This feels wrong narratively--if you're going into a fight already hurt, it ought to make a difference--but I'm not sure how it should be handled mechanically.
Typically, it's handled by having a sharply limited amount of consequence slots to fill up. And, as Sanctaphrax points out, aspects can also be compelled; which in turn nets you fate points.
But even if your consequences are never invoked against you, having them filled puts a really low limit on the amount of punishment you can take in a scene.
Yes, but how much does that matter if you have to resolve whatever you're dealing with by tomorrow? In the books, at least, being completely healed in a couple of weeks wouldn't make a difference, because the situations in question never take longer than three days or so to deal with.
In the books, sure; but I've run scenarios that have taken in-game weeks. Plus, the books take place weeks or months apart -- so a character with Inhuman Recovery could be reliably back to 100% by the next Scenario/Book, while a character without is still injured.
It can't only be people who just want to get around defenses, because using spirit attacks like this is in the RAW. I feel like they wouldn't stick it into the sourcebook just because someone wanted to cheat the system like that, so it follows that some groups can use it without a problem.
I wouldn't say the existence of an exploit means that it's used "without a problem." As Sanctaphrax points out, it has serious game-breaking potential.
Would this stunt be less of a problem if you couldn't use more than one of its consequences on any given thing (ie, you couldn't use more than one consequence to power a spell, you couldn't use more than one extra consequence to absorb an attack, etc)? This feels clunky, but I don't want my character to be able to absorb bigger hits than any other character or cast massively overpowered spells; this stunt is supposed to be for a bunch of smaller things.
If it's for a bunch of smaller things, armor or extra mild consequences are more appropriate. Remember that a Severe reduces a six-shift hit -- a grenade is only Weapon:4 and getting hit by a moving car is Weapon:5, so that's the type of injury it's meant to absorb. We're talking broken bones, disembowelment, and other such things that should outright incapacitate someone who isn't a determined PC and would keep a character recovering for weeks to months -- remember the bit in Small Favor where Gard is literally shoving her intestines back into place? That was a Severe consequence.
Remember: Stress and consequences are abstractions, and it goes both ways. I've often said that a stress hit or even a Taken Out does not necessarily mean the attack actually impacted you -- by the same token, the attack actually impacting you does not necessarily mean a consequence or even stress.
So you could
easily have a character take Tough Stuff, narrate that they're getting bruised and beaten, but that the Armor:1 is letting them shrug off most of the attacks and keep going.
Sure. That's not at all out of line for 2 Refresh.
I disagree; Inhuman Toughness is a 2-refresh power, and if all your stress boxes are taken up, it does not let you absorb an extra 4-shift and an extra 6-shift hit and keep fighting. This power does.
If it could let them keep fighting through additional minor hits -- as nadia just said is the intention -- that would be one thing, but as is, this stunt would let a character already loaded up with the normal consequences take a grenade to the face and keep going.
There are some special interactions like Sponsored Magic + Evocation. And for some reason you can't take Wizard's Constitution with Toughness. It's hardly common, though.
Well, it says Recovery and Toughness powers
replace Wizard's Constitution, which I took to mean that its effects are included in those powers anyway.
It's probably better to say that Recovery Powers don't affect the extra slots than to ban taking both together.
Seems kind of arbitrary, though, doesn't it? Why should the supernatural healing ability make the bullet wound in one's leg heal up in a week or so, while the one in their arm that came from the same gun, during the same fight, take months?
It's way better and also way more expensive, as is appropriate.
The Catch is really more benefit than weakness. It's a big discount.
Even Inhuman Toughness has a required Catch, even if that catch offers no discount at all.
On the contrary, it's often the people with Recovery powers who spend the most time in brutally injured states. They can handle it, after all.
True, look at Wolverine -- how many times is he reduced to his damn skeleton just to pop back? Various versions of him have stated that he's used to pain by now, I believe.
Every imaginable set of rules is fine for some groups. But if you allow mental spirit attacks, anyone who's good at Evocation can one-shot everything. Pretty much nothing is physically tough enough to handle a 7-shift force lance and mentally tough enough to handle a 7-shift sleep beam.
Agreed 100%. It would've taken a truck going 65 to bring down my Valkyrie character from my earlier Fight Night example in one shot (and even then, the truck would have to sneak up on her), but a single mental attack took her down easily.