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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: Madmacabre on March 01, 2011, 02:16:59 PM
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Hello all!
I wanted to share some toughts and maybe get some insights from other Gms.
Over the course of the last few months we played a couple sessions of DFRPG. My group consists of a Red Court Infected (Stage Magician), Changeling (half brownie park ranger) and an Emmisary of power (Traditional chinese ways and spirits). The Emmisary of power has the Sponsored Magic power.
The characters are very interesting and the stories are a bliss to create and run. Gotta say that FATE is quite a nice system.
Unfortunately, after a couple game session we found that when you have a spellcaster (anyone with access to Thaumaturgy or Evocation in one form or the other), the other characters tend to become obsolete very fast.
Spellcasters always have the right spell for the right situation. In combat their damage potential is over the top compared to any other types of characters and they can pretty much do the same things as anyone else using a little time and magic.
We recognize that spellcaster have limited ressources based on their mental stress track, but when they choose to act, its never boring! A single attack could vaporize even the most powerful NPC.
How do you manage your spellcasters in your game?
How do you create challenge that others will excel at and where the spellcaster won’t “steal the show”?
Would it be more appropriate to have a full spellcaster campaign?
Thanks for the insights
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Spell casters are potent especially if you play the villans without concequences but they are about equal with a well specialised melee character, too really challenge your casters have two or three fights in a row and never leave them enough time to recover thier concequences, and scatter innocents around the battlefield to stop them area of effecting.
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Well first up if the spellcaster is totally overshadowing everyone, look for ways to force characters to face challenges apart from one another. Also if you have multiple combatants, for example, and want everyone to enjoy a big showdown, insist that each player can only fight a single NPC for the conflict. That's right in the rules.
Use compels and other complications to hamper the Emmisary's freedom to act. Have your Emmisary's Sponsor become a Signatory of the Unseelie Accords (if they aren't one already) and have them dragged into political situations where their usual dramatic solutions won't be permissable.
Also, don't be afraid to put the responsibility back on the player. Unless the set-up for your game is that the Emmisary is the big hero and the others are supporting characters, it's just as much that player's responsibility to help his friends have fun as well. Talk to him and come up with situations that keep his character occupied while the others get a chance to shine.
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Spellcasters are potent; but only in short bursts. 3-4 evocations and they're tapping into Consequences. With multiple opponents, or waves of opponents, or powerful attacks on their friends that have to be blocked, they can be challenged.
Also, social situations (where spells rarely work) can inflict some pretty severe Consequences.
Keep in mind that Armor works against spells unless Magic is the Catch (rarely the case).
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The strain for casting spells also effect the caster. You cannot be flinging spells all the time left and right without mental fatigue coming in. Sure a Wizard for instance is powerful but more sustained the battle is the more stress they take.
Look at Harry Dresden in the book series. How many times is he mentally taxed and physically exhausted from his spell casting and things going on? Recovering those levels in the FATE system is difficult usually resulting in a sustained rest just like Dresden falling down so tired barely to function, which happens a lot in the novels.
That is why they need allies. Harry has Murphy a mortal helping him out and at times she is on par with him. Thomas his White Court Vampire Ally. The Alphas all those shapeshifters.
Yes, Spellcasters have a lot of punch but they do pay for it in their strain on their sheet. (I know I am using the wrong terminology, one of my players borrowed my books because he is going to be running a new Dresden Game).
You have to make sure your Spellcaster is pushing it and getting those boxes marked. Make sure you toss in the penalties. You cannot cast a spell without cost the harder the spell the worst it is.
Remember the Social Fatigue Combat that can also help tire your Spellcaster out. I notice a lot of GMs miss that rule. Harry gets attacked like that a lot as well.
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Man, seems like this comes up every ten minutes.
Another thing to remember is that spellcasters seem more powerful than they are because they're so easy to optimize. Powergaming with a wizard is as simple as taking every point of Refinement you can handle along with peaked spellcasting skills. So it's easy to do even if you aren't trying to.
It sounds to me as though your characters are not optimized at all. If that's the case, then a halfway competent spellcaster will be the strongest thing around.
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Right now I've got a sword wielding Erinyes (Cthonic Greek Deities of Vengeance) who is rolling +6 Weapon 6 on her sword, and +5 for defense with Toughness and recovery. She's able to get up to +10 Weapon 6 when she needs it without spending fate points.
This is at submerged.
Not quite as up-front and powerful as a wizard but she can do the +6 weapon 6 all day long, the wizard gets 4 or 5 such chances per scene, generally.
