Oh right! You asked about why can't you use a Conflict in a Challenge, and I had an answer but never gave it.

The main reason is what the purpose of a scene is. In a Challenge, you're basically doing something like darting the camera around to a bunch of tasks being completed at once to resolve the overall situation. It's generally one roll for each task, and the outcome of the whole thing is determined by how the sub-problems were dealt with. It's quick and then it's done. A Conflict is a much more zoomed-in situation that takes much longer to resolve, mechanically speaking. Rather than a signle roll to determine the outcome of the conflict, you have a number of rolls, defenses, stress and consequences as pacing mechanisms, and it generally isn't going to happen in the same span of time around the table.

If you put a Conflict into a Challenge, you'd be removing one of the major benefits of using a Challenge to begin with, that being the speed of resolution. On the other hand, there's no reason that a conflict can't be framed as a Challenge. Maybe your heavy combatant type is using Fight against a relatively high difficulty, while your other types find their own ways to help the situation that don't get framed as Create an Advantage so much as Overcome outright. Superhero battles work great this way: one hero holds off her nemesis to buy time, another goes to deactivate the doomsday machine, a third has to free the hostages.

There are reasons the two aren't quite as connected as they could be, but also ways to intertwine the ideas of them, so long as you know what each is mechanically distinct for.



I would have been one of those suggesting Intimidate have an option to be Str-based for the low-Charisma types who happen to be hulking brutes. One of the things I don't much like about D20 is how rigid the skills are with the stats. Then again, I never understood how a hulking brute could actually have a low Charisma in the first place, considering they're hard to ignore. I guess people assume Charisma means "politeness".

But yeah, using Fight to impress people who are impressed by fighting prowess is exactly why Fight is allowed as an Overcome action in the first place. It's built right into Fate.

I thought that was only one use for them. For instance, the party might be disarming or dealing with a complex trap, the operation of which takes a few moments. Or trying to open a portal quickly. Or conduct refugees onto a rocking ship.

I can readily imagine any of those as taking place while an epic fight is underway. Now, one could just make Fight part of the challenge, but that would seem to trivialize it. There should be at least a few good exchanges before the trap chomps down, the portal opens, or the last little waif is onboard.

Has anyone done that? Run a Challenge of maybe a couple of rolls for each participating character (or making one Challenge check for every couple of Conflict exchanges)? Once the challenge is done or failed, the Conflict might have a clear end, with the PC withdrawing, or maybe the stakes are higher than just bought time.

I've done it with skill challenges in D&D, which is what makes me think about doing it here. Also, it's just very cinematic. Most fights in fiction aren't usually about the fight itself, but about some other goal.

I hear you. Still learning.

Yeah, it just rubs me the wrong way. Like, Robin impresses Little John, but it's an actual "fight" not just flexing and posturing. But, hey, in most Robin Hood stories, there's a Shooting contest at some point. Oh, well.

I could explain my take on Intimidation and Charisma, but I won't ruin this fine thread with that.

Has anyone else been looking at Loose Threads? Seems like it could be a really interesting adventure world. Looking for ideas and thoughts from others.

Nope, but I am game. I would be willing to join and make a character if you want to run the intro adventure?

Not sure I'd have time till after Christmas to run. Was more spitballing and looking for ideas

I've written a game using an adaptation of the FATE Core rules. The main change is of the four actions, and the skill list. My four actions are Attack, Bypass, Create (Aspect), and Discover (Aspect). I have one skill for each of these actions in either a Physical, Social, or Intellectual context.



The setting is one where your worldview (faith or philosophy) comes with an ability to shape or embody at least one of the eight elements (air, cloud, earth, fire, glass, lightning, metal, or water), which makes arguments about which worldview is "right" that much more exciting.

While I've written the book, I'm trying to raise funds to have it designed and illustrated. Like so many before me, I've turned to Kickstarter for help.

https://www.kickstarter.com/pr...ignty-powered-by-fat

I'd appreciate any support: financial and moral. Thanks!

Could we get a thread to discuss Wearing the Cape?

I have a need some help with planting the clues so that my players can find them, strictly speaking in narrative terms (not in dice roll sense). The situation is this:

Main villain (Handsome Jack) has kidnapped and reprogrammed a robot (Loader Bot). Player characters (vault hunters) have mounted a rescue (infiltration) mission. The main problem is that Jack has not only reprogrammed the robot to fight for him (vault hunters can handle that), but has also rigged him to explode should he lose the fight. Now I'd like to place two or three clues along the way so that player characters can discover that the robot's gonna explode, so that they can can try to save him. If it's of any significance the setting is a corporate city (city of Opportunity) withing a post-apocalyptic setting (Borderlands games). System is Eridium Fate, my own Fate Core hack (about which I'm more than glad to talk).

