Varje tisdag och fredag postar jag en artikel om en av Apocalypse World's playbooks. Idag har turen kommit till The Battlebabe.
The Battlebabe
Even in a place as dangerous as Apocalypse World, battlebabes are, well.
They’re the ones you should walk away from, eyes down, but you can’t.
They’re the ones like the seductive blue crackling light, y’know? You
mistake looking at them for falling in love, and you get too close and it’s a
zillion volts and your wings burn off like paper.
Dangerous.
The Battlebabe is designed to be an interesting protagonist. Like a stranger in town, they have no inherent connections to the world in the form of facilities or people working for them. They have moves to survive danger and socially dominate situations. Their primary stat is Cool, which is used to keep their head cool, survive trouble, stay in control.
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My take on it:
Battlebabes can be a little tricky to pin down. Their name implies that they're the ”baddest ass” of the apocalypse, but that spot belongs to the Gunlugger. Other playbooks are very clear what your character does everyday, like, the Driver drives, the Hardholder rules, the Operator does jobs, the Skinner does art, and so on. But the Battlebabe playbook doesn't give you anything to start with, the Battlebabe has no given place in the post-apocalyptic society. She really is the stranger.
I think the key to understanding the Battlebabe is instead looking to her stats. She has a crap score for Hard, which means that straight-up confrontational violence will probably end in pain for her. She has a +1 Hot, which means there is a lot of possibilities for you to push your will through with people through manipulation or seduction. Foremost, she has a whopping +3 Cool, (every other playbook starts with +2 in their primary stat) which means she can deal with (through the basic move acting under fire) almost any danger or trouble you throw at her.
What emerges from all this is a cocky, independent motherfucker who does whatever she feels like, and never let's other get the drop on her. When you play a Battlebabe, take a strong stance for what you want, and don't let anyone stop you – Play your passion! Vincent writes ”when you want to play someone dangerous and provocative, play a Battlebabe”, and I think he's spot on. Above all, be brave! Be provocative!
(okay, one paragraph on the Zen of Apocalypse World again)
See, it's easy to consider Acting under fire a reactive move, seeing as you use it to deal with shit that comes up, but as I expanded on in the Hardholder focus, when you play Apocalypse World, you narrate your character however you want until resistance comes up, right? So, that's how you should play the Battlebabe. Do whatever you want. Be cocky. Be assertive. When things become difficult, the MC will have you roll acting under fire, and you'll most likely make the roll, because you're the goddamn battlebabe, you're cool as ice.
Use this to your advantage. You're great at acting under fire, so start a fire. Bring the heat. Escalate, and other people just won't be able to keep up like you do. Pick the really maverick arenas, like running on roofs, chicken-racing motorcycles or wrestling on a volcano, I don't know. <object width="425" height="350"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/bTyWfbvX0xQ"></param> <param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param> <embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/bTyWfbvX0xQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"> </embed></object>
Vincent talks about Battlebabes having primarily Mindshare effectiveness rather than Fictional effectiveness or Mechanical effectiveness. That means they make good protagonists, and they should recieve the space in the story to match. Tying back to the fact that Battlebabes lack strong connections to the world at the start, they really start at square one and work themselves up. So, when you do fail that cool, hot or hard roll and end up broken, betrayed, broken or lost along the way it is just a part of the rising hero's arc. The first time I felt I really pushed the envelope as a new-fledged MC was when I made a hard move on the Battlebabe in our group, had her captured and a forced witness to the perverted dog-orgies of the hyena cult. This sexual/violative content was something new in our gaming group, but it worked, and the Battlebabe escaped with a sworn promise to bring these fucknuts down, or something to that extent.
Battlebabes can pretty much find any niche, I've seen the motorcycle helmet psychopathic killer, the hot but immature and impulsive woodsman with a sniper rifle, and the good-hearted white knight of the hardhold. I imagine they're all rootless wanderers at heart, though, who wasn't born to their place in the world, they found their way through chance or grim determination. If you where pressed me to tell what the Battlebabes ”job” in the post-apocalypse was, I would probably say adventurer and troublemaker. Which, of course, is easily recogniseable, movies and games are abound with Battlebabes. Maybe take a look at The Fifth Element for two hours of two Battlebabes, or maybe Hamlet – The most classic Battlebabe of them all?
Why the Battlebabe is the best playbook to play:
You get to be the hero, and you can be whatever you want! You got sweet moves and sweet gear, what the hell are you waiting for? The apocalypse world is your oyster, and you're not afraid of a little food poisoning.
