All in One, Part 2
Read part 1 here.
After the Cypher System and Savage Worlds, the universal roleplaying game systems suggested most often to me are Fate Core and Cortex Prime. I’m glossing past Cortex Prime because I’m not sure whether to think of it as an RPG per se or as a toolbox for making RPGs, which aren’t quite the same thing. (I believe it’s more the latter, and I intend to explore that aspect of it at some point.) But Fate demands a look, especially since I’ve already seen how it can accommodate another of my high-concept characters, Ruyermo Aporreado.
Fate defines characters through “aspects”: things that set a character apart, such as personality traits, conspicuous features, background, reputation, beliefs, goals, relationships, obligations, earned or inherited titles, and persistent problems. Aspects are meant to be double-edged, offering both benefits and complications.
The first two aspects Fate asks players to choose for their characters are their high concept (what I’ve called the “one main thing”) and their “trouble,” a complicating factor that they have to contend with regularly, which may be internal (a personal struggle) or external (a problematic relationship). One of a player character’s aspects is always related to their “first adventure,” which necessitates deciding what that adventure was, and two are always related to their shared experiences with other PCs, which necessitates being part of an already established group. These three aspects are called the “phase trio.” The presumption that all the PCs in a group have worked together before and established bonds already isn’t going to work for every PC or party, and it complicates the exercise of testing the system with preselected character concepts.
Players also have to choose skills—usually in a pyramidal fashion, with one rated Great (+4), two Good (+3), three Fair (+2) and four Average (+1). These word choices are odd to me: I think of “fair” as being roughly equivalent to “average,” if not slightly worse, and I think I’d choose a word like “respectable” instead, or something like Cypher’s “practiced.” Pyramidal skill assignment means having to choose exactly 10 skills that you’re as good as everyone else or better at, no more and no fewer. The Fate System Reference Document says this method “was designed to be as quick and accessible as possible,” but I’m not sure I agree. When I tried to create Ruyermo for Fate, choosing skills was where I ran into the most dilemmas—wishing I could choose three Good skills instead of just two, or having to stretch to choose a fourth Average skill. An alternate method that the SRD suggests for “veterans” is simply to assign 20 skill bonus points, and honestly, I think that method is the one that’s actually quicker and more accessible, as long as players realize that +4 is the cap for starting PCs (except in superhero or mythic games).
Finally, there are stunts. The default is three per PC, but you can gain more by trading away “fate points,” which are opportunities to influence the game to take the story in a direction favorable to the PC. A stunt can extend the use of a skill to accomplish something it doesn’t usually cover, grant a bonus to the use of a skill or create a special exception to the rules of the game.
Inspector Anatoly Nikolayevich Golovko
Refresh 2
Aspects
Policeman With a Sense of Honor (High Concept)
Vodka Connoisseur (Trouble)
Patient Cossack
[Crossing Paths aspect]
[Crossing Paths aspect]
Skills
+3 Fight, Physique, Shoot, Stealth, Will
+2 Athletics, Contacts
+1 Investigate
Stunts
Combat Reflexes. In a physical conflict, you can use Fight or Shoot instead of Notice to determine turn order.
Hard Boiled. You can choose to ignore a mild or moderate consequence for the duration of the scene. It can’t be compelled or invoked by enemies. At the end of the scene, it comes back one level worse.
Indomitable. +2 to defend against Provoke attacks specifically related to intimidation and fear.
Tough as Nails. Once per session, at the cost of a fate point, reduce the severity of a moderate consequence that’s physical in nature to a mild consequence (if mild consequence slot is free), or erase a mild consequence altogether.
Stress
Physical [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ]
Mental [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ]
Two of Anatoly Nikolayevich’s aspects are placeholders that in an actual game of Fate would be filled in with aspects created by crossing paths with other PCs in the phase trio. “Vodka Connoisseur” is a euphemistic reference to his alcoholism, but it also incorporates a potential upside, in that he might be able to use his refined knowledge of vodka to establish rapport with someone or intuit something about their personality. Patient Cossack identifies him with his ethnic background—Cossacks are perceived as brave, independent, honest people and great warriors—and also alludes to the proverb «Терпи, казак, атаманом будешь» (“Be patient, Cossack, you will be an ataman”), implying that he endures hardships in the present so that he might achieve great things in the future.
