This is not a criticism of Fate Core, but probably my GM skill level and/or rule misunderstanding. I've run sessions of Fate before, and they've never gone well. Here's some of the things we've encountered:

1. the sessions FLY by, not in a fun way, but things happen so quickly there's no sense of immersion and we end up completing things within an hour;

2. player's don't really feel much like the character they've created, since their cool aspects or stunts only work when they have Fate Points, and it's hard to generate enough compels so that you can always use your powers;

Besides just "accepting this" as how Fate works, what am I doing wrong!

At the risk of sounding like a grumpy grognard, I think that the issues that you're having with Fate are problems baked in to the Fate system, and that you would be better served moving to something closer to a traditional RPG. If you give some ideas about the kind of games you'd like to run, I'd be more than happy to recommend some games/game systems that might do a better job of suiting the playstyle of you and your group than Fate.

First off get rid of any idea that Fate is somehow special or different than other RPGs. It is not. The core of it is a lite rules engine coupled with a lite set of mechanics to describes the nuts and bolts of a setting.

Everything you do with D&D you do in Fate. Or better yet everything you do in GURPS you do in Fate. The implication of this means that you need to setup a good tabletop campaign first and worry about how to implement in Fate second.

Now the advantage of Fate is that it is very flexible when it comes to implementing a given campaigns. It has a few set of mechanics that can be used to detail people and things.

If your campaign would suck in D&D, Traveller or any other system then it will suck in Fate. So again focus on creating a fun and interesting campaign.


First all of you need to define the setting in which the adventures will take place. Fate doesn't replace this work. What the designers of fate recommends (on page 20) is to focus on the people rather than the technical details of the setting. But Fate can handle both through the use of the Fate Fractal where anything can be defined as just another Fate character.

Aspects are like what other system call gifts, flaws, advantages, disadvantages, etc. It is a lot more free form and balance outside of what make sense for the campaign doesn't really matter.

Aspects can serve as a prerequisite for Extras like magic and psionics.

Remember Aspects can be all benefit, all trouble, or something in-between. Ideally you want a few aspects that have complication that will cause troubles because this will earn the player fate points to spend on his character.

Then there are Skill which work pretty much like any other RPGs. Their design tends to be on the lite side.

Stunts are specialized aspects of skills that give a better bang when used but only pertain to a narrow set of circumstances. Many Extras involve the granting of special stunts.

The trick to using all this is learning to how to pigeon hole the various parts of your campaign.

For example you are running a dungeon fantasy campaign and decide there are only six skills set to the traditional D&D six (Str, Int, Wis, etc). A magic missile is a specialized stunt of the Intelligence skill and can only be used by a character who took the aspect of a magic-user. Conversely a Cure Wounds spell can only be used by a character who took the aspect of Cleric. And the magic-user and cleric aspect have various complications i.e. troubles as well as benefits. Obviously for a cleric there is the matter of his religion. A magic-user might have social issues with the campaign's society, or rival mages always hunting him for his magic.

Anyway the Fate Core and even more lite Fate Accelerated have a lot of good advice on the individual parts of the Fate. Where they fail is that they lose themselves in story gaming and the narrative advice when setting up a campaign.

Like I said at the beginning of the post, it is imperative you setup a good campaign first and then implement it fate second. Unlike many traditional RPGs Fate simply does not have enough mechanical detail to hold players interest if the campaign is boring. You have to have a decent campaign to run a decent fate game.

Thanks. My group and I enjoy crunch-medium games, like Savage Worlds and World of Darkness.

The challenge we have is that to be your character (e.g., you're a master swordsman (aspect) or you have a cool power (stunt), you need Fate chips. You don't get very many, it's hard to come up with enough compels so you have a steady stream, so frequently your character (at least when I run/play) ends up in situations where they AREN'T your character - you can't be a great swordsman or be able to fly (in a way that affects the scene) because you don't have a fate chip to activate your Aspect/Stunt/Power.

Again, not a criticism, just thinking that we're not doing it right.