What it brings to the world of the apocalypse:
If you really play on the Battlebabes potential for protagonism, it can bring a main character of sorts and character arc to your game. So what kind of Battlebabe you play also says something about the story as a whole, what your Battlebabe struggles with can inform what the world struggles with. Individualism versus Loyalty? Sanity versus Madness? Compassion versus Cruelty? Authority versus Revolution?
If you play your Battlebabe boldly, it'll be a force of flux in the world, bringing change, chaos and/or interesting events to it. Also, since the Battlebabe is connected to nothing and everything, you have a character that can be brought into almost any situation.
Fundamental scarcities of the playbook:
Of course, the lack of a clearly defined place in the world is a double-edged sword. You must find your drive for your Battlebabe, beyond mere boredom and troublemaking. What is her passion, her connection, her humanity? What does she care for? You have to make bold decisions and then go for them, you have to trust that the MC and your +3cool will back you up. If you feel lost or intimidated at the start of your first game of Apocalypse World, the Battlebabe might not be able to carry you.
Moves and crap analysis:
Dangerous & sexy and Ice cold firmly establishes you as able to dominate or intimidate people by sheer presence. Rolling +cool to go aggro (threatening with violence) is so deliciously sweet, especially as your Hard is to crap.
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Perfect instincts and Impossible reflexes are really neat as they ensure that even if you're ambushed or attacked in your bed, you're still present and ready to deal with it. The way Aeon Flux dress, she definitely has Impossible reflexes. Visions of death is just awesome, I mean, you get to decide someone who lives or dies in an upcoming encounter. What other game does that? That's yours, Battlebabe. Enjoy it!
The Battlebabe also gets to customize her own weapons. making them quite deadly if wielded correctly. In sheer force, the Gunlugger wins, of course, but this gives an element of style to your fighting. In battle, you'll try to avoid head-on-collision as much as possible. Always try to manouever to a position where you can easily win the fight, or use the surroundings to your advantage, be creative. Roll +cool, not +hard.
Hell, even intimacy leaves the Battlebabe unfazed, as her special move cancels out any other character's special move (special moves are triggered by sex). This means others have nothing on you, sexually. If you sleep with someone it's because you want to, not because you need to. Battlebabes never get chosen, they're the ones choosing. An alternative way to interpret it to play up the world-weariness of your character could be that for your Battlebabe, sex is a dull affair. But that sounds a little boring. Related, Suna asked this on Barf forth apocalyptica:
When it comes to taking moves from other playbooks, you can go any way, really. Daredevil or A no shit driver from the Driver playbook helps you play even more agressively. Healing touch of the Angel or Bonefeel of the Savvyhead if you want to play up the weird, Moonlighting from the Operator is always a good choice, A devil with a blade from the Maestro D' if you want to be a blade-wielding warrior, or maybe Prepared for the inevitable from the Gunlugger to take care of yourself?
Dynamics and relationships
Good questions to ask the Battlebabe: ”What makes you angry?” ”Who do you hate? Who do you fear? Who do you love?” ”What is your most serious scarcity right now?” ”Where do you sleep? Where did you come from?” Good questions to find and rouse the Battlebabe to passion and action.
You can easily be a part of the Chopper's gang, the Hardholder's gang, the Operator's crew or the Hocus' cult, and that'll give you relationships and interesting things to do. Or even better, get your own gang as your first improvement and set out to crush the tyranny of the Hardholder or the Hocus, play the magnetic revolutionary striking out from ambushes like a white mink hiding in snow, rouse the people to your cause with your hotness! The Battlebabe is a natural rebel.
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The Driver makes a great ally, with the mobility and brute force to complement your presence. You are both free spirits, but your playbooks also need people around you to bounce off of, and if you're sleeping together it's never problematic like it usually is with the Driver. It's like a perfect match! The Angel is another playbook who needs a friend (or enemy) and if medical supplies is a scarcity, I bet the Battlebabe can hook him up, same with The Savvyhead. All these three playbooks really benefit from another character bringing trouble and/or passion to their lives, so form strong (positive, negative or ambivalent) relationships to them.
I have no idea what the relationship to the Brainer or Skinner would be like, but I imagine it would be explosive. And I can't imagine you having anything but passion for The Maestro D' and their establishment. Pure passion, or passion mixed with hate or contempt for the decadence, your pick.
The Battlebabe is the strong lone survivor type of character, which means you won't need a Touchstone, Gunlugger or Faceless to fill that slot. If you do have a group with both a Battlebabe and one of these, they might be the most interesting as rivals or enemies, or with a strong difference in status – Maybe the Gunlugger or Touchstone is your mentor? Maybe you are the brain and the face and the Faceless is the meat, which would make a truely frightening duo.
