home-brew DW Classes Pt.1

I love a ton of systems but the most enjoyably hack-able system I have played with has been Dungeon world.  The 11 year old me that sat around drawing my own pokemon cards in pencil loves that system.  "Tyrana-submarine-amon-Rex! use fire bubble torpedo!"

Imagination is super effective!

Dungeon World has a really active community on G+ and you can find a bunch of cool free home-brew stuff to bolt into your campaign as well as people to play with and test the stuff you make.  The Dungeon World system is just elegant enough in it's simplicity that in a few hours you can make a balanced custom class from a simple idea with some practice.  I suggest sticking to the core classes until you really get the system though. The system also happens to be complex and structured enough that you can offer incredible power to players without destroying game balance.  It is not nearly as dense as systems like D&D, so it wont appeal to everyone and though i really enjoy it there are a lot of things that dungeon world just cant do.

My favorite aspect of the character classes/playbook in Dungeon World is that the class moves and abilities don't all ways demand a roll. The playbooks, at their best, naturally create the atmosphere of the class they represent.  If you choose the barbarian playbook then you are encouraged by the rules and your abilities to act like a barbarian and the GM is encouraged to fill the campaign with things that a barbarian can interact with.  The presence of you character in a situation changes the situation somehow simply through the possibilities that exist in the individual character sheets.

This class I made is a decent example of that, though; I think it needs another pass to be perfect but who cares about that!!

This is first attempt at a Knight Class/Playbook
(i am no expert with bloggs or pdf's but you should be able to see both pages; and you should be able to download it if you want to. I will also add that it needs a bit of work to be really presentable.  I just made it for my own use)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1jzGZXV-azBSDFNNklieE9pYk0/view?usp=sharing


I borrowed some inspiration from an unfinished Knight playbook I found on the inter-webs so cheers to that guy/gal

When making this class I really wanted something that felt knightly as opposed to just a fighter or a paladin.  So i asked myself what is a knight.  What makes a guy with a sword more than himself, what makes him a knight?

- a horse
- honor
- a quest, a mission, a code of behavior
- lots of armor
- a lord

I looked at this list and I saw all the things that the stock paladin class has. the paladin has a patron and a code and lots of armor and a quest.  The paladin has all these things but he doesn't feel like a knight all the time at least not in Dungeon world.  In fact in most systems a paladin feels sorta like judge dredd or captain america; the class is lawful and good but not exactly knightly.

So i took another stab at my list of knightly things
- a horse (this is a must)
- romance
- standing alone against the odds
- tournaments
-rescues and escapes
- duels
- lost causes

this seemed better and it is what i used to make the above playbook.  his horse is important for him as both a method for dealing damage, escaping bad situations, solving non combat problems and generally interacting with the world.  This seemed important because you aren't a knight (in the classic European military sense) unless you are mounted.

The class has many moves that let him risk his own death to protect or control a fight. This seems appropriate, for every knight that slays a dragon there are ten that get eaten first.

He has some abilities that synergies and simulate combat in a tournament setting.  These lend some interesting ideas to combat.  where other players are trying to deal damage a high lvl knight is trying to knock people down and charge around the battlefield, basically acting like a knight.

The class is aslo full of moves that open up the knight to big weaknesses that a GM can use creatively against the knight.  The class has tons of utility and tanking skills as well as the ability to deal huge single taget damage at the start of a combat so it was inportant to give him many weaknesses.  He is clumsy in his armour.  His horse dosnt fit in dungeons.  His chosen Order can sereously restrict his ability to act.  useing Yeild has a powerful ingame effect but restricts the player. he takes increaced damage from falling to the ground.  All these things encourage the player to decide when to act and how, carefully planing.  Then, when he does act, the player has the ability to be swift and decicive... like a knight.

So far i have seen 3 player use this class and enjoyed it. Though two died and one looks like he will be strangled by an ogre next session.

cheers