Good points, I think I'll keep the Knight as described above, but make the encounter work thusly:

The Guardian is trapped in the middle, he is bound by a spell and the Knight is clearly feeding on him (winds are tearing pieces of him away, whirling them into the knight where he absorbs them). With a lore roll or after doing damage the first time, they discover that the Knight can apparantly dump stress and consequences onto the Guardian, as long as he is bound.

The Knight has minions, initially 4, that he spends an action calling forth the first time he is damaged or majorly inconvenienced by the - ie. the moment he realizes he is facing supernatural heavy weights.

He'll likely do something like leave the Guardian behind and wade into close combat, taking advantage of his aura of despair ability, leaving a minion or two to keep them from freeing the Guardian.

The "solutions" I can see for the players are:
- Tie the Knight down, have some of the free the Guardian. They have to fight him defensively, as hurting the Knight means hurting the Guardian.
- When the Guardian is free, they could run away or blast the Knight to smithereens. At this point he likely spends an action calling up more minions, clearly becoming desperate, but he also looses access to a few of his powers. His Aura of Despair is likely switched off immediately. Still a tough fight, but now they can win without killing the Guardian.
- They can put a hope related aspect on his minions, Invoking that for effect that to turn them against him. (lore rolls or info-dump by me opens this option).
- It should be obvious that his minions are his victim's souls. Freeing them may become an objective.
- They can decide that they don't really need the Guardian and just blast him down, taking out both of them. Or just run for that matter, though it has been made clear the Knight can use the Guardian's power to drill out through the NeverNever and appear inside the Cathedral's threshold.

Not trying to script the fight here, just trying to consider if there are enough options to make it interesting. The church treasure only comes in later, once they are on the trail. Also, I am hoping they will make it a priority to protect the poor thieves, once the players become aware that they are just sacrificial pawns used by Clan Raith to stir up trouble.

Take two on the knight and his minions.

The White Knight of Despair
High Concept:White Armoured Incanation of Despair
Trouble: In the Face of Hope I Must Despair
Other Aspects: No Flesh Beneath the Mask, I Must Feed Upon Despair or Become Inert, When They are Weak I am Strong, I Can Only Understand That on Which I Feed, So White It Hurts the Eyes

Skills:
Lore +5
Alertness +3
Fists +5
Deceit +5
Discipline +4
Conviction +4
Intimidation +4
Empathy +0 (+4)
Rapport +0 (+4)
Presence +4
Endurance +5
Craft +0
Contacts +0
Resources +0
All other skills default to good (+3).

Stunts:
I Know Despair When I See It: Empathy counts as great (+4) for detecting aspects related to despair.
Despair is Mine to Inflict: Rapport counts as great (+4) for imposing aspects related to despair or making social/mental attacks related to despair.

Powers:
Claws -1: No hands, just claws.
Supernatural Toughness -4
Inhuman Stoicism -2 (custom power from this board, mostly just for 1 mental armour and 2 extra mental stress)
The Catch (True Hope) -0
Emotional Vampire -1
Incite Emotion (Despair) -2
- At Range
Aura of Despair -2
- Custom Power.
- At the start of his round, every creature in the same zone as him is subjected to a mental attack, using deceit vs. discipline, with weapon 0. This is raw despair, so mental damage and despair related consequences.
Feeding Dependency +1
affecting...
Supernatural Strength -4
Supernatural Recovery -4
World-Walker -2
Demesne -1: The Empty Hills That Hope Has Abandoned
Channeling -2: Despair Magic. He can bind people that despair, he can drain their powers, he can make them his pawns, he can eat them out and leave only a specter behind.

Notes: He is a powerful outsider, one of the original sponsors and creators of Clan Skavis. He is powerful, but also limited in several ways. When he cannot feed for long enough, his armour falls away and just his marble mask remains. Inert and harmless. If given despair too feed on though, the mask will awaken and he will rise. When defeated completely, he returns to being just the mask. Only if the mask is broken can he be returned to the Outside. The mask is virtually indestructible, easily withstanding a nuclear blast. Only a big magic ritual, involving lots of True Hope (tm) can destroy it. Or perhaps just hitting it with a Sword of The Cross will suffice, who knows.

