Monday, March 28, 2011

[FATE Core] Skills, Trappings, and Stunts

Interesting post by Lenny Balsera the other day about the importance of skill trappings in FATE -- and one that aligns very nicely with the importance of trappings in FATE Kerberos, which is, let's say, encouraging. I'm confident about it, of course, but part of me is always wondering, "Yeah, but what will so-and-so think of it?" Replace "so-and-so" with any pre-existing FATE author, lather, rinse, repeat. It's more than just that, though: It's looking to those people and asking myself if what I am doing/have done with my own version of FATE is in the conceptual ballpark of what they've done with FATE. I'm not afraid to -- pompous as this will sound -- break new ground, or go exploring on my own, but I feel... more confident (?) about it if it seems like I'm extending or enhancing a portion of a map that's already been drawn rather than trying to erase and redraw it. Does that make sense?

So while while what Lenny posted is far from a one-to-one with FATE Kerberos, the emphasis on trappings -- FATE's red-headed stepchild, IMO, taken for granted compared to aspects -- is extra reassurance (on top of a successful playtest and development process) that the way FATE Kerberos puts trappings front and center is just a logical outgrowth of what's come before and not some crazy, left-field idea.

Anyway. I'm talking this to death. But the development process was, for me, dominated by a single dilemma: doing something different with FATE without alienating current FATE gamers. And Lenny's post confirms some of the thought process that went along with that "something different." So... good!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Good cross-link. I found it a very enlightening article in my efforts. I've been working on the SoG Class system lately and this was very useful.