20140307 Hey I need to hack Fate’Okay mayb...

Robert Hanz - 2014-03-07T17:08:10-0500 - Updated: 2014-03-07T17:08:10-0500

"Hey, I need to hack Fate!"

Okay, maybe you do. I'm kind of vocally on the "minimum hack necessary" side, but we'll ignore that for a moment. Here's what I recommend as a first step towards any Fate hack:

Imagine what you want to do. Now, go write a scene, as in a short story or novel, that would use whatever you're trying to do. Use this as your guide towards your hack. As much as possible, when writing your modification/"system", try to keep the stuff in the system/rules matching up one to one with stuff in your fake scene.

When doing this, focus on the decisions that characters make (you know, the core of any story), what options they don't pursue, and how that impacts the scene and the hypothetical rest-of-the story.

If you need to write more than one scene, go for it. But these scenes should provide good guidance for what you really need to have in your rules, what's extraneous detail, and what's utterly unnecessary.

Shared to the community Fate Core - Public

+1'd by: Edward Taylor, Jon Merchen, William Wright, Elsidar Amhransidhe, Artur Fiedorowicz, Baz Stevens, Andreas Habicher, Terry Willitts, Teo Morgan, Jon McCarty, Stephanie Bryant, Paul Kießhauer, Ryan M. Danks, Hans Messersmith, Alex Rushing

Paul Kießhauer - 2014-03-07T17:51:23-0500

I agree, that's a good way to go.

Something I would like to add, that often comes up when trying to convert a rules heavy system, but not only then, is to ignore old rules and try to convert the setting, not the system. I've often seen this with magic systems, for example, which have some sort of mana/casting stress/backlash or other kind of system, not because the narrative supports it, but thats how magic is most often balanced in other games, and people feel like magic has to have something like it. The same trap lurks for many other things, and it's important to ask yourself if you are implementing a rule because it makes sense, or because all other systems you know do it like that.

tl/dr: "fiction first" ;)

Robert Hanz - 2014-03-07T18:01:57-0500

I'd also point out here that this is the approach I'd use for Fate. Not necessarily other games. But the "fiction, not physics" approach that the Fate rules take makes it a good fit.

For something like Savage Worlds or GURPS I'd recommend another approach.

Teo Morgan - 2014-03-07T18:43:39-0500

I am particularly curious about "hacks" that are simply implementations of the rules as applied to different settings. To me a "hack" is adding something that was not there previously. I suppose in such cases the setting is being hacked, but that's what Fate is for.

I think your guidelines are good +Robert Hanz, because in going through that process I think it'd become pretty clear that, "Hey, I don't really need to hack anything. Fate Core just does this stuff already."

Robert Hanz - 2014-03-07T18:55:58-0500

In many cases, it does, and I completely agree that this will often show that. Of course, my "minimal hackist" bias is showing there :)

In the cases where it doesn't, then it gives a great guide as to what the rules need to actually do.

Tim Noyce - 2014-03-07T20:00:46-0500

Actually the cardinal rule for Savage Worlds conversions (of which there are very, very many) is never convert a mechanic. Use the RAW and add in elements sparingly if you really, really need them to support the tone and content of the target setting.

While I can understand the joy of creating a consistent mechanic (indeed they are often magic systems), it is kind of moot unless it is enabling a particular kind of story, which it may do by creating scarcity or hard choices, as Dark Sun does frinstance with despoiling