19th Level

Fate was a way harder game for me to "get" than I thought it would be. I suspect if I'd never gamed before it would have been a lot easier. There's a ton of blogs and reviews that can give you all the details of Fate. I'm going to talk about the Fate Accelerated version where I finally grokked the game. Fate Accelerated and Fate Core are officially the same game, but there are some definite differences. Fate uses Fate dice - six sided dice with two plusses, two minuses, and two blanks. You roll four of them and add them together - adding various modifiers as well, but the dice give a range of -4 to +4. You're trying to beat some difficulty. It sounds pretty traditional. Here's where it diverges. Fate Core gives your character traditional skills like shooting, piloting, etc. Fate Accelerated goes for approaches  - how you do something, Are you forceful? Are you sneaky? Both a wizard and a warrior can be forceful. But your aspects and stunts give mo...

Ten sessions isn't a bad length for some campaigns. But from my recent experience Fate Accelerated works really well for something around ten sessions. The characters are pretty competent to start with - if you wanted to you could pretty much ignore advancement. If you do go for advancement your characters will advance pretty quickly, a nice way to model Luke Skywalker going from a farm boy to a Jedi Knight in a few sessions. I think Fate Accelerated would work fine for something a bit longer, though you'd want to slow down the default advancement. Dresden Files Accelerated  gives some options on how this might be done.

I've had the opportunity to use every official Star Wars RPG out there. I've played all three incarnations of the West End Games Star Wars RPG, all three of the Wizards of the Coast, and an Edge of the Empire Game that borrowed material from Age of Rebellion and Force and Destiny . I've had fun with all of them and if I were in another group that proposed any of those games I'd be fine playing any of them. It was a bit unusual for me to take a stab at going my own way with a home-brew Star Wars game. I'd thought about using Savage Worlds in the past and did a one-off Wush u Star Wars game once but Fate was a bit out there for me given my earlier experiences with it were a bit so-so - I liked it but I was unable to really grok it. What I wound up doing was deliberately avoid other adaptations of Star Wars for Fate. Now that I've been playing it for a while I've gotten more comfortable checking out what others had done but I wanted to start as minima...

One request I've received for our Fate Accelerated Star Wars game is the inclusion of some space battles. I've shied away from them as I got my handle on Fate in general. As I consider this, my inclination is to stay true to Fate Accelerated and keep things simple. Probably the most important factor in Star Wars vehicle battles is the pilot. Han Solo takes a freighter through an asteroid field that destroys smaller and presumably more agile TIE fighters pursuing him. Anakin Skywalker manages to "land" a battleship that is literally falling apart. With this in mind, I want to stay clear of giving a vehicle full stats. Rather, I will focus on aspects. If a freighter is clunky, that can be realized via aspects. Consider this possible realization of the Millennium Falcon : Fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy Prone to breakdowns Armed with twin quad lasers and antipersonnel guns Smuggling compartments This series of aspects would allow the crew to realize m...

In this week's Star Wars adventure, our heroes were on a mission to extract a Rebel agent who had crashed on a planet and was being pursued by the Evil Galactic Empire. It's based on the old West End Games' Stat Wars adventure "Operation: Shadowstrike" contained within Instant Adventures . My previous post on lessons I've learned in GM-ing Fate was rather popular and I found the exercise useful for myself as well so I'm continuing that idea here. I've had some discussions on the use of sticky notes and marking up of the map. There's one reason I do that - if not I doubt we'd be doing much with Aspects. Most of us having been gaming for a long time and are got our start with more "traditional" games. As a result, it's likely we'd totally forget what Aspects were in play - it's something I ran into playing Atomic Robo  a few years back. One encounter in our adventure wound up having a nice combination of environmen...

