Overview

ID: Character Name
Refresh: How many Fate Points you start a session with
Fate Points: How many Fate Points you have right now (they do rollover if you gather more than your Refresh)
Description: Tell us about your character (personality, appearance, whatever)

Aspects: Taglines, monikers, and descriptions that help sum up your character
Mechanics of Aspects: Spend a Fate Point to Invoke (ie narrate their relevance) to get a bonus

1. High Concept: Sums up your character (like on a trading card)
2. Trouble: How/why you get involved in these plot-laden problems
3. Phase 1 (First Adventure): First experience/incident as a protagonist
4. Phase 2 (Crossing Paths): Experience/incident connecting you with another character
5. Phase 3 (Crossing Paths Again): Experience/incident connecting you with a different character

Skills: If you roll for a challenge or conflict or anything, these are probably what you're adding as modifiers. You won't have ranks in every skill the game uses (see a tentative list in the Fate Resources folder).
Mechanics of Skills: At creation, you add one skill to Great, two to Good, three to Fair, and four to Average. Anything else will probably be at Mediocre. However, other things on your sheet might let you do special things with these (discussed in their sections).

Stress: Like HP or Sanity Points. You can skip taking Stress and take a Consequence.
Consequences: Like conditions. 'Dirt in my eyes' is mild. 'Eye Swollen Shut' is more moderate. 'Detached Cornea' is more severe.

Stunts: These are the special abilities...the 'wow!' moments in the movie trailer. They often tie into your Aspects or preferred Skills.
Mechanics of Stunts: Spend a Fate Point to use one. Their effects tend to...

* Add a new action to a Skill
* Add a bonus to an action
* Use a Skill for something you normally can't

Extras: The special effects department. Props, Headquarters, Magic Systems...whatever special thing your world needs to build to stand out.
Extras Mechanics: The main consideration here is what special gear, resources, or powers you have. And moreso, what are the limits and costs of them. This will be figured out on a case-by-case basis for now and then organized as a whole system.

 Elective Action Order (aka Balsera-Style Initiative)

Action happens in the order that makes sense, starting with the person that makes sense. Then they choose who goes next, and they choose the next person, and so on. Everyone gets their turn before a new round begins. The last person to act in a round chooses who begins the next round. GM's can spend some sort of limited game points/currency to let a NPC act next.

Zones

## Roar Phase

The Roar phase is a fun option if you're using approaches (as in *War of Ashes: Fate of Agaptus* or Fate Accelerated) and your setting lends itself to it. At the start of conflicts, combatants can psych themselves up, call out challenges to each other, cast rituals, jockey for position, etc.; this is called the Roar phase, when opponents can enter a transcendent state.

This state may occur through intense concentration and focus, through wildly uncontrolled (and usually violent) emotions, through fearless derring-do, or the like.

To Roar is to be a paragon of one chosen facet of oneself. To outside eyes, the studiously intense scholar would seem to have nothing in common with the literally-foaming-at-the-mouth barbarian warrior, but both are, in fact, roaring.

In Fate terms, Roar is an initial step of conflict during which anyone can create an advantage. With great reward, however, comes great risk, and roaring means not having access to the full range of your usual capabilities.

### Creating a Roar Aspect

In one respect, creating a Roar aspect is like creating any other situational aspect—they're both just using an approach to create an advantage. But there are three major differences when it comes to actually bringing one of these aspect extras into being.

For one, when you roar and as long as you are in this state, you are limited to using the approach you used to create the Roar advantage, and the two connected approaches (see the diagram).

Olivia is entering a conflict with Lord Marcus Sidonius and Olivia's player wants her to roar with Careful, so she attempts to create the advantage *Intensely Focused*. Once she's roaring, she can use the free invoke from that aspect normally, but she's limited to the Careful, Sneaky, and Clever approaches.

Second, the base difficulty to create one of these Roar aspects is +2. The players and the GM take turns rolling for Roar aspects—that's right, the GM can create as many aspects as the players do. How many free invocations are generated for each aspect, however, depends on the roll results.

