Can someone walk me through a basic evocation attack?

[Ghsdkgb]

I know there's an example in the book, but I read it and was still confused. I tried running a game the other day where my players faced an evil sorcerer, and ended up just having to fake it (fortunately, none of them noticed, and were totally cool with it when I confessed).

So, let's say I have a guy with 3 Discipline and 4 Conviction. I decide I want to put 6 shifts of power into it.

Ignore any sort of bonuses I may have from items or aspects or specializations, for now.

That means I take 3 mental stress to cast it, right? One to get up to 4, plus two more to get to 6?

And then that's just to DECLARE it. To actually cast the spell, I have to roll a 6 on my Discipline, meaning I need a roll of 3 on the dice, right?

Which means, if I make that roll, it's automatically considered a twelve-shift attack on the other guy? Is this correct? Does the amount of power ALWAYS equal the difficulty of the roll?

And then what is rolled to defend against it? Athletics, to dodge? Discipline with a shield spell? Both, if applicable, and their sums subtracted from the 12 "damage"?

Finally, what if I roll lower than 3? Let's say I get a +1, giving me a total of 4. Assuming I don't have any Fate points to burn or anything like that, does the spell simply fail? Like, I go through all that, and nothing comes out? Or do I just get an 8-shift spell? Or does the spell cast, but go all over the place with no real target? Either way, the Mental stress box is still crossed out, yeah?

Finally, let's say the guy has a source of power he's tapping into, like a ley line or enchanted crystal or something. We'll call it a +2, because. Does that mean he gets a +2 on the power, and has an extra +2 difficulty on the roll? Or is it the other way around, giving him a +2 on the roll and thereby allowing him to more easily put the extra shifts of power into the attack (with added mental stress)? Or is it both, giving a total +4 damage on the final attack, if successful?

Thanks in advance!

[Haru]

You are correct up until here:

Which means, if I make that roll, it's automatically considered a twelve-shift attack on the other guy? Is this correct? Does the amount of power ALWAYS equal the difficulty of the roll?

If you make the discipline roll, it will be a 6 shift attack with a weapon:6, not a 12 shift attack. If the defender reaches more than 6 shifts on his dodge roll, the weapon:6 spell does not do anything to him.

The discipline roll serves 2 purposes: targeting and control of the spell. Let's look at them independently.

Targeting:
Much like with a regular weapon, your roll is the target number for the target to dodge. The spells power does not factor in here in any way.

Control:
Unlike a regular weapon, you create your weapon with the same roll you use to target it. You decide what power the "weapon" will have at the most at the time you attack with it. If your discipline roll matches or exceeds what you set for the spells power, you can proceed like any regular weapons attack. If your discipline roll is below what you set the power of your spell, you will have to make up for the difference in 1 of 3 ways:
- invoke Aspects: This is the best way to go, if you have the option. It raises your roll to match the spells power and you can proceed as above.
-Backlash: You take an amount of stress equal to the number of shifts your roll was below the spells power. This will make the spell work as intended.
-Fallout: The excess power of the spell, that is the difference between your roll and the power you chose, will be let out randomly, and usually to your disadvantage. The details are usually set by the GM.

After all of this, the defender rolls an appropriate skill to dodge. Usually that will be Athletics, but stunts might change that. If the Athletics roll succeeds, the spell misses and the defender does not get any stress. If the dodge roll fails, the number of shifts are still subtracted from the attack roll, and the remaining shifts + the weapon rating of the spell are the resulting stress.

If the defender has a block or armor active, it will still reduce the stress of the attack by its value.

Example:
Let's take your Discipline 3, Conviction 4 mage who does a weapon:6 fireball.
First he takes 3 shifts of mental stress, like you said above.
He rolls a 5 on his discipline roll, leaving 1 shift uncontrolled. Since he does not want to take any more stress for the spell and doesn't have an aspect he can use, he decides to let it out as fallout, setting the room on fire.
His target now has to dodge a 5 shift attack, but with athletics at 2 and a roll of +0 he fails to do so, resulting in 3+6=9 stress. Luckily, he is a wizard himself and put up a block:5 shieldspell in advance, so he only receives 9-5=4 shifts of stress.


If you have an aspect to invoke, it can only improve your discipline roll, not your conviction to control more power safely (simply because it isn't a roll). On the other hand, with enough aspects to tag, you will get something along the lines of a 12 shift attack with a weapon:6 spell, which is bound to hurt regardless.

