Apects / FP system vs. roleplaying

[Haru]

You could take it the white court route, have a house that feeds on greed, and communism was just the well meaning, but horrible attempt to try and correct something within society, that could not be explained but was felt everywhere. Maybe not even greed, but maybe vain, that would make people feel better than anyone else, leading to the wish to make everyone equal. Or something else entirely.
My point is: communism as a human reaction rather than a supernatural action seems far more likely and could bring a slightly positive spin on the history, which might make the whole thing more interesting in the process. After all, involving mortal authorities is the "nuclear weapon" of the supernatural world, as Harry mentioned somewhere.

[Addicted2aa]

Def vamps. There is just too much in pop culture and in Dresden with them being involved in bureaucracy for them not to have fingers in multiple communism pies. I would say that different courts would have different  areas. Not sure about the history of USSR, let alone Prague under the communists, but if there were prisons that political dissidents disappeared too, ran by the reds. Guaranteed food source.
The white court, fear feeding family are in the secret police, showing up at houses at random to search, just to feel the people's fear. Bring them in for questioning to dine for hours on their fear.

Keep the Fairy Courts out of it I would say. It just doesn't seem to fit that type of political environment. Maybe some mythical creatures that live on misery. Perhaps a couple of wizards in the government, pulling a Animal farm, some humans are more equal than others. The ones with magic

[UmbraLux]

On the other hand it's very improbable that supernatural forces wouldn't have tried to use the situation to their own intentions. At least partly. I mean, there is a situation and everybody has to adapt or react to it somehow.

I like the idea of emphasizing this - the supernatural predators may not have started it (humans are capable of evil on their own) but they're certainly willing to profit from it.  Could run with any of a number of things...red court using prisons like grocery stores, Skavis vamps as low level KGB muscle, Black Council hiding forbidden magic/research among human tragedy & abuse, wyldfae preying on the populace adding a few more disappearances among many, or even black court carrying on a low level resistance against oppression.  Sounds like fun!

[Baron Hazard]

I've had 5 sessions i think now. and lets see the very first session involved a quick combat with some Triad hitters, 4 mortals, went down pretty quick. And then two sessions ago I had a brief run in where our Changeling started a brawl with a couple of white court security vamps, after a few rounds the Wizard convinced Papa Skavis to call them off.

That is literally all the combat that has been in 5 sessions of game. Sure "Monday Night Game Group" is by far the best group ive ever come across and I feel so lucky to have found them. But still the game has been driven by nothing but interpersonal play and politics, and I feel like the fate point system has at the very least not hindered, but more often actively helped it.

[Jabberwocky]

Thanks to all. Yes, vampires, being quite ubiquitous in the setting, would definitely have had to react. The communist regime tried to destroy the traditional faith - they closed down monasteries and churches, sent clergy to work camps, harassed people who attended Christian services... All this would have come handy for vampires.
(One example: here - this seems like a session scenario but sadly these events were real)

[JDK002]

An interesting take on it could be that communism was the heavy handed approach to the threat of the supernatural.  Coming down hard on the supernatural factions that feel they are above the laws of man, then human corruption set in and it all went horribly wrong.

[Jabberwocky]

Ok, another question regarding the different approach of this game. Being taken out and concessions. Again, I was used to using common sense when describing outcomes of conflicts - not wanting to kill the PC per se but still judging the situation according to the general conditions. For instance, in Shadowrun, if a PC was stupid/unlucky enough to get taken down in an adverse situation death might have occurred. Like starting a gunfight with multiple opponents in a barren deserted place - after taking some shots the PC could just bleed to death. Such things happen, it's a harsh world. You'd better judge the situation better next time. But DFRPG offers concessions. How am I supposed to use that in really serious and dangerous situations? Let's say the PC starts a fight in a room full of vampires, he sees quickly he's going to lose and so he concedes. What now? The logical outcome of such an event would be having his throat ripped or a bullet to his head. Finito. Bad guys shouldn't be there for fun. How do you handle those potentially hopeless situations? I mean, I don't plan to kill PCs because of bad roll outcomes or whatever but there should be some feeling of reality, too. Dangers are REAL, especially when the PCs act stupid.
So what is your experience with concessions? Thanks!

[Addicted2aa]

Concession have to pass the groups thought. And in a more traditional gaming group the GM probably has vote's equal to +/- 1 of the group number. So if he offers a concession, and the group(you) don't think it's good enough, ask him to try again. If it becomes clear he can't think of a valid option, continue combat. TO THE DEATH. or you know whatever taken out option the NPC decides on.

Which actually raises a question for me. Traditionally when I've taken players out, I've picked an option that seemed in line with the NPC's goals. Is there anything in RaW suggesting that taken out result be what the NPC wants as opposed to anything interesting the GM can think of? Cause if it's a purely meta decision, I have way more options available to me

[Taran]

It also states, in the book, that if the natural conclusion to losing an encounter will be death, then you should tell the player before he decides to start a fight.

That being said, if the player knows that being taken out will result in death, he is MORE likely to use the concession rules.

The concession has to be reasonable, and usually takes place BEFORE the player is out and unconcious or helpless.