We didn't have these problems in Dresden Files, because you pick a template and set of powers that you always have. My magic user could always use magic even if he didn't have a Fate Chip, and the Werewolf that had enhanced toughness always was extra tough.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;809012We didn't have these problems in Dresden Files, because you pick a template and set of powers that you always have. My magic user could always use magic even if he didn't have a Fate Chip, and the Werewolf that had enhanced toughness always was extra tough.

That your solution.

Note on page 12 the definition of Fate Points is

QuoteYou can spend fate points to invoke an aspect, to declare a story detail, or to activate certain powerful stunts.

It sounds like you are rating those stunts too powerful thus requiring a Fate Point to activate. The Fate System Toolkit is freely avaliable so look through that for idea on how to structure your stunts and extras.

http://www.faterpg.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/FST-SRD-CC.html

Reread page 92 of Fate Core on Balancing Stunt Utility. Note in the side bar they recommend Fate Points are used to balance VERY POWERFUL stunts. What very powerful? That depends on your campaign.

Or what happen in my games with Fate, you are not being generous enough. By generous I mean if the players walk into an area of magical darkness and filled with traps. They get a fate point right then and there. Or you rolled on a random table they encountered a city patrol while trying to rob a house. They get a fate point.

Compel means that an aspect of the campaign provides complications. Now obviously they are not going get a fate point for the campaign's equivalent of stubbing your toe. But it doesn't have to HIGH DRAMA (note the caps) either.

In short I realized that I should be handing out fate point every time a situation comes up that works against the players. The more trouble I cause for them in my campaign the more fate points I will be handing out.

Pretend that D&D is a Fate Game.

1) The players would get a Fate Point for encountering a Trap. They would get a consequence for failing to deactivate the trap.

2) The players would get  a Fate Point for a hostile random monster encounter. Although it is random, it is I made it part of the rules of the campaign that there will be random encounters in certain locales. So when I roll, it is the same thing as a compel and hence the players get a fate point for their characters.

3) A player has Drunkenness as an aspect. Encounters a room full of beer and drinks it all up. They would get a fate point for roleplaying their aspect in a negative way. They would suffer stress or consequences as a result so ultimately it could led to severe consequences if they get a fight before sobering up.

I am sorry for being vague on the following. While I did run Fate it was only for a handful of times a year ago.

Fate mechanics amounts to a handful of mechanics surrounding the four actions of Overcome, Creating a Advantage, Attack, Defend. Everything is made up shit.  And boring shit as rules goes.

What makes Fate exciting is that it has just enough structure allow a campaign to come to life beyond "let's pretend." However is it is also utterly dependent on the referee to make the dry die rolls and modifiers exciting.

In short you best bet to get a grip on this part of Fate is to read Matt Finich's Old School Primer. Because one thing that OD&D and Fate share is the fact both rely on Rulings not rules. Something you will read about in the opening chapter of the Fate System Toolkit.

If I ran Fate again, I would make up a cheat sheet of the bare bone rules shorn of all the story game and narrative verbiage. I would then take my Majestic Wilderlands, the Third Imperium, Harn, or whatever and then figure out how to apply details to fate as Aspects, Skills, Stunts, and Extras.

And that would be the mechanics I used. It is possible, if you have the time, to go very detailed like in Dresdan File, or better yet Legend of Angleterre/Starblazer Adventures. Or go very lite like in Fate Accelerated.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;809012The challenge we have is that to be your character (e.g., you're a master swordsman (aspect) or you have a cool power (stunt), you need Fate chips.

 you can't be a great swordsman or be able to fly (in a way that affects the scene) because you don't have a fate chip to activate your Aspect/Stunt/Power.

I've been running exclusively Fate Core for the past year or more, and I have never once seen any character in any of my games take a Stunt that requires a Fate Point to activate.

There are Stunts that require FP to use, but I have yet to see a player ever take one. Even after a year of play.
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On the topic of Aspects requiring FPs, THEY DON'T!

They require FP to get a +2 or a re-roll, but they don't require anything to "use".

They way Aspects are used in the overwhelming vast majority of the time is to ALLOW ACTIONS AND ROLLS.

Having a certain Aspect will allow you to attempt things you otherwise couldn't. When a player says what they want to try, the GM will mentally look over who that character is by remembering their Aspects and judge whether or not such a thing is even possible FOR THAT CHARACTER.

Scenerio 1
GM: The werewolf runs off howling into the dark underbrush of the tangled forest.

Player1: I want to track it.

GM: (Remembers that the character is a "Keen-eyed Wood Elf") OK. Beat a +2.


Scenerio 2
GM: The werewolf runs off howling into the dark underbrush of the tangled forest.

Player2: I want to track it.

GM: Um, come again there, Sparky? How in the exact fuck are you planning on doing that? All your Aspects are about being a city-born martial artist. I think tracking, in the forest, at night, is a bit out of your league.

And that sort of "allowing actions and rolls" usage of Aspects (how they are used 95% of the time) doesn't cost anything.

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So two different characters with two different sets of Aspects coming up to the same challenge, and one gets told "beat a +2" and the other gets told "No, I don't think so." based entirely on what Aspects they have. And with no exchange of Fate Points.

One of the concepts in Fate Core is that "aspects are always true".  If you have an aspect of "world's greatest swordsman" then you are still the greatest swordsman whether you spend a Fate point or not. The thing to keep in mind is that aspects only make the difference between success and failure some of the time. This is just the same as with "traditional games" too, just handled in a different way.

As an example, in a game of GURPS you might shoot at an enemy. You are a distance away, and that has a range penalty associated with it but neither you nor the GM has internalised the range chart, so you would have to look it up. I bet one of you would say, "let's roll and then we'll look up the penalty if it will make a difference." If you roll a critical hit, there is no need to check; same as if you roll a crit miss. If you roll way lower than your target number (even without crit-ing) you may not bother looking things up either.  Same as if you roll higher than your unmodified skill; you've missed whatever the penalty is.

Fate is the same, but the mechanism for deciding is different. You are duelling, have a skill of +4 and the aspect "world's greatest swordsman". You roll a +0 on your fate dice and are up against a person with a +5 combat stat (a giant, perhaps...). +4 skill by itself is not enough to beat this opponent. Being +4 and "the worlds greatest swordsman" might be enough to beat them, however. The difference is, rather than the GM deciding, or a chart deciding, you the player get to decide whether your aspect makes the difference or not. The fate point economy is a balancing mechanism which stops players always making the call in their own favour.

The upshot of this is that you are always an amazing swordsman but that is only the deciding factor some of the time.

In terms of dull combat, this is the same as any other relatively light RPG. Look at B/X DnD or something similar. The mechanics themselves don't provide much flavour; you have to add it yourself. Otherwise combat rapidly reduces to "I swing, I miss" and so on. It it incumbent on the GM and player to describe an interesting engagement between combatants. If there is a difference between Fate and older games it is that older games might put the narration duties on the GM alone (or not address it) where as Fate explicitly shares the narration between all players round the table.

This sharing of narration requires a mental shift for players in my experience, and groups can struggle with this when playing Fate for the first time. If you think this is a factor in your group's case it might be worth talking about explicitly between games to get everyone on the same page. I find the approach is more easily accepted by groups with lots of players who also GM. If your players rarely GM themselves they may need to develop a new set of playing skills.

You are far from alone with have trouble playing or running FATE.

Like any system, some systems work better for some groups than others. Tagging aspects is great for some players, not for others. Chat with your players and decide whether its more fun to keep with FATE or whether they would prefer to try something else.

After my experience with FATE, I wouldn't touch it again even with someone else's dick tied to a stick. Even Estar's dick strapped to a classic 10 foot pole would not be enough!

Quote from: dbm;809036Being +4 and "the worlds greatest swordsman" might be enough to beat them, however.

The difference is, rather than the GM deciding, or a chart deciding, you the player get to decide whether your aspect makes the difference or not.

In my games, it's often me GM deciding, for example, when I think, "Hmm, you're The World's Greatest Swordsman, so yeah, you just beat the guards, hands down, no roll. How do you want to leave them, dead or unconscious?"

But, of course, in the main, you are exactly right.

It's hard to know what to say given I don't know your players or what is going on round your table. Also there are so many ways to approach Fate that even advice is tricky. I think a few poster here have already provided solid response to the Aspects issue so I'll give the other one a shot.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;8089981. the sessions FLY by, not in a fun way, but things happen so quickly there's no sense of immersion and we end up completing things within an hour;

That is an interesting criticism. Fate does play fast, but not necessarily that fast! Nor have I have heard speed of play being associated with lack of immersion though I can almost see that.