Finally, trying and failing to create a Roar aspect means success at a cost. The Roar aspect will be created, but along with it will come a related consequence for the GM to use against the PC. On a tie, the GM only gets a boost against the PC rather than a consequence. It's a tricky business, transcending the bounds of mortal consciousness and capability. With great ambition comes great risk, and the gods don't take kindly to hubris. Note that minor NPCs who can't take consequences thus can't create a Roar aspect at a cost; they simply fail altogether.

Olivia fails the roll to create the roar aspect *Intensely Focused* for her debate against Lord Marcus Sidonius. The GM decides that Olivia will gain the mild consequence *Oblivious to her Surroundings*. The GM gets one free invocation of that consequence.

Minor GM characters can roar with something they are skilled at, but lose the Roar aspect automatically if they have to use an ability they are bad at.

The NPC Lord Marcus Sidonius is skilled (+2) at appraising goods, negotiating contracts, and avoiding a straight answer, so he might roar by beating around the bush with a flowery opening speech to avoid getting to the point. He is bad (-2) at physical activity and admitting he's wrong, so he would automatically lose his roar aspect if he had to face evidence that he gave incorrect figures, or if Olivia managed to move around so that he is huffing and puffing to keep up with her pace.

### Compelling a Roar Aspect

Naturally, a Roar aspect can be compelled, either by the player who created it or by the GM. If the player compels it, it's worth a fate point, as usual. If the GM compels a character's Roar aspect, however, refusing a compel not only costs the player a fate point as usual, but also removes the Roar aspect from play. See "Losing a Roar Aspect" on the next page.

### Losing Your Roar Aspect

A Roar aspect lasts until you choose to use a non-adjacent approach or until the end of the scene, whichever comes first. Barring any interference, of course. If the GM offers you a fate point to keep on Raging just as you're about to calm things down, for example, accepting means you're stuck with it for a while. You can pretty much count on the GM using this to your disfavor one way or another. What happens when the Raging barbarian can't stop raging, even though the only combatants still standing are his allies? Excellent question. Hopefully someone will survive to answer it.

As noted earlier, refusing a compel on a Roar aspect not only costs a fate point, but immediately removes the Roar aspect from play. There are no half-measures with Roar—either you're roaring or you're not. And as soon as you're not, it's over.

Back to our earlier example, where Olivia was *Intensely Focused*. During their heated conversation, Olivia had started walking briskly to wear Sidonius down. Their walk has led them to a glade outside of town. Unfortunately for the both of them, one lone Orc has strayed from its pack to the same glade. If it notices them, more will soon follow. If Olivia wants to flee (Quick) or defend (Forceful), she will have to lose the Roar aspect. The GM offers a shiny fate point if Olivia will keep roaring, and Olivia's player accepts. She thinks she can Cleverly hide from the Orc. Let's hope she has not underestimated their keen sense of smell.

Roar isn't something to be entered into lightly. Roaring can mean risk and loss just as easily as power and glory.

### Magic Rituals in the Roar Phase

Priests and others who bravely court the favor of the gods can create very special aspects through magic rituals during the Roar phase. See under "Battle Rituals".

### So Why Have the Roar Phase?

Fate veterans may wonder why we have a Roar phase and its effects, if both sides can create an equal number of advantageous aspects. Here's why:

First, it's part of the setting for a lot of historical material that inspires fantasy, such as ritual calling-out and boasting in many societies from Western Europe to Western Africa to the Pacific Islands

Second, even when Roar aspects aren't used directly against each other, it adds to the fiction by shining a spotlight on each character in conflict and what they're about. These aspects are used in a variety of ways; the Roar phase doesn't guarantee a zero sum between GM and players because some of them are won by way of taking a consequence before the battle even starts.

Third, it lets you create lots of temporary aspects with free invocations you can stack later (see "Invoking for Effect") at the moment in combat when the enemy is not trying to hurt you yet, so you don't have to worry about defending.

