26
votes
Accepted
Mook Stress Boxes in Fate Core
Yes, you're reading it wrong. Each stress box can absorb a number of shifts of its ordinal or less, and you can only use one at a time. Not just mooks. From p.160:
When you take stress, check off a ...
- 32.8k
20
votes
What is the purpose of differently-sized stress boxes as opposed to flat stress or same-sized boxes?
Fate is all about creating interesting stories. Progressive stress box values are designed to do exactly that.
The rules say that to absorb Stress, you have to mark off a box that has equal or bigger ...
- 16.9k
18
votes
Why aren't you allowed to check off multiple stress boxes per hit?
Stress is a pacing mechanic. It's a way to control how fast and intense your conflicts are. Messing with this changes the kind of stories Fate tells, by changing how seriously PCs take conflicts.
...
- 52.7k
17
votes
Can a White Court Vampire heal Hunger Stress with Inhuman Recovery?
Inhuman Recovery allows the recovery of a single physical mild consequence.
Feeding Dependency inflicts hunger consequences, not physical consequences.
The only way to restore those is going to be ...
- 2,770
16
votes
How many shifts are needed to take out a character with a single blow?
The other answers are addressing the context of the narrative and the general tone of Fate, and at the table they're probably more useful. But let's answer the question literally too:
You need to ...
- 52.7k
15
votes
Accepted
Aspects implying Resistance/Immunity
For resistance to fire:
It's pretty straightforward to use stunts and extras.
Because I am a dragon, I have armor:2 against heat-based attacks.
or
Because I am a dragon, I have +2 to defence ...
- 52.7k
13
votes
Accepted
How many shifts are needed to take out a character with a single blow?
It takes as many shifts of harm to take someone out as it takes. The amount is arbitrary, since the character may have more or less stress boxes, consequences, stunts, etc. Asking how many is kinda ...
- 36.9k
12
votes
Accepted
Is there a way to attack the mental stress track of mortals without violating the Laws of Magic?
Yes, it's possible to inflict Mental Stress with magic without breaking the Laws of Magic. You just can't affect someone's mind directly; whenever you're thinking of an effect that could cause Mental ...
- 4,501
10
votes
In the Dresden Files RPG is it possible to get mental armor, and if so, how?
If you could do so, that would be an abuse rather than a use of the system.
That said, on (YS250) in the 'flavor text' in the sidebar to the left, your question is asked and answered, i.e.
Hey, ...
- 18k
9
votes
Is there a way to attack the mental stress track of mortals without violating the Laws of Magic?
Directly tampering with the human mind, either by reading it or modifying it, is a direct violation of the Third and Fourth Laws, respectively, no matter how you do it or what your motives are. Both ...
- 5,998
9
votes
Accepted
How to respond to "stress tracks / narrative consequences are arbitrary"?
Bypassing stress in the situations you mentionned is playing by the rules. But don't take my word for it, let's see what Fate Core tells us.
When to use stress?
"In brief, stress represents the ...
- 285
8
votes
Accepted
How to write down Evocation mental stress
So, if a Wizard has, for example, only the third mental stress box available (☑️☑️☐☐) and Conviction 4, will any Evocation Spell with 1 to 6 shifts cost him the same?
Yes.
It costs 1 plus the number ...
- 13.8k
7
votes
Accepted
Stress Tracks and Beast Change
My recommendation: Absolutely nothing happens.
To see why, we need to look at the nature of the damage system in Dresden.
Stress, by itself, doesn't do anything. What causes you to be Taken Out is ...
- 14.2k
7
votes
A stresstrack/timer for FATE one-shot
Sounds like a job for the Fate Fractal
As detailed on p.270 in the Fate Core rules, the Bronze Rule — aka the Fate Fractal — lets you build the tavern like a character and give it a stress track of ...
- 51.3k
7
votes
Accepted
What is "Current Stress"?
Current Stress (deprecated)
The current commercially available version of InSpecters is not the only version. In a previous version, Stress worked differently and was a little more death-spiraly, in ...
- 32.8k
7
votes
Accepted
Can stress be taken outside conflict?
Here is my emphasis on the same sentence
stress represents the ephemeral toll of participating in a conflict
In other words, stress does not carry over into the next scene.
A contest or a ...
- 17.1k
7
votes
Accepted
How long should someone be out of action when they mark Trauma?
How long would it take someone "left for dead" to get back into the score?
This is not a trick question; it's what you have to answer for yourself as a GM when deciding if and how somebody ...
- 32.8k
6
votes
Why aren't you allowed to check off multiple stress boxes per hit?
(This started as a comment on BESW's answer, but I ran up against the character limit, so...)
In addition to the combat balance considerations, I think there's a narrative/game design aspect to this ...
- 765
5
votes
What is "Current Stress"?
It's probably a place to keep track of how many times you've rolled for stress that session, but it might instead be a place to track the temporary penalties to your next roll.
The typical lasting ...
- 52.7k
5
votes
Accepted
Are consequences tracked per stress track?
Normally No
You can fill your normal (free) Consequence slots with either consequence type, but only one Consequence per slot. If if one of those is filled with, say, Deep Cuts, you can't also fill it ...
4
votes
Aspects implying Resistance/Immunity
One of the elements of Fate Core that comes into play here is that Aspects remain true whether they are invoked or not. (FC76) If your dragon has "Can Withstand the Hottest Flames," then that's just a ...
- 51.3k
4
votes
Accepted
Does thaumaturgy at "Evocation's Methods and Speed" inflict stress like Evocation does?
Yes, you do take stress, because it is evocation (YS288, left side, 2nd bullet):
The spell is cast like evocation: power first, control later, all done in one exchange
In the gathering phase of ...
- 898
4
votes
Accepted
How does Stress work for characters with multiple Affiliation dice?
Using the Large-Scale Threat rules (OM115) and the rules for Affiliation (OM62), the answer is A. He would roll his single d6 Buddy affiliation with no other penalty. This is intentional, as it allows ...
- 51.3k
4
votes
A stresstrack/timer for FATE one-shot
Sounds like a job for the Fate Adversary Toolkit!
There is a section about building “countdown clocks” for just such a purpose.
Countdowns
A countdown adds urgency to an adversary: deal with it now ...
- 12k
4
votes
What is the impact of longer than usual Stress Tracks?
Well the obvious answers is social encounters will take longer and your players will be more powerful(provided you don't increase the enemies the same amount). Depending on how you run encounters, ...
- 2,056
3
votes
Merging egos with stress and trauma in Eclipse Phase
It's assumed in the normal merging process you are trying to integrate the fork well. This means you aren't actually getting everything from the fork, just the important parts. Now, the important ...
- 65.7k
3
votes
How do I explain stress to a d20 crowd?
The parallel I've drawn to the stress track for d20 games is it's fairly similar to spell slots for a Wizard- or Cleric-type character:
For example, a wizard has a certain number of zeroth-, first-, ...
3
votes
Is there a way to attack the mental stress track of mortals without violating the Laws of Magic?
Attacking a mental stress track is basically just causing mental confusion and exhaustion for your target. Non-magical people do this to each other all the time by verbally abusing each other, feeding ...
- 17.1k
2
votes
Is there a way to attack the mental stress track of mortals without violating the Laws of Magic?
No
That is a direct violation of the Third Law and the Fourth Law of Magic. Which are Never Invade the Thoughts of Another and Never Enthrall Another respectively.
To attack the mental stress ...
- 468
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible