Making a killing curse

[FishStampede]

I'm trying to make a killing curse to use if my villain decides to just take out the PCs, but I want it to be somewhat "Fair Play." That is, they have a good chance of escaping it even after it starts if they're clever enough, while also making for a nice and interesting scene as they try to escape its effects. Also, this is to exercise the thaumaturgy system so I can get a better handle on it, as hopefully I will never need to use this. I probably should have chosen something less difficult for my first custom spell, but I have to follow the muse.

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Ulagu's Allure

Cherokee have a legend about a giant insectile beast called Ulagu, the progenitor of yellow jackets and other stinging insects. It was supposedly defeated ages ago, but its influence still echoes in the present. This spell calls upon Ulagu's power to curse the victim, marking him with pheremones that a swarm of yellow jackets (which the spell summons) will target while also attacking anyone unfortunate enough to be in the general area. The yellow jackets are not actually normal insects, but spiritual beings from Ulagu's brood. Close examination would reveal unusual features like horns instead of antennae and stingers made of bone, but who's gonna closely examine a yellow jacket before it dies?

Type: Thaumaturgy, Summoning/Entropomancy
Complexity: 33? (see below)
Duration: One scene (or 26 exchanges?)
Effect: A swarm of supernaturally aggressive yellow jackets covers three zones surrounding the victim, which is normally a prepared spell target, such as a satchel containing sympathetic components and a bit of the caster's fingernails. The swarm applies an aspect of "Covered In Bees!" to everyone stuck in the effected zones, that is then tagged each exchange to produce an 8-shift attack until they are no longer in an effected zone.

Notes: This works rather strangely from traditional "your head asplode" curses, since I'm trying to have it create a potentially lethal effect over an entire scene instead of just a "Bam! Dead!" effect. While it can be a fun time limit on things to have sudden instant death hanging over you, it isn't exactly this guy's style, and I like the idea of an exciting escape from a deadly swarm better for my game. So, since it's so weird, I'm going to need a lot of help with the math:

I came up with a total of 33, surprisingly not far off from most other death curses. Here's how I got there:

4 zones: I got this from veils. One for the initial target, three to expand it to adjacent zones

8-shift attack: This is where it starts to get weird. I'm going from the second-highest Endurance in the group likely to be targeted, so it's possible someone might resist it but unlikely. If I want to lower it so it's less certain death, but still highly dangerous, would it be right to bring this down to, say, 4?

22 consequences + 4 health boxes: Going by the highest endurance in the group, this is how much it should take to kill for sure. However, this is not a sure-kill spell, it's more like an almost-certain-death-but-still-time-to-escape-if-they're-smart spell. So is this number the maximum number of rounds that aspect can be tagged for free?

-5 Duration: This is another very odd part I noticed. Since I'm targeting an object or zone, the default duration is one day. Even wasps do get bored so I doubt they would stick around THAT long, so I reduced it by five steps to bring it down to one scene. Is this correct?

My goal here is not to instantly kill the entire party but to create a dramatic scene with very high lethality potential, but good chances of escape if they're clever. I'm sure I got 90% of the mechanics wrong, but that's what learning's all about. Thanks for all the help this forum's given me.

[Becq]

I think you're on the right track to start off by nerfing the mechanics in the interest of fun/playability/style/etc.  The Thaumaturgy rules as written are probably overkill, assuming the most common interpretations are correct.  Basically, assuming the villain has a symbolic link and a little creativity in throwing together a few declarations, the villain can nuke the player in short order.  Which isn't going to be fun.

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Instead of making the attack a single win/lose roll, have you considering making it a DoT-style attack?  Basically, I'd recommend taking a look over the Environmental Hazards rules (YS325).  Then build the curse as a slowly strengthening environmental hazard that "pulses" every so often, as needed to build the effect you want.  If you are going for a single-scene buildup, then maybe it pulses every exchange or so, starting with a very small effect that the party will easily resist as they are mopping up the mooks, but building up to the point where if they don't take down the BBG quickly, the growing swarms of insects are going to bury them.  You can link the whole thing to a scene aspect (The Doom of Ulagu's Allure) and treat the attacks as compels, so that characters in trouble can opt to buy off the compel (for that exchange), and get Fate points to use for the fight otherwise.