Finally, it's the only way to create certain types of advantages, particularly battle rituals (see "Magic").

## Exchanges

Next, each character takes a turn in order. On their turn, a character can take one of the four actions. Resolve the action to determine the outcome. The conflict is over when only one side has characters still in the fight.

Rolf has been challenged for leadership of his crew by First Mate Hans, in front of the assembled scurvy sailors of the good ship *Fiero*. This is a fairly dramatic point in the story and the GM decides to run it as a conflict. The two opponents will deal other stress through use of bombastic boasting, savage threats, well-crafted arguments, and base personal attacks. It's possible that they may come to blows, but what matters is convincing the crew to fall in behind one of them.

## Exchanges in Combat

While various types of conflict in Fate—social, mental, physical, etc.—use the same basic rules,combat and warfare can play out as a special type of conflict, relying much more than others on visual elements. When a conflict escalates into the physical, it's often time to go to the maps and the minis.

In the following discussion, anyone in a fight is called a *fighter*. They don't literally have to be a career soldier or anything—it's just shorthand.

To keep track of things in a combat, every fighter is represented on the battlefield by a miniature or token of some kind. Miniatures are ideal, because they give the battlefield more color and visual interest. If they don't come pre-painted, they can be fun to paint, whether you're good at it or not. If you don't have any miniatures handy, distinctive markers such as cardstock standees or cardboard tokens will do the trick equally well. For nameless NPCs, you can even use coins of varying denominations. (Hey, they're nameless for a reason. Representing them with pennies is apt.) As long as you can tell who's who, you're golden.

## Weight

Weight represents how importance, influence, size, or numbers favor one side over the other.

### Weight in Combat

Things like a fighter's facing and positioning within a zone don't really come into play—these rules don't care about that level of detail. Instead, it's the relative *weight*of combatants within a zone.

Add up the weights of all fighters on each side of a combat in a zone. If one side's total is greater than the other, that side *outweighs*the other side, or is "heavier." Unless a character has a specific stunt that would affect their weight, the general size of the character determines weight. Humans and most player character types normally have an individual weight of 1. Other creatures (monsters) can have different weights.

If the heavier side outweighs their opponents in the zone by at least two to one, they can replace any one of the dice they rolled with a [+].

If the heavier side attacker outweighs their target by at least four to one, they can replace *two*of the Fate dice results with [+].

It's a good idea to indicate weight advantage on the battle map using Fate dice, Campaign Coins' Fate Tokens, or Deck of Fate cards so you'll remember when it's time to roll dice.

Weight comes into play whenever common sense dictates it would be relevant. Always include it when attacking or defending, but not necessarily when creating an advantage or overcoming. It depends entirely on context. Generally speaking, if the mere presence of allies in a zone would help accomplish something, it's reasonable to include the weight advantage.

If the relative weights of two sides change during a round, adjust the dice accordingly on the*next*roll after they've changed. In other words, who outweighs whom can change on a turn-by-turn basis, no matter how things started out.

### Weight in Social Conflicts

In social conflicts—for example, a debate between two leaders for control of a Guild—weight represents the importance, influence, and authority of the opponents. Rank, reputation, credibility, and circumstances will factor into this, and unlike physical conflicts, sheer numbers may not carry the day.

### Swarms

Some creatures, like hornets or crows, are so small they have a weight of 0. They are too small to affect a creature of weight 1 or more unless there are a large number of them. Defeating an individual creature with weight 0 is handled using the overcome action instead of a conflict. So when creatures such as these attack*en masse*, they do so in a*swarm*.

Swarms come in three basic sizes. A *small swarm*, the size of an average human, is weight 1. A*big swarm*, one about the size of a bear, is weight 2. A*huge swarm*, one as big as a troll, is weight 4.

If you want *really*huge swarms, the kind that can cover an entire farmstead, use several huge swarms. Five huge swarms are a lot more interesting and versatile in a fight than one gargantuan weight 20 swarm. Not only can five huge swarms spread out to five different zones, they can also work together to get a teamwork bonus. See "Characters and Creatures" for more about groups of adversaries.

