Rob Donoghue is writing a magic systems toolkit and said that he wanted to do a version of DFRPG evocation with the "serial numbers filed off", so we might at least get a glimpse of what that looks like.

Skimble, in your example, when you say that Harry succeeds on his roll, do you mean he succeeded with style, because that's the only way that you get two free invocations. Or, do the amount of shifts you put in initially get you those extra invocations? So if I put in 7 shifts, do I get a total of four free invocations (two for 3 shifts, and then one each for 5 and 7 shifts)?

Am I wrong in thinking that you can always add custom rules on top of Fate Core? So for instance, you could have additional stress tracks, like social.

In terms of my players performing mental mojo quickly, that's pretty much out of the question, as long as I can compel them and they don't buy it off. Just because they have an element on their sheet doesn't mean they have full mastery of it. Look at Harry, for instance. He's fine when he wants to use kinetic force, but up until Changes, his veils suck. According to Your Story, that's the result of compels. My wizards are heavy hitters, no good at the delicate stuff.

@fantazero, about mental attacks: can they be performed as evocation? The mental conflict section specifically mentions Thaumaturgy, however in the evocation section under elements, it's mentioned that the Spirit element covers mental magic.

I appreciate the feedback and hope you guys don't mind if I ask an off-topic question I'm my own thread, though it is related tangentially.

In White Night, how did Carlos get his shield up before either of the vamps moved? Both of them should have the initiative, bit Ramirez was able to raise a defense right before one of them started firing. Is there a RAW way to do that?

So there's a player in my group that keeps getting on me about nerfing evocation. Specifically, he wants to restrict spell targeting and blocks. We're running a 9-refresh game with a skill cap of Superb, and I have a couple of wizards in my group. Both of them have Conviction and Discipline as their top skills, and each has one point of Refinement. They can both cast powerful evocations, and they hardly miss. Granted, we've been playing under the assumption that backlash helped targeting, but we've recently changed that. Most of the physical opposition I've had has been fairly fast, with Inhuman or Supernatural speed, but again, the wizards rarely miss unless they're trying something really big. In terms of their skills, I'd rather not restrict how they build their character as long as it seems reasonable (they won't suddenly have Claws at the next Major Milestone), but is something wrong when they rarely miss? Or are they supposed to aim that well?

With blocks, he wants to cut their effectiveness in half, essentially making a standard block cost as much as an armor effect. He had a character (who died today, in fact) that had an enchanted item with a 10-shift block with a large number of uses attached to it. Most things that went against it to damage him couldn't hit it, and his skill was high enough that he could avoid most maneuvers to disarm (until today). He thought that was too powerful, mostly because things couldn't punch through it and hit him.

This is the first game that I've ever GM'd, though we have been playing for a while now. Do I just need stronger opposition for wizards or is there a valid point here? Sorry if this doesn't make any sense/I am just being dumb. This hasn't really been an issue until recently, or at least not one that was brought to my attention. My personal theory is that I need to do a better job of tagging/invoking aspects when they're to my NPCs' advantage defensively, focusing less on directly dealing damage.

So this item is just wrong then, correct?