Anatoly Nikolayevich isn’t Great at anything, but he’s Good at a lot of things, so buying his skills using a 20-point budget is clearly the way to go. I gave him an extra stunt because he’s stoic, taking things as they come, and I can’t imagine making a lot of use of fate points with him, so he has little need of a generous refresh. The only reason I didn’t give him a fifth stunt is that I couldn’t find another that fit.
Joseph Chapman
Refresh 3
Aspects
Luckbending Gunslinger (High Concept)
Civil War Deserter (Trouble)
Trouble Magnet
[Crossing Paths aspect]
[Crossing Paths aspect]
Skills
+4 Shoot, Will
+3 Notice
+2 Athletics, Fight, Physique, Rapport
+1 Stealth
Stunts
Bend Luck. When you invoke Luckbending Gunslinger to reroll, roll six dice and ignore two of them.
Fortuitous Shot. When you succeed with style on a Shoot roll, you can spend two shifts to put a situation aspect on the target in addition to hitting them for stress.
Extras
Bend Luck
Permissions: One aspect reflecting the ability to manipulate probability; +4 or greater Will.
Costs: One stunt.
People who can bend luck are able to manipulate probability, gaining the Bend Luck stunt and adding the following actions to the Will skill:
Overcome: Use Will to add a plausible element to a scene without spending a fate point.
Create an Advantage: Use Will to specify the placement of an NPC in space and/or time in order to create a new situation aspect.
Defend: Use Will to reduce the severity of a consequence by one step, at the cost of 1 mental stress.
Stress
Physical [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ]
Mental [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ]
Given that Chapman’s “one big thing” is something all Fate PCs can do to a limited extent simply by spending a fate point, it requires a subtle understanding of the game system to figure out how to turn it into something that feels less metagame-y and more in-game-y, without also making it an overly powerful ability or one that a player will use indiscriminately. I don’t have that subtle understanding, so I consulted with Mike Olson, one of the coauthors of Fate Core, who recommended tweaks to Bend Luck and Fortuitous Shot (initially the SRD stunt Called Shot, but I renamed it after applying his suggested changes), including the “roll six, choose four” mechanic. I like this mechanic a great deal, because it feels to me like choosing one course of events from many possibilities—exactly how I imagine “luckbending” working.
Coill Amaezhiad
Refresh 3
Aspects
Wandering Fortune-Teller (High Concept)
Half-Drow (Trouble)
Tells It Like It Is
[Crossing Paths aspect]
[Crossing Paths aspect]
Skills
+4 Divine
+3 Empathy, Lore, Rapport, Will
+2 Investigate
+1 Deceive, Notice
Stunts
As Foretold. When you use the Divine skill to Create an Advantage, invoking the resulting aspect grants a +3 bonus instead of +2.
I’ve Read About That! Has read hundreds of books on a wide variety of topics. Can spend a fate point to use Lore in place of any other skill for one roll or exchange, provided he can justify having read about the action he’s attempting.
Prophecy. Once per scenario, you can make a Divine roll against a difficulty of Great (+4) to make a prophetic statement about one or more future events. On a success, and for every two shifts, create one game aspect using words from this prophecy. Every part of this prophecy will come to pass, though perhaps not in a strictly literal sense, and not necessarily without unforeseen ramifications. A game aspect created by Prophecy goes away when invoked, compelled or used to Create an Advantage.
Extras
Divine
Permissions: One aspect reflecting the ability to tell fortunes
Costs: Skill ranks
The Divine skill allows you to tell true fortunes using divination tools such as oracle cards. Anyone can deal and interpret the cards, but the readings you do always come true in one form or another, for good or for ill. Doing a reading takes between 1 and 10 minutes, free of disturbances. When you succeed with style, you gain additional information, or the information you receive is more accurate, significant or consequential.
Overcome: Use Divine to discover information about a subject’s past, present or future that isn’t readily discernible with Empathy, Investigate or Notice. This information may reveal the existence of a new enemy.
Create an Advantage: Use Divine to discover someone’s past or present circumstances, a secret they possess, or an incident that will occur to them or because of them in the future. This discovery creates one aspect, determined by the GM, that grants something beneficial to an ally or neutral NPC or detrimental to an enemy, although some time may have to pass or preconditions occur before this aspect activates. Alternatively, it may reveal the existence of a new ally.