*"What if I want to use swarms of something larger, like wolves or hyenas?"*

Sure, you can do that too. See "Groups of Minions" for more details.

While they outweigh their opponents, swarms can't be damaged by normal attacks that don't affect an entire zone, nor are they affected by opposed movement—there's just too many of them to try to make them go anywhere they don't want to go. Without a weapon such as an alchemical explosion, you have to invoke an aspect for effect to make your attack affect a wide area, like *Boiling Oil*or *Flooded Room*.

*Olivia and Rolf have run into three big (weight 2) swarms of vampire bats spread out around the ancient ruins they were exploring. Right now the heroes are outweighed so their particular weapons are useless against the swarm. With all his might, Rolf knocks one of the giant pillars loose and uses the create an advantage action to add the aspect Wobbly Pillar. On her action Olivia invokes the aspect for effect and is able to attack one of the swarms by pushing the pillar and letting it crash down on the bats.*

## Movement on the Battlefield

A fighter can move to an adjacent, uncontested zone during their turn as a free action. This is made more difficult if:

The zone the fighter is in or going into has an aspect that suggests an obstacle.

The fighter is attempting to move more than one zone.

Someone is blocking the fighter, by grabbing or otherwise trying to stop zone change.

If the first or second condition is met, the fighter will face passive opposition to moving into another zone. If the third condition is met, they'll face active opposition. Either way, it's an overcome action.

Note that because this is an overcome action, the fighter will at the very least always have the option of succeeding with a serious cost. This means that if they*really*want to get out of their current zone, they will always be able to do so—but the cost may be more than they're willing to bear.

Regardless of the opposition and the outcome, opposed movement costs the fighter their action for the turn.

Passive opposition means the fighter's struggling against the environment. If either the starting zone or destination zone has an aspect that suggests an obstacle to be overcome, the difficulty is Fair (+2). If*both*zones have such an aspect, the difficulty is Great (+4).

If the fighter is trying to move more than one zone, add +2 per additional zone to the difficulty. If these have adverse aspects, add +2 per adverse aspect as well.

Active opposition means the fighter and their opponent(s) will make an opposed roll, with the opponent's total providing a difficulty for the fighter to overcome. Moreover, the opposition can invoke adverse terrain aspects, as appropriate, to increase the difficulty by +2 per invocation.

## Maneuvers

It's often important in combat to force your opponents to be where you want*them*to be—and to resist being moved where they want*you*to be.

We've included some examples below of how you can take advantage of the four basic actions to create specific *maneuvers*.

Most maneuvers allow your character to move to a more favorable location (e.g., adjacent zone with a useful aspect such as *Higher Ground*or *Good Footing*), or move an opponent to a less favorable location (adjacent zone with a troublesome aspect such as *Avalanche!*or where the opponent will be outweighed).

### Maneuvers as Actions

Maneuvers as actions should be declared *before*rolling. The player should think about the specific flair they want to add, and choose the appropriate maneuver. If it's not on this list, the GM can assist in making up the maneuver on the fly. Here are some examples of maneuvers that can be performed with basic actions:

Push: When you and your opponent are in the same zone and you succeed in an opposed overcome action, you can push the opponent back one zone as your action. At your discretion, you can end in the same zone or choose to push only your opponent.

Pull: When you and your opponent are in the same zone and you succeed in an opposed overcome action, you can move and pull the opponent with you one zone as your action.

Charge: When you run into melee in an adjacent zone, you double your weight for one attack action. Additionally, if you succeed with style, you can force the opponent back one zone in a straight line at the end of your action (in addition to the attack). You both end in the same zone. However, if you fail in your attack, you give your opponent a free boost—that's in addition to taking one stress for failing the attack as normal;*and*also in addition to the boost they would normally gain if they defended with style.

Full Defense: When you create an advantage to improve your defenses against attacks this turn, you create a *Full Defense*aspect that you can invoke freely once for every attack made against you, but the advantage goes away once you take any other action.

