Adjudicating the Discovery of a Catch

[Theogony_IX]

How is Catch discovery handled in your games?  This is something I've been trying to find definitive rules on for a while and I haven't been able to find anything.  Is there something in the RaW that covers how to go about discovering a Catch and how to determine the difficulty?  If not how do you or your GM handle it?

[Taran]

I guess, you'd look at the rebate bonus for a catch.  (just the research rebate, not the accessibility rebate) The higher the rebate, the easier it is to research.  Using the guidelines in the book about the kinds of libraries etc... would also be taken into account.

So, this might be a situation where the 'workspace' rules come into play.

Choose a difficulty based on a +0  Catch.  Like Superb or Higher.

Let people roll to see if they know (assuming they know WHAT the creature is).
If they don't, then require a proper library or other research lab...or summon something that would know the answer - which would be a Lore Skill replacement ritual or an actual summoning with all its draw-backs and dangers.  Or finding/dealing with the right kinds of people who might know: social conflicts, contacts roles etc...  This might just give you aspects to try another Lore roll.

For every +1 on the catch, you can drop the difficulty by 1.

That's my 'off the cuff' advice.

Edit:  or you could just not allow them to make a Lore, if you want the research to be part of the adventure.  Basically, because no-one knows the Catch.

[Kennifus Prime]

If it's something that's based off an existing thing in the Dresdenverse I base it off of a Lore roll. That's what covers their Supernatural knowledge. You set the difficulty to know The Catch based on how common the knowledge is. For instance, rolling Lore to determine The Catch of a Black Court Vampire is likely pretty low. Whereas trying to find The Catch of a Sidhe isn't exactly something Average Joe knows. If it's a White Court Vampire knowing sort of how The Catch works might not be difficult, but know a specific type of White Court Vampire Catch is likely trickier. However, in all instances it would be a Lore roll I'd think.

Now setting the Difficulty for that Lore roll gets trickier. In my examples of BCV, Sidhe, and WCV where would we set those Difficulties? A +1 Average for BCV? A +3 for Sidhe? Maybe a +3 to know how WCV Catches work and a +5 to know the specific Catch for this particular type of WCV? It's hard to say. I don't think anywhere in the book lays this specifically out.

What is the exact situation you're dealing with? That may help us better determine how to handle it.

EDIT: After seeing Taran's post. (I was typing at the same time lol.)

I guess, you'd look at the rebate bonus for a catch.  (just the research rebate, not the accessibility rebate) The higher the rebate, the easier it is to research.

I like this idea as well. The more of a Rebate the creature has from The Catch the easier the Difficulty. It makes sense as the Rebate is based on how rare or common The Catch itself is.

[Taran]

White court vampire catches are super secret from how I interpret it.  And their catch is +0 for how easy it is to research.  Didn't Harry learn the Raith Catch from Thomas himself?

I don't have my books but they have base requirements for discovering catches and isn't 'intimate knowledge' a basis for a +0 catch?

If that's the case, then I don't think a random Lore roll would fit the bill unless you have an aspect to represent that kind of knowledge.

I suppose you could set a base difficulty, like legendary and each +1 on the catch represents an aspect (or a -2 to the difficulty)

I'd put BCV around +2 since that knowledge is available on the internet and I think they rate the internet at Fair.  (Once again, I don't have my books).  It's probably also available as a scholarship roll as well as a lore roll given stokers Dracula is everywhere. 

[Kennifus Prime]

White court vampire catches are super secret from how I interpret it.  And their catch is +0 for how easy it is to research.  Didn't Harry learn the Raith Catch from Thomas himself?

I don't have my books but they have base requirements for discovering catches and isn't 'intimate knowledge' a basis for a +0 catch?

If that's the case, then I don't think a random Lore roll would fit the bill unless you have an aspect to represent that kind of knowledge.

I suppose you could set a base difficulty, like legendary and each +1 on the catch represents an aspect (or a -2 to the difficulty)

I'd put BCV around +2 since that knowledge is available on the internet and I think they rate the internet at Fair.  (Once again, I don't have my books).  It's probably also available as a scholarship roll as well as a lore roll given stokers Dracula is everywhere.