You can do the same thing as a longer term spell, similar to Storm Front -- just make the curse pulse at a much slower rate (once per hour, once per scene, or at certain key events in the storyline).

Basically, ignore the rules and design an encounter, rather than a spell.

[FishStampede]

What you mentioned is pretty much exactly what I am going for. I guess I didn't explain it too well. Edit: In fact, looks like I left off the spell's damage entirely! Oops.

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Basically, it's supposed to put an aspect on the three zones it effects ("Covered in Bees!") that it then tags each exchange for an Epic+1 hit against anyone who is in the zone. They would then roll Endurance to resist and whatever they get reduces the stress accordingly. I could reduce the power a bit to make it nicer, but the idea is to have something horrible that they have a very limited time to escape from, but escape is still possible.

Due to the way the spell works (targeting a sympathetic item instead of a character, it being a summon with a damage over time) there are a lot of ways they could escape, like getting behind a threshold, jumping in water, finding the spell target and ditching it, kicking the guy who's accidentally carrying it in the knee and running, etc.

I don't want to ignore the rules entirely because thaumaturgy's still a tool for my PCs and I'm making this spell as a way to help myself understand the rules as much as it is a tool in the villain's arsenal. Unless things go horribly wrong plot-wise, this spell will probably never come into play. However, just like the horror it's named for, it's sitting there...waiting.

[Sanctaphrax]

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Basically, it's supposed to put an aspect on the three zones it effects ("Covered in Bees!") that it then tags each exchange for an Epic+1 hit against anyone who is in the zone.

That's not how Aspects work. You only get one tag, unless you buy the Aspect repeatedly.

Honestly, I don't see much reason to introduce the Aspect rules here.

For weird spells like this, you basically have to make up a system for determining complexity yourself. Either that or just pick a number.

My preferred system would be complexity = shift value of attack + 2 x number of zones hit + number of extra attacks + total value of the wards and thresholds in the way + 4 for each sticky aspect inflicted.

I made that up on the spot, but it ought to give a semi-reasonable result. Namely, 18 + number of attacks beyond the first (let's say 10) + the barriers that need to be broken (let's say 0).

So, 28ish.

[FishStampede]

Used the aspects because of possible similarity to the weapons-grade entropy curse, and because it basically imposes a moving environmental hazard. Looking back, it seems that environmental hazards are not actually aspects and that seems odd to me, but I'll change that. I know you only get one free tag, that's why I have all those extra shifts at the bottom for maximum health boxes and consequences. I figured those were used to "repeat until dead." Did I misunderstand that part?

As much as I'd like to wing it or use an alternate system, the issue here is I'm using this to get an understanding of the system as is. Those suggestions are good but would be more useful if I was more familiar with the system. I need to know how to handle it if a player decides to do something even remotely similar, though obviously less lethal.

[Sanctaphrax]

Used the aspects because of possible similarity to the weapons-grade entropy curse, and because it basically imposes a moving environmental hazard. Looking back, it seems that environmental hazards are not actually aspects and that seems odd to me, but I'll change that. I know you only get one free tag, that's why I have all those extra shifts at the bottom for maximum health boxes and consequences. I figured those were used to "repeat until dead." Did I misunderstand that part?

Sort of.

There's no real system here; you just have to eyeball things to work out how many shifts they're worth.

Charging the number of shifts required to auto-kill to have the swarm repeat until the target is dead is a reasonable way to get a cost for a swarm that automatically kills its target, but I didn't think you wanted that.

Environmental hazards can be aspects too, by the way. Anything can be an aspect.

As much as I'd like to wing it or use an alternate system, the issue here is I'm using this to get an understanding of the system as is. Those suggestions are good but would be more useful if I was more familiar with the system. I need to know how to handle it if a player decides to do something even remotely similar, though obviously less lethal.

"Wing it or use an alternate system" is the system as it is.

The Thaumaturgy rules rely on the GM working out a fair complexity for whatever effect the players want to use. Guidelines are presented, but for odd ideas like this one you're on your own.

I think my suggestion ought to cover similar ideas from players, as long as players are also attacking zones and not characters.