If you give your character a mundane or anachronistic name, like Nigel or Sue, your GM should allow you proceed though the entire creation process, only to have your character horribly slain in the opening scene of the first adventure. Do not say we failed to warn you.

The Dying Earth RPG is of course based on Jack Vance’s famous fantasy novel of the same name. While Kalyr is not based on any specific Vance work, many of his novels have influenced the setting.

I think we should enforce this rule

Stunts allow players to individualise their core abilities. You can add additional feats and powers beyond the normal scope of the skills. And you can use them to specialise. The downside is stunts add an extra level of complexity which goes against the grain of the lightweight FATE implementation I’m trying to write.

I’m thinking along the lines of the model adopted by Awesome Adventures, which makes aspects do slightly more work. Invoking aspects can modify the scope of skills, rather than just give a bonus to the die roll. You do lose a bit of crunch; if for example, your character is a highly-skilled martial artist, using stunts you might define a series of moves as stunts at character creation time, each with a precisely defined effect. Without stunts you just take something like “Grand master of Kandar-Fu” as an aspect, and then spend FATE points in-game to define what cool moves a Grand Master can do actually during play. For a PBeM-type game where six months’ of message gaming might be equivalent to a night’s play in a tabletop environment, I’m thinking that may well be the way to go.

Some FATE systems, such as the best-selling Dresden Files RPG have a powers system that relies very heavily on stunts. While the Kalyr setting is psionics-heavy, I’m using a skill-based system for powers. So a high-powered psi would need to devote a big chunk of the skill pyramid to those skills. The issue here is balancing psionics and normals. Perhaps supernormal skills still should cost refresh?

Eliminating stunts may end up having a knock-on effect on skills. I think this needs playtesting in chargen; are there any valid character concepts that really need stunts and can’t be modelled with just skills and aspects?

This one actually doubles up as both setting flavour and adventure seed, which is precisely the sort of thing I’m aiming for.

Dartheyn d’n Eruinar was not having a good day.

Heading the Administration Division of the Academy of Knowledge in the city of Elbeyn was never going to be one of Kalyr’s easiest jobs, he reflected. Endless meetings with his opposite numbers in the city’s other guilds was no way to spend a morning. And today it was nothing but nit-picking discussions about contracts and services rendered and payments by people who liked the sounds of their own voices but didn’t really have a clue what they were talking about. Life would be easier if all other guilds were as meritocratic as his, rather than using the senior ranks as dumping grounds for the idiot sons and daughters of the noble clans. Who always thought their noble rank made them superior to him, when everybody knows how much they depended on competent freemen below them to get anything done.

And with the glorious ruler of the city absent most of the time, too busy playing games of intrigue in the imperial court in the capital, this shower of idiots effectively formed the government of the city. We don’t stand a chance, he thought. One day, the humans from the wilds will take over, just as in the apocalyptic predictions of the Guardianspeaker of Kardak the Defender. And what’s more, we kandar will deserve it, for being so hopeless. Either that, or the brutally disciplined kandar legions of the Koniac Empire will just roll over us like a man stepping on an ant.

He is not sure which fate is worse. Dead or enslaved is dead or enslaved, regardless of whether it’s by the hand of humans, or fellow kandar.

His communicator pings, snapping him out of such morbid thoughts. Through the device he hears the disembodied voice of the chief of the Security Division, Usalu Blerynthar. Yes, she’s a noble, from that notoriously feuding and murderous clan, but she’s more than competent at the job. Simply surviving growing up in that clan gives the skills to make a good security operative, and by The Guardians, she’s good.

“Bad news, Dartheyn”, she says.

“What’s the problem”, he asks. The tone of her voice was enough to tell him an already bad day was just about to get worse.

“We’ve found Vargeyn”, she says, “The bad news is that he’s very very dead. Guild of Construction work gang found the body this morning, in the storm drain, clearing the blockages after yesterday’s rain.

“Guardians!”, he said, “How did he die?”

“Stab wounds, it appears”, she replies, “Think we need backup from the Academy of the Mind here – some psychometry on the body and the scene is going to help”.

“That will be done”, he says, “The mind-benders owe us enough favours. Contact them right now, and tell them we need one of their best”.

He silently curses to himself. Vargeyn was one of his best auditors. He’d been working on irregularities with the usage agreements for equipment supplied to the Academy of Life, who had been getting more evasive and more slippery with each passing moment. He was convinced those power generators and refrigeration units were not being used for the purposes that had been stipulated in the many pages of agreements the Academy of Life had signed. Vargeyn turning up dead like that seemed to much of a coincidence.

Somebody is going to pay for this.

Those of you who have read this far, what does this tell you of the world? Does it make you want to know more?

The current draft Skill List has 45 skills. While I’ve trimmed it down quite a bit from earlier versions, which owed a lot to my fifteen-year old GURPS version of the setting, I still feel this is too many for a FATE implementation, which relies on much broader skills.

