Session 0

In this thread we will discuss the characters, the setting, almost everything :) All of the players will have some ideas in mind but they will be detailed according to the discussions here. At first, two things come to my mind: what kind of a person do you want your character to be (specialized in which areas, good at what etc.) and what is the relationship between the characters in the group? Fate has a built-in aspect called "relationship" in which every player needs to decide the nature of the their character's relationship with at least one other. You don't have to be all interconnected, just one connection is enough. Once we start discussing these, we will then in the process decide on the specifics of the setting.

By the way, it would be super if everybody says how familiar they are with Fate system. I tend to overexplain things, so if you tell me hhow much you know I will adjust myself accordingly.

I have no experience with Fate so you will never overexplain things to me.🙂

Re character and setting, I have a few ideas.

If we are a research group working for a government, my character could be a spy for a rival group/government/company. If we are a group of highly motivated adventurers I think it would be fun to be a reckless explorer looking for a good time with discoveries being incidental to the mission. Or my character could be a driven geeky scientist obsessed with discovering a new species, not for riches but for the advancement of science.

So three entirely different concepts of which I am happy to play any of based on the rest of the group's desires.

First of all, I want you to know that you can ask anything, no matter how basic. Here is a one-page cheat sheet for Fate Condensed. It nicely sums up all the important stuff. Also, The official SRD and Evil Hat Wiki (Evil Hat is the company producing Fate materials) will help a lot, especially during character creation.

Alright, these are some nice thoughts for your character. In addition to that, we may discuss the world we will play in. I mentioned it will be similar to Star Trek. However, that was only to emphasize the technological development of the world and the situation with different species coming in contact with each other. It may not be a neat, organized and fundamentally optimistic world like Star Trek, we may also play in a more chaotic, cyberpunk-ish world. I'd like to hear your opinions on ths too.

Great! Those resources will be useful. Thanks.

Chaotic and pessimistic sounds fun to me. Allows for more interesting things to happen and more unpredictability I think.

Hi Campers! And thanks for the invite! I'm really looking forward to this. In terms of Fate experience, I've played in a few games, both Accelerated and Core, so I'm comfortably familiar with the system - but by no means an expert. I think Condensed is my favorite iteration so far, so I'm particularly pumped about giving it a spin.

In terms of the setting concept, I think I'm leaning towards either a sort of Star Trek kind of crew on a mission, or a Traveller/Firefly concept where we're specialists that have been contracted by *someone* to do a job.

In any case, I'm open to any role except commander. I'd probably lean towards security, xenosociologist, or engineer/techguru the most, but I'm up for filling whatever crew needs we might have.

In terms of aspects and such, I'll tailor those to the role once we have those figured out. Hope this helps!

Just sharing my current thinking, I'm leaning towards playing a Xenobiologist. She's a bit nutty (I feel like sane people don't blast off to worlds unknown, in sure danger of risk of loss of life and limb). She's the sort who would appear blissfully unaware of danger, trusting her instincts to get her out of danger just in the nick of time. Picture her giving a throat swab to a crocodile, pulling her hand free just as the jaw snaps closed. Perhaps she's a bit of an adrenaline junky, pushing the limits because it makes her feel more alive. She laughs all the time, but maybe her jokes have a bit of dark edge to them. Think of the class clown who tells jokes because that's the way they've learned to get along with others. I think she might conceal it, but she cares a lot about other people and volunteers for dangerous missions so that they don't need to take the risk. I think she might have trouble accepting failure, and would always be encouraging everyone to give a mission another try, or to try a new angle.

I'm digging this "sent on a mission by a private contractor" idea. It has elements from both ends: you can be an organized group with specialists and you don't need to be overly official like Enterprise on a mission. As you may recall, I wanted this group to have worked with each other at least a couple of times. Maybe you were a group of specialists (an engineer/mechanic/tech guy, a xenobiologist, a leader with more charismatic and athletic capabilities etc.) who were doing business some time ago but haven't seen each other in years. This "private contractor" has reached out to all of you and made you an offer (we'll need to work on the details of this offer, I believe the reason why this group is working/travelling together is an important issue). So the gang reunites. In this scenario, you may not even be the only group sent to this planet. Federation has some loose control over the issue but by no means they can prevent independent groups from entering the planet.

naelick, I really liked how you proceeded to develop your character. If you have more definite ideas like this, you can go on and start looking for stunts and aspects of your character from here.

Lastly, I've realized that you don't need to submit a blank character, it is sufficient for you to apply to game and be approved. It was ignorant of me to ask that :)

Yeah, that was mostly a stream of consciousness thing. I'm trying to refine it into aspects.

This is just my personal style, not a recommendation, but I like to wait until I've played a bit to define my stunts. I find that if I rush to define them at the start, I don't end up using them or use them in ways I didn't expect.

First thoughts: My character would be a nerdy engineer type. Young and driven to get ahead, trying to prove himself. I like the idea of "sent on a mission by a private contractor" as well. Maybe my character would latch onto Naelick's because he wishes he had a personality more like them and gets that vibe vicariously through them. My character is a planner and not at all spontaneous so kind of a stick in the mud quite bound by convention.

