Splatbook*

As GM moves

Think about how the hazard works and more importantly—how you intend to use it in play. Write out a series of fairly specific GM moves that reflect as many of the following as make sense:

  • How the hazard's presence is fore shadowed or revealed
  • How the hazard harms or hinders
  • How the hazard escalates or gets worse
  • How the hazard might thwart attempts to overcome it.

Consider adding conditional triggers to each of these moves, as a reminder of when to use them.

If the hazard is dynamic and changing (like a storm, an avalanche, a wildfire, etc.), give it an instinct, written in the format "to [do something]." During play, use the hazard's instinct as a guide to how it behaves. If you're not sure what a hazard is going to do next, do whatever its instinct suggests.

Why use this approach? Mostly, because it helps you hone your craft. You can think through pacing and escalation in advance, rather than under pressure during play. This sort of prep can also make it easier to let things burn; if you write a move like "slice off a limb" when you prep the hazard in advance, you'll be more likely to actually do that during play.

That old ruined greenhouse that the crinwin are excavating has a number of animate, aggressive, vines that could cause all sorts of trouble for the PCs. I first consider writing them up as monsters, but I realize that they can't really be fought… no matter how many vines they chop through, there will be more! Instead, I write the vines up as a hazard with the following GM moves:

  • * Make quiet noises as they slowly grow and creep (how it's fore shadowed)
  • * Seem to be moving, but stop when looked at directly (how it's fore shadowed)
  • * Reveal a mass of vines entwining a desiccated crinwin corpse (how it's foreshadowed)
  • * Slip a tendril around a limb, slowly and quietly (how it hinders)
  • * Sprout thorns and inject a numbing, euphoric poison (how it harms)
  • * Lash out with more tendrils to subdue struggling prey (how it escalates)

I also give it an instinct: "to ensnare."

I'm not seeing this hazard as doing damage—it just restrains prey, makes it bliss out and stop struggling, and then slowly suffocates it. I figure that anyone who gets injected with the euphoric poison will need to Defy Danger to do anything other than relax and enjoy themselves.