Attack: Divine isn’t used to make attacks.
Defend: Divine isn’t used to defend against attacks.
Stress
Physical [ 1 ] [ 2 ]
Mental [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ]
Aside from his poverty-level, peripatetic existence, most of Coill’s difficulties in life stem from having drow parentage in a world at best distrustful of it and at worst hostile to it, yet also being alienated from drow society, so “Half-Drow” serves as his trouble aspect. It has the upside of also implying one or two innate abilities that other PCs might not have, such as being able to sense his surroundings in total darkness. Telling fortunes is something beyond run-of-the-mill Investigation, and so the Divine extra creates a skill by the same name to accomplish that task. I asked Olson about how to fine-tune Coill’s extra as well, and he suggested the stunt I’ve called As Foretold, and pointed out the importance of having Prophecy create one or more aspects that can be invoked.
Designing extras to accommodate Chapman’s and Coill’s supernatural abilities is difficult and delicate work, requiring a fairly deep understanding of the game’s mechanics; nevertheless Fate’s ability to handle them is impressive. As “the next GURPS,” Fate manages to exceed expectations in almost every instance—if, and only if, you reeeeeally know what you’re doing. For a newbie, the ceiling on what you can accomplish without inadvertently breaking game balance is lower, and only a simpler, more straightforward character such as Anatoly Nikolayevich can be guaranteed to work as intended. I’d give Fate an A for someone who knows how to hack the system, but only a C for players and GMs picking it up without prior knowledge.
I recently put out a call on social media asking whether there were any universal RPG systems I was missing, and it turned out that there were quite a few, the most often cited of which was the Hero System.
The Hero System is in its sixth edition, but that edition was published 16 years ago; it’s nearly as old as fourth edition GURPS, which recently turned 20. It’s also unique in having originated as a superhero RPG, Champions. I was curious to see how it would handle a character like Anatoly Nikolayevich Golovko, who has no supernatural ability at all.
Like GURPS, the Hero System takes a budget-based approach, in which more powerful abilities cost more. It makes no bones about players’ ability to use it to create game-breaking characters, admonishing them to maintain “an attitude of fairness and responsibility” in character creation. (“To put it another way, having a car gives you the freedom to go places, and having a hammer gives you the freedom to build things. But having a car doesn’t give you the right to drive on the sidewalk, and just because you have a hammer doesn’t mean you should hit people with it.” OK, Dad.)
The Character Types Guidelines table lists character point budgets for Normal (Standard, Skilled or Competent), Heroic (Standard, Powerful or Very Powerful) and Superheroic (Low-Powered, Standard, High-Powered, Very High-Powered and Cosmically Powerful) characters. “Skilled Normal” and “Competent Normal” sound synonymous to me, but Competent Normal PCs get twice as many character points (100) as Skilled Normal PCs (50), so I suppose “Competent” has to be interpreted as “Competent to handle bonkers situations.” In other words, Competent is a good commando, while Skilled is a good electrician. (The accompanying text reveals that to be more or less the case.) Based on that, I’d consider Anatoly Nikolayevich to be a Skilled Normal PC. Coill would be a Standard Heroic PC simply by virtue of being a fantasy character, and Joseph Chapman would have to be considered a Powerful Heroic PC at least, possibly even a Low-Powered Superheroic. I’ll split the difference and call him Very Powerful Heroic. Thus, Anatoly Nikolayevich gets 50 character points to spend, Chapman gets 275, and Coill gets 175—quite a spread.
And here’s where I come to a screeching halt, because holy cannoli, the Hero System is even crunchier than GURPS. Look at this character sheet. Look at it.
That is just too many abbreviations; too many stats calculated from other stats, using algebraic formulas with parentheses; and too much of an emphasis on combat, combat, combat. I’m not math-phobic, nor am I anti-combat—I’m making a living writing about how to run monsters in combat in Dungeons & Dragons, among other things. But there’s more to life, and roleplaying games, than combat. The Hero System can’t be “the next GURPS,” because however dated GURPS may be, the Hero System is even more so, despite being technically more recent. It’s a step backward, not forward. If you ask me to choose between GURPS and this, I’m going to choose GURPS.
Next: Genesys, Risus and What’s Old Is New.
