this is an embarrassingly small question, but it's bugging me and my troupe greatly. The short form of the question is, "Can a player choose MORE THAN ONE item from a list of items on their DW character sheet as starting gear?" In DW, your character sheet offers starting equipment options for each class. Sometimes, it's clear that the character just gets the indicated item (e.g., the cleric automatically gets dungeon rations, and there's no choosing involved). Sometimes it is clear that the character must choose one, and only one, item from a list (e.g., the bard may choose ONE instrument from the list of instrument options, and the bard may also choose ONE of the following items from a list of four options: adventuring gear OR bandages OR halfling pipeleaf OR three coins). In cases like this, the language is clear: "Choose one" means that no matter how long the list is, you can only choose one of those items.
Where my troupe runs into problems is when the starting gear options for a given character are vaguely defined. For instance, the druid should "Choose your defenses: A) Hide Armor B) Wooden Shield." Some in my troupe say this means "Chose ONE of these two defensive options, EITHER the armor OR the shield." Others in the troupe argue that the sentence does NOT limit the choice, so they should be free to choose BOTH the armor AND the shield as long as they are aware that their weight load will be affected by that choice. But then other troup members point to situations such as the druid's choice of weapons: "Choose your armament: A) Shillelagh, B) Staff, C) Spear." Could a druid then choose TWO of these items? All three? Or just one?
In the case of the druid's weapon, this is largely an irrelevant decision, as practical concerns limit the choices here. One can't reasonably carry a shillelagh, a staff, and a spear all at the same time without the task of carrying the items becoming burdensome and awkward, and one can't USE two of these items together at the same time, so my players will typically choose just one weapon in such a case. But other cases are NOT so straightforward, such as when it would make GOOD SENSE for a druid to choose to take BOTH hide armor AND a shield. The same issue comes up with the cleric, who can "Choose your defenses: A) Chainmail, B) Shield." It's hard to imagine a character going into battle with ONLY a shield, especially not a traditionally armored character like the cleric. The wizard faces a similar choice: "Choose your defenses: A) Leather Armor, B) Bag of Books and 3 Healing Potions."
Perhaps my troupe is just hung up on words, as the only time this really becomes an issue is when the "Choose your defenseS" option comes up, using the plural of "defense." A similar situation occurs with "Choose your armS" (plural) instead of "Choose your weapon" (singular) In the example of character creation given in the DW rule book, they create a wizard who must CHOOSE BETWEEN leather armor OR the books and healing potions. So in short, when there is a list of items to choose from on a DW character sheet as starting equipment, are we supposed to assume in every case that the sheet SHOULD read, "Choose ONE of the following defenses/arms/weapon sets/etc."?
Best Answer
You choose only one of the options. This isn't actually ambiguous in English—choosing from a lettered list is a convention that always means "or" except when specifically stated that more than one can be chosen.
The ses in the words like arms or defences do not indicate anything to the contrary — that's another feature of English that's potentially confusing, but also unambiguous. In English, the s can mean either a word that's grammatically plural or grammatically categorical. Categoricals are words that indicate represent kind without meaning singular or plural. You would not say “choose your defence” or “choose your arm” — at least, not without being grammatically incorrect. For those uses, the categorical must be used, and the categorical is formed the same as the plural — but does not mean plural.
So the Druid must choose either Hide Armour or a Wooden Shield but not both, and similarly for the other classes with these choices.