Ok, so we've got a xenobiologist and an engineer. It sounds like we might need someone with a few more mundane, less esoteric skills to fill some gaps like planetary survival, weapons & defense, and maybe a bit of hands on experience dealing with other not-necessarily friendly life forms. Possibly a former military man who's served a number of terms as Security / Tac Ops shipboard and groundside on various planets. Now he's in his middle years, not really fit for frontline duty anymore, but not the officer type either (think a career NCO), he's become a security consultant for xenoexploration teams.

Definitely going to take an Aspect from Danny Glover in the Lethal Weapon series: "I'm getting too old for this." Of course he'd use that to push through insurmountable odds and impossible situations. But it could be compelled in interesting ways.

I can move away from an engineer because as I think of it, those two are somewhat close to each other and I don't want to stifle your character, FluxCapacitor. What do you think? As long as I can keep the nerdy concept I'd be open to something else. Maybe security.

Hi Windyridge, I'm totally down with the security specialist. He's already coming together in my mind and I'm very happy with where he's going so no worries at all.

Hi everyone! Thanks ireneofunyes for inviting me in... cool game brewing from the looks of it! I'll give a character some thought, though I admit I generally usually like to at least have the backdrop roughly sketched in a sci-fi game before I think about making a character for Star Trek, Star Wars, Traveller, Alien, or Flash Gordon. ;)

Old hand at Fate. Have run and played in 2.0, Core, FAE -- not Condensed. Will refresh on that...

Looks like an engineer, xenobiologist, and security specialist. Anything specific folks think we're missing? Pilot / operator? Commander? Doctor / Medic? Android?

Welcome Harrigan! Glad to see you with us, though the idea of GM’ing an experienced player makes me nervous :D

I’m having internet issues lately so I cannot post as much as I like, sorry about that. I hope that it will be fixed today.

I think a charismatic leader character is missing. I’m not saying you should add it, if one of you wants to play an android assassin etc., it’s fine. But if you’re trying to equally distribute skills, I guess a more socially skilled character is missing from the picture at the moment.
I’m the same. I liked how you all proceed with the characters but we should also start discussing the background of the world. I’m currently working on sketching out the draft of your general journey.

By far we have established that this is not an ordered world like Star Trek. There is a Federation-like organization representing the humanity (it may not be restricted to humans, all of your characters don’t need to be human as well) in space, but it is by no means an omnipotent power. We are still in early development in terms of space exploration. Though meeting with this new alien species you were going to meet is a big thing, since rumour has it that it is the first species in decades to have an advanced civilization. Not much is known about them, Federation is trying to keep the negotiations a secret but they cannot keep people away from the planet. There are even some Federation-backed non-official scouting groups sent to investigate.

These may be good starting points. If there are any parts you like to pick up and develop I’m eager to listen. Finally, especially those who are relatively new to Fate, I suggest you to start thinking in terms of Fate rules when you develop your characters. Like how can I describe this character generally in one word (high concept)? Or which skills can I use to evaluate this character? Again if you have any questions you can ask me, or ask it directly here since Harrigan joined us, he will be more knowledgeable than me.

I have an idea if no one wants to be full-time ship's captain. The expedition leader could be the lead scientist, diplomat, or something like that, and ship's "command" could be delegated to a dedicated AI NPC. It could have an acronym for a name even, like HAL. Hmm, maybe not HAL...

Since we're not a military type expedition, we don't necessarily need a strict command hierarchy - which could also lead to some interesting character dynamics if no one person is totally in charge.

Don't be nervous! You'll do fine, and I'm happy to sit back and watch you do an awesome job, just answer questions and provide advice, or actively help you out. Whatever you prefer.

For those new to Fate, this is a fun primer...

The Condensed sheet that our GM shared is awesome, but dense. Here's a quick take on things...

Fiction First -- always just describe what you want to do. Don't try to match it with one of the four actions.

The Four Actions -- Attack, Defend, Create An Advantage, Overcome. Every action in the game that's mechanically important will slot in here. But see above!

Outcomes -- whenever you bounce dice on one of the actions above, you'll succeed with style, succeed, tie and get a minor advantage called a boost, fail or succeed at a cost.

Aspects -- the bit everyone talks about. These are just facets of things that matter in the game. Characters have them, objects can have them, scenes have them, even the campaign as a whole can have them. They are touchstones and narrative beats that we will reference to make things easier, harder, and more interesting for our PCs. They are almost always two-way, positive for some reasons, negative for others. If you're a "World Class Boxer," you're good at fighting. But people want to challenge you and you might have lingering injuries, etc.

PCs have a High Concept, a Trouble, a Relationship, and two Free aspects. These can be Invoked to help or hinder your rolls, they can be Compelled to make the narrative more interesting, and they really should lay out there the things you want to explore about the character in the game.

Stunts -- think of these as Feats. Things you're really good at. They often break the rules in minor ways.

Stress -- think of these as plot armor / hit points... they are used to absorb various kinds of harm. You'll have a few, and they refresh between scenes. Not a huge deal to take stress, but next up is...

