Fate points? In AW?

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Fate points? In AW?
« on: October 27, 2011, 04:37:47 AM »
So there's AW, and we love it. And there was those games, where we had "Fate points" or "Plot points" or smth like that, and it helped us when the roll was.. not quite as cool as we wanted.
Can we somehow include this into AW?
Easy at first sight, not so much in second, at least I'm not sure. AW has this quality which separates it from usual crunchy games: there're a lot LESS rolls in the game, so much less that we can give xp for just rolling a stat(you know that). Sometimes, if that's not battle, we can go for whole session with rolling no more than, say, 3-5-7 times.
So rolls are rare. And rolls are valued. Their outcome? Valued, too.
In traditional games we roll the whole time, so we can't always spend FP, we only save it for something crucial. in AW with, say, 2-3 FPs(per session) we can totally change the game's outcome
Solutions? Well, for now I see two. We can give flat bonuses - say, 3FP means not "3 rerolls", but "you can add +1 to result 3 times, either for one roll, or divided for several". Or we can use something like "1 FP reroll per CAMPAIGN", making it really special.
Or both.

Any other ideas, comments, smt like that?

P.S.: using "ark"-based 6 FPs and  making them roll +(FP left-3) can be interesting, I think

P.P.S. Monster of the week has 7 non-restorable "ignore wound or make this roll 12+ post-factum" luck points. Interesting idea. Any other?

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #1 on: October 27, 2011, 04:01:47 PM »
I'll just pop in to say I'm happy with the way luck is working in Monster of the Week right now.

Each spend is very powerful, so they can get you out of a tight spot. This is balanced by the fact they don't come back. I've noticed that most players will spend some early on, but they start getting much more reluctant to use them later on. That is pretty much the mechanic working as intended.

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #2 on: October 28, 2011, 07:00:20 AM »
See, Mike, that's all good, but I fear that them not replenishing could be a bit of a problem if I want to run a long campaign(which I like to). It seems that I need to prepare for the moment of total Luck Loss as a "story comes to a big end", and I'm not sure I'd want this...
...Though, maybe, if in this big end they HAD, however slim, chance to save the world, survive, and get some of their luck back to go further... maybe, this could work.
BTW, remind me, in Monster of the Week, does everyone have the same amount of Luck on start? 'Cause in my case this is AW's hack towards RogueTrader, and in the original RT there's sorts of difference between characters, based both on "roll this stat", character building choices and natural inclination of certain classes to have a lot of fate points. I'm not sure in this case, should I drop the difference, or convert it somehow? (difference can be from 2 FP some fighters have to 5 FP for the leader himself)
I know that some of the MoW playbooks have an option to "regain" luck, while others have not, maybe I could use this...

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #3 on: October 28, 2011, 02:33:52 PM »
Everyone starts with the same amount of Luck, but there's one playbook (Mundane) who can get more back with advances.

The finite number of Luck is definitely tied to MotW being intended to have a point where things get harder. Essentially, if you use up all your luck making things easier, then things get harder from there on out.

If you don't want to have that sense of a diminishing resource, you could use a similar mechanic that replenishes.


*

Jeremy

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Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #4 on: October 28, 2011, 10:03:59 PM »
GnD, you could also make the Fate points something that recharges based on character action (like Willpower in good-ol' storyteller).  With minimal tinkering, you could just say any time someone marks XP they could choose to regain 1 Fate instead.

Or, heck, just make XP the points you spend. 

(Of course, that has all sorts of potential ripple effects on player behavior. But maybe that's what you want.)

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #5 on: October 29, 2011, 05:34:01 PM »
Just as a data point, we roll a lot more than 3-7 times per session. 1-2 improvements per session is normal, which means probably 15+ rolls.

I wouldn't call rolls in AW rare, IME.

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #6 on: November 23, 2011, 01:57:37 PM »
I don't think 'fate points' or whatever belong in AW. Part of the premise is that the world is merciless and awful, and no matter what you try, there's no escaping that.

If the system isn't built around nihilistic failure (I don't love the character improvements that give you high stats, either), it takes a lot of teeth from the game, and I just really dislike being gummed by Apocalypse World.

Re: Fate points? In AW?
« Reply #7 on: November 25, 2011, 02:49:18 AM »
Shreyas, for now I use Fate Points in a specific way you'd like. It's the game of WH40K, and characters are important enough that daemons are always interested in corrupting them. So most of characters can always ask for help.
Daemon's help, though, always leads to problems.