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Well it can be of concern, especially for newbie GM's when One PC can shoot a car full of holes while another can level buildings. Sure they may be able to only level two or three buildings in an encounter, but that's a heck of a lot more effective way to stop bad guys...if the building is full of them. Unfortunately it does have its dangers, such as catching innocents in the crossfire much less using lethal magic on mortals.
After a similar problem occurred in my game I made myself really sit down and read through the rules more in-depth. As a result I've learned that fate Points can be the GM's best friend; if your Wizard has just blown his last fate point on buffing up a big spell you can compel an aspect on him to change what happens to the spell and with no fate points to buy it off...well then things can get fun!
Other fun stuff; adding in more than one monster, add in some innocents that happen to wander into the zone that's about to be filled with fire "Aww, it's a puppy!"
And with Sponsored Magic the Sponsor Aspect can be compelled to stop actions or change actions as the sponsor steps in and goes "Uh, no dude" or "Try this instead, it'll be more fun!" depending on the flavor of the game.
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Right now I've got a sword wielding Erinyes (Cthonic Greek Deities of Vengeance) who is rolling +6 Weapon 6 on her sword, and +5 for defense with Toughness and recovery. She's able to get up to +10 Weapon 6 when she needs it without spending fate points.
How out of curiosity, I mean the +10 was it the you spend mental stress power?
You can at submerged character melle build get +7 attack +9 weapons as well as supernatural recovery or toughness.
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Also, remember, that your caster is a follower of traditional Chinese spiritualism. That means he is completely incapable of casting any spell that doesn't fit that theme. Also, his spells only work when and if his master allows it. Thats the price he pays for the cost break on sponsored magic.
The strain for casting spells also effect the caster. You cannot be flinging spells all the time left and right without mental fatigue coming in. Sure a Wizard for instance is powerful but more sustained the battle is the more stress they take.
Look at Harry Dresden in the book series. How many times is he mentally taxed and physically exhausted from his spell casting and things going on? Recovering those levels in the FATE system is difficult usually resulting in a sustained rest just like Dresden falling down so tired barely to function, which happens a lot in the novels.
This would actually be a result of him pushing himself so hard he had to take mental/physical consequences in the fight. Your sress never gives you penalties and is automatically refreshed as soon as the fight is over.
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Everybody's game is going to be different, of course. An all-Wizard game is going to differ from a game following a mix of mortals and supernatural folks.
One strategy to make sure everyone is contributing is to note everyone's top skills, and then make sure those are being challenged. Another way to ensure screen time for all is to regularly compel each player's concepts and aspects, rather than making each session a monster-hunting episode. Also, remember that characters can be helping with Maneuvers in any combat, making it easier for the main combatants (wizard and some other type of fighter) to end conflicts more decisively.
As has been proposed in other threads, human cannon fodder supplementing a given supernatural threat should discourage the Wizard from deploying some of the more destructive battlefield magics, for fear of a First Law violation, allowing the other characters to play a more active role in combat.
However, if violating the Laws of Magic is not a restricting factor in the game - due to either a non-mortal spellcaster, Sponsored Magic, or failure to enforce Lawbreaker and other setting consequences for killing humans - then yes, the spellcaster is going to end up being more powerful when freed of the consequences Harry had to grapple with every time things got hot in Chicago.
But obsolete? No. Spellcasters cannot have all of the skills and still be good at anything, so other characters are needed to help move things along with their own specialities and aptitudes. And if those characters' aptitudes aren't being brought into play or their Aspects challenged, then it make sense that they seem obsolete - because somehow the table has allowed them to become obsolete.
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Good scene aspects are a great way to both add color to a fight and potentially rein in the nastiest types of spellcasting.
If your Emissary likes fire magic have the conflict take place in a highly flammable atmosphere, maybe a factory that produces volatile chemicals (providing he has a reason to not just detonate the place). If the PCs throw down on the roof of an abandoned apartment building that is falling apart earth magic (or really anything that does zone damage) would be a bad idea. And god help that PC if someone turns on a building's sprinkler system, because all that running water is really going to mess with his magic.
Oh, and smart bad guys who know they're facing a spellcaster will probably endeavor to remain behind a threshold whenever possible.
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One strategy to make sure everyone is contributing is to note everyone's top skills, and then make sure those are being challenged. Another way to ensure screen time for all is to regularly compel each player's concepts and aspects, rather than making each session a monster-hunting episode....
But obsolete? No. Spellcasters cannot have all of the skills and still be good at anything, so other characters are needed to help move things along with their own specialities and aptitudes. And if those characters' aptitudes aren't being brought into play or their Aspects challenged, then it make sense that they seem obsolete - because somehow the table has allowed them to become obsolete.