While I'm still quite a ways away from achieving Fate system mastery, I'm definitely getting the hang of it - so much so that it's making me resist the shiny call of trying some other games (though now that I think of it, I could do Dresden Files Accelerated ). Looking at the map from a recent game the first thing I'd say I've learned is it is vital that everyone know the Aspects that are currently in play. Even though I play using a virtual tabletop in Roll20, I've gotten into the habit of using sticky notes to list the aspects of all of the NPCs as well as writing down the environmental aspects. One thing that's been challenging for me mentally is including aspects that the characters do not know about - the players still know about them. Now, if they want their characters to be able to get a free usage out of them they'll need to have their characters perform an action to "discover" that aspect.  I've also learned to be ...

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.... Star Wars: Tales of Rebellion Episode II: Gallisport Recruitment Having captured the Clone Wars-era shipyard of Admiral Bayran, the Rebellion is searching for a worthy person to convert the Separatist yard to production of Rebel craft. Reviewing intelligence data with their sponsor Bail Organa on Alderaan, our freedom fighters discover that the woman they want may be in the system they just departed - in the city of Gallisport on Shesharile 5. There, Rayne Toruna, an aging Twi'lek engineer, leads a swoop gang known as the Mynocks. During the Clone Wars, Toruna was one of Kuat Drive Yards lead engineers, having created the Delta-7 and A-Wing fighters. She left KDY after seeing what the Empire was using her creations for. If Toruna could be persuaded to join the Rebellion, the Separatist Shipyard could soon be producing fighters for the Rebellion against the Evil Galactic Empire... Cast of Characters: R2-C4 - Rogue Imp...

I first encountered Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar in the 1980s in the pages of TSR's Deities & Demigods book for AD&D followed by their Lankhmar: City of Adventure sourcebook. I had a pretty difficult time finding collections of Leiber's stories - my recollection is they either were out of print or not at my local Waldenbooks, in these days before Amazon. It was shortly after I graduated college that White Wolf released a series of hardcovers compilations that I finally managed to read all of the stories - and it's been an awfully long time, it might be time for a reread. Lankhmar has found its way into a number of RPG properties. TSR released a number of Lankhnar products - AD&D wasn't a horrible match for the setting but I feel it needed a bit more tweaking than they gave it. Mongoose Publishing did two versions of Lankhmar for RuneQuest but to be honest, I was less than impressed by those efforts, though I think RuneQuest is a very good match for the s...

I thought it might be interesting to post some stats for our Fate Accelerated Star Wars characters. The game is set in the time leading up to Rogue One and A New Hope , with our heroes working for Bail Organa. These stats are before any milestones are accounted for. Gaven Stark Refresh: 3 Fate Points: 3 High Concept: The old ways are gone and it's up to me to bring them back. Trouble: It may not earn me a medal but it will sure to get me noticed Other Aspects: I know my way around a blaster [two more aspects open] Approaches Careful: Mediocre (+0) Clever: Average (+1) Flashy: Good (+3) Forceful: Fair (+2) Quick: Fair (+2) Sneaky: Average (+1) Stunts Chest full of medals: +2 Flashy attack with a blaster Two more available without reducing refresh Background Growing up at the end of the Clone Wars, Stark had an idealized vision of the Old Republic and believed the Empire was a noble continuation of it. He served many years in the Imperial Arm...

Owing to winter storms, sicknesses, and internet outages I've not gotten as much gaming as I'd like to have this calendar year. However, we've managed to generate some Fate Accelerated Star Wars characters and completed a single two-session adventure. Next game is in a few days, probably a one-session adventure. I've not achieved perfection in running Fate Accelerated, but I'm definitely getting the hang of it. Unlike my earlier attempts with Fate, aspects are getting used frequently and there are frequent spends of Fate points. So far it has primarily been player character aspects that are getting used plus consequences so an item to work on is getting situational aspects in play as well. However, this is quite an improvement from my earliest attempts which saw minimal aspect use. I was a bit worry that approaches would be a difficult mechanic for us to grok - mechanically it's straightforward enough, where the way you do something takes precedence over...

