Love, Hate and FATE

What I love about FATE

It does a great job of separating the rules from the setting.

By that I mean that setting or genre details do not restrict the rules or mechanics of the game. For example, another game may say in it's rules that a Dwarf can't be a Druid or a Half-Orc must take a Charisma penalty, because that is in keeping with the setting. In FATE, while you may choose to play in a setting where the choices for Dwarves and Half-Orcs are limited, the rules are not encumbered those setting constraints. You can also choose to play in a setting where there are Dwarven druids and charismatic Half-Orcs without hacking the rules.

What I hate about FATE

While the rules may be unencumbered by the setting, they were created to serve the setting.

By that I mean that there are no rules for things that were unimportant in the setting. Spirit of the Century (SotC is when FATE became interesting) is about pulp adventures and things like weapon damage, armor, fantasy magic, fantasy races, super powers, and space combat receive little or no support in the rules. Fortunately, some people who are equally as awesome as the designers of FATE have created some equally awesome games that fill the gaps. Diaspora and Starblazer Adventures bring a lot of cool stuff to the FATE toolkit. The Dresden Files promises to fill even more of the gaps - it is going to be harder to wait the next few months than it was to wait the last three years!

In addition to the above, there are a lot of ordinary folk who have come up with their own hacks to cover FATE's shortcomings. Also, there are some other games out there that strive to give players the tools to create the characters that they want to play in the setting that they want to play in. The best of the rest is probably PDQ#, but that's another post.

So, like a lot of other people I love FATE but realize it does lack a few things. I have borrowed a lot of ideas from these people over the years and now I will attempt to give something back. First up, Magic!