Your players know best how they like clues planted: what seems fair, what seems too obvious, where they like to look. Have you talked to them?

Surprise isn't necessarily ruined by revealing information to players out of game, it just means the surprise doesn't happen at the same time it happens to the characters. And there are advantages to that.

I've been reading this blog since I asked this question elsewhere and for the most part it concurs with what you're saying (as far as I can understand it).

http://thealexandrian.net/word...ames/three-clue-rule

I've only played a little Fate, and I'd like to play more, but I'm a little leery of it because I have yet to see the fate point economy really work.

I haven't ever really seen players feel the need to spend many points. I tend to see them create an advantage, usually using the best skill they have for the situation, which usually gives them at least a boost, but often results in one or two free invocations. Two more advantages are created, each benefitting from a free invocation, which means they're likely to get two more free invocations each. It becomes something of a chain reaction, and means that the players never have to spend more than a fate point or two, to get the ball rolling, and maybe give it the occasional kick.

I can try to slow this down by having the opposition remove a PC advantage before anyone uses the free invocations. In a conflict, I might try piling attacks on them, but if they use a free invocation to defend with style, they get a boost, which they can probably use for free to make another advantage with two more free invocations.

One clear way to deal with this would be to make it harder to create advantages, so that they're often having to spend a fate point just to succeed, which means that their free invocation effectively wasn't free, or (if they managed to succeed with style), they really only got one net free invocation. I'd rather not just hike up the difficulty arbitrarily, though.

It could be that I haven't played long enough scenarios, and that the opposition is supposed to concede and take consequences when that wave of free invocations looms over them, so that in the next scene I have enough fate points to really hit the PCs hard.

Even if I get that part figured out, and the players are spending fate points regularly enough to run low and want more of them, I'm still not sure how to keep the economy from crashing or soaring too high. The players should earn fate points by getting into some trouble due to personal or situational aspects being compelled to their disadvantage. A given disadvantage should, it seems, be cause for higher difficulty and more rolls, which would necessitate spending the fate point they just received for it, or more than that - so what was the point of the compel, other than, one hopes an entertaining scene.

So, is my assumption that a difficulty that earned a fate point should cause about a fate point's worth of trouble off the mark. It is more that a "fate point's worth of trouble" might be worth leaving in place, and that it's a balancing act. Take one kind of trouble here, to relieve another kind here? Risk taking a fate point in the hope of dealing with the bad luck without having to spend it, and slowly building up a stockpile?

I've not had a massive amount of experience playing the Fate system, but if I understand right compels can also be used to introduce dramatic twists in story, or introduce non-roll based complications.

Eg. A character has "A Lover in Every Port". As the GM, you feel the players are having too smooth a run of it in their present locale. Assuming the player here is willing (I would be, but I play for drama more than power) you compel this feature - An ex from a different city/planet/universe has gotten tired of this characters nonsense, and has tracked them down to settle the matter - A shotgun wedding maybe? or possibly just a shotgun.

This give the player a Fate point that they wont be immediately spending to just cancel the trouble, and a chance to play out some back story and maybe some other related compels.

And if you've seen players focussing on their best skills, consider looking at situations where they can't or shouldn't use them. If all their skills are in fighting, direct the story towards a social event where throwing a punch will cause them huge grief with an ally or an important neutral party. Then they should be looking to Fate points to bolster lesser used skills, or at least create advantages that don't just steamroll those poor NPCs.

Anyway, just my two cents.

I think you're right, it's just that dramatic twists and non-roll based complications can, due to the nature of Fate and the way in which it's common for players to prefer smooth sailing, turn into attempts to return to the status quo.


Maybe that's part of it: Fate players have to be prepared to play for the drama, rather than safe and easy situations. The rules definitely appear to assume that it's not necessary for the player to be "willing." It's assumed that they'll either accept the compel or buy it off. Though the rules do also mention "negotiation," so I guess it's assumed that sometimes neither the offered point nor the option to buy off will seem appropriate to some people.

