Fate Core - The Fate Codex

I owe many of my projects over the last couple of years to the Kickstarter crowdsourcing platform. Crowdsourcing is still a young concept and watching its growth and evolution is fascinating. Another style of crowdsourcing I've seen more of is the site Patreon, where you sign up to back a person, rather than a project. One of these persons is Mark Diaz Truman and first project is The Fate Codex.

The Fate Codex will be a small electronic magazine featuring rules, hacks, fiction and settings from Fate creators across the board.  It's no coincidence that Mark's talked to several of the folks who worked on the Fate Worlds books, since almost all of us have been hounding Fred about when the next ones should come out. I don't think Mark will have much trouble getting some awesome designers to put out some neat ideas for the game.

The hacks I post here are a good way for me to stretch my legs as a designer and not get wrapped up in my pro work all the time. Fate is a flexible and durable system and I'm very happy with the response I've gotten for my work here. I hope that similar work shows up in The Fate Codex, since working with Mark is a great pleasure.

Fate Accelerated - Shadowrun 2070

My Fate Core hack for 2050 could probably use some polish, but until I get a chance to get back to it, I decided to put together a hack to run Shadowrun's modern version using Fate Accelerated.  The goal here is to let folks who love the setting but are less enamored of the system still shoot elves in the face for money. The hack is after the jump, chummer!

This also works for other cyberpunk settings, like Deux Ex or Android.

Fate Core/Fate Accelerated Hack - Crimson Skies

This hack is likely pretty obscure, but it's been a Great White Whale for a while. I love the Crimson Skies universe. It's a settign where the US broke up shortly after the Great War, and, because of it, air shipping has come into vogue. Which means air pirates, cocky pilots and zeppelins full of loot.

Crimson Skies has been a board game, a Clix game, a computer game, and Xbox game and now it's compatible with both Fate Core and Fate Accelerated.



This is about designing the planes as Extras. Everyone should have one, since they are as common as cars in the setting. The only difference is splitting up stress between the separate tracks in Fate Core. 

This hack could also be used for any setting where vehicles play a big part in the action like Car Wars or Battletech. 

Fiasco - Clock Blockers

It's been a crazy, crazy year for me. I've worked with amazing people, had a hand in designing some awesome games and been part of hard charging Kickstarters that are changing the face of the industry. Everything awesome that happened this year got started right around this time in 2012, so I wanted to commemorate a great year with something fun.

I present my very own Fiasco playset entitled Clock Blockers. It's about time travelers using their machine for their own fun and profit rather than worrying about stepping on butterflies. Maybe you put right what once went wrong. Or you decide to sink Noah's Ark and corner the market on giraffes.

Special thanks to BVB Design for taking time out of their busy schedule to make this playset look awesome. I love the cover so much.

Praise for Clock Blockers:

"It's a great playset, right in the zone!" - Dan Curtis Johnson

Fate Accelerated - 7th Sea

I was happy to see folks interested in both a Core and Accelerated hack of 7th Sea. This one will be much shorter, since I'm less concerned with modeling system elements here.

Thanks to +Ryan Macklin for inspiring me on the Approaches. The hack hits after the jump!

Fate Core Hack - 7th Sea

Many years ago, my first published work was for Alderac's 7th Sea shortly after it became Swashbuckling Adventures. 7th Sea holds a special place in my heart for a variety of reasons. It was my first published work. It was the game I ran for almost everyone in college. It gave me a life long love of swashbuckling movies long before Johnny Depp brought them back into vogue.

I've eyed a Fate hack for 7th Sea for a while. I originally set out to do one with Spirit of the Century to allow PCs that were on the same level as the influential characters in the setting. I wanted to be able to have PCs that could match wits with Cardinal Verdugo and trade blows with Captain Reis. I wanted the sorceries to reflect the fiction. I want this rich setting to live on.

This hack also works for The Three Musketeers, Pirates of the Caribbean, and The Princess Bride.
All hands on deck! The hack begins after the jump!

Firefly - Freedom Flyer

Today marks the release of the fourth Echoes of War adventure. Freedom Flyer comes to us from Nicole Wakelin. The Crew has to help an old friend get out from under a bounty on her head to start a new life out in the black. Nicole was great to work with and, as always, Monica Valentinelli and Mark Diaz Truman did a great job making this tale razor sharp.

I spoil my favorite sequence after the jump.

Fate Core Hack - Parliament of Dragons

Like many entries, this began as a simple hack. I picked up the Council of Wyrms boxed set at a local used bookstore. TSR pumped out a lot of great settings and content that's ripe for a Fate conversion. The boxed set is full of a lot of great ideas, and it is especially interesting to see a game that tries to recast the popularity of Vampire's "PCs scheming vs. PCs" in terms a different audience can understand.

Playing dragons as PCs is a no brainer. The elapsed time from the moment someone first said "Wow, I can't believe we killed that thing!" to "Hey, how come I can't play that thing?" was likely less than two seconds. I ran a fairly lengthy game of FFG's Fireborn and coming up with challenges for such powerful characters was part of the fun. The trick is to properly convey the scope of the PC's power, while still coming up for interesting things to do. the Council offers a great setting that mixes intrigues in the halls of power and heading out to the islands to lay waste to some armies.

This is still primarily a hack for Council of Wyrms, though you can get away with playing this setting without needing the boxed set. You'd have to make up your own fantasy world for your PCs to lord over, but that doesn't seem too hard. Either you've got a couple soaking up a few spiral notebooks (I know I do) or you can generate one using Fate Core's setting creation guidelines.


Consider this a gift to all the people who made Fate Core a two-fisted success this year and all the fan that said such nice things about Camelot Trigger. The rules for Parliament of Dragons begin after the jump!

This hack works for Council of Wyrms, Fireborn or any setting where the PCs are masters of their domain.

Plot Points - Ravenloft

Three of my dear friends have started a podcast in which they read and review classic RPG adventures. Check out their first review of the classic Ravenloft adventure!