Total Cost: -20

On second thought, there are only 4 of these guys, leaving them to tie the knight's opponents down and letting him face one alone. I think that if they fail, he can call up maybe two more... but that should cost him an action and he only has two more.

Echoes of Those Who Despaired in the Face of the White Knight
High Concept: Ghosts of Those the White Knight has Consumed
Trouble: Bound to His Will
Other Aspects: When He Calls, I Must Come; Hope Will set Me Free; Remembering What I Was Brings Only Despair

Skills:
Alertness +2
Fists +4
Athletics +3
Endurance +3
Conviction +0
Discipline +0

Stunts:
Unliving Ash Bound By His Will: May use endurance for social stress track.

Powers:
Inhuman Speed -2
Claws -1
Vulnerable to Hope +1: Any attack utilizing True Hope somehow gets +2 weapon rating. True Hope can compel their high concept to scare them away.

Total Cost: -2

Notes: Human shaped figures with claws, made of ashes. They are quick and hit hard, but fall relatively quickly. They are what is left behind when the White Knight consumes a human fully. Who knows what kind of servant the Guardian will eventually make.

Crunching the new numbers:
Melee attack at +5, weapon 6 in total. The werewolf will reliably be dodging this, with his athletics effectively at +6. The wizards will need a great block to survive this.
Mental attack at range +5. Enough to hurt the wizards a little, enough to hurt the werewolf so he can feel it.
I wasn't thinking that feeding and another attack than incite could be combined. It only allows explicitly for incite emotion to be combined... at least the attack skills must be the same, imo. He cannot make both a fists attack and a deceit attack in the same round.
There is nothing in the emotional vampire power suggesting that he gets a massive bonus to his attack. So even when touching people, I can't see why he should get +5 extra weapon damage there (giving the 14 stress mentioned). Am I overlooking something here?

As for what he is facing...
He is going to be taking skill +5 to +7 attacks in melee, at weapon 4. They will hurt, even if I end up giving him mythical toughness again.
He will be blasted with skill 10, weapon 7 magical attacks. They do not need to satisfy his catch for this. A player bought a +4 focus item and has a +1 specialization. He kills things with his mind.
Without his minions, he would start the first round by getting hit with likely...
- a skill 6 power 4 attack mental attack spell. Doing about 5 mental stress.
- a skill 10 power 6 attack. Doing about 9 physical stress.
- a skill 7, weapon 4 melee attack. Doing about 4 physical stress.
- a skill 5, weapon 5 magical attack (enchanted item: Lazor). Doing about 3 physical stress.
- a skill 6 power 6 magical attack. Doing about 6 physical stress.

So a 9, 4, 3, and 6 physical stress hit. Filling out half his stress track and giving him his first minor consequence and filling out half his stress track.
As I see it, without the minions and without a lof of luck, he will be facing an extreme consequence in round 3. He won't take that, so there he goes out. It is intended to be a challenging fight, where they need to use their brains at least a little. And if the wizards are willing to take extra mental stress through powerful spells and backlash? He is down in round 2, at the very latest.
The minons should tie the players down a bit and make the fight last 5-6 rounds... giving him time to take one or two players out or at least make them take consequences. Perhaps even make them think of freeing the guardian to help end the fight.

The kind of encounter I am hoping for is one where the characters can see that they are facing a lot of consequences to win this one... unless they free they guardian and make him join them. That means getting the knight away from the guardian somehow, breaking the spell.

Are my numbers wrong? I hope I got this right. And thanks for the feedback, I really appreciate it.

Hey there, I am new to these boards and new to the dresden rpg (and fate/fudge in general).

We are running a game set in Denmark, where the primary bad guys are White Court Clan Skavis. The characters are investigating a case of theft, where someone has stolen a major magical artifact from a church, to use in a ritual to influence the voters for the next election.

