What is "Powered by the Apocalypse"? (and nevers)

[tibbius]

This is terminology that bounces around on some other forums in the Web.

It references a game called Apocalypse World, which is like a wandering-the-wastelands-after-a-catastrophe themed game.

Specifically, it references two design concepts from that game: Playbooks and graduated success mechanics.

Playbooks are basically character classes, where each playbook gives some unique "Moves" that can only be attempted by the player with that playbook. Graduated success is in the vein of "yes and / yes / yes, but / no!" where the result is determined by 2d6 (12+ yes and, 10-11 yes, 7-9 yes but, 6- no).

Games that are PbtA leverage one or both of these design concepts. Some examples are Dungeon World (big thick tome) and its counterpart World of Dungeons (3 pages).

This all is a sneaky way of introducing something for free (you could pay for it if you like it enough: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/323192/nevers). Screenshots follow.

[tibbius]

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[tibbius]

Just as a point of interest ... there are 7140 different types of character that can be generated with the selection of three Never Fails from the list of 36, multiplied by 18 for the selection of a Never Win from that list. So, something on the order of 128,000 potential unique character types.

https://www.calculatorsoup.com/calculat ... tion=solve