Ideally, yeah, they won't just try to negate the new complication, but that's where the tricky balance comes in. The player might judge that the complication isn't just dramatic and interesting, but could foul up the overall goal. Maybe they're trying to keep a low profile and tail someone, and now this NPC is making a racket or getting in the line of fire, or something. In other words, the complication might represent a stack of new situational aspects that the referee could further compel. I guess I'm thinking in terms of players who work hard not to give the GM any kind of leverage, and maybe I should just try not to play with such people.


Thanks.

Have you guys considered asking the moderators if this discussion group is worthy of being a Discussion Board?

It's a forum that exists to provide opinion and discussion when people might want it.  I don't see that this comes with an obligation on anyone's part to ensure that there is always discussion going on.   Better for it to be here and not be used, than for it to not be here when someone could use it....  Wouldn't you agree?

You clearly have no idea what it actually entails to be an RPoL sanctioned discussion board. Turns out RPOL says you are, but for whatever reason they don't put you in my Discussion Board section. Maybe because I didn't create it?

In any case a more direct answer is "Equivalent for it to be here and not be used than to be there and not be used." Neither one of us knows when any game or discussion board is going to be deleted, but this two days of activity has already put the board in safe territory for another year either way.

If discussion boards require activity, they've been really bad at enforcing mine.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:13, Sat 02 Sept 2017.

Now, now.  There's no need to try to be incendiary with your response.  Sure, I misunderstood your question, but I also never claimed this was a rpol sanctioned discussion board.

Actually, RPOL doesn't actually say we are, either.  Despite the word "discussion" in the title, we are simply a forum in the Discussion category. This means we have a cast list and the right to advertise in Wanted-Players or in response to Wanted-GMs threads.

Simplest reason for why this group isn't a rpol sanctioned Discussion board?

The owner of the board hasn't pursued the option.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:28, Sun 03 Sept 2017.

What I was trying to do was cheekily admit to a mistake. Take it as incendiary or not as you like. It is what it is, and it isn't what it isn't.


No, but mine are listed in the Heaven section entitled RPOL Discussion Forums link to a message in another game as is this one. How you got listed there without them saying you are an RPOL Discussion Forum is beyond me, but it would explain why the forum isn't on that section of my page.


I do still have cast lists on both of mine, so it's either a rule they're bad at enforcing, or it never was. And I don't want to test the fact that they have not removed my Discussion Boards from the games I can advertise for.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:13, Sun 03 Sept 2017.

As a newbie to Fate, are the many Worlds of Adventure a good starting point as a GM? I was thinking of trying to GM Morts http://drivethrurpg.com/produc...enture-for-Fate-Core if/when I have the time here on rpol someday.

In reply to MalaeDezeld (msg # 294):

They are meant to be, yes. The core system books (Core, FAE, and the toolkits) give you everything you need to run, tweak, and expand upon any of the individual Worlds.

Personally, I never really found most of the Worlds interested me themselves, but I collected them all anyway. Each one has some fascinating special rules in them that can absolutely be used for other things. I put together a Star Wars game using Kriegszeppelin Valkyrie, Legend of Zelda game using Masters of Umdaar, and another friend of mine was putting together an original creation with bits from Frontier Spirit and Psychedemia.

And, naturally, each one is a setting, with plenty of ideas on how to run games using it, so should be excellent resources for a GM who wants to pick up and run something with as little system mastery as possible beforehand. Sadly I haven't gotten a chance to take a closer look at Morts, but I expect it's much the same.

I'd actually recommend running something like a one-shot or short campaign if it's your first time out, and I would stick to pretty vanilla Fate Core or Fate Accelerated. Strangely, even those it's meant to be simpler, FAE can more a harder switch for some folks used to more traditional systems.

Anyway -- I would pick the genre you all like best, or are currently most interested in trying, and cooperatively build the setting if you're talking about a face to face group. If you're talking PBP play here or elsewhere, to avoid bogging down it's often good to have the GM lay the setting out, at least initially. IMO.

Hi all

Just wondering if anyone has uprising RPG my brother got it for me as an extra Christmas present which only turned up last week :(

What are people doing with it? and what's it like to play ?

Hey all, a friend of mine is trying to kickstart a FATE Core adventure book called 'In Thoth's Wake'. Address is below if you have any interest:

https://www.kickstarter.com/pr...e-zine-quest-edition

I may also be able to get some information on the business side of things in case others on RPOL would like to do something similar - if there's interest from others in following his lead, I can post what I am able to learn about his experience.

So I've a question or two.

Which version of Fate, or which specific Fate game, would work for a superhero game with 'modern' superheroes?  And the same question(s) for which would work for a superhero-lite vigilante game (basically the Batman universe)?