What skill can be used to oppose undodgeable energy weapons' attack rolls?

Question

Background

In my Fate core campaign, my group is fighting against aliens in a near future setting (the campaign is loosely inspired by XCOM: Enemy Unknown)

In the core book, most combat examples are melee ones, rolling Fight vs Fight, and the odd ranged fight with bows and arrows or thrown knives is usually resolved with Shoot vs Athletics. I don't think that Shoot vs Athletics is a good fit for laser beams and plasma bolts.

The problem

How can I represent gunfight using opposed skill rolls? Or, in other words, which skill can be used to defend against Shoot where the weapons are high energy, high velocity plasma guns?

Attempted solutions

Here's what I've tried so far:

1. Shoot vs Athletics, as per core book suggestion. Did not work because it looked like a poor Matrix rip-off.
2. Shoot vs passive opposition. The character shoots against a fixed difficulty target based on environmental conditions. Pretty good when the PC are shooting enemies, very boring in the reverse because the players aren't involved in fight resolution.
3. Shoot vs Notice. Notice is representing the battlefield knowledge of finding a good cover. The opposed roll is delayed: when characters scramble for cover they'd roll notice and use that value as passive opposition, like #2 above. Slightly better results, but it seems "weird" to use notice to "find cover" and also if the player makes a good roll (or invests in advantages/fate points) he'll be pratically invulnerable.

What I need

I need an opposing roll because, at the moment, I'm struggling to have coherent damage output: we have fixed stress output mitigated by armor values (for example: a plasma gun does 7 stress, heavy armor reduces the amount by 3). I want to have guns and armor to have aspects instead (as suggested here, which is a beautiful idea), and the stress output decided, by the most part from an opposed roll.

The same example above, translated with my ideal opposed roll, would be like this:

• The alien shoots with his plasma gun and rolls a 5
• The player defends with [skill] and rolls a 4
• The player suffers 3 damage: 1 (from delta) +3 (from weapon:3 property of the plasmagun) -1 (from armor:1 of the player's body armor)

Answer 1

I tend to think that setting such pairings in stone tends to make the game boring. If Shoot is always opposed by Athletics (or whatever else you pick to replace it), then players justifiably tend to hog those two and all other skills are sidelined.

I believe the best way would be allowing creative use of the whole skill set, even allowing unorthodox choices if supported by interesting aspects. (Remember that aspects are true whether somebody invokes them or not)

Somebody's shooting at you with lasers. How are you going to deal with that?

• Of course I'm in cover already, and I only move when their attention is elsewhere. Never let them take a shot if I can help it: Stealth
• I keep track of their targeting dot. Never let it touch me when it's steady: Shoot
• I'm the Master jury rigger. The suit inserts I made out of white styrofoam should be ablative enough for the couple of seconds I need to get out of the way. (They flare brightly and stink afterwards though): Craft
• There's Thick foilage everywhere. If I keep moving, they'd be hard-pressed to take a proper shot: Athletics
• I already Spotted that sniper. I'm sticking to the blind areas where they can't shoot: Notice

This makes the game more interesting in my opinion, and no one skill tends to be more important than the other.

Answer 2

In my opinion, the base solution doesn't satisfy your preconceptions because of narrative problems.

Shoot vs Athletics, as per core book suggestion. Did not work because it looked like a poor Matrix rip-off.

Don't narrate it as a dodge... but rather like your third suggestion. Seeking cover. And the player has to be able to justify the cover in order to get the dodge.

If you want to make sure that players are involved in the resolution, you can also make a change to the world to add an aspect that reflects the fact that bullets can't be dodged without cover. And allow free tags to it when any opponent is attempting to dodge in a flat terrain without cover. This reflects the fact that you can dodge the shooter if not the projectile... but it is harder.

If you do want to have a skill, the one thing that I could think to base it on was shield use (if you have the technology) or armor use. This would reflect the in-combat tuning and positioning of the defensive technology to dissipate the weapon's energy.

But in the end, it's still just athletics by another name, so we come around to where anything used in combat is mechanically the same- its a matter of narration and such and imposing penalties for a lack thereof on those that don't narrate it in an appropriate manner.

Answer 3

A couple grab-baggy ideas —

Make perception operate defensively without making it something you roll for your defense. In order to use Athletics to seek cover/whatever before the shooter gets a chance to shoot at you, you first have to know the shooter is there/aiming at you. If you don't know the shooter is there/aiming at you, your defense is considered 0 (with no rolling). This method privileges snipers and sneak attacks, which may be considered a feature. Basically if you can't pinpoint the origin of the attack, you can't defend against it.

You could also consider taking a page from Kriegszeppelin Valkyrie, from the Fate Worlds books. That has a dogfighting rule, where you can't actually use your attack action against another plane until you've first put an aspect on it ("On His Tail" or whatever). But flip that around: suppose you can't roll to defend against gunfire until you've established an aspect rationale (cover, special sci fi armor/defense systems, accelerating to too-fast-to-track speeds); otherwise you're in the "defense is considered 0" state.

Answer 4

Shoot !

If you absolutely need an opposed roll (something I think deserves its own discussion), why not try Shoot vs. Shoot ? In-universe justification ? The skill represents the character's combat training in gunfights situations, his ability to anticipate fire and position himself optimally. This opens the possibility to have Stunts such as Gun-Kata to enhance Defend rolls made with Shoot or other fun stuff if thematically appropriate.

It has been commented that this might make the Shoot skill too important. This would indeed make the skill vital for anyone wanting to get involved in firefights. One way you can counteract this is by giving the "Defend with Shoot" action a Stunt cost. This compensates nicely but may take you back to your original question in the case of those who didn't "take the course"...

Answer 5

I broke some skills for firefights up into Marksman (making direct attacks; basically the normal Shoot skill) and Maneuver. Maneuver was used to create advantage for cover, whether it was seeking cover or creating suppressive fire on enemies.

Answer 6

Ryan Macklin came up with a Survival skill in The Fate Codex Vol. 1 Issue 2. It replaces Notice, and is used for general awareness as well as the "duck and cover" skill to defend against "gunfire and other such attacks…" when taking cover.

In this type of game Athletics can still be used to defend against ranged attacks, like when running from cover to cover. But if you want mostly a "get in cover, shoot from cover" then Survival might just be what you want.

Answer 7

Touching on what was mentioned in the comments from a previous answer, I think that if none of the existing skills work for you thematically, then you should simply create one. Call it Battlefield Awareness, as suggested, or Firefight Tactics, Spec Ops Training, Take Cover, whatever you think best describes the action the players should be taking when getting neemed by a laser.