Post by Tabletop Junkie on Feb 15, 2022 22:45:03 GMT -5
Building Stunts
We allow players to take stunts during character creation, or leave open the option to take stunts during play. We have a list of all the things that stunts can potentially do, to help you when you’re coming up with them in the game. When in doubt look at the listed stunts for guidance in the Fate Core book pages 96 – 127. When building stunts in this setting, know that you can tie in your stunts with not just skills but the force ability as well, as a more focused or specialized item.
Adding a New Action to a Skill
The most basic option for a stunt is to allow a skill to do something that it normally can’t do. It adds a new action onto the base skill in certain situations for those with this stunt. This new action can be one that’s available to another skill (allowing one skill to swap for another under certain circumstances), or one that’s not available to any skill.
Adding a Bonus to an Action
Another use for a stunt is to give a skill an automatic bonus under a particular, very narrow circumstance, effectively letting a character specialize in something. The circumstance should be narrower than what the normal action allows, and only apply to one particular action or pair of actions.
The Usual bonus is +2 to the skill total. However, if you want, you can also express the bonus as two shifts of additional effect after the roll succeeds, if that makes more sense. Remember, high shifts on a roll allow your action be more effective in certain ways.
You can also use this to establish any effect worth two shifts as an additional benefit of succeeding at the skill roll. This might be Fair (+2) passive opposition, the equivalent of a 2-point hit, a mild consequence, or an advantage that takes Fair (+2) opposition to remove.
Creating a Rules Exception
A stunt can allow a skill to make a single exception, in a narrow circumstance, for any other game rule that doesn’t precisely fit into the category of an action. Chapter 9 is full of different little rules about the circumstances under which a skill can be sued and what happens when you use them. Stunts can break those, allowing your character to stretch the boundaries of the possible.
The only limit to this is that a stunt can’t change any of the basic rules for aspects in terms of invoking, compelling, and the fate point economy. These remain the same.
Balancing Stunt Utility
In Fate Core book pages 89 – 91 which shows example stunts on top of the example stunts in each skill in the Fate Core book you’ll notice that the circumstances under which you can use them are pretty narrow compared to the base skills they modify. That is the sweet spot you want to shoot for with your own stunts, you want them to be limited enough in scope that it feels special when you use them but no t so narrow that you never see them come up after you take them.
If the stunt effectively takes over all of the skill’s base actions, it’s not limited enough. You don’t want a stunt replacing the skill it modifies.
The two main ways to limit a stunt are by keeping its effects to a specific action or pair of actions (only creating an advantage or only attack and defend rolls), or by limiting the situations in which you can use it (only when you’re among nobles, only when it deals with the supernatural, and so on).
For the best results use both have the stunt restricted to a specific action, which can only be used in a very specific in-game situation. If you’re worried about the situation being too narrow, back up and think of the ways the skill might be used in play. If you can see the stunt being relevant to one of those uses, you’re probably on the right track. If you can’t you may need to adjust the stunt a little to make sure it’ll come up.
You can also restrict a stunt by only allowing it to be sued once in a certain period of game time, such as once per conflict, once per scene, once per session.
FATE POINT-POWERED STUNTS
Another way to restrict ho w often a stunt comes into play is to have it cost a fate point to use. This is a good option if the desired stunt effect is very powerful, or there doesn’t seem to be a good way for you to change the wording of the stunt to make it come up less often in play.
Our best advice for determining what really powerful means is that it either goes beyond the specific limits we gave above (so, if it adds a new action to a skill and a bonus), or significantly affects conflicts. Specifically, almost any stunt that allows you to do extra stress in a conflict should cost a fate point to use.
Stunt Families
If you want to get detailed about a particular kind of training or talent, you can create a stunt family for it. This is a group of stunts that are related to and chain off of each other somehow.
This allows you to create things like fighting styles or elite schools and represents the benefits of belonging to them. It also helps you get specific about what types of specialized competencies are available.
Creating a stunt family is easy. You make one stunt that serves as a prerequisite for all the others in the family, qualifying you to take further stunts up the chain. Then, you need to create a handful of stunts that are all related somehow to the prerequisite, either stacking the effects or branching out into another set of effects.
Stacking Effects
Perhaps the simplest way of handling a related stunt is just making the original stunt more effective in the same situation:
• If the stunt added an action, narrow it further and give the new action a bonus. Follow the same rules for adding a bonus, the circumstances in which it applies should be narrower than that of the base action.
• If the stunt gave a bonus to an action, give an additional +2 bonus to the same action or add an additional two-shift effect to that action.
• If the stunt made a rules exception, make it even more of an exception. (This might be difficult depending on what the original exception is. Don’t worry, you have other options.)
Keep in mind that the upgraded stunt effectively replaces the original. You can look at it as a single super-stunt that costs two slots (and two refresh) for the price of being more powerful than other stunts. Examples of these stunts are in Fate Core book page 94.
Branching Effects
When you branch, you create a new stunt that relates to the original in terms of theme or subject matter, but provides a wholly new effect. If you look at stacking effects as expanding a stunt or skill vertically, you can look at branching effects as expanding them laterally.
If your original stunt added an action to a skill, a branching stunt might add a different action to that skill or it might provide a bonus to a different action the skill already has or create rules exception etc. the mechanical effect isn’t connected to the prerequisite stunt at all, but provides a complementary bit of awesome.
This allows you to provide a few different paths to being awesome that follow from a single stunt. You can use this to highlight different elements of a certain skill and help characters how are highly ranked in the same skill differentiate from each other by following different stunt families. For examples of branching refer to Fate Core book page 95.