Anyway, the characters have just stepped through a portal into a demesne in the NeverNever, where the guardian of the church was sucked in. The Guardian is a magical creature, inspired by the Museum Guardians from China Mievelle's "Kraken". So they are supernatural heavyweights, guarding important relics and places of power that resonate with the people somehow.

In this demesne, a small deepening within a circle of hills, the ground is scorched and freezing wind blows. There is an overwhelming sense of despair and there are whispers on the wind - telling them to abandon hope, to give up, to let go, to submit. In the center of this deepening, the Guardian kneels, apparantly holding on to his greatsword for dear life. As he kneels there, before him stands a shining knight in white, covered in metal. The white knight's face is a marble mask, remniscent of classical statues: Androgynous, beautiful and cold. The knight's hands ends in claw, looking like a twisted amalgation of metal and flesh.

Now this guy is obviously something affiliated with Clan Skavis and is in fact a potent outsider, somewhere between walker and noble class. He is bad news. He is eating the Guardian, slowly, and when he has consumed it fully, he will step through the portal where he sucked the guardian in. He will be inside the threshold of the church and he will be free.

The group consists of 5 characters, submerged level. They are all supernaturals of good power - 3 have evocation and/or sponsored magic. One has thaumaturgy and is going to be milking potions and one shot items for all they are worth. One is a bad-ass werewolf detective. They have all optimized their characters somewhat - their skills, powers, etc make them very good at what they do. I am expecting discipline 9, power 6 offensive spells. Fists 7, weapon 4 from the werewolf. They can dish out a lot of damage. We are allowing defensive blocks - small evocation blocks with 1 attack duration as reflexive actions, costing mental stress based on power. They can take a fair amount of damage.

These are the monsters that await them.

The White Knight of Despair
High Concept:White Armoured Incanation of Despair
Trouble: In the Face of Hope I Must Despair
Other Aspects: No Flesh Beneath the Mask, I Must Feed Upon Despair or Become Inert, When They are Weak I am Strong, I Can Only Understand That on Which I Feed, So White It Hurts the Eyes

Skills:
Lore +5
Alertness +4
Fists +5
Deceit +6
Discipline +4
Conviction +4
Intimidation +4
Empathy +0 (+4)
Rapport +0 (+4)
Presence +4
Endurance +5
Craft +0
Contacts +0
Resources +0
All other skills default to good (+3).

Stunts:
I Know Despair When I See It: Empathy counts as great (+4) for detecting aspects related to despair. Rapport counts as great (+4) for imposing aspects related to despair or making social/mental attacks related to despair.
Defence Is For Mortals: May take -2 defence to gain +2 attack on fists. As per the "Swing for the Fences" stunt.

Powers:
Claws -1: No hands, just claws.
Mythical Toughness -6
Inhuman Stoicism -2 (custom power from this board, mostly just for 1 mental armour and 2 extra mental stress)
The Catch (True Hope) -0
Incite Emotion (Despair) -7
- At Range
- Lasting Emotion and Potent Emotion
- Aura of Despair: Every character in it's zone is each turn subjected to a weapon: 0 mental attack, using Deceit.
Feeding Dependency +1
affecting...
Supernatural Strength -4
Supernatural Recovery -4
World-Walker -2
Demesne -1: The Empty Hills That Hope Has Abandoned
Channeling -2: Despair Magic. He can bind people that despair, he can drain their powers, he can make them his pawns, he can eat them out and leave only a specter behind.

Notes: He is a powerful outsider, one of the original sponsors and creators of Clan Skavis. He is powerful, but also limited in several ways. When he cannot feed for long enough, his armour falls away and just his marble mask remains. Inert and harmless. If given despair too feed on though, the mask will awaken and he will rise. When defeated completely, he returns to being just the mask. Only if the mask is broken can he be returned to the Outside. The mask is virtually indestructible, easily withstanding a nuclear blast. Only a big magic ritual, involving lots of True Hope (tm) can destroy it. Or perhaps just hitting it with a Sword of The Cross will suffice, who knows.