Full Attack: When you fully commit to an attack while disregarding your own safety, you can make an attack lethal (see "Lethal Attacks"). To do this, you must describe what you are doing and overcome a Good (+2) difficulty using an appropriate approach; on a success, your next attack will be lethal. However, your give your opponent a boost that works in their favor when they attack you, such as *Exposed*. A risky trade-off for adding extra oomph to your attack.

### Maneuvers as Boosts

Maneuvers as boosts are determined after the roll. Sometimes you land a lucky blow or make a skillful shot. Instead of taking a boost for succeeding with style on an attack, you can instead perform one of these maneuvers. Again, think about what you want to achieve, and interpret accordingly.

Knockback: When you succeed with style at a melee attack with a heavy weapon (e.g., two-handed mace), you can knock the opponent back one zone at the end of your action. You and the opponent end the action in two different zones.

Disarm: When you succeed with style at a melee attack, you can force your opponent to drop their weapon or shield. This prevents the use of any equipment stunt associated with it until they succeed at an overcome roll (difficulty +2) to pick it up or pick up another handy piece of equipment.

Footwork: When you succeed with style in a melee attack, you can move automatically one zone, even if someone is opposing your movement.

The astute reader will notice that maneuvers as boosts are examples of invoking aspects for effect. In this case the aspect is a boost so it goes away once it's used, and since it's used as soon as it's gained, we don't bother writing the boost down.

## Lethal Attacks

For a variety of reasons, some attacks are more deadly than others. They're less a matter of wearing your opponent down than of landing exceptional blows which can have an immediate and devastating effect on the defender. In game terms, we call these attacks*lethal*.

While an average attack can usually be mitigated by checking a stress box, lethal attacks go straight to the defender's consequences, bypassing their stress track entirely. This means that a successful lethal attack will always mean some sort of longer-lasting trauma for the defender—or, in the case of mere minions, who don't*have*consequences to begin with, instant defeat. (Probably by death. We don't call them "lethal attacks" for nothing.)

Making an Attack Lethal

Broadly speaking, there are five main ways to make an attack into a lethal attack.

1. Using certain maneuvers.
2. Having a relevant stunt.
3. Using an appropriate magic ritual.
4. Some deadly creatures have lethal attacks.
5. Creating such excellent attack conditions that the GM judges the attack to be lethal.

Using Maneuvers

The Full Attack maneuver sets you up to deliver a lethal attack but makes you exposed as well. See the "Maneuvers" section for more detail.

Having A Stunt

Certain stunts with a special weapon or using a particular technique can give particular attacks the ability to cause lethal damage. Lethal damage is always a "once per session" stunt effect. See the  "Equipment Stunts" section for more detail.

Using a Battle Ritual

Rituals essentially grant temporary stunts and some rituals, such as "Combat Fury," can grant the ability to cause lethal damage. Lethal damage is always a "once per conflict" effect. See the "Battle Rituals" section for more detail.

Deadly Creatures

Some creatures are just naturally deadly! For example, creatures that are venomous (e.g., snakes, scorpions); creatures with particularly dangerous fangs or claws (e.g., leopards, alligators, sharks); creatures with supernatural attacks (e.g., vampires, werewolves, demons.)

GM's Discretion

Sometimes the players come up with a brilliant plan that leaves the enemy at a serious disadvantage. If they put serious (and successful) effort into creating conditions that would make their attack much more dangerous, the GM can decide to declare that an attack will do lethal damage.

Often such situations will be represented by lots of preparatory aspects and boosts, which will in turn convert into substantial bonuses. The GM should not give a deadly outcome in that situation—the bonuses will be damaging enough. But it may be useful in a situation where the GM knows the players will be able to do all that preparation, and just skip over it in favor of making the initial attacks lethal rather than stretching out an otherwise unimportant conflict.

FATE CODEX

Game Creation Tips: Managing the Conversation

by Leonard Balsera

Fate Core describes a process of collaborative game creation, where everyone participating in the game sits down and, from the vast reaches of empty nothingness, produces an awesome world with dramatic tension to play in.