Thoughts are:

1. Get rid of Gambling – since Thlan (a chess-like game whose rules are unspecified) fills the same in-game niche. If we still want games of chance or gambling dens, fold into Streetwise (for lower-class games) or Kandar Social Graces (for upper class ones)
2. Merge Brawling and Kandar Fu into a generic Unarmed Combat skill. Having these as separate skills was never any more than colour.
3. Merge Art, Music and Performance into a single skill, with specialisations.
4. I’ve considered merging Nobility and Rank, since they’re functionally almost identical, but I can see too many character concepts wanting both.
5. Make Artillery a specialisation of Missile Combat?
6. A catch-all “Profession()” for any profession where the primary skills aren’t covered by any other skill, and isn’t a craft. That will replace things like Agriculture.
7. Do we need Animal Handling? In my largely urban-based games it’s not something that’s ever come up, and none of my 30+ player characters have ever taken the skill. The sort of thing that could be rolled into professional skills for people like stablehands or farmers?
8. Area Knowledge. Fold into Streetwise (for urban areas) or Survival (for wilderness areas)?

Can you suggest any more?

It’s all very first-draft work-in-progress at the moment. The final text will be fleshed out with examples, but the nuts and bolts of the mechanics should be there.

As ever, feedback is appreciated.

Again, this assumes some knowledge of FATE-speak – I do intent to describe manoeuvres, consequences and so on!

• Combat (and other conflicts) is round-based rather than turn based. Players can post declaring their characters’ actions in any order. One every player has posted, or a pre-determined period of time has passed, the GM wraps up the round and starts the next one.
• Combat resolution uses simultaneous combat rounds (as in FATE 2.0) rather than alternative rounds. A single skill roll covers both attack and defence, highest roll wins and inflicts damage.
• There are no stress tracks; all damage goes straight through to consequences. I’m currently toying with the idea of using those Skills which would normally affect the length of the stress track to affect the number of shifts required for different levels of consequence and/or to take out opponents instead.
• Players invoke or tag aspects for a +2 before any real or virtual die rolling; i.e rerolls. To avoid cluttering up gameplay threads with mechanical details, aspect use should be implied rather than explicit. This has implications on how you name aspects.
• I’m toying with the idea of changing the way maneuvres work; when you free-tag the resulting aspect, rather than a flat +2, the bonus is the number of shifts you got. This probably needs playtesting to see if that’s unbalancing.

Comments and feedback welcome.

Healing

You can heal or reduce the severity of injuries or diseases, either on yourself or on others. This has the effect of reducing the level of consequences or removing them entirely. It can stabilise the condition of someone who’s dying, but it’s limited to accelerating the effects of natural healing. You can’t do things like regrow lost limbs.

Mind-Reading

Allows you to read another’s mind. In a single exchange you can’t do more than read strong surface thoughts or emotions, which can act as an assessment to reveal an aspect you can then free-tag. You’ll need to take out your opponent in mind-to-mind combat before you can start rifleing through their memories.

Far-Sensing

This allows a psi to extend any of their normal senses around them to gather information. It can be used to see what’s behind a door, eavesdrop on a conversation that’s out of normal earshot, determine what something tastes like without physically touching it, locate a specific individual a significant distance away, or detect the active use of a psionic power. The better the result, the longer the distance and greater the detail.

Precognition

This allows a psi to, within limits, foretell the future. In the Kalyr universe, the future hasn’t actually happened yet, so it’s not possible to violate causality. A successful roll allows you to place an aspect on “the future” or “the world” which remains in place until the prediction is either fulfilled or prevented. You can free-tag the aspect once, anyone can subsequently tag it, including the opposition!

Psychometry

This allows a psi to gain insight into the past. It will tell something of the history of an item or location, particularly violent or traumatic events associated with strong emotions. The better the roll, the more information that can be gained, both in terms of detail and distance into the past.

Mind-Control

You can control the mind of another. In a single exchange you can plant a suggestion, creating a temporary aspect you can subsequently free-tag. You need to take your opponent out in mind-to-mind combat before you can force them to do anything against their will.

Mindspeech

You can send thoughts, either words or images. If you’re targetting a willing recipient, the difficulty depends on distance. You can use against an unwilling target as a manoevre placing aspects like “distracted”.

Light-Sculpt

You can bends and twists light energy to create illusions. The illusions have no physical substance, but aren’t just in the mind of the target, but can be seen by anyone in range.

Matter Rearrangement

You have the ability change one substance into another. It can be used to turn lead into gold, the soles of someone’s shoes into glue, or make a solid object crumble into dust. A very high result is needed to make a permanent molecular or atomic change, and all but the most subtle things take too much time and concentration to be able to use in the middle of a fight. In most cases the substance will revert to it’s original chemical nature after a few minutes, although damage to an item is still permanent.

