Jan 292011
 

So, Fred’s post talks a lot about what Fate Core has been. My main interest is in where it’s going. That’s what this post is about, as a supplement to Fred’s post. In that sense, the title might be misleading – I’m thinking out loud a lot throughout, more interested in asking questions and exploring potential than finding answers. I don’t know if this is really “Core” material or not. But, who cares? It’ll be fun. I’m assuming you read the other post and that this isn’t your first rodeo with Fate as a system.

I think the best way to proceed is to go a subheader at a time, in roughly the same order Fred did, and just follow all the way down through the document. Again, minimal editing, so if I go off into left field weirdo designer territory… well, just go with it. Continue reading »

 Posted by at 10:54 am  Tagged with:
Jan 252011
 

I’ve seen folks describe Fate in a variety of ways. Collect them all together and it becomes a big jumble of paradoxes. It’s rules light and it’s heavy, etc. And it’s true, we’ve certainly “overwritten” our Fate 3 based games out of a great love for explanation, examples, guidance, and advice. But at the end of the day, is the system all that heavy?

If I’m right, there are two things that lead to the Big Tome Effect. The first is the above “great love” I’ve already mentioned. The other is additional scaffolding provided in service of a particular implementation.

With that in mind, I’m going to write up Fate Core without the overwriting tendencies — so, minimal explanation and advice, no examples — and see if it’s really all that big. My suspicion, not so much. This will be largely off the top of my head, with an occasional reference to the books when I’m doublechecking something. When I’m done this should read like a brisk version of The Basics chapter from either of our games, plus condensed versions of a few system components outside of that content.

This is a rough draft, written with minimal revision and editing.

When you’re done reading — what did I forget?
Continue reading »