Total Cost: -24

I haven't given him any powers to represent the whole "can only be rendered inert" and "mask is virtually indestructible" thing. The mask can of course be used as an Item of Power, but that would probably eat the wearers fate points and inflict mental conquences on him, feeding the white knight and eventually awakening him once again. He was used as a trap for the Guardian by basically throwing the mask on the ground and releasing a big burst of despair - similar to the hankerchief of sunlight that Dresden used. He then sucked the Guardian into his demesne and started feeding.

Now that the players are here, he will of course call up some flunkies to make the fight more interesting. He is, after all, facing 50 points of refresh.

Echoes of Those Who Despaired in the Face of the White Knight
High Concept: Ghosts of Those the White Knight has Consumed
Trouble: Bound to His Will
Other Aspects: When He Calls, I Must Come; Hope Will set Me Free; Remembering What I Was Brings Only Despair

Skills:
Alertness +2
Fists +3
Athletics +3
Endurance +3
Conviction +0
Discipline +0

Stunts:
Unliving Ash Bound By His Will: May use endurance for social stress track.

Powers:
Inhuman Strength -2
Inhuman Speed -2
Claws -1
Vulnerable to Hope: Any attack utilizing True Hope somehow gets +2 weapon rating. True Hope can compel their high concept to scare them away.

Total Cost: -5

Notes: Human shaped figures with claws, made of ashes. They are quick and hit hard, but fall relatively quickly. They are what is left behind when the White Knight consumes a human fully. Who knows what kind of servant the Guardian will eventually make.

These guys purpose is just to tie the players down and deal some damage. They are fast and hit hard, but they fall apart easily.

For this whole scene I think there will be the White Knight and a handful of these guys, 5-6 of them. Giving the scene a total of 49-54 points of refresh in the opposition. Additionally, and I had honestly no idea how to represent this with powers, the Guardian is being fed on. There is some kind of spell holding him in place in the middle of the deepening, where the White Knight feeds upon him. Turning the White Knight's attention away will stop him from feeding temporarily, but to free him the spell must be broken. I imagine it's a strength 10 or so spell binding him, meaning that with a round or two of dedicated counterspelling it will be brought down. Spirit element most likely appropriate for this.


Not sure if this is quite hard enough, so I am considering to make the White Knight able to dumb consequences and stress onto the Guardian, as long as he is bound. This will make it even more important to free him ASAP. Of course, once he is freed, he wants vengeance and will join the fight against the knight. He is actually a very similar type of being - an animated suit of armour, mixed of elements from all the ages in which there have been kings in Denmark. An armour with viking runes, latin inscriptions, etc. Probably stat him out as a smaller version of the knight, sans the despair abilities.

So does this sound like a reasonable "balls to the walls" combat scene? The White Knight, plus 5 or 6 bound servants. The Guardian trapped by a ward, feeding him, perhaps protecting him from harm. A few different zones - the portal they came through, the deepening in which the knight has trapped the guardian, a few hillsides around them. Scene aspects include: Barren Hills Covered in Ash, Freezing Winds, Despair is in the Air.
If it turns out that the players are tearing him apart too quickly, he will start dumping stress and consequences onto the guardian. If he seems tough enough, he won't have that option.
Oh yeah, he fights until a Severe Consequence is taken, the servants will only take a mild consequence. Including his endurance and recovery, this guy can take 6 mild consequences. That is a lot, so eventually I might downgrade his toughness to supernatural. Still on the fence about that.

Any comments, criticism or insights are welcome. I would appreciate it, this is only the second fight I am running in this system.
Oh yeah, the silly and overly wordy aspect names are on purpose. For some reason I just took that naming scheme for him, it seemed to fit. He is almost silly enough to be a Death Knight in Exalted or a bad guy in a boys manga/anime.