I will venture a theory here. Old school games generally encourage players to act smart and efficiently. Acting stupid often get's you killed and is generally discouraged. This both reflects what happens in real life and is pretty much the mindset of most games, roleplaying or not.

With Fate it's bit like the game is saying "Go on, do that stupid thing. I know you want to. Trust me, it'll be fun!". That is because Fate is more of a fiction emulator than reality simulator and in genre fiction is quite common for the protagonists to make poor choices because that is dramatically more interesting.

So to some extent the pacing of the Fate expects players to embrace complications and not necessarily take the more direct, route to success. Is that what is perhaps what is missing?

Other than that, if you are keen to stick with Fate, you might want to shop around and see which variant suits you best. Just because Core is the newest iteration it doesn't mean it's the right version for your group. I personally quite like Bulldogs!, it think it's a very accessible flavour of Fate.

Just jumping over from the FUDGE thread.

Since FUDGE plays something like FATE without the Aspects, could you just run FUDGE, and not deal with the compels and such? As i understand it, you basically hand out a handful of Fudge points or Luck, and when they get used, they get used. They're not tied to anything but the player's willingness to use them, and the GM's call on whether they can be used.

Alternately, could you use fewer aspects, but give a blanket bonus whenever they came into play? I suppose that would be OP, though, because a +2 bonus in FATE is big.

Thanks all.

I just got a great explanation, that if your aspect says you have a cool power, it just LETS YOU DO STUFF without Fate Chips. It's always true. So that means.

If my aspect is "Crazy Telepathic", then I can use Rapport to read people's minds. It might fail, there might be some big dice contest, but I can still do it. No one else (w/out an aspect like this) can do it.

This was one of my mistakes, I think.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;809065If my aspect is "Crazy Telepathic", then I can use Rapport to read people's minds. It might fail, there might be some big dice contest, but I can still do it. No one else (w/out an aspect like this) can do it.

Keep in mind the effectiveness is the important bit - a person with the ability to read minds would be no more effective than a person who is an expert in body language, assuming both have Rapport +x. The aspect defines contextual stuff which may or may not matter, and if it does matter significantly then you might ask for the player to pay with a Fate point at that time (or reward them with a Fate point if it worth a complication - what happens if they are in a zone of "telepathic static" for example?)

Edited for typo

Quote from: dbm;809066Keep in mind the effective is the important bit - a person with the ability to read minds would be no more effective than a person who is an expert in body language, assuming both have Rapport +x. The aspect defines contextual stuff which may or may not matter, and if it does matter significantly then you might ask for the player to pay with a Fate point at that time (or reward them with a Fate point if it worth a complication - what happens if they are in a zone of "telepathic static" for example?)

That true to a point in that situations the two could use their rapport would differ. For example a telepath facing an individual wearing a psionic shield helm would face a lot of difficulty with using the rapport skill which would not effect the person skill in body language. And the reverse is true is both folks were in total darkness.

Which why it is important to define the setting of the campaign first for Fate. Because the setting will define the aspects available and the benefits (and troubles) they confer.

Quote from: estar;809090Which why it is important to define the setting of the campaign first for Fate. Because the setting will define the aspects available and the benefits (and troubles) they confer.

Indeed, and aspects are a fantastically compact way of capturing these, as long as the group discusses them and agrees.

Fate core talks about campaign aspects, and proposes them for setting the focus and tone of the campaign as a whole.

In an early Fate Core discussion over on TBP people were discussing how they would do Dune using Fate Core and suggesting all sorts of complex rules for lasers and shields (two of the defining factors of Arakis as you undoubtedly know). My suggestion was just to have a campaign aspect of "Lasers and Shields" to remind people of the campaign concept (the best way to model genre is just to have the players to agree to the genre conventions if you can, in my opinion) and that could be tagged or compelled in borderline cases where needed.

Which is not to say that you shouldn't have complex rules to model genre or mechanics if you want that to be a major feature of your campaign.