Questions about non-wizardly powers

[traeki]

I've seen lots of cool discussion thus far about Evocation and Thaumaturgy, but I'm a lot less clear on how other powers work in the new cost framework.  Here are a couple of specific questions:

1) I think I've seen various references to enhanced strength (or toughness, etc) that have different associated adjectives and costs (Inhuman -2, Supernatural -4, though those might just be different development versions of the powers).  I'm curious what those powers do for you, and what kind of reasoning goes into costing them.

2) To what extent are powers that could be instantiated as magic, but aren't nearly as broad, covered, and how are they costed?  That is, suppose I have the ability to mold stone with my bare hands as some kind of gargoyle, or command swarms of insects and spread plague, but not just "do anything".  I'm curious if the game provides sort of a "mutant power" feel alongside the "freeform magic" feel, and if so how it's costed.  Perhaps the power would work like the equivalent evocation, but you get major restrictions on scope, and bonuses to power level, at a given refresh cost?  It seems like it'd be nice to have maybe simpler but potent powers that don't pressure you into skill choices the way magic does, I guess...  Anyway, I'm curious to know what direction you took such things, if any.

3) Can you talk a bit about the costing intuition behind non-negative costed powers?  +0 powers I think are pretty straightforward -- that's something that alters the character mechanically, but not in a way that is advantageous or disadvantageous on average.  But I have a little more trouble wrapping my head around straight up flaws -- how do you decide how many fate points a player would need to receive to justify a flaw?  Why allow it over an aspect that gives the player fate points exactly as often as it inhibits them?

Thanks!

(I am blind with excitement about this game.)

-John

[Bosh]

I don't know enough to answer most of what you say, but a few things:
A. "Mortal" stunts cost you -1 refresh. These are small mechanical bonuses that normal people can have, such as Dresden's listening ability in which he focuses on something and hears better, which isn't really magical.
B. I THINK that with the exception of Soulgaze and Wizard's Constitution all Stunts cost at least one refresh. However, these ones are still beneficial, at least mildly. It's hard to tell from context, but it seems that these might be freebie stunts.
C. I don't think there are any Stunts that give you positive refresh. Any weaknesses (I think) are written up as part of a powerful stunts (like a Fae stunt giving you a weakness to iron) or aren't a stunt at all but are an aspect instead.

[traeki]

Hi, Bosh,

A) Yeah, that seems to be the general transition from SotC's "Fate 3.0" to the DFRPG version -- power costs refresh.  I was asking about superhuman levels of strength and toughness, not just pulpy resilience.  =)

B) These probably aren't the only ones.  A playtest stat-up of Elaine I saw had "Blood Drinker +0", for example.  Of course that's an older instantiation of the rules, but I'd be surprised if all other +0 stunts have been removed.

C) That same write up of Elaine mentioned at least one positive refresh "stunt", as did several others located there (I'd post a link, but I've lost track of where that page was -- one of the bleeding or burning alpha playtests).  Again, that's hardly authoritative regarding the current state of the rules, but I daresay it makes _sense_ to have +0 or higher costs, I just was looking for information about the thought process behind _costing_ them.

Cheers,

-John

[traeki]

Ah, here it is:

http://www.rickneal.ca/?page_id=66

There are others on the character links from various blog posts (including other examples of non-negative stunts):  http://www.rickneal.ca/?tag=dresden

[Bosh]

Ah yes, I see what you're talking about. Hmmmmm, that might've been changed by now, dunno...

[iago]

I'm sort of stuck here, because the depth of answer needed here is... the game itself.

I'll say these things quickly:

- There are a few "rebate" powers that will kick a refresh point or two back your way if you have them: my powers are contained in an item rather than in myself; my powers are only conditionally available when i shapeshift; my powers make me hunger for the flesh of the living.  That sort of thing.  I don't think these ever give you back more than 1 or 2 points of refresh. 1 says "inconvenient", 2 says "serious vulnerability", if I were to generalize.

- Mortals with no powers whatsoever get a +2 bonus to their refresh.  Turn that around, and you could say that everyone with a power is paying a 2-refresh surcharge in order to play a powered character.  That's the thinking that goes into some of our pricing (particularly the presence of zero cost powers or high-yield low-cost building-block powers like the speed/strength/toughness sets) -- a 1-refresh power gets to be a little cooler than a 1-refresh stunt. 

- Powers are built largely on the idea that they have the effect strength of multiple stunts mashed together.  So a 2-point power is going to have effectiveness similar (but often a little bit better, due to that one time surcharge above) to 2 stunts added together.

- You can us the stunt-building guidelines together with the above to grow your own powers.

- You can create a very wide range of effects with magic, but that flexibility is pretty exhausting to exercise consistently.  Other powers give specific effects without as much of an energy drain.

[traeki]

I'm sort of stuck here, because the depth of answer needed here is... the game itself.

::wry grin::  I daresay I anticipated that, and indeed in my heart of hearts that was the depth of answer for which I was hoping.     I figured we've got two months* before we can stare at the words on the page, so I might as well start asking the hard questions now.