We allow players to take stunts during character creation, or leave open the option to take stunts during play. We have a list of all the things that stunts can potentially do, to help you when you’re coming up with them in the game. When in doubt look at the listed stunts for guidance in the Fate Core book pages 96 – 127. When building stunts in this setting, know that you can tie in your stunts with not just skills but the force ability as well, as a more focused or specialized item.
Adding a New Action to a Skill
The most basic option for a stunt is to allow a skill to do something that it normally can’t do. It adds a new action onto the base skill in certain situations for those with this stunt. This new action can be one that’s available to another skill (allowing one skill to swap for another under certain circumstances), or one that’s not available to any skill.
Adding a Bonus to an Action
Another use for a stunt is to give a skill an automatic bonus under a particular, very narrow circumstance, effectively letting a character specialize in something. The circumstance should be narrower than what the normal action allows, and only apply to one particular action or pair of actions.
The Usual bonus is +2 to the skill total. However, if you want, you can also express the bonus as two shifts of additional effect after the roll succeeds, if that makes more sense. Remember, high shifts on a roll allow your action be more effective in certain ways.
You can also use this to establish any effect worth two shifts as an additional benefit of succeeding at the skill roll. This might be Fair (+2) passive opposition, the equivalent of a 2-point hit, a mild consequence, or an advantage that takes Fair (+2) opposition to remove.
Creating a Rules Exception
A stunt can allow a skill to make a single exception, in a narrow circumstance, for any other game rule that doesn’t precisely fit into the category of an action. Chapter 9 is full of different little rules about the circumstances under which a skill can be sued and what happens when you use them. Stunts can break those, allowing your character to stretch the boundaries of the possible.
The only limit to this is that a stunt can’t change any of the basic rules for aspects in terms of invoking, compelling, and the fate point economy. These remain the same.
Balancing Stunt Utility
In Fate Core book pages 89 – 91 which shows example stunts on top of the example stunts in each skill in the Fate Core book you’ll notice that the circumstances under which you can use them are pretty narrow compared to the base skills they modify. That is the sweet spot you want to shoot for with your own stunts, you want them to be limited enough in scope that it feels special when you use them but no t so narrow that you never see them come up after you take them.
If the stunt effectively takes over all of the skill’s base actions, it’s not limited enough. You don’t want a stunt replacing the skill it modifies.
The two main ways to limit a stunt are by keeping its effects to a specific action or pair of actions (only creating an advantage or only attack and defend rolls), or by limiting the situations in which you can use it (only when you’re among nobles, only when it deals with the supernatural, and so on).
For the best results use both have the stunt restricted to a specific action, which can only be used in a very specific in-game situation. If you’re worried about the situation being too narrow, back up and think of the ways the skill might be used in play. If you can see the stunt being relevant to one of those uses, you’re probably on the right track. If you can’t you may need to adjust the stunt a little to make sure it’ll come up.
You can also restrict a stunt by only allowing it to be sued once in a certain period of game time, such as once per conflict, once per scene, once per session.
FATE POINT-POWERED STUNTS
Another way to restrict ho w often a stunt comes into play is to have it cost a fate point to use. This is a good option if the desired stunt effect is very powerful, or there doesn’t seem to be a good way for you to change the wording of the stunt to make it come up less often in play.
Our best advice for determining what really powerful means is that it either goes beyond the specific limits we gave above (so, if it adds a new action to a skill and a bonus), or significantly affects conflicts. Specifically, almost any stunt that allows you to do extra stress in a conflict should cost a fate point to use.
Stunt Families
If you want to get detailed about a particular kind of training or talent, you can create a stunt family for it. This is a group of stunts that are related to and chain off of each other somehow.
This allows you to create things like fighting styles or elite schools and represents the benefits of belonging to them. It also helps you get specific about what types of specialized competencies are available.
Creating a stunt family is easy. You make one stunt that serves as a prerequisite for all the others in the family, qualifying you to take further stunts up the chain. Then, you need to create a handful of stunts that are all related somehow to the prerequisite, either stacking the effects or branching out into another set of effects.
Stacking Effects
Perhaps the simplest way of handling a related stunt is just making the original stunt more effective in the same situation:
• If the stunt added an action, narrow it further and give the new action a bonus. Follow the same rules for adding a bonus, the circumstances in which it applies should be narrower than that of the base action.
• If the stunt gave a bonus to an action, give an additional +2 bonus to the same action or add an additional two-shift effect to that action.
• If the stunt made a rules exception, make it even more of an exception. (This might be difficult depending on what the original exception is. Don’t worry, you have other options.)
Keep in mind that the upgraded stunt effectively replaces the original. You can look at it as a single super-stunt that costs two slots (and two refresh) for the price of being more powerful than other stunts. Examples of these stunts are in Fate Core book page 94.
Branching Effects
When you branch, you create a new stunt that relates to the original in terms of theme or subject matter, but provides a wholly new effect. If you look at stacking effects as expanding a stunt or skill vertically, you can look at branching effects as expanding them laterally.
If your original stunt added an action to a skill, a branching stunt might add a different action to that skill or it might provide a bonus to a different action the skill already has or create rules exception etc. the mechanical effect isn’t connected to the prerequisite stunt at all, but provides a complementary bit of awesome.
This allows you to provide a few different paths to being awesome that follow from a single stunt. You can use this to highlight different elements of a certain skill and help characters how are highly ranked in the same skill differentiate from each other by following different stunt families. For examples of branching refer to Fate Core book page 95.