Telekinesis

You have the power to move things and even throw them around using the power of the mind at a distance. The amount of matter you can lift is equivalent to that which you would be able lift using an equivalent skill level in Strength, except that you don’t need any physical contact with the object. It does require you to see whatever you’re trying to lift, either line-of-sight, or though use of the Far-Sensing ability

Temperature Control

This is the power to heat things up, or make things colder. It can be used to make items so cold they shatter, or cause things to melt or burst into flame.

Certain more powerful abilities will be Stunts based of these skills.

The “trouble” with FATE is there’s always more than one way to do anything. My gut feeling is that I’m going to have a relatively small number of skills, with lesser powers being basic trappings of those skills, and the more potent ones being stunts. What I really want to do is to have something relatively free-form, and want to avoid a crunchy GURPS/Hero style powers-building meta-system at all costs.

My previous build was a Fudge-ified version of the GURPS psionics system, which had four power groups. I’m inclined to keep those groups in some shape or form. It allows the creation of characters who are strong in one power, and weaker in others.

Awareness

I’ve been calling this “The Way of Vision” in the existing game.

• Danger Sense – A passive ability triggered by the GM; a successful skill use just before something bad is going to happen places an aspect on the scene that the player can free-tag.
• Clairsentience. Enhanced senses (hearing/sight/tough) at distance, including through walls, although you need a high skill to sense though solid barriers.
• Precognition – Predict a (possible) future.  Either fleeting inages, prophesies or whatever. Probably works by creating aspects which go away once the prediction is either fulfilled, or made impossible.
• Psychometry – Gain information about an object or location’s history.
• Detect use of psionics – This is a passive skill use, allowing detection of any use of psionics in the vicinity. In the interest of game balance I want this to be a common ability.
• Locate people or things at a distance

Mind over Matter

In the existing game, I’ve called this The Way of the World. I think we need two different skills here, one for the amount of raw power, and one for the finesse.

• Psychokinesis - The power to move physical objects around with the power of the mind.
• Temperature Control – Can heat things up or make them cold with the power of the mind.
• Illusions – Can affect light sources to make believable-seeming illusions
• Matter Alteration – Can change the chemical or even the atomic structure of matter. Can see possible game-balance issues with this one; someone who can dissolve an opponent’s swords with a glance is probably too powerful; probably need to make it too slow to be able to use in a combat situation.
• Physical psionic attack – Extending one of the above powers to make ranged attacks which deal out physical damage. Possibly make this more than one power; a directed energy blast against which armour is a defence isn’t the same as using psychokinesis to heat up brains and make heads explode.

Telepathy

I’d split these into two different power groups called “The Way of Restoration” and “The Way of the Will”, but the division was a bit arbitrary.

• Mind-Reading – Detect surface thoughts or strong emotions in a target. An unwilling target can resist.
• Mind-Reaming – Can rifle though a a target’s mind, accessing memories and mental associations.  Requires you to have taken out your target first.
• Mental Attack – Can attack a target’s mind directly, as an attack doing mental damage. If you take your opponent out, they’re either knocked unconscious or rendered vulnerable to mind-reading, mind-control or mindwipe.
• Suggestion – Plants a suggestion in the target’s mind, placing an aspect on a target you can free-tag in the later round.
• Mind Control – Can control a target like a puppet; requires you to have taken your target out first.
• Mindwipe – Can delete a target’s memories, or plant false ones.
• Mindspeech – Can communicate with another (not necessarily a psionic themselves) at distance.
• Psionically-aided combat – Fight armed or unarmed using your psionic skill instead of your combat skill. Either you’re using mind-reading to detect what your about to do, mind control to make your opponent miss, or precognition to predict where the blows will fall.

Others

Random powers that don’t fit into any other category. Some of them should be more powerful stunts requiring other abilities as pre-requisites.

• Healing.
• Metabolism Control
• Shapeshifting.
• Mindswitch.

In the past year or so, FATE has taken off commercially as a flavour of Fudge – there are several FATE games on the market now. I’ve come to the conclusion that what I’m trying to do is insufficiently different from FATE to justify not using that system as a basis. So while the setting remains unchanged, the game rules will undergo a bit of retooling.

So what I now want to do is playtest a variant of FATE optimised for email or message board play rather than tabletop play. The challenge will be how to preserve as many of the good bits of FATE in an environment that has traditionally relied heavily on Game Master fiat. It’s also a design goal that characters and other game stats will be sufficiently compatible with existing tabletop version of FATE such as a Diaspora that people will be able to use the setting with those rulesets if they want to play the setting in a tabletop environment.

To start with, I want to run through several alternative character generation methods to determine which one works the best. There won’t, at least to start with, be any obligation to commit to playing those characters over the course of an extended campaign, so initially I’m not asking anybody to make any long-term commitments. If that’s successful we’ll move on to some actual gameplay, which will be focussed on conflict-resolution scenes rather than any longer story-arcs.

We’ll probably be using my old Kalyr mailing list on The Phoenyx to host the playtest chargen sessions. In the meantime, I’m going to be putting the whole playtest draft on this site, and enable comments.