A concession could be as simple as running away.  But it has to have some negative impact on the player.  He loses his best weapon/item/foci, the damsel in distress gets eaten by vamps, the vamps follow him and find out where he lives...

Other concessions could be blown out the window and covered in rubble where the enemy can't find him, so they assume he ran away...There are lots of possibilities for concessions that don't involve the vamps capturing or eating the PC.

EDIT:  I find concessions hard to adjudicate on the fly.  Players tend to want to get out of a situation without too much penalty.  "my character retreats back for the rest of the fight....yay!  I got 3 FP's for my consequenses"  *heal, heal, heal (Recovery power)*  Make them pay for a concession.

[Edrac]

*forgive any spelling or grammar errors, I'm typing this out on my phone*

Concessions (and being taken out, or stressed out as I call it) are purely a matter of determining who has naration rights.

For instance: when a PC decides to concede they have LOST, plain and simple. However, they get to say how and why they are no longer in the conflict and that is the crucial thing. In a physical conflict the easiest way of narrating this is for them to say "in the confusion of the battle I slip away to safety". In a social or mental things get a little more complex and it's here my players always draw a blank. For social I always suggest a "turn the other cheek" scinario for the PC concession. Something like "I walk/storm/run out of the room, clearly clearly unhappy, with my tail between my legs" or something to that effect. And mental could be "I curl up into a ball on the floor with a glazed expression" If consequences were taken use them for narration ideas.

For NPC's I generally go with the "villan escapes to fight another day" or if they're just mooks "I surrender"

Being taken out, or stressing out as I put it. Means the winner of the conflict gets narration rights. If you want to be brutal, you can have the loser just bleed out while unconscious. But I always find capture WAY more interesting. You cancombo it with the villan conceding to have him get away with the party member that was unconscious.

[Taran]

Which actually raises a question for me. Traditionally when I've taken players out, I've picked an option that seemed in line with the NPC's goals. Is there anything in RaW suggesting that taken out result be what the NPC wants as opposed to anything interesting the GM can think of? Cause if it's a purely meta decision, I have way more options available to me

That's different from a concession.  If you take someone out, you get free reign to make the persons life miserable.  If you're GMing a Ghoul, and that ghoul takes out a player, there's a good chance that player is going to be eaten for breakfast...

EDIT: Yes, there is something in RAW.  I'll find it...

PG. 206, last paragraph
"As a rule of thumb, when death is on the line,
announce it in advance, preferably at the start of
the conflict—e.g., “This guy’s playing for keeps.
If he can kill you, he will. You can see it in his
eyes.” or “Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya.
You killed my father. Prepare to die.” That way
everyone has plenty of time to see utter defeat
coming and can keep an itchy finger on the
concession trigger."

From that paragraph, you can assume an NPC's motives will dictate the outcome of Take Out.  If a thug hired to steal something from a PC takes that PC out, he may call 911 before he runs away with goods, or try to prevent the character from dying - he doesn't want to go to jail for murder! 

@EDrac:  I agree

[Tedronai]

I'll try to go down the list, here, but I don't have a lot of time to write this post...

The effects of a Take-Out or Concession are at the whims of the respective controlling player (or GM), not necessarily bound to the goals of the character.

For the white-room vampire scenario, a reasonable concession result might include being captured, bound, and imprisoned to be offered as a sacrifice, 'recruit', or other form of 'gift' to some superior who was not present in the conflict.  This allows the PC to survive the immediate danger, but be placed in an extremely precarious position for the near future.
A comparable taken-out result might include forcibly 'turning' the PC, changing some of their permanent aspects and mandating that they begin spending their Refresh to add the appropriate transitionary template at the next reasonable opportunity (or potentially adding it immediately and accruing some Debt until such time as they can buy it properly).

Just remember that Concessions and Taken-Out results are (and must be) Bad Things (TM).  If it doesn't hurt, then you're not doing it right.

That's about the depth I have time to go into for now.  I'll check back later today to see if there's more I can help with.

[Addicted2aa]

The effects of a Take-Out or Concession are at the whims of the respective controlling player (or GM), not necessarily bound to the goals of the character.

See this is the bit I'm wondering about. Lets say we're fighting in a hale storm in the arctic, PC X has magguffin Y and Big Bad Guy Evil Dude, BBGED, want's the magguffin back and also to eat PC's brain. BBGED wins with an evocation attack of pure force on PC X. If GM decides without taking BBGED's motives into effect, I'm going to knock PC X unconscious with a hale stone, have the force blast knock him back onto a piece of ice over a cave, ice breaks and he goes tumbling down into the dark, where a tribe of yeti's find him and Magguffin Y.
If I take BBGED's motives into play, he at least gets Maggufin Y, and maybe snacks a bit on PC X's brain a bit, the level depending on how cool the table is with character death.

I've always gone with the latter, and in general try to play as close to RaW as I can. This other option opens up alot of room for and will probably adopt it even if not RaW, but would prefer if it was.

[Tedronai]

The yetis are RaW-available.
From the sidebar, "Dictating Outcomes":
"the player of the attacker that takes
out an opponent gets to decide the manner
in which his victim loses"

[Addicted2aa]

GM counts as player?