This. One of the main tenants of FATE is that you tailor the story to your characters. Have you read Neutral Grounds, the adventure Evil Hat released recently? It reads more like a list of ideas than a traditional adventure because you're supposed to take those ideas and tailor them to your players, characters and setting. Anyway if the others feel like they aren't doing anything then give them (or encourage them to find) something to do.
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Spellcasters cannot have all of the skills and still be good at anything, so other characters are needed to help move things along with their own specialities and aptitudes. And if those characters' aptitudes aren't being brought into play or their Aspects challenged, then it make sense that they seem obsolete - because somehow the table has allowed them to become obsolete.
I forgot to address the earlier point that - with Thaumaturgy - spellcasters can mimic any skill in the game, and that is certainly true. But Thaumaturgy takes time, and really good Evocation/EvoThaum skill substitutions can obligate the spellcaster to take Consequences in exchange for that flexibility. So, yes, a properly crafted spellcaster can certainly *be* an Army of One, but they are generally giving up a lot of ground to the bad guys in the process, which is where other players help shore up the team and take some of the weight off the spellcaster's shoulders.
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The only thing I dislike on threads like this is the idea that the wizard needs to be hampered repeatedly to make the other players more valuable. I'd hate to play a wizard in such a campaign...
"OH your wizarding powers are irrelevant here because it's RAINING HEAVILY, AGAIN. Time for the werewolf to get a spotlight!"
At some point it becomes really obvious and annoying that the wizard is being constantly hampered.
It's cool to do this when it's appropriate - like, when it should be raining outside (the campaign enters the rainy months when your characters are deep in the Amazon, or something, the bad guy is afraid of wizards and intentionally waits for rain, ect), but if the wizard is constantly facing scripted limitations, then he's being punished for his choice of character.
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I don't think that non-spellcasters are "obsolete" but I do think they can feel unloved if the GM isn't careful. By this I mean that Harry tends to drive the action in the books, and since Harry is a spellcaster most of the examples of action we see in the books feature spellcasters. A GM needs to look for ways to put players in situations where other talents become valuable to the team.
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we've got two casters, a reborn emissary of the mesopotamian god of the dead and a totally mundane medic with lots of guns. nobody is overshadowing anyone.
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All I have to say in regards to Wizards being overpowered is, have you seen a Knight of the Cross in action? With weapons of 5, conviction of 5, and your Righteousness active you have base attack and defense score of 11. You also go through all forms of armor and toughness. Oh and Righteousness can be used in sooooo many different reasons. So no, I really don't feel that Wizards are overpowered.
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All I have to say in regards to Wizards being overpowered is, have you seen a Knight of the Cross in action? With weapons of 5, conviction of 5, and your Righteousness active you have base attack and defense score of 11. You also go through all forms of armor and toughness. Oh and Righteousness can be used in sooooo many different reasons. So no, I really don't feel that Wizards are overpowered.
I am pretty certain you are wrong about righteousness, nowhere does it say that it adds 5 to you dice bonus, the max it can give you is a plus 1 due to conviction being higher than your roll.
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I think that you might be misinterpreting the effect of Righteousness, Amseriah. I am fairly certain that it doesn't add your Conviction to all of your other skills.
As for the thread topic, I have a high-refresh game going on right now with a Mythic Strength-using half giant character who has pretty much stomped everything in his path so far. I'm pretty sure that he's done better than an equivalent spellcaster would have done in his situation.
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Huh...teaches me to just read sidebars. I've really been screwing that up in our game. As a side note: with this being the case, and only being able to get a +1 to a roll, how the hades to KotC SURVIVE conflicts with Denarians? I know that they can hit them hard without the armor and toughness, but really with no access to any of the inhuman+ stats that the Denarians have, they won't ever go first, they have no soak to speak of, and combats are going to last more than 1 exchange. They never really talk about the overturn on that gig to be that high...in fact it seems like most of them get to retire before they meet their Boss. I am really thinking about them talking about Shiro dueling them and surviving solo, not gangs of good guys vs. one bad guy.
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Huh...teaches me to just read sidebars. I've really been screwing that up in our game. As a side note: with this being the case, and only being able to get a +1 to a roll, how the hades to KotC SURVIVE conflicts with Denarians? I know that they can hit them hard without the armor and toughness, but really with no access to any of the inhuman+ stats that the Denarians have, they won't ever go first, they have no soak to speak of, and combats are going to last more than 1 exchange. They never really talk about the overturn on that gig to be that high...in fact it seems like most of them get to retire before they meet their Boss. I am really thinking about them talking about Shiro dueling them and surviving solo, not gangs of good guys vs. one bad guy.