Consequences -- once your stress boxes are gone, taking further harm is going to give you a Consequence. These are injuries, illnesses, lasting damage of various sorts that takes long to heal... and that acts like a new aspect that can be Compelled or Invoked. You can usually take three of these before you are Taken Out. (Knocked unconscious, killed, really sad, left behind, etc.)

Fate Points -- metacurrency used to Invoke and Compel aspects. You'll generally have three, and earn more by having your own aspects compelled. Also note that some aspects come with a free invoke, and don't need a Fate Point to activate for the first time only. (Once a free invoke is used, it's gone).

I'll shut up now, but I know that some of these concepts can be a little different than what you see in most trad games. Will give my PC some thought today...

This is all very helpful. I watched a video first, then read the Fate SRD, then the comic which is great, and lastly the most excellent summary. Looks really fun. I am excited to play.

So in thinking about my PC, some questions for our GM and the whole crew:
Sweet, and far preferred personally... unless we are playing Star Trek!
This sounds like both advanced aliens and FTL travel exist. True? If so, we should flesh out both a little.

o Aliens One alien race or many, what's their disposition towards humans, what is their tech level, etc.
o FTL - jump gates that ships pass through or warp / hyper drive integrated into the ship? Are there 'lanes' which make travel easier and safer? How long does a jump / trip take, and does it consume dwindling resources / fuel? There's great discussion on this is in the Fate Space Toolkit.
Ah, here's the detail on the aliens. I'm cool with this. Though "first species in decades" seems to indicate there are others...

PC-wise, yeah, I'll go with a face-type leader / pilot.
I like the idea of an AI aboard, perhaps one installed by the company we're working for. So the ship might be ours / my pilots, but we've had to install this black box to take the job...

What do others think?

I like the idea of the mandatory Black Box install. Thing would probably be hermetically sealed and super encrypted - what exactly does it do? But tampering with it would void the terms of our contract, so the mystery remains.

You can think in terms of Star Trek on that area. It means that there are various alien species, some of them friendly, some of them hostile and some of them unknown. But I realized that we should at first decide on the advancement of humans. I keep calling the governmental organization "the Federation" but a federation that consists of various alien species that has made their peace with each other is very different from an organization that is only led by humans (and of course organizations that are run by different species as well). The second option would lead to a much chaotic world, which I like. What's your ideas?
I may offer a third option on that: like FTL drives, ships can teleport but much shorter distances compared to FTLs. There may be official transportation lanes but considering the vastness of space and the unordered circumstance of our world, illegal transportation spots also exist. We could give the ship some aspects and each time you try an illegal transportation, you roll a dice. Or any time you make any kind of unusual maneuver with the ship, you can use some feature of the ship to make the roll and ship also can have Fate points etc. I should say, making the ship a character is not an original opinion of mine, we have used it in a past game of mine that we had to finish early. But it is a nice idea to play around, I wonder your opinions on this also.

I also liked the Black Box idea. I'm stroking my evil GM beards right now :D

I prefer complex interstellar politics, so mostly humans-only in our group, but maybe with back-room deals, alliances that have gone sideways, border wars. But I am *literally* okay with anything here, and be aware the deeper we get with this stuff at the start, the slower we'll be to actually get going. Fate's really good at starting in flight from a sketch, then coloring in between the lines as you go.

FTL -- yeah, there are dozens and dozens of ways we can model this. It is, IMO, one of the few things we should figure out before we start since it affects travel times, the sizes of ships that can travel, and sort of the whole vibe of a space setting.

I like the idea of a mix of races in the federation but I'm not so attached to the idea that I wouldn't enjoy a federation of just humans.
Me too on the black box idea!

Let me hear your opinions on ship being a character and needing a roll to perform certain actions. That way you can choose a Milennium Falcone type of ship with more agility or if you want, a stronger ship with a solid hub but slower etc. However, as Harrigan said, there is no need to decide on every little detail of the game before we start. I will open an Out of Character (OOC) thread when we start the first session to further discuss these issues. Also, this mystery of "where are we and why don't we remember anything" will be a self-contained story, in terms of content I imagine it to be a prologue to the game, so we won't be using many things related to our game world in the first session, we'll have plenty of time until and after that to sketch out details, too.

Since I am new to Fate I'm not sure I'd have a good opinion on the ship being a character or not other than to say it sounds like a neat idea.

If we're starting in the scenario where we all wake up... we don't need to decide on the ship being modeled as a full character right away. If it were up to me, I think I'd make the black box / AI a character, not the ship. Depending on how you're modeling gear, equipment and vehicles in this game, it might just have a couple of aspects, stunts, and stress track. Let me know if you wanted pointers on how some other Fate games handle these things.

Okay for the AI, it can have an experimental setup that, if succesful, can grant you a boost (faster travel, faster maneuver, more accurate weapon aim etc) OR if fail, there may be negative consequences depending on the context and the amount of failure (your FTL may malfunction, you may be transported to an unknown area without accessing FTL for a while, the ship can take a damage as a whole etc.). Or would you like a more detailed and organized AI character with all the aspects and stuff?

@Harrigan, maybe you can share some sources on how Fate incorporates these kind of stuff and we can all read and think about them as we go along. As I said, until the end of Session 1, this thing won't be much of an issue.