And your answer actually fills in a lot of the gaps for me, thanks!   

-John

*"April at earliest, late June at latest" means "two months from now", right?  I'm gonna keep clinging to that raft.  It springs eternal, this well in my breast.

[iago]

::wry grin::  I daresay I anticipated that, and indeed in my heart of hearts that was the depth of answer for which I was hoping.     I figured we've got two months* before we can stare at the words on the page, so I might as well start asking the hard questions now.

And your answer actually fills in a lot of the gaps for me, thanks!   

-John

*"April at earliest, late June at latest" means "two months from now", right?  I'm gonna keep clinging to that raft.  It springs eternal, this well in my breast.

A lot depends on whether the final bits of art, the indexing, the cross-referencing, and possibly a vignette story from Jim can happen by April. If it can't, then it can't.

[Rechan]

What DOES the Inhuman/Supernatural Strength/speed/whatnot give you?

I'm fairly curious about the Speed part too. I don't think Fate really emphasizes Initiative (he who goes first wins), nor multiple attacks, so what does the speed do?

[iago]

What DOES the Inhuman/Supernatural Strength/speed/whatnot give you?

Strength is about hitting hard, breaking things, and lifting things, as you might expect.

Toughness is about taking hard hits.

Recovery is about healing from them rapidly.

Speed is...

I'm fairly curious about the Speed part too. I don't think Fate really emphasizes Initiative (he who goes first wins), nor multiple attacks, so what does the speed do?

SOTC has initiative, as does DFRPG.  Speed increases your ability to act first and your ability to get out of the way of things and your ability to cross distances quickly.

[ClarkValentine]

I'm fairly curious about the Speed part too. I don't think Fate really emphasizes Initiative (he who goes first wins), nor multiple attacks, so what does the speed do?

Let me put it this way: There are times when the best tactic is Run Away - but that only works if you're faster than the critter you're running away from.

[Bosh]

Iiiiiinteresting, it seems that supernatural powers are even more tool-kity than I thought, which would make it even easier to use Dresden Files rules for other sorts of games without much house-ruling.

[iago]

Iiiiiinteresting, it seems that supernatural powers are even more tool-kity than I thought, which would make it even easier to use Dresden Files rules for other sorts of games without much house-ruling.

That's an ulterior motive at work, yeah. We didn't do as good of a job as we'd have liked in SOTC to REALLY show what's going on under the hood. We tried to improve on that in DFRPG.  We might not have gotten that done perfectly, but I definitely think we stepped up our game.

[Ihadris]

... my powers make me hunger for the flesh of the living.  That sort of thing.

I've been meaning to ask about the feeding dependencies, which I'm guessing are going fall into the above category. How do they work on a practical level? One of my players has expressed an interest in playing a 'Red-Court Infected' and after re-reading the write-up for it on the website I was left with the impression that those who do not take the tattoos of St Giles will not last very long at all.

How feasible is it to play such a character and is it neccesary for there to be some form of magical intervention, whether it be the tattoos or an equivilent, in order to play successfully?

Ihadris

[traeki]

I've been meaning to ask about the feeding dependencies, which I'm guessing are going fall into the above category. How do they work on a practical level? One of my players has expressed an interest in playing a 'Red-Court Infected' and after re-reading the write-up for it on the website I was left with the impression that those who do not take the tattoos of St Giles will not last very long at all.

How feasible is it to play such a character and is it neccesary for there to be some form of magical intervention, whether it be the tattoos or an equivilent, in order to play successfully?

This isn't really an answer to your question because I don't know what I'm talking about, but my suspicion is that the tattoos' -1 refresh cost indicates that they mitigate roughly half of the feeding ::cough:: suck-y-ness (+2 refresh).  So maybe you make the same Resolve check but with half your Alertness or a flat +1 or whatever added to your Resolve because you might notice the glowing whorls.  (Again, to be clear, I am totally making all this up, it may have nothing to do with the actual systems.  But maybe I'll get lucky and Fred can spend an extra five minutes with his newborn after responding "yup".  )

Anyway, so you'd have a chance to survive without the tattoos in my version, you'd just be a lot more reluctant to use your supernatural badassery (presumably cranking up the difficulty on that Resolve check).

What I don't even really have a guess about right now is what happens when you fail that roll and take a life.  The books would seem to imply that that's seriously bad times, in the same way that losing at Russian roulette is bad times, but more so.  And that seems like a pretty harsh penalty for failing one roll.  So maybe you get multiple chances to, in the words of Catatonia, "stop doing what you, keep doing it to me", but like each failure does damage to your mental track, possibly causing consequences.  I like that actually (whether or not it's actually the system), because then your Hunger would get the free tag for the -2 Consequence "Drooling Noticeably", and you'd have an even harder roll that next time.  And Taken Out, here, would mean "lost to that great red darkness of the soul", which makes it no less fair than having Taken Out in combat mean "oozing grey matter from an ocular bullet wound".