I'd say that the Boss doesn't let his guys get ambushed (perhaps as a compel on the D-coin guys' high concepts), the D-boys are usually beating on someone else who can't resist when the Fists of God come along(which means they get to use Desperate Hour); looking at the 3 KOTCs in OW, all 3 would have an equivalent of Superb or better defense. And Shiro has Fantastic Weapons and an Aspect that says how 1337 a swordsman he is.
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I agree with Toturi. Also, the Denarians' superior physical powerset would be fairly useless most of the time. The Toughness and Recovery powers get ignored by the Swords, and the Strength powers only matter if they can land a hit. Thanks to high Weapons, True Aim, Righteousness, and bucketloads of fate points, that should very rarely happen.
But I wasn't satisfied with that explanation, so I made a stronger version of Shiro. I wanted him to deserve the title of "world's greatest swordsman". So, here it is:
Shiro Yoshimo (Scuba Diving)
High Concept: Knight Of The Cross
Other Aspects: Boundless Virtue, No Greater Love, Swordsman Without Peer, Wielder Of Fidelacchius, Faith Demands Sacrifice
Skills:
Fantastic: Weapons
Superb: Conviction
Great: Lore, Discipline, Presence
Good: Alertness, Athletics, Endurance
Fair: Fists, Stealth, Contacts, Empathy
Average: Might, Rapport, Resources, Investigation, Survival
Stunts:
Righteous (Conviction): +2 to Conviction for the Righteousness power.
Riposte (Weapons): sacrifice next action to counterattack after a successful defence with Weapons.
Footwork (Weapons): use Weapons to defend against ranged attacks.
Duelist (Weapons): +2 to Weapons when defending against a single opponent.
Devastating Slashes (Weapons): attacks with swords inflict 2 extra stress.
Master Of The Blade (Weapons): +1 to all attacks with a sword.
Powers:
Bless This House [-1]
Guide My Hand [-1]
Holy Touch [-1]
Righteousness [-2]
Sword of the Cross (Fidelacchius) [-3]
Total Refresh Cost:
-14
Refresh Total:
3
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Damn. World's greatest swordsman indeed.
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The only thing I dislike on threads like this is the idea that the wizard needs to be hampered repeatedly to make the other players more valuable. I'd hate to play a wizard in such a campaign...
"OH your wizarding powers are irrelevant here because it's RAINING HEAVILY, AGAIN. Time for the werewolf to get a spotlight!"
At some point it becomes really obvious and annoying that the wizard is being constantly hampered.
It's cool to do this when it's appropriate - like, when it should be raining outside (the campaign enters the rainy months when your characters are deep in the Amazon, or something, the bad guy is afraid of wizards and intentionally waits for rain, ect), but if the wizard is constantly facing scripted limitations, then he's being punished for his choice of character.
At the same time you have to keep in account that his character choice is not detracting from the fun of the rest of the group. The needs of the many supersede the few after all.
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At the same time you have to keep in account that his character choice is not detracting from the fun of the rest of the group. The needs of the many supersede the few after all.
I really don't understand the obsession with having characters be "balanced". Ive played overpowered characters ive played underpowered ones, and enjoyed both. It seems to me that creating a story that accurately reflects the world in which your playing should be far more important.
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I really don't understand the obsession with having characters be "balanced". Ive played overpowered characters ive played underpowered ones, and enjoyed both. It seems to me that creating a story that accurately reflects the world in which your playing should be far more important.
Yes, there's a difference between 'power balance' and meta-game 'play balance'. DFRPG does a fairly good job of the latter and completely ignores the former. Not a bad thing.
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Remember the write ups in Our World are posibly underpowered in some cases..........
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Yes, there's a difference between 'power balance' and meta-game 'play balance'. DFRPG does a fairly good job of the latter and completely ignores the former. Not a bad thing.
Problem being that so many people look at what casters can do an have a kneejerk reaction of "thats o.p., no you cant do it", then end up have more house rules then their where rules to begin with.
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Not sure I'd call it 'kneejerk'. Different groups look for different things in a game system. I can understand a desire for in-game as well as meta-game balance, even help when the issue is interesting. God knows I've made some fairly drastic changes to game systems in the past! :)
I do agree it's worth pointing out that it isn't a flaw in the game, it's a feature some simply prefer to house rule away. It's even worth bringing up the meta-game balance factors.