The Battlebabe
Even in a place as dangerous as Apocalypse World, battlebabes are, well.
They’re the ones you should walk away from, eyes down, but you can’t.
They’re the ones like the seductive blue crackling light, y’know? You
mistake looking at them for falling in love, and you get too close and it’s a
zillion volts and your wings burn off like paper.
Dangerous.
The Battlebabe is designed to be an interesting protagonist. Like a stranger in town, they have no inherent connections to the world in the form of facilities or people working for them. They have moves to survive danger and socially dominate situations. Their primary stat is Cool, which is used to keep their head cool, survive trouble, stay in control.
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My take on it:
Battlebabes can be a little tricky to pin down. Their name implies that they're the ”baddest ass” of the apocalypse, but that spot belongs to the Gunlugger. Other playbooks are very clear what your character does everyday, like, the Driver drives, the Hardholder rules, the Operator does jobs, the Skinner does art, and so on. But the Battlebabe playbook doesn't give you anything to start with, the Battlebabe has no given place in the post-apocalyptic society. She really is the stranger.
I think the key to understanding the Battlebabe is instead looking to her stats. She has a crap score for Hard, which means that straight-up confrontational violence will probably end in pain for her. She has a +1 Hot, which means there is a lot of possibilities for you to push your will through with people through manipulation or seduction. Foremost, she has a whopping +3 Cool, (every other playbook starts with +2 in their primary stat) which means she can deal with (through the basic move acting under fire) almost any danger or trouble you throw at her.
What emerges from all this is a cocky, independent motherfucker who does whatever she feels like, and never let's other get the drop on her. When you play a Battlebabe, take a strong stance for what you want, and don't let anyone stop you – Play your passion! Vincent writes ”when you want to play someone dangerous and provocative, play a Battlebabe”, and I think he's spot on. Above all, be brave! Be provocative!
(okay, one paragraph on the Zen of Apocalypse World again)
See, it's easy to consider Acting under fire a reactive move, seeing as you use it to deal with shit that comes up, but as I expanded on in the Hardholder focus, when you play Apocalypse World, you narrate your character however you want until resistance comes up, right? So, that's how you should play the Battlebabe. Do whatever you want. Be cocky. Be assertive. When things become difficult, the MC will have you roll acting under fire, and you'll most likely make the roll, because you're the goddamn battlebabe, you're cool as ice.
Use this to your advantage. You're great at acting under fire, so start a fire. Bring the heat. Escalate, and other people just won't be able to keep up like you do. Pick the really maverick arenas, like running on roofs, chicken-racing motorcycles or wrestling on a volcano, I don't know. <object width="425" height="350"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/bTyWfbvX0xQ"></param> <param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param> <embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/bTyWfbvX0xQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"> </embed></object>
Vincent talks about Battlebabes having primarily Mindshare effectiveness rather than Fictional effectiveness or Mechanical effectiveness. That means they make good protagonists, and they should recieve the space in the story to match. Tying back to the fact that Battlebabes lack strong connections to the world at the start, they really start at square one and work themselves up. So, when you do fail that cool, hot or hard roll and end up broken, betrayed, broken or lost along the way it is just a part of the rising hero's arc. The first time I felt I really pushed the envelope as a new-fledged MC was when I made a hard move on the Battlebabe in our group, had her captured and a forced witness to the perverted dog-orgies of the hyena cult. This sexual/violative content was something new in our gaming group, but it worked, and the Battlebabe escaped with a sworn promise to bring these fucknuts down, or something to that extent.
Battlebabes can pretty much find any niche, I've seen the motorcycle helmet psychopathic killer, the hot but immature and impulsive woodsman with a sniper rifle, and the good-hearted white knight of the hardhold. I imagine they're all rootless wanderers at heart, though, who wasn't born to their place in the world, they found their way through chance or grim determination. If you where pressed me to tell what the Battlebabes ”job” in the post-apocalypse was, I would probably say adventurer and troublemaker. Which, of course, is easily recogniseable, movies and games are abound with Battlebabes. Maybe take a look at The Fifth Element for two hours of two Battlebabes, or maybe Hamlet – The most classic Battlebabe of them all?
Why the Battlebabe is the best playbook to play:
You get to be the hero, and you can be whatever you want! You got sweet moves and sweet gear, what the hell are you waiting for? The apocalypse world is your oyster, and you're not afraid of a little food poisoning.
What it brings to the world of the apocalypse:
If you really play on the Battlebabes potential for protagonism, it can bring a main character of sorts and character arc to your game. So what kind of Battlebabe you play also says something about the story as a whole, what your Battlebabe struggles with can inform what the world struggles with. Individualism versus Loyalty? Sanity versus Madness? Compassion versus Cruelty? Authority versus Revolution?
