@Lord_Gareth Last night, we played another game of Dresden Files Accelerated. We had a fight with a bunch of boars, in which BESW experimented with some stuff. It went pretty well.
During the fight, Harold, a troll-blooded changeling singled out the alpha boar, grappled him, body slammed him, and pinned him to the ground before others closed in to finish the alpha boar off.
During that exchange, the troll got three attacks in against Harold. I could take two with stress, but I couldn't take the third.
On the third, I had to take a mild consequence. I suggested Harold should get gouged in the leg. It might make things like running a bit tricky for a while. My friend sitting beside me suggested I could just get bitten on the arm, that's relatively harmless!
But I grinned an excited grin, and chose to get gouged in the leg, because that means that'd be more complicated
I wanted the gouged leg. I wanted it to be more complicated, and be able to bite me in the ass later. Because that meant it'd be invoked and compelled against me, and I could self-compel based on it.
And all the while I get delicious fate points to use later to make Harold more potent when it really matters.
I have a guest here now and I'm leaving shortly; I'm glad I got to say all that in time. @BESW?
That episode concluded with Greener's character declaring, in all naive sincerity and with Greener knowing full well it was abjectly untrue, "Guys! jump into this foul-smelling portal that a troll just came out of! We have no idea what's on the other side, but it's gotta be safer than here where we've successfully defended ourselves against all threats except that troll!"
hahaha I just realised something (I am back for a minute): if we DO go up in weight class whilst we're there, we'll come back to deal with the wardens as a half-troll, two wizards, and a (????) whatever the eigenjars upgrade to
and he'll go "ha-haaa i've got you now! wait.... WAIT THIS WASN'T MEANT TO HAPPEN"
we already have a model of what progression looks like for einherjars, or at least SHOULD look like for einherjars
we have a mantle that is almost the exact same thing, except that they are 2 weight classes higher, get warding magic, and have a very narrow and small addition to thier burden that is really more like a suggestion
The other idea (which I just posted in Skype chat for her contemplation) is for Baily to make a deal with a fairy to become their emissary in exchange for losing her psychometry--and probably something about Rodger being threatened, or her being able to use her new power to keep him safe.
I've thought of it some more, and decided I have no problems with incorporeality as a power simply invalidating some means of attack. Just as iron skin makes one subject to magnetic powers without any explicit permission or cost. The narrative of stabbing an incorporeal person doesn't make sense. If you can't narrate how you hit them, you can't hit them.
It's a bit sillier, but yeah, a lot of the mechanics are super-portable to other settings/genres.
I'm getting the impression they REALLY understand Fate and are making it dance. Heck, they've got point-buy systems in place for customising characters.
So, here's something kinda cool from last night's session: the telepathic bartender was having trouble using his magic in battle the previous week, but this week he figured out a kinda cool application.
He rolled Create Advantage to erect an Anti-boar barrier around the zone he was in, which gave him narrative permission to force any boar trying to enter that zone to use its turn on an Overcome action (when normally it would have been a free move), and he could oppose the Overcome with his mental skill.
It was something like an active version of the 3.5 Antipathy spell.
Yeah, the applicability of aspects is purely narrative. And while there's always a risk of making something that's too universally applicable and thus too powerful, as long as you don't spam it every scene (and why would you when the whole point is in coming up with new stuff!), it's fine.
In this case the boars were Magically driven, mentally controlled by the Warden hunting the party.
So mental opposition for the boars was rolled by the Warden.
Although the boars were mortals, and thus the PCs outclassed them by 1 weight class and the boars couldn't under any circumstances get style on a roll when the PCs were using their supernatural traits... the Warden is weight class 3.
So any roll that wasn't a success with style dealt the telepathy PC a minor cost, which he took as 2 stress each time he successfully kept the boars away from him.
Well, normally it's very hard to have a successful attack action that comes at a minor cost, so DFAE invented its own rules for that.
> If you succeed at a minor cost on an attack, you take a 2-shift hit or give your target an advantage on you with a free invoke.
The idea behind weight class is that if you're just a little outclassed, you can't succeed awesomely no matter how hard you try; if you're properly outclassed, even your best success comes at a cost to you; and if you're hopelessly outclassed.... run. You can only roll defend and overcome actions, and it will hurt even if you succeed with style.
So a weight class 1 caster, like the Mind magic bartender, locking magical wits with a Warden (weight class 3), takes a minor cost every time they roll against each other unless he succeeds with style (in which case it's a regular success with neither style nor cost).
On the other hand, mortal boars (weight class 0) couldn't succeed with style at all, and couldn't deal more than 2 stress on any attack, so long as the PCs were rolling with supernatural justification to oppose.
0 is mortal. 1 is just barely the other side of mortal; stuff you can explain away if you try, able to threaten mortals but not outright overshadow them.
2 is legit supernatural "science can't possibly explain that" stuff, the kind of thing that can usually take out a mortal pretty easily.
2 is where full wizardry can kick in.
3 is "the power to threaten cities." This is stuff even the supernatural tiptoes around, like Knights of the True Cross, high-level vampire nobles, and the warrior-police of the White Council of Wizards.
4 is "nations should tremble." Senior members of the White Council, Fairy Princesses, the kind of supernatural being who is known by their name rather than by what kind of being they are.
5 is "legendary among legends." Fairy Queens, dragons, the White Council's disavowed black bag man.
And 6 is "incalculable." Gods, angels, unchained high-level demons.
"Mantles" are what DFAE calls your specific supernatural power, like Wizard or Lycanthrope or Half-Troll.
They each have a weight class and include triggers (which define when you can use your weight class), burdens (which limit your action or impose obligations/duties/complications because of your mantle), and limits (which are the cases in which you cannot ever bring your weight class into play).
Let's see. Superman's triggers would be "bringing your physicality to bear on the situation," as well as when using the laser beams and ice breath he has available.
His burdens would be saving the innocent, keeping his secret identity, and so forth.
And his limits would be that he can't use his weight class to defend against magic attacks, or at all while in the presence of kryptonite.
@Magician Kinda. They're described in a short paragraph, but your mantle as a whole can be compelled as if it were an aspect which contained all the burdens described.
It's not so much power creep as a character that's been around for something like 80 years, a large proportion of which was not concerned with making any sense or creating a consistent world.
Justice Society, precursor to Justice League, had as its members the original Flash, the magic Green Lantern, Doctor Fate (avatar of Lords of Law or something to that effect, it's been a while, but basically class 5), the Spectre (embodiment of God's wrath, here to punish sinners) and Wildcat. Wildcat is a boxer. That's pretty much it. No powers.
I kind of see Fate Core being able to handle such team-ups, where the godlike people do what only godlike people can narratively accomplish, while mundanes help out with something just as useful but less grand. But it'd take constant effort.