The hard truth is, doing this isn’t always easy. The game creation chapter is a set of tools for you to use, but it’s not a magic spell. The hard part—the work of joining creative minds in a collaborative atmosphere—still falls to you and your group.

Here’s some advice on how to manage it.

Bringing Your Best You

For as much as we claim to value the experience, it’s kind of amazing how little we (myself included) pay attention to what state we’re in when we show up to game. We’re all busy, burdened by the thousand tiny (and not so tiny) stresses of work and life. We all throw ourselves into various forms of recreation, and we all need to recharge.

Yes, gaming is fun and a great way to blow off steam. Game creation is a little different, though—it requires an effort similar to team sports and it expends energy, albeit mental rather than physical. Active, spontaneous imagining is taxing, and it pays dividends to make sure that, if you’re going to do it, you’re in the best shape you can be.

Obviously, you can’t control when stressors are going to show up and then magically plan your game around them. But you can control some things. Have you rested before the game? Have you eaten? Where’s your energy level? What kind of mood are you in?

It sounds silly, but checking in with yourself before you get to the game can make a huge difference for game creation. The other players are relying on your input as much as you’re relying on theirs. If you feel like the session is something you have to endure or “tough out,” all your energy will go to maintaining instead of participating, or worse, your resentment will bleed into what you create.

Don’t be afraid to be really honest with yourself about how much you’re able to engage with the group, and do what you need to do to get into a good headspace. Take a nap. Get some grub. Blow off steam before you start with a rant session and a couple of beers. Play a board game or watch a movie. Be kind to yourself. It’ll pay off.

And if you’re really, really not feeling it, don’t be afraid to reschedule.

The Collaborative Frame of Mind

If there’s one dirty secret to Fate game creation, it’s this: to do it, you have to want to do it.

Every time I’ve talked to people in depth about game creation gone wrong, as well as every time it’s gone belly up on me, there’s always someone in the group I can point to who didn’t really want to collaborate. I don’t mean that there was an obvious troll out to undermine other players or do anything malicious, but there was someone who, push come to shove, wasn’t open to the ideas of others. They were set in what they wanted to see or not see.

If you come to the table like that, your session will stall. The tools in Fate Core will help you if you use them in good faith, but they can’t stand as a substitute for that good faith. This doesn’t mean that not wanting to collaborate is bad, per se. It just is what it is. If you’re having this problem and you’re open and upfront about it, you can reach a middle ground, which I’ll get into later.

Here are some of my favorite ways to stay on the collaborative track.

Confirm and Build (or “Yes, and…”)

This is an old chestnut from improv theater.

Don’t deny, undermine, or reject anyone’s suggestions about anything, regardless of your initial, visceral reaction. (There are exceptions! If you’re really going to ruin someone’s fun, like with triggering or controversial content, or the group vetoes it as a whole, don’t go there.)

Instead, look at the things your friends say as opportunities, and help them out by offering more detail or greater justification for what they suggest.

So, if you’re making a fantasy setting, and someone is like, “...and there should be robots,” you might be tempted to say no.

Instead, take a breath. Think about how you might make that cool. Maybe they’re magical constructs. Say that. Someone asks if they’re common. Say they’re not common. Someone adds that there’s an elite cabal of wizard-craftsmen who make these things. Someone else says that it’s an ultra rare thing to have even one in your army. Then say, “So what if there was one feared military power that had five of them?”

Now you’re going in a direction that’s way cooler than if you stopped and said, “How do you have robots in medieval fantasy? Forget that.”

Be Simple; Be Obvious

Here’s another one from improv training. It’s almost axiomatic that the harder you try to be anything on the fly—whether it’s dramatic, or funny, or thrilling—the worse you’re going to do. You’re already a fertile ground of imaginative and interesting ideas, but you don’t think of them as imaginative and interesting because they’re yours. Maybe your ideas are rough around the edges, but you have excellent pattern-matching machines to help you refine them, aka the minds of your fellow players.