[sinker]

Which means, if I make that roll, it's automatically considered a twelve-shift attack on the other guy? Is this correct? Does the amount of power ALWAYS equal the difficulty of the roll?

You are correct up through here, though it would only be twelve shifts if the guy defending rolled made a mediocre(+0) defense roll. Keep in mind that you have to keep those two numbers separate until you know if you've hit or not. Six of that is weapon damage and isn't applied until you compare your roll of six to the other guy's defense.

And then what is rolled to defend against it? Athletics, to dodge? Discipline with a shield spell? Both, if applicable, and their sums subtracted from the 12 "damage"?

A number of people will be irritated at me for this, but the attack defines the defense within reason. A physical attack will likely be defended with athletics, though sometimes other skills are appropriate (weapons, endurance, might), an attack on someone's mind will likely be defended by discipline or conviction. If someone has a shield spell up then that acts as a block (look it up in the combat section) and can be used instead of a defense roll (you still roll defense but you have the option of taking the roll or the block).

Finally, what if I roll lower than 3? Let's say I get a +1, giving me a total of 4. Assuming I don't have any Fate points to burn or anything like that, does the spell simply fail? Like, I go through all that, and nothing comes out? Or do I just get an 8-shift spell? Or does the spell cast, but go all over the place with no real target? Either way, the Mental stress box is still crossed out, yeah?

This is where you start looking at backlash and fallout. Fallout is releasing the excess energy into the environment (often in the form of compellable aspects). This means that the spell isn't as powerful because it doesn't get that energy so in that case you have only a 4 shift spell (plus the 4 from your roll) and all hell breaks loose around you (depending on the spell, so if it's a fire spell then expect a lot of fire, etc).

The other option is backlash. This is where the spellcaster channels that excess energy through himself. The caster takes stress (either mental or physical, their choice) equal to the difference between the discipline roll and the shifts of power, so in this case two stress. The advantage with this is that the spell goes off without any other hitches. It is still a 6 shift spell (rolled at 4 so ten shifts of effort total) and if it hits then you will still have that weapon:6 attack.

Finally, let's say the guy has a source of power he's tapping into, like a ley line or enchanted crystal or something. We'll call it a +2, because. Does that mean he gets a +2 on the power, and has an extra +2 difficulty on the roll? Or is it the other way around, giving him a +2 on the roll and thereby allowing him to more easily put the extra shifts of power into the attack (with added mental stress)? Or is it both, giving a total +4 damage on the final attack, if successful?

There are very few ways for one to increase the power of a spell without taking mental stress for it (as per usual). One of them is sponsor debt (which is how ley lines can work). If you want to know about it I would suggest reading everything on the page sponsored magic begin's on and likely the next page as well, however in a nutshell you can get a plus two to power in exchange for a compel later on that you receive no fate points for (you've already been paid). Otherwise all aspects invoked apply to the discipline roll, which unless you're trying for a specific effect that requires x power is usually better because it increases your likelihood of hitting and also increases your damage at the end.

Damn, Haru got there first, but some of this is still applicable.

[Ghsdkgb]

I think I got it, now. So if I go for a spell, I decide how much damage I want to deal (in this case, Weapon: 6). At that point, I MUST get a 6 or above to fully control the spell (The difficulty for this is always equal to the weapon rating, yes?). Anything above that is extra Shifts the other guy has to defend against, so if I roll a total of 8, the guy has to defend against an attack of 8. If he succeeds, no damage is dealt, but if he fails, he has to take the leftover damage (which is just like any regular attack; that seems annoyingly obvious, now), PLUS the "Weapon" damage of the spell.

If my roll falls short, I either have to spend some Fate points (which I completely understood from the example), or take the added mental stress (ouch), or let the backlash go as it may, which is determined by the DM. If I AM the DM and this is an NPC, then I should pretty much be a good DM and let that help the players.

And if I have a ley line to tap into, that adds to my roll, NOT the Weapon: rating of the spell. Which can still end up causing more damage and such.

Do I have all that right? I think I have all that right.

Now, let's complicate things a touch. If I have a specialization in, say, fire, because why not fire, that gives me a +1 to the WEAPON rating? Which removes 1 mental stress I have to take for this spell, right? Affects nothing else?

And then, if I have a focus item, that gives me an extra +1 or +2 (depending on the time), to the ROLL. That makes sense.

So, basically, my confusion came from misapplying whether things went to the Roll or Weapon rating (I was sorta lumping them all together).

Is there anything else I missed? Either something I misunderstood or something else I haven't taken into account?

[Haru]

If my roll falls short, I either have to spend some Fate points (which I completely understood from the example), or take the added mental stress (ouch), or let the backlash go as it may, which is determined by the DM. If I AM the DM and this is an NPC, then I should pretty much be a good DM and let that help the players.

The added mental stress is called Backlash, if it gets out into the environment, it is called Fallout. Other than that, it is correct.

And if I have a ley line to tap into, that adds to my roll, NOT the Weapon: rating of the spell. Which can still end up causing more damage and such.

If you simply tag the aspect "ley line", then it is used like any other aspect, correct. But you could also treat a ley line as sponsored magic with all it's benefits.

Now, let's complicate things a touch. If I have a specialization in, say, fire, because why not fire, that gives me a +1 to the WEAPON rating? Which removes 1 mental stress I have to take for this spell, right? Affects nothing else?

A specialisation is always either in power or control. A power specialisation adds to your conviction when determining casting stress, a control specialisation adds to your discipline roll when casting the spell.

And then, if I have a focus item, that gives me an extra +1 or +2 (depending on the time), to the ROLL. That makes sense.

Like specialisations, focus items (focus item slots to be precise) also add to power or control, but they also have to be dedicated to either offensive or defensive magic. A focus item can add to one of

offensive power
offensive control
defensive power
defensive control

for one element, though you can mix and match on one item as much as you like. An item with 3 focus item slots could for example be:
Ring of Magic (+1 offensive fire power; +2 defensive earth control)

But remember, that you can only have as many focus item slots on 1 item equal to your lore.

[Ghsdkgb]

I got it now. Thanks! This helped a BUNCH!

[sinker]

The added mental stress is called Backlash, if it gets out into the environment, it is called Fallout. Other than that, it is correct.

Additionally the added stress can be mental OR physical, and is not part of your casting stress. So using the example above you would not simply take four mental stress and mark off your fourth stress box, you would take two mental stress from the casting, marking off your second stress box and then two stress from the backlash, marking off either your third mental stress box (because stress rolls up) or your second physical stress box. Most casters choose physical, cause it doesn't interfere with their casting abilities.

[crusher_bob]

Some expansion and clarification here:

It helps to differentiate between discipline and conviction and power and control.
Example:
Our wizard has discipline 4, conviction 3.  He puts his free specialization from evocation into spirit power.
He has a +1 offensive spirit control focus item, and a +1 defensive power & control (2 slots, +1, +1) focus item.

So, for everything but spirit, he has Control 4, power 3.
For spirit, without foci, he has Control 4, power 4.
With foci, for offense Control 5, power 4 and for defense Control 5, power 5.

---------------

Now, our guy wants to make a power 4 zone wide attack, with spirit.  Zone wide attacks cost +2 power, so the total power of the spell is 6 (4+2=6).  He can call up 6 power for 3 mental stress (1 point for the first 4 power, 2 more points to up that to 6 power).

He has a control of 5,and rolls (+, -, _, _) for a total of only 5.  This means he has to take fallout or backlash.  He chooses fallout, which reduces the power of the spell to whatever his control roll was.  So he's only ends up throwing a control 5, power 5 (power 3 zone wide) attack.

If he had chosen to take backlash instead, he would have taken a 1 stress hit (6 (power) - 5 (control roll) = 1), that he can choose to take on either the physical or mental stress tracks.  Taking backlash means that the power of the spell isn't reduced, so it would be a control 5, power 6 (power 4 zone wide) attack.

[braincraft]

If my roll falls short, I either have to spend some Fate points (which I completely understood from the example), or take the added mental stress (ouch), or let the backlash go as it may, which is determined by the DM. If I AM the DM and this is an NPC, then I should pretty much be a good DM and let that help the players.

Other posters have well covered the mechanics, but I wanted to comment on this. Fallout is by definition a bad thing. If your players can get their disadvantageous circumstances to work for them, that's good, but your job isn't to make fallout helpful, it's to make it interesting.