To answer the OP's specific questions:
-How do you manage your spellcasters in your game? The fate point economy is a big part of any character's power. Compel one character repeatedly while not compelling another and the compellee will be able to throw down big. The compels themselves also tend to be limitations by nature more often than not. A second method is managing scene length and zone breadth. While combat scenes typically span seconds to a minute or two and cover only a few zones, a chase scene could cover hours and a much higher number of zones. A running combat would fit somewhere in between. In other words, don't plan stand up knock down battles against a wizard. That leads in to tactics. Evocation needs line of sight. Use cover! Or obscurement - a smoke grenade can do wonders. Better yet, tear gas. :) Finally, put the wizard on the defensive. The more spells he uses on defense, the less available for offense...and he only gets three to four consequence free spells per scene.
-How do you create challenge that others will excel at and where the spellcaster won’t “steal the show”? Long scenes, covering multiple zones, with enemies avoiding the wizard's line of sight. Multiple opponents in several zones. Tough opponents who's catch is something physical - metal for example. Misdirection. Consider how many spells a glamour wielding fae might lead the wizard into using unnecessarily. Hit and run attacks...extremely fast opponents such as vampires can move into a zone, attack, and keep moving to another zone. Don't forget zone borders where appropriate either. ;)
-Would it be more appropriate to have a full spellcaster campaign? If that's what you want, it works. I wouldn't term it "more appropriate" but it is a valid option.
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Really, I'd look less at the power-drawbacks of being a wizard as much as at the other drawbacks of being a wizard.
First, technology, technology, technology. The world is full of technology and runs on technology now. Not only does this technology create an inherent problem with being a wizard, but any enemy with half a brain is going to try to use technology to their advantage in many ways. Think like someone trying to hide something from a wizard - or, heck, just trying to disrupt his operations.
Second, what does Harry always harp on? A wizard is a humongous force - when the wizard has time to prepare and bring his best stuff. It's not hard to engineer non-forced situations where the wizard isn't going to be as prepared and someone like Billy just has to flip his switch and he's ready to throw down. Heck, all the situations where Harry knows he has to leave things behind or he'd be coming in loaded for bear and throwing off delicate situations.
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I find it interesting that the only full wizard in my campaign has approached me specifically to de-power herself without any suggestion by me that it was needed or required. So far I have not seen issues with any of the spell throwers causing the game to go out of whack or become less fun.
A large part of the game is taking place in situations where any use of heavy artillery (either magic or firearms) is out of place so it turns out not to have that much impact in many cases.
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I'm running an almost all Wizard campaign. I have five submerged level wizards and one biomancer focused practitioner. They have not lacked for a challenge so far. They thought that the Red Court Vamps were push overs until one actually got to grips with one of them. Then it quickly turned into panic, fear and a badly hurt wizard. It wasn't my intention to make it into a lesson or example; but that is just how it turned out.
I have also found that most wizards REALLY lean on that Lore roll substitution for Alertness against supernatural wonkiness coming at them. Especially in my group where I have 3 wizards with a Lore of 5. So, the biomancer saved their bacon when she was the one that noticed the mortal goons waiting in ambush with automatic weapons. Which, for me, brings up a good area for other character types to shine: Skills. Wizards, mostly, will have to stack up their Conviction, Discipline and Lore as their top tier skills. And, yes, they have Thaum to fall back on; but that takes time. Even for my Lore 5 submerged wizards that can drop a complexity 5 to 7 spell without prep. Simply craft your story such that time is not a luxury item. Then that character with, say, Burglary really comes in handy. He can be through a locked door (subtlety that is) before the wizards finish talking about HOW to craft the right spell to do it. ;D
The social skills are also a good, easy place for other characters to shine. Again, wizards have generally stacked up their 3 base skills. Not things like Deceit, Empathy, Presence, Rapport and Intimidation. Those can be huge elements of any given story and are not easily substituted by magic. At least not without skirting a Law or out-right breaking one.
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My players - three apprentice Wizards - were figuring out how to repurpose a bomb they had hexed (I intentionally made it hexable), just in case. I asked "Anyone have Craftsmanship?" and an uneasy pall of laughter settled across the table. "Just save that hunk of inert tech for someone you may find later, then," I concluded.
Alas, skill diversity is a regular casualty in an all-spellcaster game. But hey, failed encounters lead to Concessions, which mean more Fate Points, right?
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I agree with the observation that the apex skills for wizards tend to be Conviction, Discipline and Lore. But I also find that unless the player is intentionally making social combat his character's blindspot, the Few Seconds Ahead power or Empathy skill also tend to appear fairly often. Thus while the wizard may not be able to attack socially (unless he is using an Empathy "attack"), he can certainly defend fairly well.
In an all spellcaster game, the apex skills diversity may suffer but I find that the lower level skills are still quite diverse. But bear in mind that at the low end (a skill of 1 or 2), it is not much different from simply invoking an Aspect for a +2 boost.