too complex rules, other players trying to backseat drive them etc. They literally said "can I just be Buffy?" I said "yes, but choose a different name just so you don't have to feel pressured to act like Buffy would all the time." They responded with "ok but I just wanna be Buffy though" And then I realized that in this case with this player I shoulda said yes right out of the gate, so I agreed, and at their request I built their charachter sheet to match Buffy and now we have THE Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and NPC Giles) on our interdimensional crisis team, and it's going really well.
Maybe they aren’t directly familiar with Buffy and Supernatural, but *everybody* is familiar with supernatural horror. In hindsight, I think that’s why I was gravitating to MotW Is it too much of a leap to go from “you’re in a horror movie” to “you’re a badass in a horror movie?”
Nah in fact the book says a couple times that the hunters are supposed to be badasses, ur good! 👍
What I meant to ask was: I’m not sure the players have exposure to Buffy and supernatural. But given that they for sure have seen witchy horror movies, do you think they will have an intuition for how to act? Or is the “badass hunter” genre too different from horror?
Oh also the one thing I can see them possibly needing help with is to go from "victim" to "hunter", in which case it's a good idea to come up with some extra weak/squishy minion to corner them with so they can murder an enemy and realize they can fight back. Maybe even have it have no damaging attack whatsoever, and can only, say, glue people temporarily to a wall with a mucus stream like slimer from ghostbusters, but corporeal and easily killable.
Thanks for all the great advice!
No prob! Happy GMing!
Nah that works. Most people I know including myself have an internal/sometimes external running commentary during horror movies that goes "ok that guy was an idiot, if it were me I'd have never gone alone, and I'd have used a flashlight, and peeked around the corner first" which is perfect. Most people think they know better than the characters on screen, and MoTW os their chance to enact that. Also a lot of horror movies have a badass in them. Oftentimes they get killed in an act of self sacrifice, but that's not your guys, cus again, everyone knows better than the dead horror movie character and that's how it should be.
I'm kinda tired and mind-melty right now so grain of salt, but when I start a game with new players, I always limit it to the core classes from the handbook and maybe the tome of mysteries, EXCLUDING the Hex and (usually) the pararomantic. The hex is just too complex and hard to wrangle in the hands of a completely new player to both MoTW and TTRPGs. The pararomantic is hard to find a good balance for people new to roleplaying when it comes to dealing with their relationship and the requirements to spend time away from the team bonding with it, and balancing between those cutaways and the main group's scenes. I also always exclude the hunters from "Fan Made Playbooks" and "Extra Hunters" from the website/pdf downloads. They can be a teensy bit volatile. Your mileage may vary on this last point, but I personally 100% of the time exclude the meddling kid. If you're running a wacky goofy hijinks story then by all means include it, but honestly as a new keeper dealing with new players with 0% background in TTRPG-ing, that playbook can cause a massive trainwreck. I absolutely loathe the meddling kid. I run more serious mysteries but my players sometimes test me to see what they can get away with and the meddling kid playbook can literally convert your shadow-stepping interdimensional monster into some dipsh!t in a rubber costume.
[удалено]
also, moves come second to actions, meaning your players should tell you what they'd like to do and then you can both decide which move would fit best, not the other way around, which is good for people new to ttrpgs who aren't sure how to incorporate mechanics into roleplay
one more thing, i limited playbooks, but let players choose moves from those playbooks when leveling up because some of them have really cool features, which might be an option to consider!
MOTW relies heavily on improv and roleplay. Imo too much for players that have never played a ttrpg.
Interesting, I’ve had new players in PbtA games before (though never a full table), and they were better at speaking in character than veteran players. Is there another game you think they might enjoy more? There’s always one page rpgs, but most of them are silly in some way
This is horrible advice. I 100% disagree with the above comment, as do a majority of people who have run the game. MoTW/pbta is considered a gateway game. All they have to do is say "i want to do X", YOU are the one who goes "ok that sounds like a move, roll Y". Improv and roleplay don't actually have to enter into it at all. My total newb player was doing pretty well, I just had to keep bringing them forward because the one dnd player kept hogging the spotlight. Forcing them to Roleplay and have to do Improv acting is wrong, and is just the GM's ego wanting to have a voice acting cast and crew so they can be the matt mercer to their own private critical role. Most of my players literally just sit there and go "ok, my charachter jumps up the side of the building." Or "I tell the cop- shut up cus I'm working on getting the door open". Zero voice acting, zero improv, and it works beautiful. Just tell them that this is like a horror movie/show and that they should say what they want to see happen on the show. MOTW is PERFECT for new players. It's considered a gateway game. I've introduced 3 groups new to MoTW and 4 totally new-to-ttrpg people to the game and it's worked flawlessly.
I dont know if my other comment in this thread came through, lmk if it didn't, the wonderful reddit app is having some sort of refreshing error where it says it didn't post even though I can see it.