[ Part 1 ] Cast of Characters: R2-C4 - Rogue Imperial assassin droid Gaven Stark - Idealistic former Imperial army officer Marcus Doha - Veteran Clone Trooper who has lived an active life since the Clone Wars Scene 3: The "Rescue" Admiral Bayran had a small treetop estate that was under assault from a small force from the Imperial Sentinel  landing craft - an AT-ST, a small squad of stormtroopers, ISB Agent Kerrin Malloch, and Malloch's prisoner, the Twi'lek criminal Tel Akuna. The three managed to distract the Imperials with a combination of explosions, fire, and blaster fire. R2-C4 used its rockets to fly up to the estate and "retrieve" Bayran - the aging Rodian was not enthusiastic to be rescued, but a blaster (set for stun) helped convinced him. There was a bit of chaos as Doha's granddaughter, bored with waiting in the ship, was checking out the battle and was nearly in the line of fire, but she was retrieved without injury. Most of ...

I certainly could be mistaken, but to the best of my knowledge there's not a Fate Accelerated Superhero RPG Venture City , a type of cyberpunk superhero setting, and Daring Comics RPG, a more traditional superhero RPG for Fate. Admittedly. Fate Accelerated is a variant of Fate Core, but I think there's a great opportunity for a Fate Accelerated Superhero game. Fainting Goat Games does have a Villains Accelerated supplement which is a listing of supervillains in Fate Accelerated, giving a good example of how one might realize such characters. . Off the top of my head, I can think of two main Fate Core products - Like most Fate campaigns, it would be important in a Fate Accelerated superhero game to get general agreement on the type of game you're looking for. One could have cosmic superheroes like the Green Lantern Corp down to street level superheroes such as Batman and Daredevil. Of course, comics like Justice League have put Batman and Green Lantern together, but ...

Grok means "to understand," of course, but Dr. Mahmoud, who might be termed the leading Terran expert on Martians, explains that it also means, "to drink" and "a hundred other English words, words which we think of as antithetical concepts. 'Grok' means all of these. It means 'fear,' it means 'love,' it means 'hate'—proper hate, for by the Martian 'map' you cannot hate anything unless you grok it, understand it so thoroughly that you merge with it and it merges with you—then you can hate it. By hating yourself. By this implies that you love it, too, and cherish it and would not have it otherwise. Then you can hate—and (I think) Martian hate is an emotion so black that the nearest human equivalent could only be called mild distaste.  Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land  introduces the term "grok" which is a bit difficult to understand - I've always viewed it as a full and total understandi...

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.... Star Wars: Tales of Rebellion Episode I:The Hunt for Admiral Bayran It is a dark time for the galaxy. The evil Emperor Palpatine has destroyed the OLD REPUBLIC  and the Jedi Knights, guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy. In the Republic's place is the EVIL GALACTIC EMPIRE. In this darkness, Senator Bail Organa secretly works against the Emperor, supporting the REBEL ALLIANCE. He has dispatched a team of Rebel Agents to Shesharile 5 in the Minor Cluster to meet with a rebel spy to see what help the Rebellion can give to that impoverished world. Unknown to these agents, word has spread that the Admiral Bayran, a war criminal of the Clone Wars, has been hiding on the nearby forest world of Yelsain. The admiral's hidden shipyard was never found after the Clone Wars. If he could be persuaded to work with the Alliance, that shipyard could be used in the service of the Alliance.... Cast of Characters: R2-C4 - Rog...

As I thought about what to write about today, I was mentally going through my old school RPG collection as well as some of my newer games like Fate as well as thinking about some some conversations in my gaming group of late. One of the reasons that some of the older incarnations of D&D and their clones have a certain appeal to us is the flexibility they give you in what your characters can do. Newer versions of D&D introduce a lot of detail into your character with feats and skills. I've found they work well but have also seen cases where they can inhibit outside-the-box thinking. One of the challenges on the older school side is in making rulings - when a player has a rather off-the-wall solution, there's often nothing on the character sheet that would help you adjudicate resolution. Interestingly, I'm finding in Fate Accelerated a nice compromise. In it, the players actions tend to fit in one of four categories (overcome, create an advantage, attack, defe...