That's definitely true for White Court Vampires. Hrmmm. So maybe like a +5 Lore just to know that they feed on emotions in general, but much higher (if Lore at all) for determining what type of emotion they feed off of (and thus their Catch). I'm curious how you'd learn it then? Perhaps a pretty difficult Contacts roll? You know a guy who knows a guy? If you succeed you find out The Catch of a particular White Court Family, if you fail you don't. Or better yet you find out the WRONG Catch. :-P

I also like the idea of stuff like low Scholarship rolls for stuff you can easily find on the Internet. We've actually done Google searches ourselves to see how deep you have to dig before when dealing with stuff like, say, a Rakshasa.

[Taran]

That's definitely true for White Court Vampires. Hrmmm. So maybe like a +5 Lore just to know that they feed on emotions in general, but much higher (if Lore at all) for determining what type of emotion they feed off of (and thus their Catch). I'm curious how you'd learn it then? Perhaps a pretty difficult Contacts roll? You know a guy who knows a guy? If you succeed you find out The Catch of a particular White Court Family, if you fail you don't. Or better yet you find out the WRONG Catch. :-P

Yeah.  And just knowing they feed off a particular emotion does not necessarily translate to the fact that the opposite emotion hurts them.  Sunlight hurts BCV's and that has nothing to do with what they feed on (blood).

 What's the opposite of blood.  Water?  Holy Water and running water affects them. So maybe there's a connection.

Yeah.  Contacts might give you aspects to tag.  It's all part of the research.  A really, really, really good library would let you make a straight up roll but, otherwise, it's a lot of running around, finding clues and talking to people.  I mean, short of actually Knowing one.

So, maybe you need to use the guidelines under the Catch as the base requirement before you can even make a roll.  If it says 'intimate knowledge' then that's the basic requirements.  It's likely that you'll have to run into the creature once or twice or have spoken to someone who has a story about it.   Some of these stories might be somewhere in a library, though, assuming the library is good enough.

It would be impossible to get the wrong answer if you searched the Internet, though, because as we all know, everything on the internet is True. 

[wyvern]

I'd definitely base this on the cost of the catch.

+2 researchability?
It's generally safe to assume people just know unless there's some specific reason they wouldn't (such as not being clued-in at all).
For a PC attempting to research this level of catch, I'd call for a mediocre (or maybe average?) lore roll; even someone with no skill and a -4 on the dice shouldn't need more than a day to dig up the answer.  (Edit: Unless, of course, you can find a relevant aspect to compel; someone with Out-Of-Date-Knowledge might not have read Bram Stoker's Dracula, for example.)

+1 researchability?
It's generally safe to assume people don't know without a specific reason they would.  For example, of course the local Warden knows your catch; that's kinda part of their job and they've got access to the White Council's libraries.  If there's any question about whether someone would know or not, I'd tend to resolve it with a compel (for initial encounters), and just a quick check on "what sort of research resources does this person have?" for subsequent encounters.  For example, when Dresden first encounters the Gruffs, he has no idea that they're fae (and in fact is led away from that conclusion by their use of modern weaponry); I'd give him a fate point for that.  But then he just goes and asks Bob and presto, answer.
For a PC attempting to research such a catch, the first thing they'll need is an appropriate aspect invoke just to make the research possible.  Bob the Skull.  Access to the White Council records in Edinburgh.  Monoc Securities Contract.  The Merlin's Diaries.  No such aspect?  You don't even get to roll.  Once you do have such an aspect, you might still need a Good to Great lore roll - or perhaps substituting Contacts or some other skill appropriate to how you're getting the information.

+0 researchability?
These are the sorts of catches that tend to come up by accident more often than by design.  A plain wedding ring at an estate sale that burns without warning.  A fae with a perfect glamour to look like some other monster is attacked by someone with a steel knife - not because they know the knife will work, but because that's the only weapon the poor guy has.  An oriental demon, vulnerable only to the cleansing force of magical fire, finds itself up against one Harry Dresden.  I'd use aspects to cover this sort of catch almost exclusively, unless it was already well established that the catch was in play - for example, twin daemons only vulnerable to each other, wouldn't expect to get extra fate points when they fight - they know that going in.
For a PC attempting to research such a catch, the path is frustrating and fraught with false leads.  You find a relevant aspect, you make your research roll (as with a +1 catch), only you're up against Great or Superb or higher difficulty - and success tends to just tell you "The answer isn't here," unless you picked the exact right resource to ask.  (There's an excellent example of that in Cold Days, but I won't spoil it here; if you've read the book, you know what I'm talking about.)  It's probably easier to trick your opponent into revealing their catch (as a social take-out result) than to research it... if they even know what they're vulnerable to!

[Taran]

+1