Though it may seem paradoxical, don’t work too hard to come up with an idea that’s going to be impressive or interesting. Don’t try to be fascinating. Say the first thing that comes to mind. Let the other people at the table be the judge, and give them the freedom to build on what you’ve got. You never know what they’ll consider brilliant.

Hearts of Steel, from the Fate Core book, is a good example of this. The initial pitch grew from a phrase I read on Rob Donoghue’s blog: “Two Guys With Swords.” So I brought that to the table, in all its fantasy cliché goodness. The response I got back immediately was: “Why two?” and someone said, “Maybe it’s an odd man out thing…two guys with swords, and one weirdo.” Then, “Guy without sword!” And we had a laugh, and thus Zird the Arcane was born.

Abandon Your Preconceptions

The game you make in Fate Core will not be the game(s) you have in your mind when you show up. It will not resemble that game at all, or anything you’d have thought of on your own.

Not only is that okay, it’s kind of the point. You have to leave your preconceptions at the door.

Holding onto an idea too tight will impair your ability to collaborate. Of course, you should advocate for what interests you. Whatever you’re fired up about should be the first stuff out of your mouth. But what you suggest to the group is just that—a suggestion, and no more. The other players will add to and develop those suggestions, and you should let them, because they’re showing you what fires them up, what’ll make them eager to game with you.

If we’d held onto preconceptions, we would never had developed “a supers setting” into “super kung fu” into “a super kung fu monkey” into “a super cyber-enhanced kung fu monkey” into “a whole sect of super cyber-enhanced kung fu monkeys” into “a whole sect of super cyber-enhanced kung fu monkeys who have meditative chats over wine,” which is perhaps the best illustration in the Fate Core book. You are welcome.

Leave Blanks On Purpose

If you’re at a roadblock on some element of your game’s premise, simply leave it blank.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of wanting make your world perfectly consistent and rival the worlds your favorite authors have made.

You don’t need to do that. Many of the coolest twists and developments in the settings you love (especially in television) happened because the author left blanks on purpose and then figured out what they meant later, drawing on the strength of creative pattern-matching to make it seem like they’d planned everything in advance.

You can do this too. If you’re at a roadblock on some element of your game’s premise, simply leave it blank—decide that whatever question you’re trying to answer is one of the things you’re going to deal with in play. Allow it to take on the power of mystery.

In Fate Core’s Extras chapter, we tease a setting called Ancestral Affairs, where the PCs draw power from ancestral spirits and use them to (what else?) fight crime. If you’re building that setting and you ask, “What is the precise nature of the guardian spirits?,” you might wander through hours of tangent as people explore different answers to that question.

If you leave it blank on purpose, then “uncovering the nature of the guardian spirits” could become what the campaign’s about, or something you use to reflect character diversity by having different people believe different things about them.

Formal Techniques

The biggest obstacle to making a Fate Core game is decision paralysis. Even with the constraints we give in the book (drama, competence, proactivity), there’s an infinity of games you could make. You want to narrow that down.

“Want” and “Do Not Want” Lists

You remember where I said above that if you have an idea and you don’t want to collaborate on it, you should just be honest about it upfront?

Here’s why: your “must haves” and “must avoids” make an excellent starting point for talking about what game you’re going to make.

Before you start out, grab an index card and make two columns on it (or use two index cards, as long as you can see the results side by side). One column is for things you really want to see, and the other for things you really do not want to see.

Everyone should write down one of each. It can be just about any trope you recognize from media—a genre, a character type, a setting element, or a plot device—as long as you can state it concisely and clearly (if you can’t, converse about it instead until you can).

Once you have that list, look at it as a whole, and think about what game ideas could incorporate as many of those wants as possible. Some ideas are probably going to jump into your head immediately when you see the “want” list elements together. Voice them! Start the conversation! And don’t worry if you don’t get them all right off the bat—you can always use them as goalposts for later in the campaign.

If one person has a “want” that’s similar to or exactly what someone else has as a “do not want,” put an asterisk or other mark by it before passing on the card. That’s a signal to invite the other person to talk about their objection and see if there’s a way to modify your “want” into something they’ll be okay with.

You might discover that you run into a strong “want” or a fun-spoiling “do not want” in the middle of conversation, also. That’s okay! Add them to the list and use that to refine your constraints.

Break Down Common Media

You and your friends probably have at least some shared experiences watching the same television shows or movies, or reading the same books.

If you can settle on a broad genre, try picking a few examples you all have in common, then break down their elements and tropes. Do this like the “want” and “do not want” lists above, but pick things specific to those media properties. If you only use one property, then that list should be enough; if you do two or three, you’ll want to narrow it down further into a single list that grabs “do” and “do not” elements from all of them.

Then, see if those elements give you any ideas, as above. Don’t try to make a copycat of the properties you just analyzed, but think about how else those same ideas might apply.

(A more detailed treatment of this process is part of Jason Pitre’s Spark RPG, and I’ll admit that I’m a little jealous he found a way to implement it before I did.)

Another way to do this is to name a cliché or trope that everyone understands and is familiar with from other fiction, and then give it one unusual twist, whatever comes to mind. You’d be surprised at how just that one bit of added complexity can stir interest and ideas. (If you need proof of this, you need not look any further than the BBC’s Sherlock, which milks “Sherlock Holmes but in the modern day” for everything it’s worth.)

The TV Guide Summary

The techniques above are all about putting constraints on the front end of the process, but it’s also helpful to put constraints on the back end of the process, giving you a goal to reach.

One such goal could be like the summaries you see in TV listings such as TV Guide. They look like this:

“In (name of game), a group of (main character tie) do (main show action), in a (genre) world where (major setting detail(s)). Rated (rating).”

Being able to articulate what your game’s about in these terms is a good way of making sure that everyone’s on the same page and on board with the idea, so you can get to creating issues and drilling down from there. The main character tie is whatever important commonality binds the characters together, and the main show action is whatever general thing the characters are doing week to week on a reliable basis. In Star Trek, it’s Starfleet officers exploring the planet of the week, and in Fringe, it’s scientists solving what seems to be a supernatural crime. Of course, you’ll deviate from the main action, but it should work as a rough overview of your game.

For the example game in Fate Core, Hearts of Steel, it might look something like this:

“In Hearts of Steel, a trio of troubleshooters (more like troublemakers) for hire do odd jobs for various fief lords and other moneyed interests, in a fantasy world where petty kings squabble over the remnants of a once-unified empire. Rated M.”

Solo Fun, Together

You’re doing it right if everyone’s having fun.

As I said, if you’re having trouble getting into the collaborative mindset and you’re more used to the GM presenting a strong idea that the rest of the group goes along with, you can meet the Fate Core rules in the middle. They’re flexible; you won’t break them.

GMs, if you have a game idea you really want to run, and no one minds, come to the table with your current and impending setting issues already written down. Then, invite the players to develop that foundation further, by discussing the idea, naming organizations or locations, and coming up with issues for those together.

If you have one or two players really interested in a setting element, go ahead and delegate them as the “boss” of that particular element, leading the conversation about it. If no one else has input, just let them make up whatever they want. Everyone doesn’t always have to participate in every part of the collaborative process, as long as there’s an overall sense of people checking in with and listening to each other.

Character creation is also a foundation for worldbuilding, and it’s okay to flit back and forth between them. If you need to have a piece of the game you “own,” start character creation earlier on, and if you end up naming any setting bits you’re tied to, go back into chatting as a group until you’ve fleshed that out, and then return to making your character.

Don’t Worry About Getting It Wrong

Fate Core uses collaboration as a tool to get you invested in each other’s ideas and inject some surprises along the way. It’s simple, but again, it’s not necessarily easy. You’re doing it right if everyone’s having fun. Hopefully, these tools and suggestions will help you get the ball rolling and keep your sessions lively, as they have for me.

Happy creating!