@FluxCapacitor, I have a few questions for your draft. Your free aspect seems fine as it is open to many possibilities. For your high concept, it seemed a bit narrow unless you want to base your character completely on its military background. Remember, high concept is a broad enough description that will describe your character as much as possible. If you want the ex-soldier thing to be a background thing only, you may want to modify your high concept a bit. And for the trouble, can you give examples on how this aspect may cause you trouble? I'm not asking this to criticize you, just to understand how it can be used. For example, will your character be overly-sensitive to any novel and potentially dangerous thing?

Ok, bear with me since Fate is a very different game than I am used to. My concept is something like this: Leda is a tenacious and innovative engineer. I figure tenacious can go both ways. It's both great in certain circumstances and bad in others. As a student, she was so driven that she would miss meals and often sleep and work on a project until it was completed. She's very much a nerd and introvert and wishes she could be more outgoing and comfortable in social situations.

So for aspects, I have this so far:

- High Aspect: High Tech Engineer
- Trouble: Tenacious to a fault
- Aspect: Shy introvert

How does this look? Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Little pressed for time here... busy days at work. Budgets are in review, peers are about to be fired, we're hiring a new Chief Operating Officer, and we're about to buy two or three companies...

Anyway. Next week will be better.

o For the AI, I would literally model it as a character. Give it a few aspects, stunts, some mental / social skills. It can help or hinder us like any other active character in the game, creating advantages, etc.

o The best advice I can offer on aspects is this: make sure they are interesting to play. They should reflect something you want to explore about your character. And then, include some example invokes (positive uses) and compels (negative uses). Like this aspect for a mechanic / fixer character I once played:

Machines Are Easier Than People
AJ likes to get lost in her technical work -- she loves nothing more than to spend time alone, fine-tuning, adjusting, and attempting to improve systems, equipment, engines, weapons, sensors and the like. But she sometimes she can do this to a fault, taking it too far, ignoring her relationships, duties, and emotional needs by focusing exclusively on some technical problem.

Typical Invoke: To relieve stress.
Typical Compel: To complicate her life by having her nose in a datapad, missing some wonderful opportunity or connection.

Hope to post up the beginnings of my own PC later in the week.

Okay, if you want the AI to be a mysterious device that is put without your consent by your connarctors, then probably I should start preparing it.

@Windyridge, your high concept seems fine. Let me emphasize that aspects are always true in Fate games. So if you're a high tech engineer, it literally means that you are a very skilled and experienced engineer and you won't even need to roll a dice to perform certain actions. So, for example, if you're a mechanical engineer, then to dismantle a mecanical device is a child's toy to you, so Fate does not expect you to roll dice in that circumstance. I think it's one of the powers of Fate, it is a narrative driven system and let's you create characters you like. If you are more familiar with DnD, you can think your Fate characters as being at least level 7-8.

Trouble aspect is very good to complicate a scene. When you use your trouble aspect to cause some trouble to yourself or the group, you earn a Fate point. It shouldn't be thought as a simple device to earn Fate points though: it both adds complexity to your character and it adds fun to the game. So Leda will be a perfectionist, I assume? Conceptually I liked it but you can change the wording so that it is a small sentence like the example Harrigan gave or FluxCapacitor's free aspect. Something like "No errors on my watch", you'll decide of course, this was just a silly example. Your free aspect (which you can make at most two and it is not necessary, you can decide it after a minor or major milestone) is kind of vague. Try to think how you can incorporate this aspect of your character into the story. You will spend one Fate point each time you want to use (or in Fate terminology invoke) this aspect and Fate points are important, they drive the main economy of the game. I personally couldn't come up with an example where you can use "shy introvert" in the narrative.

@FluxCapacitor no need to change the aspect or the wording. As long as you can explain why one aspect is meaningful to use in one situation, you can use it and I liked the idea.

Not quite a perfectionist although that could certainly come of it. She's more of a go-getter. In other words she wouldn't quit until she found an answer or completed a task, or won an argument. Once her claws have sunk in, they stay in until the end.
Sure. How about I never give up?
Fair enough. I'll change her personality a bit. She is no longer shy, just a nerdy introvert. How about, Can't be hurt or swayed as my skin is too thick? This could make it hard for others to persuade her, or bully her.

So that leaves me with:

- High Aspect: High Tech Engineer - the concept I had visualized is pretty much what Harrigan's mechanic/fixer was except with less hands-on physical stuff, and more brainy smaller stuff like a systems and/or electrical engineer. She'd be diving into motherboard circuitries, ship systems and possibly weapons too. Once she's in, she's hard to get out, and it's as if she has blinders on to the world outside her project.

- Trouble: I never give up - this plays into her tenaciousness. She doesn't quit. This can earn her enemies as she pushes too far for answers, or results, but on the other hand, she gets the job done.

- Aspect: Can't be hurt or swayed as my skin is too thick. But I am also happy to wait for a milestone on this.

By the way, I realized that @naelick has not posted for quite some time. Hope you're okay and still with us.

@Windyridge, "I never give up" still seems like a more positively oriented aspect than a trouble. How about "it's done when I say it's done" or something along these lines since if I didn't misunderstood you, your character will have her own opinions about how things should be done and proceeded so she will act accordingly. This opens up lots of ways for her to be stubborn or complicate the issues just because it she's not comfortable leaving thing as they are. For the free aspect, it seemed more like a passive trait than an active one. I'm not sure how to incorporate that into the story. I'll look into some sources to understand how to approach this passive-active issue. In the meantime if he has the time maybe @Harrigan can comment on this.

"it's done when I say it's done" works for me. Harrigan's input would be appreciated for sure.

Killer week at work and then a busy weekend. Hoping to catch up here in the next day or two!

Firstly I want to thank Harrigan for letting us know beforehand he will not be participating for some time. Although we haven't technically started the campaign, Session 0 still counts as game and I would like everybody to participate regularly, or if they won't be able to, inform us that they won't. It's been more than two weeks and we haven't even sketched out all the characters, let alone starting the game. I hope you don't have some personal issues and everybody is okay. If that's the case, please work a little bit more to develop the story and characters.

This works for me as the Trouble aspect "it's done when I say it's done."

For skills, how do these look:

• One at Great (+4) - Investigate
• Two at Good (+3) - Crafts, Notice
• Three at Fair (+2) - Will, Drive, Lore
• Four at Average (+1) - Contacts, Rapport, Athletics, Provoke.

I'd wait on stunts until I have the skills firmed up.

Yeah it seems fine. For the stunts, you can use Evil Hat Wiki to see some examples. Stunts are maybe the most important thing towards creating a unique character designed by you. They can distinguish between Mike Tyson and Kratos from God of War (both of which are good fighters, thus will probably have similar skills but their strength are on entirely different levels). They usually don't require fate points to be invoked, however some stunts, if too powerful, need invocation.

Sorry to be quiet the last few days. I want more free time in my life lately!

So if this is about the "Shy Introvert" aspect, I go back to this:

o It's a truth - that means it'll help guide your character actions, and it will color how other people in the game see you.
o How can it help you in some instances? That is, what skill roll will you be making, action you're performing, where you say "wait, being shy and introverted helps with this!"
o How can it be used against you, to make your life harder or more complicated?

Windy's PC having this as an aspect is basically her planting a flag saying "I'm am shy and introverted. It's important to me, so please engage with it, everyone."

I admit I think there are stronger free aspects -- maybe you could add a little to it and flesh it out? Something about him not liking to draw attention to himself, something about him having trouble making conversation... or is it like *crippling* introversion?

This would mean not only do you like seeing things through to conclusion, but also that you're a control freak and have trouble letting things go. ;)

If Fate has a weakness, it's that it can be slow to start when you're using a wide-open launch point. But not leveraged enough is that what you actually need to start is a thumbnail of the setting (which we have), an opening scene (which we have), and for each PC to have a High Concept, Trouble, and apex Skill. That's it. The rest can be filled in as we go -- provided our GM is comfortable with that.

I hope to brew up my PC tonight. We have a neurotic xenobiologist, a nerdy and maybe a little obsessive engineer, and a security specialist who is former military, is that right?

Sorry for the barrage of posts. Things are occurring to me. I have PC thoughts to jot down, but of course I'm at the office and it's snowing like mad. Need to get out of here before the roads get too bad.

Question: @ireneofunyes, can you please re-state our opener? We're waking up somewhere without memory of what happened, was that it?

I guess when you edit a post, if you uncheck "this is a minor edit" thingy we see a notification, even if we have read the post before.

Yes, you were on your way to the planet, on your ship. The next moment you find yourself in a small room with no memory of how you got there.

I have submitted my sheet. I didn't include stunts yet as it sounds like I can figure those out during play. Let me know if anything needs changing.

Naelick hasn't logged in for 13 days so we may have lost them.

I don’t see your submission. Could you remove and submit again?
I’m afraid so. At this point we have three options:

1- Wait a few more days for them to join.
2- Start the game with three people.
3- Recruit one more person.

Personally I’l wait a few more days but after that, it’s up to you. Would you definitely like to be four people in the game or is it okay if you are three?

Having not played Fate before I can't really offer an opinion on optimal player numbers.

I have submitted my sheet. I think I forgot a key step in the process and that was to press the submit button. 😒

I remembered something that I should've mentioned earlier. In GP we are using Fate Core sheets but we're actually playing Fate Condensed, so we need to modify physical and mental stress slots. So @Windyridge, since your Physique is 0 and Will is +2, you'll have three phsyical stress slots and four mental stress slots. Also one of your skills is 0, it should have been +1 I guess.

For the missing player, I've decided to open a thread to recruit one more player. If naelick decides to come back, we can add them into the story later on and continue with 5 people. That shouldn't be a problem.

When you enter you character, at the top right there is an edit button. In the edit mode, there should be pluses and minuses on stress tracks. You can add it like that.

I'm thrilled by the world building you have all snuck in so far as part of this process. The black box screams intrigue and my instinct tells me to make a traitor, but I have awful instincts. Instead of traitor, how about a woman who is being blackmailed into a kind of corporate espionage. Threat to her family kind of thing. Background like that is tricky in a memory loss game, so I'll look to develop that through aspects if/when we get memories back.

Now, Naelick was playing the Xenobiologist, and if he's out, then I think we do need a similar role filled. Instead of a biologist/doctor, how about a xenoanthropologist? Focuses on cultures and contact protocols.

I’m totally up for adding some drama to the game. You’re free to expand on this forced espionage story and xenoanthropologist seems a fantastic idea! It would make your job easier if you encounter with any alien as well.

I’m currently developing the character for AI, deciding its aspects etc.

Name: Dr. Cassiopeia Canon ("CC")
High Concept: Celebrity Xenoanthroplogist
Trouble: Blackmailed by the Startel -- the star cartel is a criminal org looking to gain an inside track on new first contact situations. They will use any means to get their foot in the door first.
Aspect: Not That Kind of Doctor -- "goddamnit, I'm an academic, not a doctor, Jim"; Ugh, she doesn't do icky biology stuff so Stop Asking, but if you need an academic, she's your gal

Draft skills:
+ 4 Academics
+ 3 Athletics, Rapport
+ 2 Empathy, Notice, Contacts
+ 1 Shoot, Stealth, Investigate, Burglary

Okay, this PC seems good enough for a draft, but let me ask you a question about your aspect. I can see how it can be compelled, like you may get angry when you're asked to do the "icky biology stuff" but I don't see how it can bu used positively. Or, in general, your high concept already includes everything your aspect has to say. For example, without refering to your aspect, you can say "because I'm a celebrity xenoanthropologist, I should know bla bla". Your aspect would give you more or less the same power in the story. I hope I made my case clear, sometimes not being a native English speaker makes it hard to appropriately convey my thoughts.

You're right, of course. I just really liked the phrase, haha. I'll think on that and may scratch it to broaden her scope.

Another problematic phrase-as-aspect I'm toying with is:
-- "This One Time, At Macha Pichu" to flesh out a more physical side to her. Not sure how that has a bad side, other than tapped for old injuries

So switching to something else, here's:

Self-Righteous: CC is driven by a belief that she's the hero of her own story. Does that make her hard headed and stubborn? Maybe.

Self-righteous can work actually. She can pursue something she deems "the right thing to do" even though nobody agrees with her. This is a dual-sided aspect as the same stubbornness can be a positive or a negative thing depending on the context.

I've submitted Dr. CC. I'll edit as we go, including writing out some of her background.

Great! Be sure to add one more stress box each, both your physical stress and mental stress should have three slots. Also, remember to think about your stunts. You still have time, you can at least add one stunt before we start.

That leaves only @Harrigan. He mentioned his job being overly time consuming, so I guess we can wait a few more days. As soon as he submits his character, I'll start the Session 1.

You can come up with your own ideas for stunt also. Normally, players don't spend FP to to make use of a stunt (such as the one you chose). But, some of them are too powerful, thus they require a Fate point to be activated. Sticking with basics right now is good, though, as you'll have time to add stunts as th story progresses.

Welcome Q!

And okay, today's the day I get my PC in. Question on that. Thinking pilot, face-type as mentioned previously. What's a better dynamic with what everyone else is planning?

A. A dude who's been around the space lanes. An independent operator with a past. Maybe a tiny bit of a father figure. Maybe forms attachments a little too quickly.

B. A woman who has washed out of the military because of personal trauma in her life. Collected, cool, level-headed... but maybe a bit of a control freak and depressed about her lot in life.

C. The wild card -- an ace pilot, hot and confident and easy to like. A bit mouthy and not the world's best decision-maker.

Opinions?

I'm certainly prone to leaning toward most drama possible (C). B doesn't sound like much fun to play, but possibly cathartic.

I'll try to stay behind a bit as I feel like I've talked a lot but I, not as a GM but as a neutral observer would prefer A or C, whichever you want. Option B resembles Windywidge and Qralloq's PCs in my opinion.

I am with A, especially since my PC is already a control freak.

Inspiration has occurred. See if Hiro fits the bill. (He's been submitted, and I'll make him publicly viewable. Basically a former underworld enforcer out on the rim, lying low, avoiding his old gang and crazy girlfriend. Warm and affable and able to put you over his knee and break you in two.

Edit: Seeking a relationship aspect with someone...

So I've done something. Instead of a black box AI implanted to the ship without your permission, I've designed a few different type of ships that specialized on different areas. They are not characters per se, but they do have a list of skills (9 skills with one +4, one +3, one +2 and two +1s), a high concept (that I named with cheap jokes), stress boxes (only physical, ranging from 3 to 6 slots, corresponding to the ships' Armour modifier plus Toughness modifier) and a so-called stunt that doesn't work exactly like a conventional stunt. Firstly, ship does not have fate points, thus you can use these "stunts" any time you like as long as the stunt allows it (I put descriptions in each stunt, explaining how it can be used). Secondly, instead of a traditional stunt, these ship stunts have strict positive and negative sides. They grant bonuses and advantages in various cases but they also have drawbacks. It's up to you to use some of them with risks, the others by default give advantages but expect you to perform other actions as well.

Here are our ship options: Agile, Fighter, High Tech, Stealthy and Tank. You can review each ship and state your opinions on them. If none of them pleases you, I believe the skill system is highly customizable. You may come up with your own skill distribution, but if you choose to customize the skills as you like then I'll decide on the ship stunt :) As I said earlier, you won't be using your ship until the end of Session 1, so we don't need to decide on ships before we start the game, we have plenty of time.

Edit: Oh yes, I almost forgot. Before we start the campaign, you need decide your relationship aspect. This aspect describes the nature of the relationship with at least on other PC on the game. You can be as creative as you want here and you don't need to describe a relaionship with every other PC, just one is enough.

What is this, RPGrinder?

😂 Cass is empathetic and an academic so she and Leda being friends would make sense. She sometimes wants a friend to assuage her loneliness when she isn't knee-deep in a project, but is too shy to seek one so maybe you pick up on that. Both being somewhat nerdy gives them something in common.

Does that sound interesting enough?

Why yes!

Hiro has a dark past, lots of time spent leaning on people who owed his boss money or punching people who looked at his psycho girlfriend sideways. But he's better now! Connection-wise, he might have helped someone out of a tough spot unexpectedly... or someone might have helped him hop the freighter that put his past in the rear view mirror...

If you want, you can also go full BFF mode for your PCs. Something of a "nobody understands me more than cass/leda". That way you can introduce a kind of a jealousy situation where one of the PCs is afraid that she'll be alone if the other starts making other intimate connections. This is what core book for Condensed says for relationship aspects:
A loose "we are alike" aspect may not introduce much conflict. You don't have to be friendly of course, you may also be antagonistic to each other, like one of you can deem the other "not a real academic/scientist". You know, the typical conflicts between positive sciences and social sciences. These are the ideas at the top of my head.

I'll wait until everybody decides on their relationship aspect as well, that needs to be decided before we start. Btw I also see @FluxCapacitor not being very active in our thread for a while, hope we didn't lose anybody else :D

Deleted

I’m confused. Either you meant to post this on another thread but instead you wrote here or you hit my blind spot ‘cause I absolutely have no idea what you refer to :D

Full BFF works for me if it works for Qralloq and there can definitely be a conflict of a scientific nature or otherwise. In addition, maybe Leda gets jealous when Cass spends time with other friends. Something like she has this one friend and so she is petrified of losing her. It could be a new friendship which would make the jealousy factor more intense since they don't know each other well enough for there to be a history of trust between them.

I can't think of anything with Harrington's character though yet. I don't see them running in the same circles.

Sorry about that. Space gremlins hijacked the post and put it in the wrong game.
That's fine with me. It defines Leda's relationship to Cass, at least.

@ireneofunyes, if we each just have one defined relationship, should we try and spread that through the others?

Yes, normally player A defines a relationship with player B, B with C, C with D etc. That way the whole group is connected somehow.

I'm still here, just reading. I'll figure out TBD's relationship aspect by tonight.

Dig it. He might have even know who she was and been a little dazzled by her celebrity?

I'm having a hard time keeping the characters straight without char sheets to refer to - I blame it all on my misspent youth. I'm open to suggestions for a relationship aspect if anyone has a good idea.

My first thoughts would be for:
- Hiro: Maybe we crossed paths when we were working opposite sides of the law? That would certainly put TBD's 'Been Burned' / Suspicious Nature aspect into play from the get go.
- Cass: TBD might have run security for one of her escapades in the past. If it went well, perhaps she recommended him for this gig. If it didn't, that could be fun too.

Any suggestions gladly appreciated here.

Considering your option with Cass, maybe in that mission some things went terribly wrong and you two had to survive a difficult situation, losing a lot of people and experiencing traumatic things. That incident made you respect each other but also seeing or even thinking about each other makes you anxious and uncomfortable, that’s why you didn’t see each other for many years. This union for the mission is a pure coincidence, a coincidence that can lead up to various conflicts.

That works for me.

How does that leave us? Is everybody finished with their characters now including relationship aspects? When everybody gives the confirmation I'll start the Session 1.

I'm ready. I'd like to add stunts as we play if that's ok.

How would that work?

You can add yout stunts after we complete the Session 1, by the way.

Apologies everyone! I will catch up and make character shortly

I'm guessing Harrigan will finalize his character until tomorrow. I'll post the start of Session 1 before I sleep tonight as I don't want to postpone it further., even if he is not finished by then he can join after he's done with it, that won't be a problem.

A few last comments before we start. I'm guessing most of us (except maybe Harrigan) are accustomed to D&D and similar systems more than Fate so we will definitely have some habits carried here. In the rulebooks of Fate, one sentence that you often see is fiction first. In Fate our imagination comes first, so we try to think what we want to do in a scene, design it and then choose the appropriate skills and aspects. Unlike D&D, for example, where we have a definite list of actions we can perform, now we'll just think of what to do and try to make the aspects work in accordance with our fiction. As long as you can convince the GM and the group that a certain aspect or stunt is applicable in a situation, as long as your roleplay is convincing enough that we believe that your character is capable of doing that thing, then you're allowed to do it. This doesn't mean that you can do anything you want, of course. There is something called the bogus rule. If the group does not think that what you do is appropriate, than you can't do it :)

I also highly encourage you to use either in-game or out of the game OOC comments to increase the communication. I'll open an OOC thread before the game, you can discuss thes things there. Fate is not only colloborative before we start but also during the gameplay. You'll need both roleplay and in-game OOC conversations to overcome obstacles. Though proceeding the conversation with roleplay is more important, feel free to ask queustions to me or the group as much as you want. Play by post games are already discrete so there's no danger of interrupting the flow of the game.

Wow, hello naelick! Hope you're okay. We recruited another player and carried on, so I suggest you to read the discussions here and look at other people's PCs if they are public. There is still time for you to catch up. Though, after we start the game I hope you can inform us in case of such absences so that we can give a break or think of another solution.

Hariette Galant

High Concept: Neurotic Daredevil Xenobiologist
Trouble: I don't deal well with failure
Relationship:
Free aspect: She was just joking, right?
Free aspect: I'd rather get hurt than put others in harm's way

Great (+4): Athletics
Good(+3): Lore (Academics?), Physique
Fair(+2): Fight, Investigate, Will
Average(+1): Shoot, Rapport, Notice, Provoke

What does your first aspect exactly entail? Can you give some examples on how you can use it? Also, for your +3 skill, if you want your character to be more involved with out of the ordinary, mythological or magical stuff (like Qralloq's Indianna Jonesenesque character) choose Lore (you would still need at least +2 Academics though, I guess). For the relationship aspect, maybe one with Hiro or Theogenes Dayton? Though you are a scientist, making you closer to Cass and Leda, you're also a stubborn adventurer. Looking back at your initial draft for the character, maybe one of the other PCs owe you since you're an overly-sacrificial person?

I could see Leda owing Hariette for something. Maybe she helped with some scientific know-how on a project Leda was working on that was heavily science-based. Some environmental thing perhaps or the development of some hybrid life-form?

Leda is public now. I use the sheet for my private notes so eventually, I will make her private again.

Someone early in the thead described her as Neurotic, so I stole it because it sounded nice, but I think on reflection I'd like to change it to:

Manic daredevil Xenobiologist

I expect her to be knowledgeable about alien life. I'd use the aspect in situations like:
- Going to a new planet for the first time
- Looking for food on an alien planet
- Taking samples of dangerous alien life
- Finding uses for weird alien secretions

The daredevil part represents her physical abilities and devil-may-care attitude. I expect to use it in situations like:
- Escaping a dangerous planet
- Dodging the tentacles of a large alien while trying to catch its saliva

It can also be compelled:
- To make her stay in a dangerous situation when it would be advisable to flee
- To take an inadvisable risk to achieve a goal

The manic part represents her obsession and hyper focus on alien life, and is more of something to compel
- to get distracted and wander away from the group if she sees a neat alien
- To downplay the dangers of a specimen she really wants to keep
Would academics or lore be more appropriate for alien life?
I could see Hariette working on the practical care and keeping of hybrid life forms. In terms of personality they seem almost opposite, so I think Hariette might see Leda as someone who needs protection? Though they may need Cass' intervention if she becomes too overbearing.

That works for me.

I'm sorry, I meant your first free aspect, the "she was ust joking, right?" one. Your high concept otherwise seems thorough.
Well this is a setting where alien life forms have been known and investigated for a long time so Academics.

You can discuss further on the relationship aspect. If there is also an age difference between Leda and Hariette, something like "if you have problems with Leda you have problems with me" can work. That can definitely be positive (a supportive speech from Hariette can give advantage to Leda, for example) or negative (even though there is nothing wrong, someone being mean to Leda can make Hariette provoked). I admit this is not a strong relationship aspect but acceptable, I'll allow it if you want to go in that direction.

"She was just joking" I'm expecting for it to be compelled in social situations. Hariette has a bit of a dark, morbid sense of humor that I think might not translate well for everyone. Though, now that I review it it doesn't seem like it would come up often, so I might want to reserve it as a stunt (Something like a +1 bonus when planning something reckless or dangerous) and come up with a more versatile aspect.

I like it as a stunt better, to be honest. Feel free to do anything, though, it is not a bad aspect, just that as you said, it won't come up often.

Academics -- that's a new skill. (New to Condensed. I was wondering what the 19th skill was. Now I know!)

Looks like Academics is common stuff, Lore is for weird and unusual stuff.

Flux, if you're okay with it I'm going to add Our Paths Crossed on Delban 6 as Hiro's relationship aspect with Dayton. They were indeed on opposite sides... but I'm thinking this was was Hiro wanted out, and while he got the drop on Dayton and his pals, he choose to not lower the boom / open fire / blast 'em. So they recognize one another and remember the incident, but haven't talked about it yet?

So, in the Fate core book, there is a stunt related to the skill Lore called Specialist:
I think your idea is similar to this one. Since we haven't though about this before and I see you have 0 on Lore so if you want to keep this Battlefield First Aid stunt and improve it further, you can change the skill rating of Lore.

Given it seems we're starting, can I leave that aspect blank and work on coming up with a replacement as we play?

Sure, only high concept, trouble, relationship aspect and skills need to be decided before the game. You can decide free aspects and stunts as we go. I've approved your character naelick, you're good to go.