If you play your Battlebabe boldly, it'll be a force of flux in the world, bringing change, chaos and/or interesting events to it. Also, since the Battlebabe is connected to nothing and everything, you have a character that can be brought into almost any situation.
Fundamental scarcities of the playbook:
Of course, the lack of a clearly defined place in the world is a double-edged sword. You must find your drive for your Battlebabe, beyond mere boredom and troublemaking. What is her passion, her connection, her humanity? What does she care for? You have to make bold decisions and then go for them, you have to trust that the MC and your +3cool will back you up. If you feel lost or intimidated at the start of your first game of Apocalypse World, the Battlebabe might not be able to carry you.
Moves and crap analysis:
Dangerous & sexy and Ice cold firmly establishes you as able to dominate or intimidate people by sheer presence. Rolling +cool to go aggro (threatening with violence) is so deliciously sweet, especially as your Hard is to crap.
<object width="425" height="350"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UmtuRRhtGQw"></param> <param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param> <embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UmtuRRhtGQw" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"> </embed></object>
Perfect instincts and Impossible reflexes are really neat as they ensure that even if you're ambushed or attacked in your bed, you're still present and ready to deal with it. The way Aeon Flux dress, she definitely has Impossible reflexes. Visions of death is just awesome, I mean, you get to decide someone who lives or dies in an upcoming encounter. What other game does that? That's yours, Battlebabe. Enjoy it!
The Battlebabe also gets to customize her own weapons. making them quite deadly if wielded correctly. In sheer force, the Gunlugger wins, of course, but this gives an element of style to your fighting. In battle, you'll try to avoid head-on-collision as much as possible. Always try to manouever to a position where you can easily win the fight, or use the surroundings to your advantage, be creative. Roll +cool, not +hard.
Hell, even intimacy leaves the Battlebabe unfazed, as her special move cancels out any other character's special move (special moves are triggered by sex). This means others have nothing on you, sexually. If you sleep with someone it's because you want to, not because you need to. Battlebabes never get chosen, they're the ones choosing. An alternative way to interpret it to play up the world-weariness of your character could be that for your Battlebabe, sex is a dull affair. But that sounds a little boring. Related, Suna asked this on Barf forth apocalyptica:
And it's the best rules question EVER!
When it comes to taking moves from other playbooks, you can go any way, really. Daredevil or A no shit driver from the Driver playbook helps you play even more agressively. Healing touch of the Angel or Bonefeel of the Savvyhead if you want to play up the weird, Moonlighting from the Operator is always a good choice, A devil with a blade from the Maestro D' if you want to be a blade-wielding warrior, or maybe Prepared for the inevitable from the Gunlugger to take care of yourself?
Dynamics and relationships
Good questions to ask the Battlebabe: ”What makes you angry?” ”Who do you hate? Who do you fear? Who do you love?” ”What is your most serious scarcity right now?” ”Where do you sleep? Where did you come from?” Good questions to find and rouse the Battlebabe to passion and action.
You can easily be a part of the Chopper's gang, the Hardholder's gang, the Operator's crew or the Hocus' cult, and that'll give you relationships and interesting things to do. Or even better, get your own gang as your first improvement and set out to crush the tyranny of the Hardholder or the Hocus, play the magnetic revolutionary striking out from ambushes like a white mink hiding in snow, rouse the people to your cause with your hotness! The Battlebabe is a natural rebel.
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The Driver makes a great ally, with the mobility and brute force to complement your presence. You are both free spirits, but your playbooks also need people around you to bounce off of, and if you're sleeping together it's never problematic like it usually is with the Driver. It's like a perfect match! The Angel is another playbook who needs a friend (or enemy) and if medical supplies is a scarcity, I bet the Battlebabe can hook him up, same with The Savvyhead. All these three playbooks really benefit from another character bringing trouble and/or passion to their lives, so form strong (positive, negative or ambivalent) relationships to them.
I have no idea what the relationship to the Brainer or Skinner would be like, but I imagine it would be explosive. And I can't imagine you having anything but passion for The Maestro D' and their establishment. Pure passion, or passion mixed with hate or contempt for the decadence, your pick.
The Battlebabe is the strong lone survivor type of character, which means you won't need a Touchstone, Gunlugger or Faceless to fill that slot. If you do have a group with both a Battlebabe and one of these, they might be the most interesting as rivals or enemies, or with a strong difference in status – Maybe the Gunlugger or Touchstone is your mentor? Maybe you are the brain and the face and the Faceless is the meat, which would make a truely frightening duo.