Last night we had our first experience at using Fate Accelerated Edition (FAE) to run a Star Wars game. This was my third attempt at running a game using some variant of Fate. An Atomic Robo  game went ok while an attempt at a homebrew urban fantasy game using FAE didn't really work out. It will require a few more game sessions before I declare absolute victory but this session definitely did go far better than previous attempts. The session itself was a little rough on the technical side - one player was having sound issues (times like this I miss having an in-person group) so had to drop out and another had to leave a bit early. Real world stinks. I'll do a writeup of the session itself at a later point, this is more focused on my experiences running the game. The game is a pre-Episode IV Star Wars game, set a vague amount of time prior to Episode IV (close to it, but we've not fully nailed down if it is a few months or years). They are Rebels going on missions f...

Assuming all goes well we'll be trying out a Star Wars game using Fate Accelerated for our next game session. This has been a rather busy two weeks - the new semester has started for my part-time pursuit of my Master's, my wife is taking an advanced course in pursuit of her professional teaching license (she currently has her initial license), I've begun a new role at work, and took my daughter to her first political protest. I had a lot less time to prep for this adventure than I normally do. So what have I learned? Fortunately, it looks like prepping a Fate Accelerated (and presumably a Fate adventure in general) doesn't seem to involve as much statting up of characters. Given stat generation is incredibly quick in Fate (making the major NPCs took maybe a minute each) what I realized is I've a bit more freedom to allow my players to run off the beaten path and adapt on the fly. What I am nervous about is getting the flow of Aspects and Fate Points right....

After a brief Gaslight/Pulp Cthulhu game in the autumn, this winter we'll be playing a Star Wars campaign using Fate Accelerated . The game will be set some time prior to Star Wars: A New Hope , with every possibility of advancing beyond it. I'll likely post my impressions of Pulp Cthulhu actual play at a later point. My overall impression was it worked fine but I think I have a preference for a classic-era and style campaign. That said, I liked gaming in the late 19th-century and I think I'd really enjoy a non-Cthulhu adventure game set in that period. The decision to use Fate Accelerated came out of a desire to use something less complicated than Fantasy Flight Games' various Star Wars RPGs. They are great games and I enjoyed Edge of the Empire  but with my pursuing my master's degree part-time and taking on a new position at work, low prep-time is a must. We gave some thought to Star Wars D6  but decided to go for something a bit more on the narrative sid...

I've been giving some thought to Fate Accelerated and Star Wars. As an exercise I've tried a build of Luke Skywalker as of Episode IV. As I went through the building process it became clear there's an infinite number of ways to build a character in Fate but I overall am ppleased with the build I came up with: Luke Skywalker (Episode IV) Aspects: High Concept: Farm boy seeking to be a hero Trouble: Over my head off the farm Other: Best bush pilot in the outer rim territories, learning to trust the Force, my father’s lightsaber Approaches: Careful: +1 (Average) Clever: +1 (Average) Flashy: +3 (Good) Forceful: +2 (Fair) Quick: +2 (Fair) Sneaky: +0 (Mediocre) Stunts: Because I am learning to trust the Force, gain +2 when I carefully attack Room for 2 more at three refresh Refresh: 3 For aspects, I tried to think what Luke was like in Episode IV. His high concept is that of a dreamer. He wants more to life than what he has on the farm -...

While I prep a dinosaur adventure for my Call of Cthulhu game, I've also been spending a lot of time going through Fate Accelerated - you can blame the recent prerelease of Dresden Files Accelerated for this. However, I've also been giving a lot of thought to how Fate Accelerated would handle Star Wars . While Fate Core quantitatively stats out a character using skills, Fate Accelerated makes use of approaches. Approaches define how your character does things. The default approaches are Careful, Clever, Flashy, Forceful, Quick, and Sneaky. A character starts off with one at Good (+3), two at Fair (+2), two at Average (+1), and one at Mediocre (+0). When your character does something you use an approach. Now one might think you'd always use your best approach, but sometimes your best approach is not practical - for example, if you need to outrun a boulder chasing you down a tunnel (like in Raiders of the Lost Ark ), you'd have a very tough time convincing a GM that...